The Great Sport Relief Bake Off (BBC1, Wednesday) made two errors this week: it had the flimsy Sarah Millican as the host and she resembled an awkward classroom assistant trying to control pupils who gave her no thought. You’re not Miss Perkins, they seemed to sneer. You’re not Miss Giedroyc! You can’t tell us what to do! She wandered around the tent, offering feeble little observations, but no-one really cared and perhaps she went into the staff room to cry and text her pals that she was looking for another job because the kids here don’t respect her!

She didn’t seem to know anyone’s names, which was hard to believe as there were some actual celebrities this week, and so it reinforced the idea that this was a chaotic classroom, with Morgana Robinson the new girl who was horrified at her classmates. Oh, just look what he is doing…

The great Ade Edmondson (better known as Eddie or Vyvyan) also starred and what a surprise it was to see him in real life, as he was eloquent, polite and dignified, whereas he’s usually on screen poking someone in the eyes, hitting them with planks or setting fire to their beds.

But, crucially, the show lacked a footballer, and so the laughs we’ve had in previous weeks were missing. Without a chirpy footballer to play the clown, this episode was just like a muted version of the real show. If they want us to cough up for charity then they’d better provide some comedy, so bring on the dribbling players!

Channel 4 have built a great reputation for sitcoms. Recently they’ve given us Toast of London, Peep Show and Catastrophe so it’d be easy to think this fine run was continuing with Fresh Meat (C4, Monday) but it isn’t so. On the contrary, the run has ground to a loud, embarrassing halt. Fresh Meat might inspire several emotions but none will be as potent as despair.

I mention despair because the show’s set-up of a bunch of students sharing a flat will – if you’re of a certain age – remind you of The Young Ones, and the comparison will be enough to provoke misery about the state of young comedy today. Aren’t humans supposed to progress? The bold Alternative Comedy scene gave us rude, anarchic, hilarious characters who spewed out venom and spiky jokes about Thatcher and nuclear war, but now we have this: students in a flat with nothing to say and only tepid, vaguely humorous lines with which to say it. But perhaps we get the comedy we deserve?

I would guess that most of us aren’t instantly aflame at the thought of an art history series. Indeed, I only watched this as I was obliged to review it, but having done so I was glad because this isn’t a typical art programme. Although I must confess to not knowing what a “typical” art programme is, having never watched one, but I’d assume it’s something lofty and cerebral and the viewer will have no hope of keeping up unless they possess prior knowledge of the subject. If that’s an accurate portrayal then The Renaissance Unchained (BBC4, Monday) is not a typical art programme. For a start, it’s not presented by a waistcoated academic with pince-nez balanced on his nose. Instead, a Ray Winstone-type comes barrelling onto the screen to tell us the bloody Renaissance thought it was so special, didn’t it, being all about freedom and liberation and the power of mankind, but really, when you think about it, those damn painters were still stuck with God, weren’t they?

Still trying to portray religious scenes to keep us all devoted and on our knees? I paraphrase, but Waldemar Januszczak was telling us, with passion, that the Renaissance’s reputation deserves to be prodded because there were countless paintings which clung to the old ways, and because they didn’t fit the narrative of the Renaissance they are ignored by historians.

He’s here to put this right and his straightforward presenting style, with not a hint of stuffiness, might be just the ticket for attracting philistines like me to art history.

And the best thing this week – apart from Happy Valley, which I don’t mention here every single Saturday because you already know it’s the best – was Comedy Playhouse: Hospital People (BBC1, Friday). The Comedy Playhouse first aired on the BBC in 1961 and offered an anthology series of comedy programmes, all of which were separate and unique. It was a showcase for new comedy and some of the programmes were snapped up and turned into now much-loved famous series, such as Steptoe and Son and Are You Being Served?

The Comedy Playhouse ended in the 1970s but made a return in 2014, and its latest outing began on Friday night with Hospital People.

How rare it was to laugh at Friday night BBC1 comedy and I can only cross my fingers and hope a BBC executive somewhere has plans to grab this show and make turn it into a full series.