I last had a haircut on October 16th. Along with a hefty proportion of the population, I’m looking forward to the salons re-opening, but not just because my ends are splitting like Kim and Kanye. Every time I go there, I believe that this will be The Time. The moment when my re-style finally achieves what I’ve dreamed of – the tumbling locks of Cheryl Cole at the height of her X-Factor fame, or maybe Reese Witherspoon’s careless waves in The Morning Show, or perhaps – and this is a stretch – Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio’s ringlets in The Abyss. Sometimes, I even find myself lusting after Marge Simpson’s cobalt bouffant, simply because it doesn’t hang in useless grey rats’ tails, like my own. I loathe my hair, and am always seeking manespiration on screen, so I can show a photo to my poor stylist, who has to find new ways to tell me that I can never look like Carey Mulligan or Halle Berry, or Emilia Clarke in Game of Thrones. What will I take when I go back this month? Why, a picture of Kaley Cuoco in The Flight Attendant, for she is a modern-day Farah Fawcett.

Those of you who are happy with your hair, or indeed uninterested in coiffure generally, can rest assured that this is a cracking series anyway, though I warn you I’m going to wax lyrical about the versatility of Kaley’s ‘do while we taxi to the runway. I wouldn’t go so far as saying it’s the star of the show, but it does sit on top of the star, so there’s no escaping it. You’ve just got to appreciate that layered fringe, the mile-high ponytail, those burnt blonde highlights and the full-on 70s glamour when it all comes down. It’s serious hair. The TV show? Well, that’s pretty cool too, so pour yourself a G&T, get yourself comfortable and I’ll take you through the demo.

The Flight Attendant is about a burning-the-candle, knocking-back-the-shots air stewardess called Cassie Bowden, who, on a flight run to Bangkok, hooks up with one of her passengers, Alex Sokolov, and wakes up in a hotel room to find him dead in bed next to her. Not just dead, but brutally murdered, his throat slit from ear to ear. It’s a bloodbath, and she’s understandably freaked out by her previously oblivious proximity to the slashed corpse. HTF did this happen? Cassie proceeds to make all the worst possible choices about her situation, failing to call the police, phoning her BF to quiz her on Amanda Knox, cleaning up the crime scene, doing a runner, visiting the dead guy’s office back in New York, etc etc. If there’s a stupid thing to do, she does it, and it’s thoroughly entertaining watching her lose her shit, in between going to bars to get wrecked. Cassie is one smoking-hot mess, further complicated by the fact that she’s hallucinating exchanges back in the hotel room, with dead-Alex, who wakes up to try and help her make sense of it all.

There are also flashbacks to some sort of childhood trauma involving Cassie and a dead deer; maybe a hunting incident? It all adds up to her being a massive headcase, even before this happened. And now she has to work out how this happened. But she keeps being distracted by her penchant for vodka, and the fact that she still has to turn up for work, even though she’s being investigated by the FBI and followed by a mysterious woman (the She-Devil from Sabrina) who may have been there the night Alex was killed. Honestly, there’s more intrigue than a Bridgerton orgy, and it’s all tremendous fun; sharp and witty dialogue, plus a lead who more than matches her hair for flair and bravura. Kaley Cuoco’s performance is nail-bitingly, gloriously good, on a knife-edge of nerves, frantic guilt, and Bacchanalian recklessness. She brings a manic Vanessa Kirby energy to the show, and – unlike her character – holds it all together magnificently.

So get yourself on board – and when the salons open, show your hairdresser a pic of Cassie Bowden and say you want that one. Just make sure it’s not a photo of her in bed with a blood-soaked corpse, because that would be a whole different kind of cut.

• The Flight Attendant, 8 episodes, Sky One