... and here’s your next summer boxset binge
HERE’S THE LOW-DOWN ON THE TELEVISION SHOWS WE’LL BE OVERINDULGING ON THIS SUMMER. THE ONLY BAD NEWS IS THAT THE LATEST SEASON OF THE AMERICANS — THE BRILLIANT CULT SLEEPER SHOW ABOUT A FAMILY OF KGB AGENTS UNDERCOVER IN SUBURBAN WASHINGTON — WON’T BE BACK UNTIL EARLY NEXT YEAR TWIN PEAKS SEASON 3 SKY ATLANTIC, TONIGHT, MAY 21
TONIGHT’S the night. Twin Peaks, the show that addicted and influenced a whole generation, is back – and even in this age of TV deluge its return, nevertheless, manages to feel like an event even before it’s happened. The trailer gives away little but, delivering just snatches of images, it crackles with atmosphere and promise. The cast list – returning originals Kyle MacLachlan, Madchen Amick, Sherilyn Fenn, David Duchovny, as well as newbies Naomi Watts, Monica Bellucci, Laura Dern – is enough to drive up peak anticipation. Meanwhile, David Lynch, the show’s creator, and one of the greatest directors of our time (Mulholland Drive topped a BBC Culture poll of greatest films of the 21st century) has said he’s not making any more films: “The things that were doing well at the box office weren’t the things that I would want to do.” So this reboot is the one place to go for a new Lynch fix. Daniel Nevis, chief executive of the cable channel Showtime, has said it is “a pure heroin version of David Lynch”.
GAME OF THRONES JULY 17, SKY ATLANTIC.
THE penultimate season is almost with us and it’s short, at only seven episodes – which means that already it feels like the countdown for the end has begun. News, however, that spin-offs are planned will be a comfort for Throners. The new series begins with Cersei, Queen of Westeros, Jon Snow, King of the North, and Daenerys, Mother of Dragons and Freer of Slaves, on her throne. New faces we can look forward to are Ed Sheeran in a cameo, apparently planned as a surprise for superfan Maisie Williams (Arya Stark) and Jim Broadbent in a major role which he describes as an “archmaester” and “old professor character”.
RIVIERA JUNE 15, SKY ATLANTIC
OSCAR-WINNING screenwriter Neil Jordan is behind this heady mix of Riviera super-rich luxury and murder mystery – a show that reeks of the kind of heady Mediterranean glamour that The Night Manager delivered. Julia Stiles stars as a newly-wed bride whose billionaire husband is killed when his yacht explodes. Soon, as she tries to work out what happened, she finds that there are dark and seamy secrets. The trailer tells us just what the show is about, rolling out to the Flying Lizard’s hit Money (That’s What I Want) and delivering lines like “There is nothing as rigorous as money”. Maureen Ryan at Variety has described it as “slick” and “satisfying”.
GYPSY JUNE 30, NETFLIX
Naomi Watts is the bad therapist, the one you never want to get, in this show that ladles on the sex and intrigue around her character who gets her kicks from getting inappropriately involved with people in her clients’ lives. Sam Taylor-Johnson, the former Turner Prize-nominated artist and director of the first Fifty Shades Of Grey, directs.
POLDARK JUNE, BBC1
The world’s favourite bare-chested scyther returns – though the last series saw Poldark increasingly reveal he’s not quite the admirable hero he once seemed. And among the big questions of the new series is, who’s the daddy? Is Elizabeth’s child actually the son of Ross Poldark?
HOUSE OF CARDS MAY 30, NETFLIX
“We bring the terror” ... The capo di capo tutti of boxsets returns – but how on earth can the fantasy world of an ultra-depraved White House madness live up to what is going on now for real in Trump World? Frank and Claire Underwood are back and they are as kick-ass mean and crazy as ever. She’s the quintessential ice maiden and he’s a cross between Bill Clinton and American Psycho. “The American people,” Underwood says in the trailer for the fifth season of House Of Cards, “don’t know what’s best for them ... I do. I know exactly what they need. They’re like little children.” Shivers ...