Whether it's a result of Fringe success, a further development of a work-in-progress or simply the consequence of The List's ability to remain one step ahead, the Edinburgh Fringe has plenty of shows that won't get a review this year because we have already done one. Here are ten shows which impressed audiences last year, or on tour across Scotland, and the responses to them that deserve to be rescued from the nether regions of the internet.

Lovecraft ★★★☆☆
Carys Eleri and Wales Millenium Centre
Underbelly, Cowgate, 13–25 Aug (not 19), 10.40pm
The frankness and honesty of her stories creates a sense of intimacy and complicity. As Eleri confides her personal history of past relationships, the audience nod, groan, and laugh with recognition and sympathy (there's a lot of shared pain over Tinder in particular).

The Fishermen ★★★★☆
New Perspectives
Assembly George Square, 19–24 Aug, 12.15pm
Gbolahan Obisesan's adaptation of Chigozie Obioma's novel is a gruelling journey through family conflict that begins with the reunion of two brothers (Michael Ajao and Valentine Olukoga). While their exchanges seem innocent enough, the scenography suggests a prison and the consequences of a prophecy have left one brother free and the other imprisoned. Gradually, they reveal the terrible events that broke them apart, and the legacy of death and destruction that tore through their family.

Status ★★★☆☆
China Plate and Staatstheater Mainz
Assembly George Square, 17–24 August, 10.25am
The anger and rage are legitimate enough, but Thorpe only ever considers his privilege in terms of his British passport and whiteness. Gender is noticed, especially in his conversation with the ghost of a woman who died attempting to cross into Europe and the waitress at a rooftop bar in Singapore, but his liberal sympathies never translate into an attempt to shift attention away from his own angst. Racing across the USA in a beat-poet style adventure, he has an encounter with a Native American, who provides obligatory wisdom and a reproof to the white man's romanticism, before returning to the UK and apparently embracing the nation in all its confused glory.

Medea Electronica

Medea Electronica ★★★★☆
Pecho Mama
Pleasance Courtyard, 19–26 Aug, 1.45pm
How to reinvent Greek tragedy, step one: strip back the story to the absolute basics. A man betrays a woman who takes excessive revenge. Lend Medea some sympathy but do not flinch from her extremity and make a visual reference to Pasolini's wonderful film at the end.

Man on the Moon ★★★☆☆
Keisha Thompson
Summerhall, 20–25 August, 7.10pm
Many of the most interesting questions proposed by Keisha Thompson's autobiographical exploration of fatherhood within the Black British experience go beyond the performance itself to examine the potential of contemporary theatre as a medium for the discussion of ideas and identity. Using a simple structure – a monologue interspersed with songs – Thompson uses a journey to visit her emotionally, if not geographically, distant father to consider how his eccentricity reflects deeper social issues.

It's True, It's True, It's True ★★★☆☆
Breach Theatre
Underbelly, Bristo Square, 16–26 Aug (not 17), 1pm
It struggles to reconcile its desire to celebrate the female artist with the wretched violence enacted on her – the attempt at a comic scene mocks the cheapening of harassment but undermines the seriousness of the trial, while the rendition of 'Gloria' abruptly shifts the mood to triumphant defiance without grounding the lyrics (a rather ambiguous story of male sexual triumphalism made uncanny by Smith's version) in the events of the play. This clumsiness aside, however, It's True is a raw and forceful example of intelligent and emotive feminist dramaturgy.

Electrolyte

Electrolyte ★★★★☆
Wildcard
Pleasance Courtyard, 31 Jul–26 Aug (not 3, 10), 5.20pm
Narrated throughout by an extended spoken-word script from the play's protagonist, the audience are given a privileged insight into the thoughts and perspectives of Jess. Other impressive elements include the voice and musical performance of Maimuna Memon as singer-songwriter Allie Touch, and the spot-on breaking of the fourth wall, often to comic effect.

dressed. ★★★★☆
ThisEgg and Made My Wardrobe
Pleasance Courtyard, 20–25 Aug, 12.10pm
Experimental, provoking and daring, dressed. combines pained singing, expressionistic dancing, awkward comedy and live sewing to add layers of meaning to Lydia's story. Although these disparate elements can at times endanger the piece into veering off course, the powerful thematic undercurrent, fearless questions and charged performers ensure that it never loses sight of the issues.

Square Go ★★★★☆
Francesca Moody and SEARED
Roundabout @ Summerhall, 31 Jul–25 Aug (not 1, 6, 13, 20), 9.15pm
Max and Stevie are in the school toilets, awaiting Max's first square go with school hardman Danny Guthrie, who is no doubt going to give him a 'guaranteed pumping'. With the scent of Lynx Africa in the air and a strawberry lace in mouth, Square Go dismantles small town toxic masculinity with an uppercut of humour.

Father
Francesca Bartellini
Greenside @ Infirmary Street, 2–24 August (not 11, 18), 8.50pm
Having previewed at the Tron in advance of a run at the Fringe, Francesca Bartellini's intense monologue Father does not lack ambition. Addressing the conflict between humanity and the environment, with the abuse of a daughter becoming a vicious symbol for the male abuse of the planet, this one woman show never flinches from its critique of religion and toxic masculinity; nor the narratives of ecological disaster that are promulgated by the media in an almost ritualistic attempt to appear to be acknowledging the threat, yet without leading to any action for change.