Season one had a dramatic through-line that culminated in Bridgette attempting to track down her father-abuser, ending in a Tinder "date" and a teary j’accuse; it opened with title cards, quote, and music echoing Woody Allen's Manhattan. Join the dots, people.

Season two plays with the titular acronym (Single Mom I'd Like to F---) with variations that serve as episode titles. It's less overtly comedic than season one, but more thematically ambitious. There's a whole episode devoted, Roma-style, to the staff of Ally (Connie Britton), a spoiled, lonely, depressed and secretly lesbian housewife whose kids Bridgette tutors. Another is an extended dream sequence modelled on Pretty Woman; a third (which I haven't yet seen, because it's still in the editing suite) is structured as a feminist Western.

Though Shaw is the undisputed focus of the series – which is based on a 2015 short film of the same name that she wrote, directed and starred in – she has able support in Rosie O'Donnell, magnificent as Bridgette's bipolar mother Colleen (aka Tutu). Raven Goodwin is also terrific as Eliza, the best friend Bridgette met in an eating-disorders support group. Confounding easy stereotypes, the black Eliza is supported by a wealthy father, and more or less at ease with her obesity.

As Nelson Rose, the girlfriend of Larry's father Rafi (Miguel Gomez), Australian actor Samara Weaving is, I suspect, channelling her compatriot Teresa Palmer; Palmer is in real life married to actor-director Mark Webber, the father of Shaw's real life 11-year-old son. It's not an altogether flattering portrait, but it's not entirely cruel either – not cruel enough, anyway, to prevent Webber appearing in the recurring role of a priest (he and Palmer also scored thank-yous in the credits to the 2015 short film, so things are presumably not too prickly between them).

But all this overlapping of real life and fiction turned a little less cosy in December when Shaw was accused of "unprofessional" behaviour in the handling of sex scenes involving Weaving and Gomez. As a result, Weaving has reportedly been released from her contract – which included a no-nudity clause – and will not appear in the event a third season of the show is ordered by ABC Studios in America.

In those reports, Shaw was also accused of segregating writers on the basis of race. No formal complaints were filed, but ABC is reportedly still investigating.

Whatever the eventual findings, it would be a great shame if Shaw's alleged failings as a manager were to overshadow her undeniable achievements as a creator.

She claims the set of SMILF was a genuinely "intersectional workplace in which more than a third of writers were women of colour". She also claims almost half the people employed on the show were women.

None of which is in itself reason to watch SMILF. But the fact it is an unusually inventive, challenging, empathetic and funny show about some of the more marginalised people in society just might be.

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