Making out at the drive-in; creating a song and dance in the domestic science class; mooning at the pep rally. All those are crucial rites of passage if you live in the jazz-hands world of retro US teen musicals. Grease: Rise Of The Pink Ladies ticks those boxes for its glossy origins take on one of the all-time great irreverent adolescent jamborees (not the greatest, though, that’s Rock ’n’ Roll High School, of course).

The handsomely appointed action takes place four years before Sandy and Danny enter the picture. We briefly meet the young Rizzo and Frenchie as tweenagers, channelling the original performances. But this is the story of their older sisters (new-girl nerd Jane from New York, South Asian fashion obsessive Nancy, Latino rebel Olivia, and tomboy Cynthia) taking on the mean girls, stupid studs, and Principal McGee with her xylophone.

The Rydell High of 1954 is more racially diverse, the locker room talk is no joke, and the issue of consent is at least hinted at. But this Grease is slick rather than slippery, a Glee-ful time warp to an era which has been done to death with no new twists in the tale across its first couple of episodes. Don’t tell me more, don’t tell me more . . .

Episodes available to stream on Paramount+.