C5's dodgy thrillers are the ultimate TV guilty pleasure

Dark secrets, domestic strife and a bunch of soap stars make for ridiculous but addictive dramas, says Katie Rosseinsky

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All you wanted was a kitchen extension. But instead of spending your days picking out marble countertops and shopping around for one of those fridges that dispense ice cubes and sparkling water, you're mired in a planning permission dispute that has torn your quiet street apart. Your oddball neighbours keep ominously gesturing towards their flower beds, as if to suggest that’s where you might end up if you don’t back down with your building plans that might encroach on your shared wall. You’re being blackmailed by a builder who you vaguely recognise from Coronation Street. Oh, and your husband is definitely sleeping with your best mate, who conveniently happens to live next door.

Is this a particularly mundane version of hell? Nope, just the plot of The Feud, a six-part series starring Jill Halfpenny that aired on Channel 5 last month. Well, more accurately, it’s some of the plot. There’s also a storyline about one of the Derry Girls platonically catfishing Halfpenny’s character’s daughter in order to exact some tenuous revenge. Plus a strand featuring Neil’s dad from The Inbetweeners keeping tabs on everyone using long distance binoculars. Oh, and Larry Lamb from Gavin & Stacey is somehow involved, too.

Feeling overwhelmed already? Welcome to the exhausting, but somehow exhilarating, world of the Channel 5 thriller, where everything is at once completely banal and totally bonkers. All you can do is surrender to the madness – preferably while pouring out a glass of red wine and sighing, like every single female protagonist labouring under the weight of a Dark Secret in this thriving televisual micro-genre.