Exam season is well under way and, in the Cambridge bubble, it can often feel like you don’t have time to breathe, let alone relax. Before you click off thinking I’m going to patronise you and say all the words you’ve heard before – that you really need to rest, or that work-life balance is the true key to success – I promise this is not that article. Instead, I’m going to recognise that realistically you don’t have very much free time, and as a consequence what you do with that time not only needs to feel worth it but also take the least amount of effort possible. Hence, the one season TV recommendations!

Crashing

Before Fleabag, there was Crashing. Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s first TV show is as funny as her now seminal later work and revolves around a disparate group of twenty-somethings who find themselves living together as property guardians of a disused hospital in aims of keeping their rents down. Crashing manages to be hilarious and yet build up enough investment in its characters to be truly heartwarming over its short single season, making its cancellation after just six episodes a real travesty. If none of this convinced you, Jonathan Bailey has a laugh-out-loud turn in this as Sam, a performance so good you’ll struggle to take his dramatic work seriously again.

My Lady Jane

My Lady Jane lives in the same world as Stardust and Ella Enchanted – a fantastical, campy, pseudo-period-piecespace that is brimming with creative opportunities. The show is a satirised version of the life of Lady Jane Grey who was queen for nine oft-forgotten days in the middle of the Tudor dynasty. In its eight episodes, the series rattles along, managing to cover this whole arc, meaning the single season is still very fulfilling. It’s genuinely funny, romantic, clever, and entertaining. Additionally, the opening sequence of the show includes a major twist I won’t spoil for you, but rest assured – there’s more to My Lady Jane than meets the eye.

“An excellent soundtrack and an endlessly cool lead”

High Fidelity

An excellent soundtrack, an endlessly cool lead, and a future Oscar winner in the supporting cast – what more could you want from a TV show? Hulu’s adaptation of Nick Hornby’s novel gender-swapped the lead, turning Rob from a moody John Cusack, as he was portrayed in the film from 2000, to an equally moody Zoë Kravitz. Rob, now short for Robyn, is the owner of a perpetually empty and yet still operating record shop in Brooklyn, and the show follows her attempt to find out why she has thus far been so unlucky in love through reconnecting with her ‘Top Five Heartbreaks’, aka her exes. The show’s soundtrack alone should make you watch it (Questlove served as a music supervisor), but if that’s not enough, Debbie Harry cameos.

“Sometimes good quality, mindless reality TV is the only thing you need”

Now for some cheats, if you’ll indulge me, I’d like to add a couple of shows that you should only watch one season of (that counts right?!)…

Love Island USA Season 6

Love Island USA Season 6 reminded me of what made the early seasons of the UK edition so good – the fact that people didn’t go on thinking they were going to be celebrities when they left, allowing for both more drama and humanity. This was apparently the first season that really took off in America and I can see why – it’s got some of the best reality TV moments I’ve ever seen (Rob’s almost Shakespearean martyring of himself and jumping into the pool for dramatic effect, I’m looking at you). It’s just a fact that sometimes good quality, mindless reality TV is the only thing you need, especially after a long day of revision. And don’t worry if you’re worried that watching that many Americans will be too annoying – clearly the producers did too, and so several of the cast members are actually from the UK and Australia!

Veronica Mars Season 1

Before she was Eleanor in The Good Place, Kristen Bell was Veronica Mars, a teenage girl moonlighting at her father’s private detective agency. And before Mamma Mia, Amanda Seyfried was Veronica’s murdered best friend. The first season of Veronica Mars revolves around the murder of Lily Kane, but the show is so much more. It works as both a teen drama, and a murder mystery, and is just a fun time. What’s more it was quite the star-maker, featuring pre-fame performances from Leighton Meester, Krysten Ritter, and Jessica Chastain, as well as the aforementioned Bell and Seyfried. The later seasons are also good, but series one is by far the best and works as its own stand-alone mini-series. Plus, as a bonus for Housewives fans, Lisa Rinna and Harry Hamlin play one of the main character’s parents!