Trigonometry

Sexy, frank, realistic, and lovable, this unique series is definitely for adults, particularly the kind of adult who prefers character development over a plot-driven narrative. Whole moments go by in Trigonometry in which Gemma, Kieran, or Ray are doing something ordinary, like making pasta or showering a night's worth of club glitter off. Still, lustrously photographed and echoing the rhythms of real life, it's enrapturing. The three main characters emerge immediately as specific people. Ray is still tentatively feeling her way into an adult life after a past sacrificed to the Olympics. Gemma is launching a restaurant in an iffy neighborhood on a shoestring. Kieran is shredded by night shifts as an EMT in chaotic London.

The chemistry between the three feels genuine, too, and though the setup sounds gimmicky at first blush, it winds up feeling like something that could happen between people who meet up at a liminal time in their lives, who are young and beautiful and only just calcifying into adulthood with the soft and fuzzy borders that often accompany that process. The emotion and heat is helped along by the gorgeous piano-heavy score, and by the visuals, which make workaday London look every bit as romantically European as audiences could wish for. Trigonometry could have skewed seamy and exploitative. Instead, it's something much more surprising: sweet and easy to like.