Hurrah, The Inbetweeners are back!

Feeling like old friends that you haven’t seen for the whole six week summer holiday, Will, Simon, Jay and Neil returned to TV screens last night for the start of the third series of BAFTA winning comedy The Inbetweeners. ‘Morning benders’ said Jay, pulling up in his new car, or ‘minge-mobile’. It wasn’t quite ‘Bond, James Bond’, but as introductions go it was short, sweet and very, very funny.

The episode revolved around a school fashion show being put on by Simon’s lust object of choice, Carli. Naturally Jay thinks he’s a shoe-in to be chosen as a model, and can’t cope with the idea that Simon has been asked and not him. Meanwhile Will is determined to oppose the ‘egotistical vanity fest’, a job made difficult when you’re forced to run front-of-house. Neil of course just wants to see some tits.

With so many British comedies finishing after two series (The Office, Green Wing, Extras) the third series seems to be the comedy equivalent of the difficult second album. Luckily all fears of series 3 failing to bring the funny were abated quickly, with The Inbetweeners proving just as painful and hilarious to watch as ever. The clever-stupid one-liners came thick and fast (‘who wants a model who looks like a spotty baby crossed with the statue of liberty?’), and political correctness was again thrown to the wind with a kidney failure sufferer who proved to be ‘a complete dick’.

Writers Damon Beesley and Iain Morris have said in interviews that much of the show comes from their own life experiences, and again there are the little truisms that will bring a smile to anyone who remembers being more of an Inbetweener than a Skins character during sixth form. ‘I’m not spending another second in this house with you twats’, yells Simon to his parents before storming into his garden and climbing onto the shed roof in protest. It’s a wonderfully performed bit of comedy, and speaks to that familiar teenage feeling of being desperate to escape yet having nowhere to go.

In fact Simon gets most of the best laughs in the episode, capped off by a brilliant piece of visual comedy that shows actor Joe Thomas has big balls in every sense. The Americans may have invented the gross-out teen comedy, but it’s good to see that the Brits can churn out filth equally as funny, and make the rumours of an Inbetweeners feature something to look forward to.

The Inbetweeners is currently showing Mondays on E4 at 10pm, with repeats on Channel 4 every Friday at 10:55pm.