Hard-hitting dramas, new series, insightful documentaries – we love them, we really do. But what about the times when you just want to – dare we say it – laugh?

We may have Starstruck back on our screens and a new series of Channel 4’s Derry Girls to look forward to but as of now, the comedy pickings on TV are pretty slim. Have no fear, though, we’ve found a gem of a comedy series that isn’t long-winded and gets straight to the point of being side-splittingly funny. 

BBC One’s Cheaters may strike you as a serious watch (seeing as it’s all about infidelity) but it’s anything but. It’s the anti-romance romance, if you will. The genre we didn’t know we needed, but now can’t get enough of. 

The 18-episode series is told in 10-minute chapters, making it incredibly consumable and before you know it, you’ll have watched five episodes in quick succession.

In the age of three-hour-long movies, eight-part documentary series and everything we consume getting that little bit longer, it’s nice to watch an episode of something that is short and sweet.

According to the synopsis, “Cheaters is a sexy, messy, comedy drama about morality and monogamy, and everything in between.”

From the makers of The End of the F***ing World, Lovesick and Misfits, the first episode sees strangers Josh (Industry’s Joshua McGuire) and Fola (Enola Holmes’ Susan Wokoma) strike up a night of drunken chats in a desolate bar after their flight from Finland has been delayed. A night of passion ensues and with it, Josh’s awkward regret and Fola’s no-nonsense way of dealing with it. 

Josh can’t get his longtime girlfriend Esther (Rules Of The Game’s Callie Cooke) out of his mind but Fola admits in the morning that she actually has a husband (Sanditon’s Jack Fox as Zack) too.

The two fly back to England and, of course, as is always the way with these things, the pair find out that they’re actually new neighbours. Not just a couple of streets away from each other, oh no. They’re living just a stone’s throw across the street from one another.

It’s OK, you think. Who talks to their neighbours anyway? But those millennial thoughts around neighbour interaction quickly dissipate once Esther spots the new couple living across the road.

Waving them over, it’s clear that Zack is excited about the prospect of new neighbourhood friends and Esther is too. Talk about a sticky situation, right? 

As we dig a bit deeper into these two relationships, though, we see that things under their own roofs are far from peachy.

Fola and Zack’s sex life isn’t where she wants it to be while Josh is still trying to deal with the fact that Esther cheated on him with a woman. While Fola and Josh are dealing with their own problems, their mind keeps going back to that steamy night in Finland.

Will they? Won’t they? Well, it’s an 18-episode-long series about cheating so we’re sure we’re not providing any spoilers but can only urge you to go and watch it to experience the hilarity of it all for yourself. 

If you do watch it for one reason only, though, it has to be for Susan Wokoma. We may have loved her in Michaela Coel’s Chewing Gum all those years ago and, more recently, Enola Holmes, but she really shines in this short comedy series.

Her side glances, quick wit and comedic facial expressions make Cheaters, but the chemistry of the cast is also a major pull of the series. You feel like you shouldn’t be watching something so outright in its depictions of a relationship taboo but, at the same time, you can’t stop watching. 

We say, it’s the perfect light-hearted, sexy comedy we’ve been waiting for.

All episodes of Cheaters are now available to watch on BBC iPlayer. 

Images: BBC