There’s a scene early on in the first series of Such Brave Girls that sums the whole thing up nicely. Josie – a millennial not long out of a mental health crisis, now just in a general, all-encompassing life crisis – has helped her sister to bleach her hair. Unfortunately, she has neglected to tell Billie that the plastic bag she put over her head has left a massive, Shrek-green Asda logo on the dye job. Billie – who alternates between sweetly naive and absolutely petrifying, with little warning – lunges at Josie and smothers her new dress in ketchup, before threatening to kill herself. The girls’ mother will later attempt to return said dress to the shop – stains and all – feigning tears as she tells the shop assistant how much debt she’s in.
Suffice to say, Such Brave Girls isn’t a wholesome coming-of-age affair. It is, however, a brilliant, startlingly feral comedy, one which scooped the scripted comedy Bafta last year (previous winners include Derry Girls, This Country and Peep Show). The subject matter – suicide, abortion, financial ruin, deep-seated abandonment issues – sounds like the stuff of sadcoms. But what makes it stand out in a post-Waller-Bridge world is that it is an unashamed sitcom, with a regular cast and recurring gags. Think The Inbetweeners, if it had it been written by Julia Davis.
