John and Susan are foster children sent, mildly accidentally, to Scatterbrook Farm. There, they find Mr and Mrs Braithwaite (Steve Pemberton and Rosie Cavaliero) and a strange tension in the atmosphere. The weather isn’t right, the crops aren’t being gathered in and the scarecrow Ten Acre Field is missing…

Mackenzie Crook’s update of the beloved children’s series is a labour of love. You can tell by his position as writer, director and star and how little vanity is displayed for all that. Worzel is a part of a massive, ancient ecosystem and society that by nature means he’s pragmatic and grounded. He’s also arrogant and endearingly silly and painfully, utterly sincere. There’s a scene at the end of episode 2, ‘The Green Man’ where Worzel talks to The Green Man (Michael Palin on top form), about the future and his hopes for it which some people will see as trite. It’s anything but that, rather the simple expression of hope and patience from someone who is a very small part of a very large world.

Crook’s played down performance brings everyone else into his orbit and means the entire cast get a chance to shine. India Brown and Thierry Wickens as John and Susan are especially good and the show sensibly pushes past their initial disbelief of Worzel as fast as possible. Once that’s done, they and we are thrown into a chaotic world of scarecrows, pretend biker gangs and the complex peace treaties between the countless creatures that live in the valley. It presents, especially in ‘The Scarecrow of Scatterbrook’ as something close to an English country Swamp Thing. Polite, weird, and delightfully, gently threatening. Oh and also inventively crass at times. ‘Someone’s told a bum secret!’ may be the single best euphemism for a fart coined this century and the show is full of offhand, well-turned jokes like that.

Both episodes impress but the first inevitably suffers from having to set up the world. The second, ‘The Green Man’ leans into that world-building and gives us a near silent Michael Palin as the Green Man, Zoe Wanamaker as a local landowner who may know more than she’s letting on and a scene stealing turn from Colin Michael Carmichael as Soggy Boggart, head of a (sort of) biker gang of scarecrows. Worzel struggles to fulfil his duties and keep the Green Man happy, Soggy wants to win the Best Scarecrow prize and the day is saved in a deeply surprising way by Earthy Mangold. Played by Francesca Mills, Earthy is a small, sensible scarecrow who knows everyone’s mum and neatly punctures the macho bubble of Soggy’s gang. Even then though, she and the show, do so kindly. There’s a sense once more of all these people and creatures being a small part of a bigger system, one we’re all responsible for. One we’re all trusted to be a part of.

Verdict: It feels weird to be finishing a year like 2019 talking about a show built on trust and hope because there’s often seemed to be precious little of either to go around. But that’s exactly what this is and exactly the sort of characters we desperately need. Odd? Certainly. Kind? Always. Determined? Never argue with a scarecrow. Gentle, weird, wonderfully unsettling and profoundly hopeful, this is the Christmas TV treat you need to make time for. 9/10

Alasdair Stuart