When Birds of a Feather returned to television after 15 years, no one could've predicted what happened.
The first episode was watched by almost 8 million people and peaked at 9.5m. Making it their highest rating sitcom since Barbara in 2000 and consistently rated higher than ITV's flagship sitcom Benidorm.
I have to admit that when I first heard that the birds were reuniting, I was a little bit concerned. The original was so good and so memorable that I was worried it wouldn't translate to the modern day, and if I'm honest the move to ITV from BBC worried me somewhat.
But I needn't have worried because it was brilliant, and that was thanks to an original cast and the original writers being on board for the revived series. In fact, the series was so successful that as soon as it ended, ITV announced that it had commissioned a second series which begins on Boxing Day with a Christmas special, Birds On A Plane.
Linda Robson, Pauline Quirke and Lesley Joseph all return to play Tracey Stubbs, Sharon Theodopolopodos and Dorien Green. Tracey's son Travis is played by Pauline Quirke's real-life son, Charlie Quirke and her other son is played by Samuel James, the role which Matt Willis from McBusted played in the last series.
In the Christmas special, Birds On A Plane, Dorien treats Sharon and Tracey to a Christmas trip to Tenerife, but with Tracey’s fear of flying, Sharon’s hopes for adventure and Dorien’s eagerness for anything in trousers.
Will they actually get to the Tenerife or will they remain in Chigwell for Christmas? Well you'll have to tune in to see, but either way, one thing's for sure, it's a very entertaining episode and sets a great tone for the rest of the series.
In the second episode, There's Something About Sharon, Dorien gets the bright idea that Sharon could be the heroine for her next book, and Tracey’s got her hands full with a rather despondent Garth.
And I'm not allowed to speak about anything that happens from episode three onwards but it's onwards and upwards from there... a delightful comedy that's just good fun.