Jack Barry: You Don't Know Jack

Jack Barry wrings a certain amount of amusement out of the concept of a quarter-life crisis and its pessimistic relation to the better known mid-life variety. But it's a creaky, catch-all theme for his various insecurities, which, though often familiar for a 28-year-old white man, he at least tends to approach from oblique angles.

Apart from the bleakness that seems to have accompanied him becoming a full-time comic, what's most striking about Barry is his willingness to portray himself in an unfavourable light, from his jaded reaction at meeting his ex to his affected willingness to do anything for a street party in his (dis)honour.

The impishness he projects in his double act with Annie McGrath, Twins, survives in the rascally reasons he offers for fantasising a bus crash or refusing to die on behalf of his girlfriend. There's pedantic wit in his deconstruction of Shane Warne's sledging and an analysis of Jesus' similarities to Marvin Gaye, as well as a nice running gag about bigots claiming gay weddings leads to people marrying their dogs. A routine about the linguistics of sex acts is neatly observed and less laddish than it threatens to be.

But Barry lets his downbeat perspective infect his hour and rather underplays his uniqueness: his mastery of Mandarin affording him the rare triumph of being racially abused, which he exalts in. Fine as far as it goes, this is an emotionally and materially uneven hour that confirms he's still working out who he is.