h my goodness; how long has it been since we all had a lovely teatime treat? Too long, that's how long! But now joy is at hand, courtesy of Neil and Rob Gibbons (the pair behind the most recent incarnations of Alan Partridge) and The Reluctant Vampire. It is their adaptation of Eric Morecambe's 1982 children's book of the same name and its 1983 sequel, The Vampire's Revenge. They have kept the books' warmth and daftness and added their own talents to the six-part series for youngsters. There are jokes for parents in there too, but the brothers have wisely kept the exquisite cruelty with which they craft Alan's misadventures safely stowed away.

Here is the tale of an undead royal-ish family (temporarily usurped a few generations back when the paterfamilias choked on a scab), living a traditional vampiric life in their traditionally gothic castle. There is proud patriarch Victor (Tom Davis), who revels in the hunting and draining of the humans he despises ("I see," he says, looking round the overdecorated bedroom of his latest about-to-be-victim, "you have a keen eye for tat"). He is married to Valeeta (Sian Clifford) – they share a hot-to-trot vibe with Gomez and Morticia of The Addams Family films – and they have two children. Vernon (an absolutely wonderful turn from Gabriel Nagy in his first major screen role) is a chip off the old block, loving the vampire life and able to identify blood vintages with a single sip ("Poor circulation … lavender … the neck of a Flemish merchant?").

But he is the second son and so the spare to the heir, Valentine (Lenny Rush, who counts as a veteran actor by experience but is still only 17 and whose age only highlights his astonishing talents). And Valentine, alas, is not a very good vampire. His fangs still haven't come in, he's not a fan of blood and he can't fly or turn into a bat. A very late developer, his family all sigh and agree. Eventually, however, Valeeta is forced to admit the truth to her boy – that he is not a vampire at all, but a human baby she rescued from a fire while Victor was away in Carpathia and raised as her own. "You were going to eat me, weren't you?" sighs Valentine. "Maybe a little bit, at first," she agrees. But then she fell in love with him and thought he would pick up their vampire ways. But alas, he has not. Possibly because, as Val notes: "It's not conversational French."

Soon a series of misunderstandings lead Victor to believe Val is at last ready for his initiation ceremony and the struggle to conceal the truth from him and an increasingly suspicious Vernon is on. Underneath runs a gently developing friendship and maybe more between Val and Gertie (Dodger's Ellie-May Sheridan, in another great performance), whom he meets while on the run from a horde of villagers – led by a man who turns out to be her father (Charlie Cooper), which adds another complication to life.

Around the family is gathered a perfectly cast collection of supporting characters. There is Bill Bailey and Ross Noble as gargoyles Guy and Gary, not just siphons for rainwater ("A common misconception") but effectively the castle's CCTV cameras, if CCTV cameras were easily distracted and no use at surveillance at all. There is Asim Chaudhry as Igon (he wears an eyepatch over the missing one because when Eric Morecambe writes that joke, it stays in the act), and there is Joe Wilkinson as Wilf the werewolf, a perfect send-up of a certain type of man, as he leans heavily over an anxious-looking maid telling her that he "totally gets the female experience, because in a way I have a monthly cycle too". He is keen that people shouldn't let the monster define the man. "No one ever talks about the yeti's love of literature or his wonderful baritone!" he cries. And Jekyll, he says, "in the daytime, is a bloody good GP". The Reluctant Vampire is full of these little flourishes as well as the more straightforward gags coming thick and fast. And I really must insist that you stick around until at least the second episode in order to catch the ham-sandwich-based homage to Morecambe's finest hour (courtesy of the late, great Eddie Braben, of course).

The Reluctant Vampire has a stacked cast, a gag-packed script and the ineffable air of a labour of love – of Eric, of the tradition he worked in, of comedy itself as something for all and not just for snarky adults – with nobody phoning anything in. Fang-tastic.