Comeback tour: why we should applaud Netflix for saving Girls5Eva

The whipsmart Tina Fey-produced sitcom was dropped by Peacock after two seasons yet it’s making a triumphant return and we should all be grateful

Very quietly, without much publicity or promotion, Girls5Eva appeared on Netflix last week. For those of us who haven’t kept their eye on the ball, this came as an immense surprise. Because as far as we were concerned, Girls5Eva was dead. At the end of its second season a year and a half ago, the show’s original platform Peacock announced that it would not renew the show.

And we made our peace with that. Written by Meredith Scardino, a storied writer with credits on SNL and The Colbert Report, Girls5Eva at times seemed almost too beautiful to live. A sitcom about four middle-aged women determined to reform their noughties girl group and recapture a flicker of their old fame, it was not only dense with every form of joke imaginable – never has a show revelled quite so much in the background sight gag – but at times weirdly touching. Produced by Tina Fey and Robert Carlock, it shared an innate DNA with 30 Rock and Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt. It was fast and precise, and boasted a murderer’s row of talent.