It’s wholly devoid of CGI, explosions, life-threatening viruses, gun fights, zombies and indeed A-list stars, says Peter Fincham, but this makes Colin From Accounts all the better

A postman delivers a package to a suburban address in Sydney. When he leaves he lets the gate swing open, giving a small border terrier the chance to sneak out of the garden. A few minutes later a car stops to allow a woman to cross the road. The woman, as a way of saying thank you, flashes her breast at the driver, who is momentarily distracted and runs over the dog.

This is the inciting incident at the beginning of 2023’s most charming series, Colin From Accounts. Has anyone mentioned it to you? I bet they have. It’s the perfect example of a programme whose reputation has spread by the best form of marketing, word of mouth.

It’s got nothing to do with an accounts department, by the way – Colin (from accounts) is simply the name that the two strangers give the dog to reflect its sheer ordinariness. The main characters Ashley and Gordon (played by husband-and-wife team Harriet Dyer and Patrick Brammall, who created and wrote the series) are also, on the face of it, pretty ordinary. He runs a struggling micro brewery; she’s training to be a doctor.

Colin is injured in the accident and his back legs don’t work properly, so he’s fitted up with a set of wheels. It seems almost callous to say that this adds hugely to his cuteness, but it does. The dog, who doesn’t seem to have an owner, quickly becomes a problem. Ashley and Gordon haven’t got time to look after it. The vet’s bill is $12,000 dollars. Who should pay it? Gordon who ran Colin over or Ashley who distracted him by flashing her breasts? Cue an endless tug-of-war which inevitably turns into a tug-of-love.

There are so many TV series at the moment that make a virtue of throwing vast sums of money at the screen, but here’s a show which is wholly devoid of CGI, explosions, life-threatening viruses, gun fights, zombies and indeed A-list stars – and all the better for it. It must have been cheap to make (like another favourite of mine at the moment, Blue Lights) and rests entirely on the traditional virtues of character, narrative, brilliant jokes and pitch-perfect acting. The essence of any romcom – what you might call the Richard Curtis test – is whether you find yourself screaming at the screen, “For God’s sake, you’re obviously made for each other – stop arguing, get married and start having babies.” Believe me, you do.

The course of true love must never run smooth though, and there are plenty of obstacles on the way – the age difference between Ashley and Gordon, his short temper, her trendy friends. At one point Gordon accidentally sends Ashley a dick pic; at another, Ashley, who is staying over in his flat, mistakes his bedside table for the loo and urinates in his sock drawer. He’s sleeping in the bed at the time.

So this is no cosy seventies sitcom with John Alderton and Pauline Collins. The supporting cast are outstanding, especially Ashley’s appalling mum Lynelle (Helen Thompson) and her creepy boyfriend Lee (Darren Gilshenan). Genevieve Hegney and Michael Logo are excellent as Gordon’s co-workers. I’d never heard of any of these actors, or indeed  Dyer and Brammall themselves. They’re all brilliant.

Colin From Accounts is a gem, and a reminder that you can always breathe new life into the most familiar elements. It’s not completely perfect – of the eight episodes there’s one that misfires a bit, when Ashley’s out-of-control friends take over Gordon’s brewery for her 30th birthday party. I didn’t really believe the friends, and too much was made of the age difference between the two leads. It’s also difficult to sustain the momentum of an episode entirely centred around a party.

Which brings me back to Succession which, if it was a marathon runner, is now about to enter the stadium for its final lap. I wrote about it a month or so ago, complaining stupidly that we hadn’t heard much lately about Logan’s health, and that it seemed to have forgotten that at one point it looked as if the main characters were going to be arrested by the FBI – whereas now all they’re squabbling about is the terms of a potential takeover by corporate psycho-killer Lukas Matsson (Alexander Skarsgard). The very next episode Logan’s health came roaring back into the equation: he died. But we’re still focusing on the takeover, and the business stuff, and after some sublime episodes – in particular the trip to the Scandinavian mountaintop retreat – episode seven faltered slightly when it was entirely based around (you guessed it) a party. It was, as always, brimming with great dialogue, but when Tom Wambsgans (Matthew Macfadyen) yawned and said he’d had enough and was going to bed, I could see his point. What followed was a showdown between Tom and Shiv Roy (Sarah Snook) on a windy balcony which I suspect a lot of people thought was definitive but I found overly theatrical.

Anyway, to repeat my plea – can the cops please arrive before the end of the series, and can we see at least one of the family led away in handcuffs. Simply knowing who ends up in control of Waystar/GoJo/ATN doesn’t quite do it for me. This isn’t to say that Succession isn’t one of television’s finest achievements – it obviously is. But even masterpieces can have faults. Those scenes on the heath in King Lear: they go on a bit, don’t they?

In the meantime, if you haven’t already, binge Colin From Accounts. The whole series probably cost as much as the Executive Producer* fees for a single episode of Succession.

* The editor has asked me to explain what an EP does. I promise I’ll come back to this, but the difference between the mighty Succession and plucky little Colin From Accounts is reflected in the fact that one show lists 14 EPs and the other lists two. No prizes for guessing which is which.

Watch Colin From Accounts on BBC iPlayer.

Peter Fincham is co-founder of Expectation TV. Previously he was Managing Director of Talkback, Controller of BBC One and Director of Television at ITV.

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