There hasn’t been much good news inside the CBC in recent months.

From the loss of Hockey Night in Canada to budget cuts to the Jian Ghomeshi scandal, the public broadcaster has taken several roundhouse kicks to the face. Some days, as it limps around, with puffy eyes and bleeding from the nose, it’s easy to forget the corporation is still capable of throwing punches of its own.

One of those blows landed last week with the premiere of Schitt’s Creek (Tuesdays, 9 p.m.). Despite its sophomoric title, the new sitcom is not just a welcome addition to prime time: it is one of the best CBC comedies in years.

The pilot, which attracted an impressive 1.36 million viewers, begins with an establishing shot of a Bridle Path-type mansion. Inside, the wealthy Rose family — patriarch Johnny (Eugene Levy), his wife Moira (Catherine O’Hara) and their young adult kids, David (Daniel Levy) and Alexis (Annie Murphy) — is lurched into crisis when federal agents swoop in to repossess their pricey belongings.

Falling back on a TV trope — riches to rags — the Roses are now broke, thanks to a shady business manager. The only asset the government is not snatching is the deed to a backwoods town, the titular Schitt’s Creek.

Johnny bought the town in 1991 as a gag gift for his hipster son. But now facing homelessness, a second TV trope — fish out of water — is checked off and the snooty and dysfunctional clan is forced to relocate. They soon find themselves literally up Schitt’s Creek, without a paddle or disposable income, a reversal of fortune that’s further exacerbated when they check into a rickety motel and meet the town’s uncouth mayor, Roland N. Schitt (Chris Elliott).

I know what you’re thinking: dude, this doesn’t sound all that interesting.

And that’s kind of the point.

Over the past four decades, as the “situation” in “sitcom” became something of a misnomer, the most memorable comedies increasingly placed a creative premium on character, relationships and dialogue.

That’s why it’s often impossible to explain the appeal of great TV comedy to someone who has never watched an episode: “Yeah, Cheers was about this bar in Boston and the regulars who drank there. Ah, Seinfeld was about these four neurotic New Yorkers who didn’t do much of anything. WKRP in Cincinnati was, let’s see, about this radio station in Ohio.”

This is also why Schitt’s Creek is off to such a dazzling start. Plot is the least of it. As with shows such as Arrested Development or Curb Your Enthusiasm, what we have is a canvas for smart writing, for future in-jokes, for throwaway lines and subtle asides delivered with deadpan precision.

The pilot’s closing scene, an exterior shot of the motel at night, playfully spoofs the earnest “goodnights” of a show such as The Waltons, mixing in the dark and twisted sensibility of so many single-cam comedies:

“Let’s all pray we don’t wake up,” an unseen Moira tells her shell-shocked family, right before the closing credits.

That was the point where I decided Schitt’s Creek is a show worthy of my limited time, a show I want to follow this season. I want to hear more of O’Hara’s histrionics, the unhinged shrieks mastered in the sketch comedy trenches that you can’t teach in acting school. I want to see more of Levy’s priceless reaction shots. Then there’s Chris Elliott, an actor who never gets enough praise for his comedic timing.

“My very soul has been kidnapped,” says Moira, as her designer baubles are boxed and carted away by agents. “There’s no ransom. No one’s coming to save me.”

Co-created by Eugene Levy and Dan Levy, Schitt’s Creekgained viewers for its second episode, which aired last week right after the pilot. The show also had more online views over its first week than any other CBC comedy in history.

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One new show will not save the CBC. But this little show is a definite building block, a flash of content that is radiant instead of radioactive.

And if nothing else, it should be a reason for the CBC to smile.