Pls Like, series two, review: brilliant YouTube satire moves into darker territory
The first series of Pls Like (BBC Three) was one of the most overlooked treats of 2017. A spot-on mockumentary about vapid YouTubers, it was impeccably cast, sharply observed, and released in 15-minute episodes on both iPlayer and (oh, irony of ironies) YouTube.
It didn't exactly go viral. In a year, the first episode has racked up around 60,000 YouTube views. By contrast, a video called "VERY FUNNY ANIMALS" uploaded seven months later has had 104 million. If there were any justice, those figures would be reversed.
Judging from the first episode (the only one available at the time of writing) series two looks even better. Dour comedian Liam Williams is back playing an even glummer version of himself, now carving out a career as a soft-hitting investigative journalist ("If Stacey Dooley won't do it, I will").
Liam is reunited with celebrity vlogger Millipede (Emma Sidi), recently freed from her controlling PR company Beam (a transparent send-up of real vlogger Zoella’s managers, Gleam).
Tim Key is still a delight as Beam’s oily, wincing CEO James Wirm, who conducts business meetings in a ball-pit - but he’s no longer the real villain. The unrealistic dynamic of the first series (vloggers are all benign idiots, managers all creepy svengalis), has given way to a more nuanced admission that YouTube is a stranger, darker place than it may first seem.
The harmless likes of Zoella are just the tip of a rancid fatberg of troubling real-life content. Some of it would seem to defy parody – the site was involved in a scandal about fake Peppa Pig videos made to traumatise children – but Pls Like rises to the challenge. A brief look-ahead to later episodes introduces a right-on political vlogger and a whispering ASMR star.
The first episode, however, sees Millipede recruited to host a new awards ceremony for wholesome vloggers, to detoxify YouTube’s image and prove “it’s about more than unboxing videos and footage of dead bodies”.
Unfortunately, her new co-host is a living embodiment of the problem: the volatile, bigoted YouTube comedian Dump Ghost, no less ridiculous than his real-life counterpart Count Dankula (of “Nazi pug” notoriety).
To many viewers over the age of 20, some of these reference points may prompt a baffled shrug. (For a Virgil to help you through this inferno, try Telegraph entertainment writer Alice Vincent’s recent guide to “the 30 most famous YouTube and Instagram stars you've never heard of”). Pls Like manages the Reithian task of making this whole world comprehensible, while lampooning it in broad, silly strokes.
YouTube is changing viewing habits in ways we’re still trying to understand, and traditional broadcasters are pandering to it in their attempts to catch up. In 2016, the BBC announced it would start selling straight-to-DVD releases by star YouTubers such as Joe Sugg – which seemed a little like trying to flog Wikipedia articles as a set of luxury leather-bound hardbacks. By contrast, Pls Like is biting the hand that feeds, making this show as essential as it is funny.
Series 2 of Pls Like is available on BBC Three now, and will air on BBC One weekly from Sept 28
