I have mixed feelings about Hustle. Thing being, I am fascinated by deception, the art of the con, and all that stuff lovingly documented by close-up conjuror Ricky Jay and celebrated in scripts by his buddy David Mamet. Which puts me firmly in the show’s catchment area, you’d think.

Only, in practice, Hustle is more often than not a disappointment. A half-baked piece of tame light entertainment, implicitly hampered by its protagonists being ‘nice’ con artists, who target nasty people and liberate their money to exact revenge on behalf of hapless third parties.

So, I am surprised and happy to report that the first episode of the sixth series was tremendous fun. The pace was zippy, the attitude jaunty, and the whole was a skilfully written and directed piece of pop entertainment of quality and distinction. In some ways, I was reminded of what people go on about, and on and on about, when they reminisce about shows like The Avengers (sixties incarnation): cheeky sexy fun that’s somehow essentially British.

The episode started gleefully with a fake Kylie Minogue tv shoot, set up to relieve a central casting Arab sheikh from £250,000. Only, this was a bogus Kylie who was really one of the gang that Michael Stone (aka ‘Mickey Bricks’, I kid you not) leads. Gleeful nonsense, in other words.

Their next victim is plucked from the headlines: a banker whose institution has been bailed out by the taxpayer and has pocketed a fat pension. A panto villain — his nickname was Piggy for godsake. Boo, hiss. And oh, what joy — however predictable — to see him stitched up by the crew…

What made things different this time round, and will continue to for this season, is that Mickey meets his near-match in a sexy Detective Chief Inspector determined to add his scalp to her impressive collection. Only, Mickey likes his scalp where it is, and has no intention of giving it up, even for a woman who — to use the show’s vernacular — is mostly posh with a bit of dirty thrown in.

Of course, the team turn up top. But it’s a close thing. And part of the skill is in the hands of writer and series originator Tony Jordan, who structures the episode so that you find out what happened for real in a flashback. Meaning maximum tension is extracted beforehand by showing Mickey together with the mark and the briefcase containing a cool half million the fat banker is going to hand over, and the police busting Mickey when he has the case in his red hand.

There were some suitably cool directorial flourishes, in the tradition of the show’s flash visual vocabulary. Split screen shenanigans used to good effect, play with time distortion, and general dynamism where colour and shadow were concerned. It all helped give the show a sheen that goes with its high-rolling subject matter, altogether appropriate since the benchmark for this kind of material is set by expensively styled films like the Ocean’s series.

Tony Jordan must have been cackling with some of the lines he came up with, referencing Anne Widdecombe’s arse and having the pseudo-Kylie’s Arabic patron tell her that her version of Locomotion was shit. I’ll leave you to check out the full picture over on iPlayer — thankfully it convinced, and amused as much as it convinced. Otherwise the whole would have fizzled out as surely as a Star Wars prequel, audience goodwill pissed up the wall by cynical opportunism.

So, kudos to Kudos — the production company responsible for the equally stylish and sophisticated Spooks for BBC1, and The Fixer, similarly distinctive over on ITV. Three audience-friendly returning series with intriguing high concepts. Nice one, guys.