This Is The Most Likable Character From Derry Girls
Netflix has worked tirelessly over the last several years to corner the market on memorable teen shows, and one of the streaming service's best international acquisitions to date is Channel 4's Derry Girls, a riotously funny comedy created by Lisa McGee that is set in Northern Ireland in the 1990s.
With the decades-long period of unrest known as the Troubles as its unique backdrop, the coming-of-age series follows four teenage Irish girls — Erin (Saoirse-Monica Jackson), Michelle (Jamie-Lee O'Donnell), Clare (Nicola Coughlan), and Orla (Louisa Harland) — and their English friend James (Dylan Llewellyn), who is the only boy at an all-girls Catholic school, as they embark on numerous wild adventures and find themselves in increasingly absurd situations. While the show is easily one of the funniest on TV at the moment, moments of sincerity and emotion are layered throughout its story to create a well-balanced show about family, friendship, and the perils of teenagerhood.
But not all Derry Girls characters are created equal. There is one person who stands out as being more likable or sympathetic than all the others, and surprisingly, it's the show's honorary Derry girl, James.
Derry Girls' James stands out in more ways than one
At the beginning of the series, James moves to Derry with his mother while she goes through a rough divorce. But when she decides to return to London without him, he ends up staying with his aunt Deidre and cousin Michelle, becoming the first and only boy to ever attend the Catholic all-girls school in town. This, in addition to him being English, obviously makes him stand out from everyone else in the show. He's also the only male who isn't an adult. But even though he's an outsider in Derry and is forced to put up with a lot, especially from Michelle, who has no filter and thinks she can say whatever she wants to him, James quickly becomes one of the girls.
Of course, they also regularly pick on him and often dismiss his feelings and opinions, but nevertheless, James is always by the girls' side, ready, if not necessarily always willing, to participate in whatever wild shenanigans they have cooked up in any given episode. But what really makes James stand out from everyone else is his innocence. He's kind and easy going, with a more mild personality than any of the girls, and it is these qualities — and the fact he's often the sole voice of reason — that easily make him the show's most likable character.
It's been easy for the girls to overlook James over the course of the show's two seasons (a third season will begin filming in 2021), but once his mother returns, and it looks like he might leave Derry for good, Erin, Michelle, Clare, and Orla all realize how much they like him and just how important he is to them and their small circle of friends. It's like they also know he's the best of all of them.
Seasons 1 and 2 of Derry Girls are streaming on Netflix.