Raised by Wolves is the latest comedy pilot from Channel 4 and it’s an instant gem if the first episode is anything to go by. It’s intelligent and down-to-earth all at the same time, while keeping you locked into laughs throughout the show. There’s only one episode available at the moment, but hopefully there’ll be a full series in the offing, because it’s easily one of the smartest new comedies we’ve seen in a few years now.
Written by bestselling author and columnist Caitlin Moran along with her sister Caroline, the show is a modern day adaptation of their own childhood in Brighton. With lots of brothers and sisters, a zero attendance record at school and a limited financial resource pool somehow the Moran kids apparently managed to be literary aficionados, culturally astute, funny, inquisitive and wise beyond their years. All of these traits have now been wrapped up into the pilot of the show and we can’t recommend it enough.
The story for Raised by Wolves swaps the sea breeze of Brighton for a council estate near Wolverhampton in which sisters Aretha and Germaine live with their left-wing mum Della Gary, their younger sisters Yoko, Mariah and Cher (all named after and toddler brother Wyatt. None of the kids go to school, and find themselves mixing horror movie megathons with references to Austin and Jung, while battling their one task for the day, mowing the lawn.
In the pilot episode there’s a cavalcade of random events that string together to make up their day on the council estate, including Della’s righteous speech in a supermarket car park, a road trip with their grandad to get his stash back from his recently estranged wife’s house (check out the videos below to get a glimpse for yourself) and minor scrapes with the school going kids of the neighbourhood from the relative safety of their un-mown front garden. If the series does get taken up in full, hopefully every episode will be just as packed with brilliance.
The cast is literally pitch perfect. Rebekah Staton is excellent as the questionable, vaguely militant matriarch of the family, delivering some of the best lines in the episode with nonchalant ease. She’s backed up by the none-stop stream of great comic dialogue between Helen Monks as elder sister Germaine and Alexa Davies as the flame haired second sister Aretha, taking in everything from garden shed revenge to Germaine’s infatuation with local yob, Lee Rind. Gramps is also a crucial character and Philip Jackson pulls the role of the slightly degenerate grandad with great comic timing.
The setting of the council estate adds a lot to the potential of the show, especially with the Black Country accents that it brings with it. As well as being the perfect location to add to the comedy might of the show, the setting of the Midlands also contributes one half of the genius double meaning of the title, referring to both the family’s proximity to Wolverhampton as well as their relative parental guidance.
In addition to a brilliant storyline, backdrop, cast and characters the pilot has one of the best soundtracks we’ve seen on any TV show for ages. The pilot episode included an amazing singalong to “I Touch Myself” by the Divinyls on the road-trip with Gramps and one hell of lot of Electric Light Orchestra’s “Don’t Bring Me Down”.
Raised by Wolves is a hilarious new comedy with a hell of a lot more intelligence than the average sit-com. If you haven’t seen the pilot yet, it’s still on 4OD and you should definitely check it out, and if you’ve got any influence on the decision for the full series you should do everything you can to make it happen.
Raised by Wolves review: 5/5
