What if the Derry Girls grew up and managed to get sucked into a murder mystery?
Lisa McGee’s new Netflix show, How To Get To Heaven From Belfast, kind of answers that question, and then some. Derry Girls, McGee’s hit sitcom, finally wrapped up in 2023, but McGee hasn’t stopped writing, and her latest show draws inspiration from much the same place: that is, the wonderful, bonkers and nuanced world of female friendships.
This is still crackling with McGee’s signature dry wit, but where Derry Girls was light-hearted and silly, this one veers into more adult territory. We meet our heroes during a time of stagnation in their lives: Robyn (Sinéad Keenan) is a stay at home mum at the end of her tether, Dara (Caoilfhionn Dunne) is stuck caring for her own mother and Saoirse (Roísín Gallagher) is a successful TV writer who’s sick of her own award-winning show.
This central trio are brought together when their old childhood friend, Greta (Natasha O’Keeffe) winds up dead. Only, is she really? When they decide to attend her wake, they suddenly find themselves neck-deep in a mystery that may or may not have something to do with a dark secret that dates back to their time in school – a secret that they all pledged to forget.
Soon enough, the girls are in way over their heads and digging up all sorts of dark skeletons, as well as (in Saoirse’s case) striking up a flirtation with a much younger policeman as they careen from Belfast, to the BAFTAs, to the back of beyond, and back again. Plenty of McGee’s signature one-liners are in there. “Your car’s not going to blow away!” one character snaps at another when they receive news that a storm’s coming in; in another, Robyn shouts, “F**k girl power!” – only to be brought up short by Dara. “Too far!” she replies, pointing an accusing finger.
It doesn’t just stop with dialogue, though. Prepare your funny bone for some supremely bonkers gags that elevate the whole show to the realms of slapstick. Ever wanted to see a group of women attempt to stick up a funeral wearing Disney princess masks in order to find out if the body in the casket is the right one? That’s here. As is footage of the trio riding a banana boat, which has to be seen to be believed.
Woven throughout all of it are flashbacks to the gang as high-schoolers, along with hints as to what it is that they actually did all those years ago. The highlight of this show, as it is in most of McGee’s other work, is in the complicated relationship between its central cast, all of whom do an excellent job of recreating a friendship that is old and complex, but still packed with affection.
In one particularly touching scene, the women get drunk (bear with me) and dance to 90s pop hits; as they do, images of their younger selves, also dancing, come into focus alongside them, rendering the whole thing a lovely shade of bittersweet.
If the plot doesn’t entirely make sense (or the geography: Saoirse seems to be hopping between London and Belfast like it’s a stop on the Northern line), that’s forgivable. It’s a more complicated – dare I say, adult – show than Derry Girls, but McGee’s writing masterfully manages to toe the line between serious and silly. Watch and feel the February blues melt away.
How to Get To Heaven From Belfast is streaming on Netflix
