“While the names may remain the same, any other similarity between characters and persons living or dead is purely coincidental.”

That’s the last thing you see splashed on the tail end of the closing credits, in stark white type against bleak black, when watching Stupid Stupid Man (ABC – or should that be ABC1 now? – Wednesdays, 8.30pm).

Well, for a show that markets itself as a comedy, one of its biggest laughs is delivered right there. If irony and sarcasm are comedy’s most powerful weapons, then this show has a very impressive arsenal, at least on that count.

Similarity between characters and real people purely coincidental? Ha! I have worked with people like this for years! And I suspect you don’t have to be in the media game to recognise these personalities.

SSM is about a motley bunch working on a fictional men’s magazine called COQ – French for Rooster or an acronym for Chap’s Own Quarterly. Pick whichever suits you.

COQ is trashy (cover story this week was a charming makeover journey piece, destined to have a profoundly positive impact on the profiled woman’s self-esteem, titled “Fat Slag to Horn Bag”) and it’s full of busts, bikinis, blondes and babes.

What a lovely reminder that the chauvinistic/Larry Pickering/Page three girl/Cworr! She’s a bit of alright/Nudge nudge wink wink/Benny Hill/I’ve got a lovely bunch of coconuts-type attitude is still alive and well.

Will all of that ever go out of fashion, I wonder? That’s a question for another day …

There’s browbeaten editor Van Dyke (Wayne Hope), bitch-on-heels publisher Anne (Leah Vandenburg), PA Tina (Sophie Katinis – remember her from Headland?), smarmy sleaze Nick (Matthew Newton), shabby Dave (Bob Franklin) and weedy Chris (Ross Hampton), whose mum thinks he works at Soft Furnishings Weekly.

A tight script allows them all to clash, whinge, slap, argue, annoy and collude with mostly funny results. Admittedly, the pace rumbles along like a dependable farmyard tractor, rather than zoom and weave like a frantic, remote-controlled Corvette, but it’s good.

One of its real charms is its laidback-shooting style. Now, I get motion sickness at the best of times (I can’t watch Cops without a bucket at the ready), but while this is shot on what I like to call “nauseacam”, it’s done well. I even saw a boom mike sneak into one shot – and in this format, it worked!

It’s likeable and raw and it bumps and jumps like an accidental documentary. Only a few minutes in and that brilliant series Frontline flashed into the reminder sphere of my brain.

These eps were first broadcast on TV1 in 2006, so here’s the great, free-to-air unwashed’s chance to get in on the joke.

Give it a go. After all, how often do we get the opportunity to chuckle at an Aussie-made comedy, rather than groan and switch the channel?

Plus, I get to see my schoolgirl crush out of those nasty Sea Patrol jumpsuits in an upcoming episode. Kristian Schmid, who played the dreamy Todd Landers in Neighbours all those years ago, is set to guest star along with the likes of Barry Otto, Greg Matthews and Natalie Bassingthwaite.

Can’t wait!

— REBECCA MARSHALL