Black Books: Series 2

**1/2 - I first heard about this show in an interview of Mike Nelson that I read, and as he highly recommended it (and each season is only one DVD, and would not screw up my NetFlix procedures) I decided to give it a try. This 2nd series is entertaining enough, I suppose, but after the excellent last couple of episodes of the first series, I found this one to be a little bit underwhelming. “Black Books” is a rather dark comedy about a drunken Irishman named Bernard who runs a book store in London, his exploited employee Manny, and their friend Fran from the shop next door. The interplay amongst the three leads was a little bit more balanced in the first series, while in series 2 it seems like every plot revolves in some way around how horribly Bernard and Fran treat Manny, who is usually incompetent, and sometimes oddly effeminate. As the show progresses, I must admit that I find the Bernard character less and less appealing, as his loud, obnoxious behavior and flimsy attempts at physical comedy are increasingly annoying. There is one more series left, so I’m going to be generous and leave it on my queue… but I certainly hope it improves on series 2.