Four TV comedies to get you through exam season

With dissertation deadlines looming and library hours expanding, the leaves on campus are changing a horrible shade of exam season. Lecturers stress the importance of scheduled downtime, so here are four shows to get you though a month of  headaches and study breaks.

Brooklyn Nine Nine (Netflix/All4)

The Netflix gods have answered our prayers: the fifth season of one of TV’s funniest comedies has dropped. Spend a perfect 22-minutes in the company of Jake Peralta and co. as they keep the streets of Brooklyn crime-free, armed with Die Hard references and Terry’s yogurts. Few comedies have the heart and warmth of Nine Nine, which unites a group of genuinely good people to protect and serve. Containing all the restorative powers of a visit to the grandparents, just with fewer over-the-table interrogations.

Schitt’s Creek (Netflix)

What happens when the super-rich lose it all? They find themselves up Schitt’s Creek. This little-seen Canadian gem transports the Rose family from rags to riches, as they are forced to rebuild in a town populated by quirky, backwater characters. Starring comedy royalty, American Pie’s Eugene Levy and Home Alone’s Catherine O’Hara, as parents to Coachella-cool daughter Alexis and financially-mollycoddled son David, Schitt’s Creek will demolish your cynical defences as the Rose family are slowly charmed by life’s bare necessities.

Better Things (iPlayer)

If you prefer your comedy served with a healthy dollop of pessimism, you’ll struggle to find a better thing to watch than this dramedy created, written, directed and starring Pamela Adlon. America’s answer to Catastrophe, Better Things sees Adlon’s jobbing actor Sam Fox, juggling raising three daughters and caring for her ailing, hoarder mother (stunningly captured by Cecilia Imrie). Always whip-smart and often profound, if your course work has got you questioning life, the universe and everything, bask in the existential dread and painfully funny world of Better Things.

The Office (Amazon Prime Video)

Like televisual paracetamol, there’s not a lot a few hours at Dundler Mifflin can’t cure. For the uninitiated, Steve Carrell’s Michael Scott is manager of a paper sales branch, staffed by a team of clock watchers who pass the time participating in office antics. Consistently funny, occasionally touching and instantly re-watchable, The Office is a celebration of everyday achievement, wrapped in a big blanket of silliness.