WHAT’S IT ABOUT?

Recently divorced Amanda (Lucy Punch) – the shallow but lovable snob from the BBC’s comedy hit Motherland – has moved out of posh Chiswick in west London and resettled in the Harlesden area of northwest London – close to Wormwood Scrubs prison.

But life goes on – as she juggles bringing up her kids, looking after her Mum (Joanna Lumley), running her Instagram page, getting a new job to fund her lifestyle and finding love.

WHAT’S IT LIKE?

Amanda was a strong side-kick in Motherland, but doesn’t really have what it takes to carry her own series. Motherland was an ensemble, with a wide range of characters – female and male, posh, middle class and working class – but centring on one character makes everything a bit contrived.

Not least, the revelation that one of the other Chiswick mums, Anne (Philippa Dunne), also happens to have moved to Harlesden, feels rather coincidental – but it’s a sign of how weak the overall premise is that both her mum and Anne have to follow her to Harlesden to provide enough material.

That’s not to say that the new characters – her downstairs neighbour (Samuel Anderson), who coincidentally has a child in the same year, a local chef (Siobhán McSweeney), who also has a child in the same year, Amanda’s new boss (Cavan Clerkin), her new boyfriend (Peter Serafinowicz) – don’t have their moments, whether on the side-line of the school football pitch, at a car-boot sale, a camp site or the school disco. But they don’t have the scope or depth of the broader cast of the original show.

Each episode has a handful of chuckles and one big laugh – but too much of it feels forced and before long, you’re longing for Diane Morgan, Anna Maxwell Martin or Paul Ready to pop by to say “hi!”