The people behind Veep, Succession, and two Bond films go behind the scenes on a fictional MCU.

Are they killing cinema? That's what new recruit Dag (Lolly Adefope) wants to know on her first day on the set of superhero movie Tecto, a mid-range cog in Maximum Studios' vast multi-phase machine. Is this a dream factory, or is it an abattoir?

It's both, says The Franchise, so mind you don't slip on all that blood and pig carcass while weaving those dreams. Created by Armando Iannucci (Veep, The Death of Stalin), Sam Mendes (Skyfall, Spectre) and Jon Brown (Succession, Dead Pixels), this eight-episode series is a comedy roast of franchise moviemaking. And because the best roasts come from close friends, it's also partly a love letter to the same, as well as a howling cry for help.

It's all fucked, is the short version. The pure instinct to telling fantastic stories on screen has been buried under geological layers of studio politics, creative burnout, breakdowns, dick-swinging contests and product placement requirements ("Let's sell some milk!" shouts studio bigwig Pat in episode five, adding a last-minute scene to appease Chinese sponsors). Milk isn't the half of it.

Tecto suffers due to its middling position in a teetering stack of other productions (coincidentally, the same studio's also making Jenga: The Movie). The bosses are continually robbing Peter to pay Paul and making last-minute in-world decisions that send shockwaves through this 'everything is connected' universe. An alien genocide two movies down the line means Tecto loses a whole raft of characters. ("The fish people are carrying a lot of thematic luggage.") The movie's shortchanged when a planned cameo by the franchise star is swapped for one by a Z-lister. Major changes to comic book canon are made to appease online accusations of misogyny, leading to fan rage and death threats.