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Prime Suspect 1973, ITV

Jasper Rees Friday, 03 March 2017

The prequel is here to stay. In the end every popular TV drama flogs itself to death. The star wants out, or the writer dies, or the original source material runs dry, or the public falls asleep. And there’s nowhere else to go. Nowhere, that is, apart from back in time. Hence the retro-fitted Endeavour and Gotham and Better Call Saul.

Dispatches: Under Lock and Key, Channel 4

Saskia Baron Thursday, 02 March 2017

Five years ago BBC Panorama went undercover, sending in a reporter with a hidden camera to expose the horror going on at Winterbourne View, a hospital for people with learning disabilities and/or autism. There was outrage as the nation watched Winterbourne’s patients being tortured, degraded and abused by staff.

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The Replacement, BBC One

Adam Sweeting Wednesday, 01 March 2017

Can women have it all? (Stop me if you’ve already heard this one). This is the premise of Joe Ahearne’s new three-part drama, set in the offices of a successful firm of architects in Glasgow. But he’s a bloke, what would he know about it?

Meet the Lords, BBC Two

Adam Sweeting Tuesday, 28 February 2017

To Westminster and Meet the Lords, a series which Radio Times assures me follows “the larger-than-life characters” in one of our “most idiosyncratic and important institutions”.

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Broadchurch, Series 3, ITV

Adam Sweeting Tuesday, 28 February 2017

The first series of Broadchurch was a gigantic hit four years ago, though 2015’s follow-up suffered a bit of a slow puncture. Can this third and supposedly final outing restore the show to its former glories?

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The Swingers, Channel 4

Jasper Rees Friday, 24 February 2017

Can something be gained in translation? From its title The Swingers promises much. Much more than the original Dutch title Nieuwe Buren, which the caption in the opening credit sequence translates as The Neighbours. Someone in syndication has asked themselves the question: who the hell watches Dutch TV dramas called The Neighbours (aside from captive Dutch audiences...

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Roots, BBC Four

David Nice Thursday, 23 February 2017

Those of us who saw the first, 1977 TV adaptation of Alex Haley's Roots in our teens still remember the shock and horror at its handling of a subject about which we knew little, American slavery. We know a lot more now, but the visceral reaction to inhumanity and injustice is no less strong.

The Halcyon, Series 1 Finale, ITV

Mark Sanderson Tuesday, 21 February 2017

A screaming comes across the sky. It has happened before, but there is nothing to compare it to now…

Storyville: Life, Animated, BBC Four

Saskia Baron Tuesday, 21 February 2017

Slipped out in the Storyville slot without much fanfare, Life, Animated is the Oscar-nominated documentary which won a theatrical release and rave reviews in the US and UK last year.

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SS–GB, BBC One

Adam Sweeting Monday, 20 February 2017

“What if the Germans had won the war?” has been a recurring theme in fiction, from Noel Coward’s Peace in Our Time to Philip K Dick’s The Man in the High Castle and Robert Harris’s Fatherland. There was even a predictive pre-war “future history” version, in the form of Katherine Burdekin’s 1937 novel, Swastika Night.