When an experiment at a European particle collider goes wrong, space-time is fractured and four teenage friends find their lives propelled in divergent directions.

In a parallel universe, there might be a version of me that doesn’t enjoy sci-fi dramas about parallel universes quite as much as I do. See what I did there?

It’s true though, I’m a particle-colliding sucker for a bit of quantum multiversery, and Parallels, streaming on Disney+, definitely takes me to my happy place (or my sad place, depending on which universe I’m inhabiting). Two episodes in and there’s little that’s particularly surprising. The show could quite easily have the schoolboy-French sub-title – Les Choses Plus Étrange – but the remote French-Swiss border setting feels fresh; the young French actors give assured performances; and the set-up – that the universe divides just as you are about to enjoy your first teenage kiss – is a nicely pitched one.

If I have one quibble, it’s that thirteen-year-old Victor, played by the incredibly talented and charismatic Maxime Bergeron (surely a star in the making), is so utterly lovable it’s hard to believe he is such a dysfunctional trouble-maker that his parents want to send him to boarding school.

But there are enough intriguing twists and conundrums to keep me engaged and I’m looking forward to seeing how it pans out, although, of course, the version I see may be entirely different from the one you get in your universe, which would render this review utterly pointless. 7/10

Martin Jameson