I was really looking forward to this series because I think we need more family-friendly laugh-tracked silly comedy on our screens. Sadly it’s not quite there yet, with some inspired gags and genuinely funny jokes mixed with some rather iffy character development and scenes which cross the line from “silly” to “stupid”. If it reminds me of anything it’s Hippies – another much-hyped series from some big names which was enjoyable and amusing, but also chaotic and sometimes self-indulgent.

Sadly too it looks like Lab Rats is following in the footsteps of Hippies by performing quite poorly in the ratings and enduring some stinking reviews. It’s perhaps to be expected – watching Robin Ince in a silly wig running around shouting for an entire episode is something that’s always going to be an acquired taste. But I’m sticking with it, and it’d be a shame if it didn’t get a second series after this week’s episode, which if not the funniest half hour of television this year, was almost certainly the cleverest.

It revolved around the team having to stay up for seven nights in an underground lab – represented on screen by a brilliantly over-the-top Galloping Galaxies-esque set with loads of flashing lights. The entire episode was bravely done on this one set, which is something I always enjoy in sitcoms, but while there were plenty of good jokes, the absolute high point was the final scene.

At the very start of the episode, the Dean had expressed her concern that the experiment would end up as “a circus”, and at the very end, she walked into see Addison dressed as a clown, Jo Enright on a trapeze, Dan Tetsall brandishing a chair and a whip and Geoff McGivern in his pants holding up a weight. Why was Addison dressed as a clown? Because he was wearing an anti-static suit and had just been blown up by some booby-trapped biscuits. Why was McGivern in his pose? Because he’d taken his clothes off to relax and did his back in lifting up a standard lamp. Brilliantly, the final scene was the conclusion of umpteen quick references over the previous half hour, and was so well-crafted I really didn’t see it coming.

What a shame that, as can be seen, it’s virtually impossible to describe and it came so far in the series most viewers will probably have switched off long ago. But congratulations must go to Addison and Cooper for the most satisfying climax to any sitcom in ages.

Drama: With everyone else seemingly finding David Tennant to be utterly irritating, I have to confess I still love the 10th Doctor, particularly when he’s being impish. This year’s Doctor Who might have contained a lot of mediocre stuff, but I still think it’s the best thing on telly by about a million miles. It has such a massive emotional library from which to pull stuff from, and this year’s return of the Master was just brilliant (albeit only when Jacobi was in the role). Of course nothing further need be added to the already thousands of positive reviews for Cornell and Moffat’s contribution to series three.

Comedy: I have to confess to having been a bit slow to catch on to The Thick of It. A lot of things about it put me off – Peter Capaldi for a start, and the overly naturalistic faux documentary style, but I have to concede it is simply brilliant. In truth it’s been a shit year for comedy but “a tete-a-tiny-tete” almost made up for it.

Reality: Another genre of telly that was a bit rubbish this year. I stand by earlier comments that Dragons’ Den is no longer essential viewing. Big Brother was okay, and most other reality shows this year were poor. Probably the pick of the bunch in 2007 was The Apprentice.

Light entertainment: Well controversially I’m going to give this to Britain’s Got Talent. Ant and Dec know how to perfectly judge this sort of thing so that it never feels too exploitative. Although variety acts seem to be making a comeback in a major way, the selection for this series was particularly entertaining. Sadly, I’ve never been able to “get”Strictly Come Dancing.

Documentary: I’m on far safer ground here as I think the undisputed documentary series of 2007 was The Secret Life of the Motorway, fantastic archive footage, great interviewees and an utterly evocative series.

Iannucci has brought us some of the best comedy on both television and radio over the course of the past few years, a large amount of which has had a distinct political bias. From previews and interviews it looked as if his new show was going to be quite an entertaining and amusing look at the behind-the-scenes machinations of government. And on this count it was. But The Thick of It was utterly ruined for this reviewer by the annoying and dizzying use of “shaky-cam”.

Yes folks, shaky-cam is back, ready to give you a dose of motion sickness every time you watch, through the use of constant swaying and swooping around, as the camera desperately attempts to catch up with the action and reflect the apparent fast-paced nature of governance. It is worse to watch here than the vertigo-inducing technique that has recently been employed on the new BBC weather forecasts. The field of vision is moving all of the time, sometimes incredibly rapidly, making it hard to enjoy what you are supposed to be seeing on the screen.

The show concerns the fictional government Department of Social Affairs, which is supposed to be presided over by Chris Langham’s ineffectual minister Hugh Abbott, but in effect is operated and controlled seemingly by a wide variety of people. While Abbott is meant to be in overall charge, in practice he is advised, goaded, steered, twisted and spun by his assistants, his deputies and by the enforcer from Number 10, Malcolm Tucker. None of the deeply unpleasant characters appear to like each other and backstabbing and one-upmanship is the order of the day.

Given that the script advisor on the show is former BBC journalist and ex-government advisor Martin Sixsmith, it is likely that much of what we witness is closer to the truth than the government would like us to think. The people we see are incompetent buffoons. As has been long proposed by political pundits it looks as if it is the unelected government advisors and civil servants who actually run the country. Tucker instructs Abbot what to do, think and tell the press. And then, when he finds he’s been wrong, tells him to do the opposite.

This first episode deals with the department’s plan to set up a new taskforce to see out benefit cheats. The mark of Iannucci is all over the script here in the names the proposed team would have: Sponge Preventers; Sponge Avengers and Scambusters are some of the titles they manage to come up with. After mistakenly announcing the creation of the new squad, Abbott and his assistants Ollie and Glen find they are forced into doing an about-turn on the initiative, just as they’re on their way to present the scheme to the assembled media. Having successfully managed to do this somehow in a way that isn’t made entirely clear, Abbott is then told by Tucker that the idea of the taskforce is back on.

It is abundantly clear none of the people we see in the show are remotely bothered about the public they are supposed to be there to represent and serve. The only group Abbott is concerned about appearing positively to is the media. It is the name of the new task force that is the most important thing for the department to worry about and not what it is actually going to do. Everything is about gloss and presentation. We hear nothing about the electorate who got Abbott into the House of Commons, and subsequently the position he currently holds other than in the context that some of them are the spongers that the task force is being created to tackle.

Langham is very good as the perpetually troubled and befuddled Abbott, while Peter Capaldi fits the bill nicely as enforcer Tucker. The rest of the cast is made up of unfamiliar actors which seems to be a sensible tactic given that they are supposed to be representing a group of “faceless” bureaucrats.

The Thick of It is certainly worth sticking with, despite the fact this depiction of people with a slender grip on democracy is continually undermined by the equally shaky visuals.