Stephen Carlin: Pandas vs Penguins

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We are all, contends standup Stephen Carlin, either pandas or penguins – cuddly introverts who are fussy about their diets, or gregarious waddlers who look good in a suit. Do we stand alone and aloof, or flock together? It’s not a bad concept for a show, and it provides the recurring theme for the Glasgow-based comedian’s entertaining hour. But as with much of his act, he doesn’t really explore it fully enough to wring every last drop of humour out of it.

It’s a pretty frustrating performance, in truth. Carlin is likeable, engaging and says some interesting things, and his delivery is enjoyably smooth.  But it often seems like he could get so much more from his subjects before he moves on. In a riff about being hit on by a man, for example, he explains how he can now sympathise with women, but we want to know all the details of who, how and why, which never appear. There must be a thousand standups who could make that last half an hour or more.

He’s good on differences between the English and Scottish—it’s a well-worn subject, and he spends quite a bit of time on it—but he does inject freshness with some self-deprecating remarks about class and guilt north of the border.

But if only he’d cover less and dig deeper into the comic potential of his targets, it would be a great show, rather than the simply good one that it is at the moment.