wed 13/08/2025

tv

Tigertail review, Netflix - a story of immigrant opportunities, taken and missed

Markie Robson-Scott

“Crying never solves anything.

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Alma's Not Normal, BBC Two review - bare-knuckle comedy pilot hits the spot

Adam Sweeting

Creating the opening episode of a new comedy series is like flipping pancakes with one hand while playing the Moonlight Sonata with the other. You have to introduce your characters and invent the world they live in, while squeezing in enough plot to keep the action moving.

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Return to Belsen, ITV review - Jonathan Dimbleby retraces his father's journey to a nightmare world

Adam Sweeting

When the notorious Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in northern Germany was liberated by the British 11th Armoured Division on 15 April 1945, the BBC’s reporter Richard Dimbleby was there to record the occasion.

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Ozark, Series 3 review, Netflix - money-laundering saga hits new heights

Adam Sweeting

While not the most headline-catching show on Netflix, Ozark has been steadily accruing critical accolades (including a couple of Emmys) and a devoted audience. Perhaps this superb third series will mark the tipping point where Ozark crosses over from cliqueishness to mass adulation.

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Mark Kermode's Secrets of Cinema, BBC Four review - the undying allure of the spying game

Marina Vaizey

Mirrors and windows, looking at ourselves or out into the world, reflecting the culture or making it: compare and contrast. This was the subliminal debate in Spies (BBC Four), the latest instalment of Mark Kermode’s essays on the history and trajectory of movie-making, with some mention too of that complementary form of film, the television programme.

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The Trip to Greece, Series Finale, Sky 1 review - bittersweet swansong for the cantankerous comrades

Adam Sweeting

Could this mock-mythic journey, emulating the trek homewards to Ithaca of Homer’s hero Odysseus, really be the final series of The Trip (Sky 1)? Or will Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon see sense, and realise that they’ll never have as many free lunches as this again?

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Pen15, Sky Comedy review - the horror of adolescent schooldays revisited

Adam Sweeting

The cringe-making horror of adolescent schooldays is vividly re-lived in this US import (on Sky Comedy), but with a cunning twist. Its supposedly confused and hormonal leads are played by 30-somethings Maya Erskine and Anna Konkle, who blend themselves in with a cast of actual 13-year-olds with uncanny skill.

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The Steph Show, Channel 4 review - magazine show debuts from host's front room

Veronica Lee

As we are learning each day during lockdown, necessity is the mother of invention. In Channel 4's case, it is learning how the wonders of modern technology can save a situation: to wit, The Steph Show was meant to come live daily from a shiny new studio in Leeds Docks, but yesterday debuted from host Steph McGovern's front room in North Yorkshire. 

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Batwoman, E4 review - can Bruce Wayne's female cousin fill his bat-costume?

Adam Sweeting

The Marvel Cinematic Universe has been saturating the globe with its multi-format superheroes, leaving its DC rival looking clumsy and disorganised by comparison.

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Rock ‘n’ Roll Island: Where Legends Were Born, BBC Four review - remembering rock's big bang

Liz Thomson

“Friday night is Amami night” – that was the ad that ran from the 1920s through to the 1950s for a brand of “setting lotion”, a delightfully old-fashioned term. Those were the days when young women stayed home and did their hair, in preparation for a Saturday night out.

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