This follow-up to 2022’s Man vs Bee finds Rowan Atkinson reprising the role of Trevor Bingley, a bumbling no-hoper who is somehow still at large in the community. He’s now separated from wife Jess (Claudie Blakley), with whom his daughter Maddy (Alanah Bloor) has been living, and dwells alone rather forlornly in a remote house in the countryside.
Quite why Atkinson (in collaboration with co-writer Will Davies) seems so invested in this hapless and rather pathetic character remains a mystery, since it eschews entirely what used to be Atkinson’s main strengths (eg sardonic delivery, deadpan but scathing put-downs, a delight in bending language into comical shapes). Even the largely language-free Mr Bean was capable of glimmers of sadistic cruelty. But we are where we are, and Netflix evidently think it’s worth their while.
This time around, we initially find Trevor working as the caretaker at St Aldwyn’s Primary School in Hertfordshire (near Tring apparently), where his blundering efforts to assist in the school’s Yuletide Nativity play sadly end with him being given the sack. But out of the blue, Trevor, who is on the books of a company called Housesitters Deluxe, gets a call on his phone (the ringtone is the theme from Seventies TV show The Professionals). He’s unexpectedly commissioned to take up a “platinum level” house-sitting job in London.
It’s like déjà vu from the previous series, which found Trevor acting as house-sitter for the ludicrously wealthy Kolstad-Bergenbatten couple, whose luxurious home was an assault course of baffling electronic gadgetry. Anyway it’s an offer he can’t refuse since it’ll net him 10 grand, which will be very handy for funding his daughter’s imminent departure to study at the Sorbonne.
But before he can get cracking on that, Trevor finds that somehow, as everybody else makes a fast getaway for the Christmas holidays, he has been left holding the baby. Quite literally, since nobody has come to collect the gurgling little chap who played the Nativity play guest star and lay beatifically in the manger. Bizarrely, the infant seems to have materialised from nowhere and has no known address or family.
After his attempts to leave the fledgling Messiah with social services prove futile, he somehow has to contend with carrying out baby-maintenance while also being given the keys – or more accurately, the electronic fob – to the palatial abode of the Schwarzenboch family, who have suddenly decided to have Christmas in New York. Thus the “man vs baby” theme is set in motion, as Trevor feverishly tries to conceal the child’s existence from Petra, the frosty “executive concierge” who brusquely lectures him on what he’s expected to do at the Schwarzenboch residence (pictured above, Susannah Fielding as Petra).
This leads to assorted slapstickery, cock-ups and buffoon-like behaviour as Trev tries to get to grips with his temporary abode, a kind of gleaming new-build palace quite close to Westminster, more like the HQ of a global hedge fund than somebody’s home. Challenges include an enthusiastic dog which likes eating shoes, a marathon shopping expedition to acquire enough food to fill an aircraft hangar, improvised nappy-changing, and the discovery of mystery guests living in the basement. But the wattage is low, and the thing never gets out of first gear. Laughs are not a-plenty.
Doubtless Man vs Baby is intended as heart-warming Yuletide fare, so it might pass muster at about 6pm on Christmas Day. At any other time, maybe not so much.
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