Second review of Lassie ? Only when there's nothing serious to report (5,6)
I believe the answer is:
silly season
'second review' is the definition.
The answer and definition can be both related to time as well as being singular nouns.
Maybe there's an association between them I don't understand?
'of lassie ? only when there's nothing serious to report' is the wordplay.
I cannot really understand how this works, but
'of' could be 'o' and 'o' is present in the answer.
'when' could be 'as' (eg 'when I walked' means 'as I walked') and 'as' is located in the answer.
'there's' could be 'n' (I've seen this in other clues) and 'n' is located in the answer.
This explanation may well be incorrect...
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for silly season that I've seen before include "when real news is scarce" , "When journo jokes" , "fall in comedic fashion?" , "Time for trivial news" , "Time when there's not much news" .)