5:05min Evan tutors Manny in the Goliath team-building ethos. “At my last shop everyone had to sit on the floor in a circle and talk about a book they were really passionate about. Hideous,” Adam recalls. “And the bonuses are always just out of reach,” Matthew adds. “There’s always a branch in Bognor Regis that hits its targets, but it’s never yours.”

8:59min Bernard is in typically misanthropic form. “One third of the people who work here are not misanthropes,” Marie insists. “I’m not.”

11:02min Fran (Tamsin Greig) is appalled at the state of Bernard’s shop. “We manage to keep the squalor in the back,” Matthew insists. “You can’t get away with shops that look like that any more,” Marie adds. “You need to hoover at least once a year.”

11:34min Evan casts a stern eye over Manny’s clothes. “Adam, didn’t you say that at Waterstone’s in Piccadilly, you’re only allowed to wear black, white and ‘stone’?” Marie giggles.

14:20min Bernard and Manny have a row. “We argue more in our shop than they do in the chains because I keep forgetting that Matthew is my boss,” Marie admits. “How often in a chain would you get the staff telling you to f*** off or flouncing out of the shop?” Matthew smiles.

15:48min Bernard’s shop is empty. Again. “The total absence of customers is sadly realistic,” Marie admits.

17:23min “I like the Stereophonics and ride a scooter,” Evan boasts. “The chain managers are always trying to show how human they are,” Matthew agrees, “but what really matters is that they can tick their stupid little boxes. That’s why the staff are generally unpleasant. Once, at Waterstone’s, somebody said: ‘How about a smile?’ That makes you want to kill someone. Smiling’s the last thing on your mind.”

23:58min Groans as Evan suggests to Manny that he could be “vice deputy sub assistant” in two years. “In order to get a 50p per hour pay rise, a friend had to write a letter and make a presentation to his manager,” Marie recalls.

Verdict Adam thought the depiction of chain booksellers was “spot-on”, while Matthew found the show “funny, but also disturbingly accurate. Somebody has obviously worked in a book shop before.” Neither thought they had reached Bernard’s levels of “total destruction”, although, Marie pointed out, “We’ve only been open for six months.”

Black Books series 3 is out to buy on DVD. Thanks to Crockatt and Powell, 119 Lower Marsh, London SE1 (www.crockattandpowell.blogspot.com 020-7928 0234). Interview by Ed Potton