sun 17/08/2025

tv

Apple Tree Yard, Series Finale, BBC One

Jasper Rees

Guilty or not guilty? Dum dum, dum dum. No, it was not just in your imagination. As the axe hovered over the neck of Yvonne Carmichael at the climax of Apple Tree Yard, and the madam forewoman waited to deliver the jury’s verdict, there was an entirely synthetic and deeply irritating pause for dramatic effect. Guilty of the murder or manslaughter of George Selway? Dum dum. Dum dum. Or innocent? Dum dum.

Read more...

The Good Karma Hospital, ITV

Adam Sweeting

There's nothing like a tale set in a warm, exotic climate to lure in the viewers in damp and wintry northern Europe. Send the Nonnatus House midwives to South Africa for Christmas! Shoot a ridiculous detective drama in Guadeloupe! Go back to the Raj with Channel 4's Indian Summers!

Read more...

Cheetahs: Growing Up Fast - Natural World, BBC Two

Marina Vaizey

Oh clever title: cheetahs, when fully grown at about 18 months, are the fastest mammal on earth, clocking 70 miles per hour in short bursts. For this documentary, we were in the magnificent country of Zimbabwe, in all seasons, following a cheetah family which uncharacteristically lived in forest as well as river plain.

Read more...

Endeavour, Series 4 Finale, ITV

Mark Sanderson

There were signs of a collision as early as the second series. The event loomed larger in the third last year and last night, after an actual car crash, it finally happened: Endeavour became interchangeable with Midsomer Murders. How are the mighty fallen.

Read more...

Francis Bacon: A Brush with Violence, BBC Two

Adam Sweeting

Francis Bacon died in April 1992, aged 82, but heaven knows how he managed to live that long.

Read more...

Who Do You Think You Are? - Ian McKellen, BBC One

Jasper Rees

Science has yet to determine whether thespians are the product of genetic predetermination. We all know about the Foxes and Redgraves, myriad self-spawning dynasties of actors bred of actors wed to actors, while there are plenty of others who go about their fathers’ and mothers’ business. But we also know that there will never be another McKellen.

Read more...

Case, Channel 4

Jasper Rees

Another night, another woman battered/strangled/raped/murdered. On Sunday a pregnant woman was brutally slapped about by her husband in Call the Midwife, while Emily Watson’s character in Apple Tree Yard was the victim of a punishment rape. And so it continues in Case, the latest Nordic noir to make its way here, this time from Iceland.

Read more...

Apple Tree Yard, BBC One

Mark Sanderson

Only the final 60 seconds of this first episode of Apple Tree Yard could have been described as a psychological thriller. We know Dr Yvonne Carmichael is in the dock – the genetic scientist was shown handcuffed in a prison van right at the start – but we don’t know what she is supposed to have done.

Read more...

Homeland, Series 6, Channel 4

Adam Sweeting

The big surprise of this new-season opener of Homeland was that black ops specialist Peter Quinn (Rupert Friend) didn't die at the end of series 5 after all, despite the fact that we last saw him apparently moribund in his hospital bed, having penned a poignant adieu to sometime paramour Carrie Mathison. But, after surviving a hefty dose of sarin gas, he isn't the man she used to know.

Read more...

Meet the Trumps: From Immigrant to President, Channel 4

Jasper Rees

Tom Lehrer famously declared satire dead when the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to Henry Kissinger not long after he'd bombed Cambodia back to the Middle Ages. Lehrer never wrote another song. Meanwhile other satirists battle on. Every day delivers fresh material to work with.

Read more...

Pages

 

latest in today

'We are bowled over!' Thank you for your messages... ...
Oslo Stories Trilogy: Love review - freed love

Love was the Norwegian climax of Dag Johan Haugerud’s Oslo trilogy, the most lovestruck vision of his city and boldest prophesy of how to...

Music Reissues Weekly: The Residents - American Composer...

George & James was originally released in March 1984. Stars & Hank Forever! emerged in October 1986. The two LPs were...

Frang, Romaniw, Liverman, LSO, Pappano, Edinburgh Internatio...

Right from the bracing brass fanfare that began this Sea Symphony, you know exactly where you were: right in the midst of the deck, with...

Edinburgh Fringe 2025 reviews: Ordinary Decent Criminal / In...

Ordinary Decent Criminal, Summerhall ...

Edinburgh Fringe 2025 reviews - Emmanuel Sonubi / Joz Norris

Emmanuel Sonubi, Pleasance Courtyard ...

Album: Dinosaur Pile-Up - I've Felt Better

The history of popular music is littered with bands who...

Alien: Earth, Disney+ review - was this interstellar journey...

Ridley Scott’s original Alien movie from 1979 was an all-time sci-fi/horror classic, and even an endless stream of sequels and spin-offs...

Unmoored review - atmospheric Swedish noir set on Exmoor

“When have you ever gone off alone?” scoffs Magnus (Thomas W Gabrielsson) when his wife, Maria (Mirja Turestedt), expresses the wish to go to...

Edinburgh Fringe 2025 reviews: Kinder / Shunga Alert / Clean...

Kinder, Underbelly, Cowgate ★...