Complex, manipulative, dangerous… Words that, until a few years ago, you may not have associated with many female television characters.

Often one-dimensional and nearly always in secondary roles to their male counterparts, it’s only relatively recently that television has begun to truly satiate the demand for female-led drama – and it’s about time.

After enjoying female-centric productions such as Broadchurch, Victoria, Vanity Fair and Unforgotten, picking up the baton this spring is a new four-part ITV drama, Cheat – a twist-packed psychological thriller starring former Coronation Street star Katherine Kelly and the BATFA award-winning Molly Windsor.

The drama hones in on the dangerous relationship between university professor Leah (Kelly) and her student Rose (Windsor). What seems to be a simple case of a student plagiarising an essay snowballs into a devastating chain of events. Writer Gaby Hull told Deadline that Cheat will “explore our closest relationships and how they construct and deconstruct our characters in the most fundamental, exciting, and in this case, extreme ways”.

Why we need to see more good and bad female characters