Derry Girls

Erin and her friends have exams, crushes and plans that ought to be simple. Derry Girls makes them catastrophically bad at managing all three. Lisa McGee's comedy is set in 1990s Derry, but the teenagers' immediate priorities remain gloriously teenage.

The ensemble is its strength. Each friend can make a bad situation worse in a recognisably different way, while the adults have their own arguments and very limited patience. Sister Michael's ability to look unimpressed is almost a separate comic instrument.

The period and place give the series texture without requiring the characters to deliver history lessons. Serious events exist around ordinary family life; the humour comes from how people keep living, bickering and embarrassing themselves within it. That also gives the more emotional moments something solid to rest on.

It is a strong recommendation for a compact ensemble sitcom with a real sense of home. Still Game finds a similarly specific community at a very different age, while The Office UK offers a colder form of social embarrassment.