Award winning Welsh comedy returns for second series this autumn

Amelia Jones

An award-winning comedy set in the Valleys is returning to BBC iPlayer and BBC Three this autumn.

Following an award-winning first series which won two BAFTA Cymru awards for Best Entertainment Programme and Breakthrough Award, as well as the RTS Cymru Award for Comedy, Valleys-born writers Adam Llewellyn, James Prygodzicz and Thomas Rees are returning with a second series of The Golden Cobra, arriving on Saturday 26 September.

Set in and around Ebbw Vale, the new series sees Basil enjoying the fruits of success and finally running the number one – and only – curry house in town, after rival curry house owner Ernish, of The Gulshmahal, was sent to prison. However, while life should be easier for Basil, things soon become more complicated.

Familiar characters including Basil, Jub, Samita and Nick will return alongside gym owner Martin Bastard, the chicken-shaped Miss Port and Welsh Hollywood celebrity Michael Sheen, while a host of new characters will also be introduced.

Special guest voices include Diane Morgan (Ann Driod, Mandy, Motherland), cult filmmaker Lloyd Kaufman (The Toxic Avenger, Class of Nuke ’Em High), and Llewellyn’s own grandmother.

Llewellyn, who is also the series director and lead animator, said the show’s Valleys setting remains central to its identity, with the creators drawing heavily on their own experiences of growing up in the area.

He said he and his fellow creators all grew up in the Valleys during the 1990s, when Welsh representation on national television was scarce, adding that they were “immensely proud” to be from the area and that the cartoon was intended as a loving tribute.

Llewellyn said that while many programmes and films made in the UK use major cities such as London or Manchester as their backdrop, there was something special about creating a show based in a less commonly represented part of the country.

He added: “When you make something about the more unknown parts of the country, there’s a nice sense that you’re perhaps making something its residents enjoy on a more personal level and feel is theirs.”

The stories are also influenced by the creators’ own experiences of growing up in the Valleys, although Llewellyn said those experiences are often highly exaggerated.

One new episode, for example, draws on the idea of teenagers going on a historical school trip, while other stories can emerge from the writers simply throwing increasingly bizarre ideas around.

He said: “Sometimes myself and the writers will be sat around completely stuck for ideas and someone will say, ‘What if they go to Aberdare?’ and someone else will say, as a joke, ‘Yeah, and it’s full of cannibals,’ and it all just falls into place.”

The team also takes advantage of the fact that they are working with animation, Llewellyn said, allowing them to create situations that would probably be difficult to recreate in live action.

The process begins in a small writers’ room in Cardiff, where Llewellyn, James Prygodzicz and Thomas Rees work on episode ideas before the animation team gets to work.

Each episode takes several weeks to draw and edit, with the scripts continuing to change throughout production as the team looks for opportunities to add more jokes.

Llewellyn said one of his favourite parts of the process is working out how more complicated scenes would play out in Ebbw Vale and recreating familiar landmarks for the action.

He said: “One of the things I enjoy most is getting a tricky scene, such as a car chase, and figuring out how it would play out in Ebbw Vale, and then recreating popular landmarks for it to happen in.”

The second series also puts a greater focus on original music, with Llewellyn and the team building on the songs created for the first series.

The music has been composed by their friend Adam Harvey, with the new songs performed by musicians from the Valleys.

Llewelyn said: “After making some of our own original songs in series one, we leaned into that much more this series, and having these realised and then performed by Valleys musicians we know was very enjoyable.”

All 12 episodes of The Golden Cobra will be available on BBC iPlayer from September 26, with six episodes also available on BBC Three from the same date.

BBC One Wales broadcasts will begin on October 2, while a special making-of documentary, The Golden Cobra – Behind the Scenes, will be available on BBC iPlayer and BBC Three from October 3.

The documentary will explore the production process and introduce viewers to the team behind the show, as well as some of the people and places that inspire its comedy.

The Golden Cobra is a 12-part Beastly Media production for BBC Three, BBC Cymru Wales and iPlayer, made with support from the Welsh Government via Creative Wales.

You can watch the first series on BBC iPlayer here.

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