Sky1: The new home of the best British comedy?

If you had to sum up British TV comedy in 2011, you could probably boil it down to three simple formats. Panel shows. Repeats of panel shows. And dire BBC One family sitcoms. Miranda and Peep Show are on hiatus, The Inbetweeners are busy breaking Hollywood and safe-old favourites like The Royle Family and Absolutely Fabulous are being wheeled back out to make up for what appears to be a lack of new ideas.

Friday Night Dinner was very underrated in this writer's opinion, Ricky Gervais will be back (with added Warwick Davis) in the fall and we're also quite eager to see series two of Tom Hollander's Rev. So maybe we're over-egging the state of the problem slightly.

Nevertheless, Sky1's bold new season of homegrown British comedy has certainly caught our eye. Big guns have been called in (Ash Atalla, Ruth Jones, Craig Cash, Bobby Ball... OK, scrap the last one), the investment has been made and starting next Thursday with supermarket sitcom Trollied, the rewards will soon be on screen.

Ash Atalla's Trollied is the first out of the blocks and after watching the first two episodes, it's easy to understand why Sky1 is pushing this show hard. A supermarket sitcom is a nifty idea that feels ripe for a send-up (Are there any other supermarket-based comedies? Leonard Rossiter's Tripper's Day is the only that springs to mind) and it doesn't disappoint.

Trollied is still searching for a consistent tone and there are a few duff gags dropped every so often, but there's a warmth to the ensemble cast that make these faults forgivable. Watch out for a scene in episode one involving tinned tomatoes - or a lack of them - it will have you rolling in the (shopping) aisles. Sorry, we couldn't resist using that line.

A show that is destined to be far more divisive is Sky Atlantic's This Is Jinsy. So bonkers it makes The Mighty Boosh look like a particularly stale episode of My Family, this won't be everyone's cup of tea. A hazy dreamy-like world has been created by newcomers Chris Bran and Justin Chubb and it all looks utterly gorgeous, but brace yourself for some of the wonkiest humour this side of Monty Python.

It might have cameos from popular faces like Harry Hill and David Tennant, but don't let the friendly faces fool you, this is comedy at its most surreal. Whatever your stance on the results, the bravery of Sky investing in such a bold show is to be applauded.

Watch the This Is Jinsy trailer:



Far more family-friendly and approachable are Robert Lindsay romp Spy and the return of Ralf Little and Craig Cash with The Cafe. The latter is the Weston Super Mare-living cousin of The Royle Family, playing subtly on the day-to-day mundanity of life beside the seaside with the sweetness and warmth that Cash brings to all his work. Meanwhile, Spy is a delightful jape playing on Lindsay's ability to play a deranged MI5 boss with an Alan Sugar-esque hair/grizzly beard combo. Both are worth keeping an eye out for.

Mount Pleasant, starring Sally Lindsay, Daniel Ryan, Angela Griffin and Bobby Ball, is a sex and relationships dramedy based around a group of friends in a Manchester cul-de-sac. It's not going to win any awards for originality, but it has a similar authenticity to Gavin & Stacey and throws in a good dollop of sexy silliness and bad language.

Whether any of Sky's new homegrown output can match the fizz and punch of their strong lineup of US acquisitions (Modern Family, The Simpsons, Raising Hope) remains to be seen. But with further series from the likes of Ruth Jones, Sue Johnston and Peep Show's Matt King, Sky1 is definitely punching its weight alongside BBC Three and Channel 4 as the primary destination for the best of British.

Are you excited about the new Sky1 lineup? Which shows will you be tuning in for? Share your views below