thu 28/03/2024

tv

George & Tammy, Paramount+ review - alcohol, violence and heartache in Nashville

Adam Sweeting

Some may consider country music to be corny, sentimental and a relic of a forgotten era. If so, this six-part dramatisation of the lives of Tammy Wynette and George Jones is a reminder of how powerful and soulful the best country music can be, fuelled by raw emotions and personal turmoil.

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Slow Horses, Series 2, Apple TV+ review - Mick Herron’s spies make a welcome return

Helen Hawkins

Apple TV+ is using the arrival of season two of Slow Horses to offer a generous three-month free trial to its streamer service. Ample time to catch up with season one and watch it multiple times before all of season two is available at the end of December. Go for it.

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Tokyo Vice, BBC One review - murder, extortion and corruption in the Japanese capital

Adam Sweeting

There was originally a plan to make Tokyo Vice a movie starring Daniel Radcliffe, but it has ended up as a TV series starring Ansel Elgort. It’s almost certainly the better for it, because the eight episodes of this first season – the way it ends, or rather doesn’t, makes a second helping inevitable – give it space to explore Japanese culture and its often mutually uncomprehending relationship with American or European values.

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1899, Netflix review - Atlantic voyage turns into cosmic nightmare

Adam Sweeting

Baran bo Odar and Jantje Friese won delirious acclaim for their previous Netflix series Dark, a labyrinthine and fantastical account of children vanishing from a small German town. Anyone familiar with its baffling events and leaps across different timelines will probably feel at home with 1899, the duo’s similarly mind-bending follow-up.

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Blood, Sex & Royalty, Netflix review - yo, bros, get down with the GOAT, Henry VIII

Helen Hawkins

“It was like Woodstock on steroids,” opines an expert in Netflix’s new release about the doomed marriage of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn (yes, another one).

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The White Lotus, Season 2, Sky Atlantic review - the sizzling hit drama moves to Italy, but with less fizz

Helen Hawkins

Why did Maui work better than Taormina? Mike White’s second series of The White Lotus, which has relocated for its second season from an upscale Hawaiian resort to the fleshpots of Sicily, is still a worthwhile watch, but it’s hard not to wonder where that special savour has gone this time. 

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The English, BBC Two review - Emily Blunt's date with destiny on the prairies

Adam Sweeting

Writer and director Hugo Blick isn’t afraid of getting stuck into some knotty and morally complicated issues, whether it’s Middle Eastern politics (The Honourable Woman) or the Rwandan genocide (Black Earth Rising), but perhaps he wouldn’t be your automatic go-to guy for Westerns. Nevertheless, here he is, giving it some high-plains-drifter in a baleful tale of revenge, violence and twists of fate.

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The Crown, Season 5, Netflix review - is the royal epic outstaying its welcome?

Adam Sweeting

Now into its fifth season, Netflix’s royal pageant is entering that danger zone where once-majestic TV series suddenly find they’re running out of steam. Perhaps Harry and Meghan’s publicity-hogging shenanigans and the real-life loss of the Queen and Prince Philip have somewhat overshadowed Netflix’s quasi-fictional drama. Perhaps everybody has become sick to death of rehashed versions of the life of Princess Diana.

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SAS Rogue Heroes, BBC One review - rock'n'roll desert warfare from the pen of Steven Knight

Adam Sweeting

Irregular warfare has proved to be a speciality with the British armed forces. This new six-part series, based on Ben Macintyre’s 2016 book, tells the story of the chaotic birth of the Special Air Service during the war in North Africa in 1941, and it's a rollicking ride.

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All Creatures Great and Small, Series 3 finale, Channel 5 review - revived vet show still strikes a popular note

Adam Sweeting

Ben Vanstone, the showrunner for Channel 5’s hit revival of All Creatures Great and Small, originally foresaw it as stretching over four seasons, but has subsequently revised his opinion. With the third series ending and the fourth already in preparation, he now foresees broader horizons. “Everything in this show plays out slower than you think it would,” he commented.

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