STREAM IT OR SKIP IT: ‘HOW TO GET TO HEAVEN FROM BELFAST’ ON NETFLIX, A FRESH SERIES FROM THE CREATOR OF ‘DERRY GIRLS’
In the new Netflix dramedy How To Get To Heaven From Belfast, three old friends try to keep their teenage secret safe when they hear their fourth friend, whom they haven’t heard from in 20 years, dies. It’s written by Lisa McGee, who brought us Derry Girls, and it has that same sharp sense of humor.
HOW TO GET TO HEAVEN FROM BELFAST: STREAM IT OR SKIP IT?
Opening Shot: Eerie music plays as we see three teenage girls run with flashlights. They run to an abandoned house in the woods, where a fourth friend is sitting, dazed. “I still dream about that night sometimes. I still dream about them. Because they were there. We did everything together back then. Just the four of us. Separate, but inseparable.” The four girls stare at the house as it goes up in flames.
The Gist: Twenty years later, three of those teenagers — Saoirse (Roisin Gallagher), Robyn (Sinéad Keenan) and Dara (Caoilfhionn Dunne) — are still close. Robyn, a mom of three who is near the breaking point and Dara, who is a talkative, empathic person, live near Belfast; Saoirse, who is the creator of a hit British mystery series, splits time between Belfast and London. They all get an email from the sister-in-law of their fourth friend, Greta (Natasha O’Keeffe), whom they haven’t seen since that incident 20 years prior; she died unexpectedly, and the email invites them to come to her wake in Dongeal.
The three women bicker like old friends as they pick up Saoirse at the Belfast airport and take the drive across the border to Knockdara, the town in Dongeal where Greta lives. On the way, after Dara put petrol in Robyn’s diesel SUV, they’re towed into town by the handsome Liam (Darragh Hand).
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They decide to go to Greta’s house the next day, but decide to get snookered at the hotel pub. With all the women trying to figure out if they’re there to truly celebrate their friend or if they are there to make sure the secret they share stays under wraps. They find out from Liam that Greta fell down the stairs, a death that seems a but suspicious for someone who is their age (38), and Saoirse gets even more suspicious when Greta’s Facebook page suddenly disappears.
When they stumble to Greta’s house the next morning, fighting massive hangovers, they meet Greta’s police officer husband Owen (Emmett J. Scanlan) and their daughter Maria (Matilda Freeman), and reacquaint themselves with Greta’s intimidating mother Margo (Michelle Fairley) and goofy brother Feargal (Ryan McParland). They are all creepy as hell, and the house is strangely devoid of mourners. But when the women go in and see Greta’s closed casket, they find some things about about Greta’s death that send them on a chase that starts with a serious car accident.
What Shows Will It Remind You Of? Created by Lisa McGee, How To Get To Heaven From Belfast has a lot of the same snarky charm as her previous series, Derry Girls. Of course, the middle-aged female-friends-with-a-secret theme is pure Yellowjackets.
Our Take: How To Get To Heaven From Belfast certainly starts like it’s going to be super-dramatic, with all the secrets from this set of friends’ collective past more than hinted to. Greta was the one that the other three girls rescued from that house, and all four of them have the symbol that they found on the wall there tattooed somewhere on them, as a reminder of this pact the four of them had. That tattoo is how Saoirse realizes that something is awry about Greta’s death. Dara separately finds out from Greta’s daughter Maria that the sister-in-law who emailed them doesn’t exist.
So there’s a mystery for these women to solve, as they try to figure out exactly what happened to Greta. And, of course there’s more to their shared secret that needs to be explored. But McGee’s goal seems to be as much about seeing Saoirse, Robyn and Dara using this chase as an excuse for them to get closer as friends once again and for them all to forget their frustrating lives.
We can see this most with Saoirse, who seems to have the most going on with her high-profile job and relationship with her producing partner Seb (Tom Basden). But she falls right away into a flirtation with Liam, and seems to be so annoyed with her show’s stars demands that she essentially would rather end her successful show than kowtow. Robyn talks about her toddler gaslighting her. Dara wants to be less of a people-pleaser. So we can envision this chase being a funny way for the three of them to figure things out as they fight and bond with each other.
And don’t get us wrong, the show is very funny. McGee is especially adept at showing the rivalry between Northern Irelanders and those from the Republic, and offhand jokes like Liam saying to Saoirse that Northern Irelanders don’t usually like to waste petrol have so much history behind them that they’re even funnier. For the most part, though, the humor is going to come through in how Saoirse, Robyin and Dara fare as they figure out Greta’s fate.
Performance Worth Watching: Roisin Gallagher is great at showing how Saoirse may have her stuff together on the surface, but really doesn’t, and she’s not even shy about showing how dysfunctional she is.
Sex And Skin: None.
Parting Shot: On a beach far from Dongeal, a woman in a white robe runs out of the woods. She has a now-familiar tattoo on her hand.
Sleeper Star: Michelle Fairley’s Margo likely scared the crap out of Robyn, Saoirse and Dara when they were teenagers, and she’s equally as intimidating now.
Most Pilot-y Line: Robyn gets emotional when “Greta’s song” is played on the radio. The song? Nelly’s “Hot In Herre.”
Our Call: STREAM IT. How To Get To Heaven From Belfast is a sharply funny examination of how friendships change over time as well as a pretty darn good mystery.
Joel Keller (@joelkeller) writes about food, entertainment, parenting and tech, but he doesn’t kid himself: he’s a TV junkie. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, Slate, Salon, RollingStone.com, VanityFair.com, Fast Company and elsewhere.
2026-02-12T22:08:22Z