The first series of Things You Should Have Done aired on BBC Three in early 2024, a dry and quirky comedy about a recently bereaved “stay at home daughter” from middle England. It was the brainchild of Lucia Keskin, better known online as Chi with a C, and the show marked the then 23-year-old’s transfer from internet comic (her repertoire ranged from parodies of American Horror Story to impressions of Gemma Collins) to TV star. It also came with the co-sign of Roughcut, the production company behind People Just Do Nothing and Stath Lets Flats, helmed by The Office producer Ash Atalla.
The premise was almost unbearably sad (inept young girl loses her parents in a horrifying car crash and has to navigate life without them, as per a list they left for her), but the end product was zany rather than gloomy. An episode on getting a job saw Chi (Keskin) decamp to a care home, embracing an early retirement in a bid to avoid employment at all, while the chapter devoted to learning to cook ended with two family members being admitted to hospital. The tension between Chi and her bitter aunt Karen (Selin Hizli) was a constant, complete with insults about Chi’s “fat ham hock legs”. Not one but two characters spat into a bowl of pancake mix and no one so much as flinched. And there was a truly unforgettable rendition of Pure and Simple by Popstars winners Hear’Say. The characters tended towards their own nonsensical idiolect and failed to understand the most basic of concepts (see: Chi thinking a breast screening was some kind of peep show), giving the programme more than a dash of Stath-like incompetence. Frequent ghostly appearances by Chi’s dead parents added a sadcom touch, although – wisely – it was never enough to feel truly devastating.
Series two opens – major spoiler incoming – with another untimely death in the family, this time of aunt Karen. Presumably Hizli was unavailable (she also stars in the excellent Am I Being Unreasonable? with Daisy May Cooper), otherwise I cannot think of any good reason to have given her the chop. Unfortunately, her absence is glaring – so many of the show’s best scenes involved Karen scheming about how to get the family home back from Chi, or merely making her meek husband Dave’s (Daniel Fearn) life a living nightmare. Her funeral does, at least, tee up some good gags, such as Chi accidentally downloading the template for a best man’s speech instead of a eulogy (“Dave is a very lucky guy today …”). Karen tripped over a vacuum cord at work and fell down 86 steps, leading Chi to believe that her aunt has been reincarnated as a vacuum cleaner. Yet killing off one of the cattiest characters and someone who detested Chi doesn’t make for a particularly emotional storyline – although Keskin does get to say excellent, unhinged lines such as: “My dead auntie is inside this Drift-max cordless IZ900!”
Thank goodness for Bridget Christie, as a therapist capitalising on Chi’s grief, overstepping all kinds of professional boundaries, and doxing her clients in the process. Ruth isn’t Karen 2.0, but she fills the need for another jittery side character – not least when she gets into a fight while working at a food bank. More good news: Sarah Kendall is back as Sarah Gilbeaux, the down-on-her-luck comic last seen working as a lifeguard, barmaid and compere at a holiday campsite. Juliet Cowan is also very watchable as Dave’s rich and seemingly unstable sister Claudia, who sometimes speaks like Dr Seuss (“Of course I’ve got a horse!”) and is conned by Chi and step-cousin Lucas (Jamie Bisping), who return her cat for a reward before stealing her again. Meanwhile, Keskin remains perfectly gormless as Chi, occasionally aided by miniature versions of her heroes (“Help me, Lily Allen,” she pleads as she tries to figure out what food to donate to charity. “You’re working class, aren’t you?!”)
In series one, the fact that the list was a very loose narrative conceit didn’t matter too much, but in series two, it is so loose as to be almost nonexistent, with Ruth now providing the suggestions for Chi based on their therapy sessions. Coupled with no more Karen, Things You Should Have Done now feels like a different show altogether, despite the flashes of brilliance (Keskin did win a Bafta for emerging talent last year, after all). I am still hoping and praying that Karen has faked her own death à la Can You Keep a Secret?, and that she’ll be back someday. But until then, if you want to see a horse – and a cleaner – being liberated to the sound of Spanish one-hit wonders Las Ketchup, boy have I got the show for you.
• Things You Should Have Done aired on BBC Three and is on iPlayer now.
