Okay. So last week, I reviewed The Cup (BBC Two, Thursday, 28 August, 9.30pm) and really couldn't get over the fact that it was too personal to me. I bemoaned the stupid caricature of Northern-ness, how a load of the jokes didn't work because they'd failed to notice what life in Sunday League football is really like. Most importantly, The Cup misses what's important in every great comedy ever made... and that's heart. So, with the second episode now aired, has it got any better?

I was filled with trepidation in the lead up to the second programme of The Cup. The first reason for this was mainly because I thought it was going to be awful. And I was right. It was awful. However, I was also worried about the fact that most comedies use a lot of their best jokes in the season opener, to hook you in. Then, it'll fade slightly before coming back for a strong finish. So, looking at it like that, I was faced with the very real prospect of the fact that the second show would have less jokes than the dismal first.

Last week, The Cup had a joke about the kids living their lives forever in "shaaame", if they lost a football match. It was reasonably funny, possibly only in delivery. There was also a nearly-good moment when the main character offered an Asian gent some Cobra beer as a bribe. In that, there was a moment of great clarity - the brand of beer, the fact one had already been taken... however, it wasn't capitalised on. So last night's show took proved that this is a show that's already run out of ideas.

Instead of working with the beautiful naivety that a lot of Northern Blokes have, couple with a sublime sarcasm, this show simple decided to make everyone look as ugly as possible. Last week, I would have taken this personally of course. This week, I don't even identify with these characters as fellow humans.

So ogreish are the characters that there's absolutely no point buying into them. If there are moments of heart, they're buried so deep that you basically couldn't care less about what happened to them. The main character (whose name I can't even be bothered to learn) is such a dick, that you find yourself willing ill toward him. It's not that he's a 'bit sad' or 'cares too much'... he's just... a dick. And who really wants to hang around with dicks?