Something’s happened to TV in recent years, the nuances of which I don’t have the time nor inclination to get into, but let’s just say… scripts are not scripting like they used to. Sitcoms broadly aren’t as tautly funny as they once were (can you imagine Girls or Broad City being released today?), meanwhile prestige TV has become almost retro as a concept (I’ve been watching Breaking Bad in the year 2026 to remedy this). All of which is to say: Leo Reich’s new comedy series, produced by A24 for Channel 4, could not have come at a better time. Is it perfect? No. Does it recall some of the best millennial sitcoms of yore? Yes, genuinely.
We’re introduced to one of our leads, Ethan (creator Leo Reich) via an incredibly relatable opener: “Ethan had one of the easiest lives in human history. There was much to feel grateful for. He had recently received a blow job in a park. His screen time was down to six hours a day, not including laptop or TV. He loved to read. He didn’t read, but he could read, and when he did, which was never, he loved it.” He’s 24, living in London with his friends from uni, Abi (Emily Fairn) and Sam (Olive Gray), and just trying to get by (in that aforementioned scene, he’s desperately trying to figure out how to get rid of a hole in the wall of their damp rented flat so that they can get their deposit back).
Will Robson-Scott
Much of It Gets Worse will be recognisable to London-dwelling Gen Z and younger millennials – almost painfully so. This is a deeply familiar world of Peckham DIY film screenings and Dalston poetry nights and cramped accommodation frugally decorated with IKEA furniture and mugs filled with fag butts next to Nutribullets. What sets It Gets Worse apart from other contemporary offerings attempting to capture what it means to be in your 20s today is that it’s devoid of out-of-date snark and off-the-mark references (see: And Just Like That). Instead, it operates from a place of fun and genuine recognition, like an inside joke that the audience is in on.
The plot-lines of the series are meandering yet realistic. Abi’s got a boyfriend who’s more interested in porn and street food pop-ups than having sex with her. Sam is navigating a carousel of interconnected sapphic situationships while living in a warehouse. Ethan appears to be constantly fending off a sort of ambient loneliness and directionlessness fuelled by a sense of arrested development. These are flawed characters that we want to root for because they remind us of ourselves and our friends (or, at least, that’s how I felt watching – I may no longer be in my 20s, but the lives on screen could have been mine a few years ago).
Much of the action (or lack thereof) is elevated by a clever script. The jokes are astute and consistently land. British comedy fans will be pleased to hear that Vicki Pepperdine of Camping and Dear Joan and Jericha fame shows up as Ethan’s mum with some of the series’ best lines and delivery (“London is loud and horrible, almost everybody we know has been stabbed!”). Lena Dunham also makes an appearance as Abi’s girlboss manager, a cameo that lights up the screen for a few minutes. And you probably already know that Andrew Scott shows up to spit in Ethan’s mouth during the opening episode. Pleasingly, the script doesn’t lag throughout the series’ tight five-episode run. You find yourself – shock, horror – actually wanting to watch the next episode.
While It Gets Worse is a Gen Z sitcom, it has a millennial spirit, following in the lineage of some of the best British comedies of the 2010s. Reich himself has name-checked sitcoms like Fresh Meat and Peep Show as inspiration (I’d throw Fleabag into the mix, too – especially considering the narration from Zadie Smith), with dashes of American shows like Girls and Insecure. It’s not a flawless creation by any means – there are times the subject matter feels overdone (do we need another TV show about self-obsessed young people out-growing their friendships and relationships?), and the acting can occasionally feel a little careful and overthought – but it also feels like a breath of fresh air in among a deluge of half-baked writing and risk-averse remakes.
Alongside other recent shows like Adults and Overcompensating, it seems we may be entering a new Golden Age (or, at least, a slightly shinier Age) of sitcoms – ones that take their cues from the millennial comedies that came before them, but with an updated Gen Z lens.
