The 18-Episode British Sitcom So Iconic, Netflix Is Bringing It Back After 12 Years

Published Sep 9, 2026, 11:00 AM EDT Ben Sherlock is a Tomatometer-approved film and TV critic who runs the massively underrated YouTube channel I Got Touched at the Cinema. Before working at Screen Rant, Ben wrote for Game Rant, Taste of Cinema, Comic Book Resources, and BabbleTop. He's also an indie filmmaker, a standup comedian, and an alumnus of the School of Rock. Whether it’s Basil Fawlty goose-stepping through his hotel or Alan Partridge getting crushed by a cow or David Brent doing an impromptu dance routine for charity, British sitcoms have a way of getting under your skin. From Fleabag to The I.T. Crowd, us Brits are the world leaders in cringe comedy. It would be tough to name the cringiest comedy in British television history, because there are so many strong candidates — Mark and Sophie’s wedding on Peep Show was as much a horror movie as it was a sitcom — but The Inbetweeners has to be one of the frontrunners. Where Skins had presented a very sensationalized, scandalous portrayal of Britain’s youth, The Inbetweeners was much closer to what most people’s teenage years were actually like. The agonizing awkwardness, the mind-numbing mundanity, the ruthless bullying, the juvenile insults, the incessant foul language, the dating disasters, the public humiliations — The Inbetweeners captured every last bit of it in all its horror. Across 18 episodes, The Inbetweeners lampooned every relatable foible of a lower-middle-class upbringing in the UK, and it ended on a beautifully bittersweet note with the four lads enjoying one last hoorah, destroying Simon’s car, and vomiting all over each other. Then, they came to the big screen. The Inbetweeners Is Being Revived Again (This Time On Netflix) Image via Netflix In the summer of 2011, a little under a year after Channel 4 had aired the series finale, Film4 released The Inbetweeners Movie. As far as sitcom-to-cinema translations go, it was pretty successful. Following the cast on a lads’ holiday to Malia, The Inbetweeners Movie felt big enough to justify the move to a theatrical experience — those sun-soaked beaches really popped on the silver screen — while still retaining the charm and intimacy of the original series. Then, three years later, the movie got a sequel, The Inbetweeners 2, that made all the mistakes the first film had avoided. They just made another movie for the sake of making it, and they went a lot bigger but lost what made The Inbetweeners so special in the first place: the emotional bonds between these fragile young men. Both the series finale and the first movie had ended the franchise with a bang, but The Inbetweeners 2 left it on a whimper. Now, a full 12 years later, Netflix is reviving the property for yet another movie. The streamer just announced that The Inbetweeners 3 is in production, with Simon Bird, James Buckley, Blake Harrison, and Joe Thomas all reprising their iconic roles. Series creators Damon Beesley and Iain Morris are coming back to write and direct the threequel, so I’m cautiously optimistic. The Inbetweeners In Their Mid-30s Is Either Genius Or A Film Too Far The Inbetweeners 3 could either be really great or a complete disaster — it doesn’t seem like there’s any in-between, so to speak. It could either end The Inbetweeners on a high note after the underwhelming second movie, or it could turn out so bad that it retroactively harms the legacy of this modern classic. So much of The Inbetweeners’ humor is tied to the characters being teenagers, so revisiting the same characters in their 30s could either be an ingenious twist on the formula or a total misfire. Jay making up stories about having orgies with celebrities was charming and cute when he was a clueless child, but it might come off as creepy (or even more hilariously pathetic) as he approaches 40. Simon continually pining after Carli, no matter how many times she rejects him, was funny when he was 18 and thought he had his whole life figured out, but it’ll just be sad in his mid-30s. It’ll be difficult to translate those characters’ adolescent personalities into adulthood, but if they get it right, it could be a fitting final chapter for The Inbetweeners saga. The Inbetweeners Release Date 2008 - 2010-00-00 Network MTV Cast Henry Lloyd-Hughes Mark Donovan John Seaward John Webster