How about entertainment we *can*stomach?!

Glow is amazing, I wasn't expecting to like it
ha ha, yeh, the whole idea gave me the boak initially. but was surprised as it went on the sorts of themes it dealt with. It's a good mixture of fun, sharp humour and emotional intensity. i cried buckets when the third season ended.

Motherland.

Halt & catch fire as PP said is brilliant (& I am not at all a tech /programmer person!)

I really enjoyed GLOW too - didn’t expect to!

Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries is my comfort blanket - 1920’s Australia female detective

Glow is amazing, I wasnt expecting to like it, but it was very well done.

Also I'd add Call the Midwife.

I've really enjoyed three comedies/comedy dramas on Netflix. One is Glow. Sounds dreadful on paper - about female wrestlers. Saw the ad and though, yuk, no! but caught the trailer and it made me laugh so gave it a chance. was soon addicted. very funny, great characters, and actually quite emotional. great analysis of female friendships, the dilemmas of trying to be feminist while also just trying to get through real life etc.(also a subtle look at the conflicts between different strands of feminism) Wonderful. very cleverly written. It was created and written by women. Another is Great News. The whole cast is brilliant, but i love the fact that one of the funniest and most prominent parts is an older woman. It's about a struggling young tv producer whose mum joins the company as an intern. Tina Fey is one of the writers, and she also makes an appearance in some episodes, including one which is a really clever satire on sexual harassment in the workplace. The third is Dead To Me. Just completely over the top daftness, hilarious. It's just great to see two really funny interesting women in a drama. My partner watched all three of these with me and loved them (especially Great News) so just goes to show it's a myth that men won't/can't enjoy funny women/writers. we've actually watched Great News twice now and both agreed that it is the first thing since Father Ted that is one of those shows you can watch again and again and still fall about laughing at.

Seconding Discovery - plenty of well-rounded women, including a butch lesbian engineer; half the bridge crew is female and so's the protagonist. Definitely passes the Bechdel test. Fair warning though: the third season's touted as having a transgender character and a non-binary one so hopefully that won't be handled in a wokey-wanky way.

Anything Reese Witherspoon produces (I’m not a mega fan despite the username!). She’s really into stories told by women. Off the top of my head: Wild, Big Little Lies, The Morning Show, Little Fires Everywhere.

I used to like The Women - but rewatched recently and found it hard to stomach but can’t put my finger on why. The characters aren’t really that fleshed out, they almost seem caricatures if women (the career one, the serial mother, the executive housewife, the tramp and the token lesbian). But I like the general concept re: cast.

Happy Valley, Last Tango in Halifax, Unforgotten - love anything starring Sarah Lancashire and/or Nicola Walker. Nicola Walker in Anneke Stranded on BBC Sounds is also very good.

Not a suggestion for a film or show, but instead a streaming service MUBI which has lots of international, independent and older films and shorts. I have seen some really wonderful things on there, many featuring interesting female characters and/or directed by women.

We loved Orphan Black. The main character is a no-shits-given female and she has many clones!! Plenty of strong and resourceful female supporting characters too.

Going back a long way, but there are several series of the sitcom “Surgical Spirit”, about a fabulously feisty female consultant surgeon Sheila Sabatini, (who eats her male colleagues for breakfast and has a brilliant line in sarcastic putdowns!) played by Nichola McAuliffe if I remember rightly. There are plenty of other good female characters too, including the theatre manager and the nurses. It was such a mould breaking series when it came out, having a female lead in a male dominated profession, with such uncompromising attitudes, wit and strength. Her evil toothy grin as she crushed and outwitted the male opposition was a tonic for oppressed women everywhere!

YY to Mary Beard. I also really like Lucy Worsley's historical programmes and books.

20 Feet From Stardom on Netflix. About all the female backing singers, mostly unsung (pardon the pun), without whom the likes of Mick Jagger would have sounded ordinary.

Anything with Mary Beard in it, I love her and her enthusiasm for history!

In sci-fi, most of Star Trek is ok; the latest ones ( Discovery and Picard) have a lot of women in important roles.

Enola Holmes was fab!

Another vote for gentleman Jack

Female led drama:

Unbelievable on Netflix is fantastic but shocking - it's based on a true story, and some might find it harrowing.

Sensitive Skin and Good Girls (both on Netflix).

I enjoyed watching Hong Chau in film Driveways.

I mentioned some in the other thread. Gentleman Jack, as already mentioned. Vida - someone recommended it to DH. if I'd read about it first I'd have been put off, and there's a bit more sex than I'd have chosen but it's definitely women-centred with some good characters. Definitely meets the OPs hope for some lesbians!

Halt and Catch Fire - maybe particularly interesting for me having been in software albeit a different type since the era covered. It has some very good female characters.

Unorthodox is brilliant.

Also the much missed Victoria Wood. Always brilliant. Women at the heart. She wouldn’t have wasted her time with the current BS.

Yy to Tenko and Cagney and Lacey.

I would happily watch Cagney and Lacey again. It was one of my favourite programmes as a teen in the '80s. The two lead characters were incredible: complex, realistic, relatable and aspirational. I want to say it was ahead of its time, but actually, I feel like we have gone backwards since those days.

For Sci-Fi, The Expanse is pretty great. I was a bit put off initially as the first series has a noir style detective plotline with a detective becoming obsessed with the missing woman he's searching for and imagining a whole relationship they never had. But every single character who recognises his obsession tells him how creepy he is and nothing about it is ever played as anything other than fucked up. While at the same time the main female characters are pretty great. Most especially Chrisjen Avasarala and Bobbie Draper.

And in many cases the women are expanded on hugely in the tv series compared to the books. Especially Cara Gee's Camina Drummer.

Unfortunately though, it's now marred by the sexual misconduct allegations against one of the male leads Cas Anvar which are currently being investigated.

Lily Tomlin in film Grandma. One of my favourite films even though it's not my usual thing.