Yaxlont: A Delightful Twist on the Monster Under the Bed Story

In the just slightly alternative reality we are presented with in Yaxlont, monsters who live under the bed are real and anyone can see them (well, the kids at least – it isn’t made clear whether adults can).  They befriend a child who needs them and usually fade away when the child hits eleven or twelve years old.  This isn’t the case with Joe (played by Joe Barber who you might remember from Adolescence) who is seventeen and still has “Yax” with him.

There is a small problem, though, which comes in the shape of Jess (Emily Burnett).  Jess needs help with her homework and Joe (somewhat smitten) brings her home to study, much to Yax’s horrified chagrin.  Played by Freddie Meredith (who was in a number of episodes of Andor – and many other TV shows), Yax comes across as a fully-formed and highly sympathetic… monster under the bed.   Yax and Joe have something of a fine bromance going on between them, but perhaps Yax should have researched what happens to adolescent boys a little bit before the helping with the maths homework in the bedroom scenario.  Perhaps, too, he has become a little set in his ways - but Yax's learning curve is about to become a lot curvier.

Written and created by Uncle Shortbread (Arthur Studholme and Cosmo Wellings), and presented by the BBC, this comedy short is something of a delight.