... A meal to induce acute indigestion--and even worse Light Entertainment reviewed by Mike Becker FOR a change, my television plate this week had three things on it. so, like the children, I thought I'd leave the best till last. Sad to say, the meal was highly indifferent, one of the constituent parts leaving me with a very bad taste indeed and vowing never to have it again. Firstly, there was ...

... Could descend to mediocrity by Jackie Dyason A NEW man has joined the ranks of television policemen: Det.-Insp, Jack Regan (John Thaw) in Thames's series The Sweeney (Thursday, January 2, 9pm). We were promised a series concerning three men connected with the Sweeney Todd --slang for Flying Squad. but in fact the first episode was mainly a recap of the character Regan, for those viewers who ...

... So rambling and non-exploratory by Maggie Ollerenshaw WE expect religion on our screens on Sunday, but not as the subject matter of the evening play: a play all the more unusual for having three Catholic oriests as major characters. In an age when the church has lost its majority appeal and fascination, the men who hold office within it retain a fascination. As with cele brities. we can only ...

... STV's first is disappointing by Jackie Dyason STV'S story of the supernatural on Christmas Eve (9.30 pm) was a half-hour adaptation by Tom Wright of R. L. Stevenson's short story Markheim. Although Stevenson set his story on Christmas Day in an Edinburgh antique shop, it seemed an odd choice for the first production from STV's new studios in Glasgow; neither the time nor the location was ...

... The clammy, the topical by Hazel Holt TRYING to write about Tarbuck--And All That (ATV, Saturday, May 17, 10 pm) is like trying to pick up a junket with your fingers. All you get is a damp clammy feeling and a kind of exasperation. Because, really, there's nothing there. The writer (Eddie Braben), the tor tconn uiews;, tne designer iraui Dean Fortune), the cameramen (led by Mike Whitcutt) ...

... Bared the bitter truth by Audrey Henderson THERE were no heroics and few horrors in The Dandelion Clock (Play for Today. BBC-1. Thursday, May 15, 9.25) but Wilson John Haire bared the bitter truth of contemporary family relationships beneath the pressures of civil war. And he did so without recourse to religious dogma or political bias. With a school attendance record of three weeks in ...

... Smothered under stockpiles of tourist board red herrings by Jill Weekes CULTIVATE an English rose, with an eye on foreign flower shows, and you may produce a splendid, yet sterile bloom. Sam and the River, a six-part film serial for children (Episode 4. BBC-1. Thursday, May 15th, 5.15) is rooted in rich soil. A De Lane Lea-Delmore produc tion, made in association with Sveriges Radio. Stockholm ...

... Very rough indeed by Jill Weekes MANY people would work hard to ensure a few good laughs nowadays, but discovering them in The Rough With The Smooth (BBC-1, Wednesday. August 13. 9.55) was like prospecting for currants in a pit of soggy suet. Any smooth, it seems, long ago expired, bequeathing to.. Part Five of this six-part comedy series, starting and scripted by John Junkin and Tim Brooke ...

... Promise not kept by Jackie Dyason BBC-2's Centre Play, The Stick Insect (Monday August 18, 9.50) was by a writer new to me, Barry Unsworth. His familiar theme of the eternal triangle was treated with some imagination, although the talented cast had to cope with some trite dialogue and the pace flagged once or twice. Robert (Robert Lang) and Bea trice (Frances White) displayed suitably ...

... Blunt, honest, engaging by James Scott AT the end of a perceptive review of the first of BBC-2's current series of half-hour plays from Birmingham, Second City Firsts, a colleague in these columns, Ann Sheldon Williams, made a request for a 90-minute play, next time, from new writer Alan Bleasdale (Television Today. March 27), a request which not only has my wholehearted support but one ...

... Not enough for an hour, not enough care, but some good by Patrick Campbell LES DAWSON has a strong and appealing personality; and a style of comedy that has served him well both as host and guest in many a past programme and has led to the selection of Yorkshire's Holiday With Strings as the official ITV entry IUI nil? o muiuicuA icoinni- Because that personality shows through indeed stamps ...

... by Jill Weekes THERE was ample space for a few performing squirrels along the lifeless branches of lTV's Friday evening programmes. Admittedly, the title We Don't Want To Lose You, first in ATV's new comedy series The Squirrels (ITV, Friday July 18. 8.30) suited the moribund tone of the evening. Yet sandwiched between a General Hospital story about transplant ethics, where two characters ...