I'd been looking forward to The Reluctant Vampire for ages and sat down on Sunday night to watch it only to realise I'd missed it. I had assumed it would have an 8pmish slot but it actually went out at 6.40pm, a real Sunday evening family slot. And sure enough The Reluctant Vampire, based on Eric Morecambe's novel and adapted by the Gibbons brothers who write Alan Partridge, is something of a Horrible Histories/Simpsons-style two-tier comedy, with jokes for little kids and big kids. I think I even heard a joke mistaking the word "count" for something much ruder.

The plot if about a family of vampires – dad Victor, Tom Davis, mum Valeeta, Sian Clifford and their two sons. Val, Lenny Rush and Vernon, Gabriel Nagy. Val is having difficulty getting to grips with being a proper vampire. He struggles to fly and doesn't even like the taste of blood that much. And there's a reason why, which – no spoilers – we discover at the end of episode one.

The performances are superb and the supporting cast is solid gold. Servant Igon, Asim Chaudhry, wears an eye-patch over his missing eye, Joe Wilkinson plays a woke werewolf called Wilf. This Country's Charlie Cooper leads a subrban lynch mob out on the hunt for vampires. Bill Bailey and Ross Noble (pictured with Val) even crop up as a couple of gargoyles. The best moment in the first episode was thanks to a brilliant bit of comic timing with Bailey.

Sorry, that should be one of the best moments. Most of the best moments belong to a standout starring performance from Lenny Rush, who really is a sublime comic actor, with a facial expression for every occasion. It's not just laugh out loud funny, there is pathos here too, as Val goes through a mix of adolesence and existential crisis.

Basically it doesn't matter what age you are, watch The Reluctant Vampire. There's something for everyone to get their teeth into here.

The Reluctant Vampire, Sundays, BBC One and all available on iPlayer so I didn't miss it after all.

Picture credit: BBC/Boffola Pictures/Jonathan Birch