Television
The Best of the Week
SATURDAY JULY 22
The Coroner (Prime, 7.30pm). It was a daytime drama series in the UK, but it’s good enough for early evening here:
Claire Goose plays a solicitor who returns to become the coroner in her home town in South Devon. There’s a light murder-mystery and unresolved sexual tension with the boyfriend who broke her heart (Matt Bardock), who is now a detective. Poldark’s Prudie (Beatie Edney) scrubs up to play Goose’s mum. Devon looks lovely as well: locations include Dartmouth, Torquay and Broadsands Beach.
SUNDAY JULY 23
Little Big Shots (TVNZ 2, 8.00pm). Talent and dating shows: television hasn’t changed much since the 1950s. Steve Harvey, who hosts the American Family Feud, presents a kids’ talent show, which could be equal parts amazing and sickening. In other talent-show news, it’s the final of Britain’s Got Talent on Saturday (TVNZ 1, 7.00pm).
On Thursday, a new season of First Dates Australia begins (TVNZ 2, 8.30pm), the one that mercilessly eavesdrops on singles at restaurants.
Sunday Theatre: Resolve
(TVNZ 1, 8.30pm). This week’s dramatisation is a story of bravery and tragedy, and it was made despite opposition from its subject’s friends and family, who mounted a petition. Pana Hema-Taylor ( The Brokenwood Mysteries and Westside) plays Christopher Crean, the New Plymouth man who took a stand against gang violence in 1996 and paid with his life. Crean had witnessed a Black Power attack against Mongrel Mob members in his neighbourhood and was willing to testify. Black Power members made several attempts on his life before fatally shooting him in October. Four men were convicted of his murder and Crean’s death gave the New Plymouth community the courage to stand against the gangs. Crean was posthumously awarded the New Zealand Bravery Decoration, but his family have suffered mightily since.
MONDAY JULY 24
Scandimania (Choice TV, 4.30pm). Is Scandimania still a thing? It’s a virus that slowly infected the UK from
2011, when Danish series The Killing screened on Channel 4, and has gone from scratchy Faroe Islands jumpers to “hygge” in six short years. Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall investigates what the Danes, the Swedes and the Norwegians are getting right in this three-part series.
Home Fires (Vibe, Sky 006,
8.30pm). As in, keep them burning, because it’s World War II in rural England, and the ladies of the Women’s Institute are stepping into the breach. The female-focused series was hugely popular in the UK, which makes ITV’s decision to cancel it all the more perplexing. The second, and final, season begins in 1940; Czech soldiers arrive in the village of Great Paxford. It’s a fabulous excuse to dust off all the WWII clothing, props and paraphernalia in Britain, if it wasn’t already being used for The Halcyon (see page 64), that is. The cast includes Francesca Annis, Samantha Bond and Fenella Woolgar.
TUESDAY JULY 25
Delicious (UKTV, Sky 007, 9.30pm). Dawn French and Emilia Fox, together at last. This four-part series was a stocking-filler in the UK last Christmas, a fun foodie comedy-drama about the wife and ex-wife (Fox and French) of a famous chef (Iain Glen). It’s also great promotion for Cornwall, which looks gorgeous, especially the lovely Pentillie Castle on the banks of the River Tamar.
WEDNESDAY JULY 26
Offspring (TVNZ 1, 8.40pm). Forgive us for thinking that this Aussie series was toast: to be fair, it was cancelled after season five, then brought back for a (presumably) last hurrah. Nevertheless, here’s season seven of the adventures of the Proudman family, in particular Nina (Asher Keddie), who is now in a relationship with Harry (Alexander England) and worried, as always, about its effects on her daughter Zoe. Keddie told the Herald Sun that she was determined that Nina would “grow up this year”, which will be a relief to all.
Chicago Justice (Prime, 8.30pm). Dick Wolf’s Chicago franchise ambitions are complete: with Chicago Justice, the über-producer completed the Fire-PD-Med circle of trust, right up until it didn’t; Justice was cancelled after one season. Strike Back’s Philip Winchester plays square-jawed Assistant States Attorney Peter Stone (son of Law & Order’s Ben Stone), a man of principle bringing the bad guys to account after the emergency services have done their duty. As with Law & Order, Justice uses ripped-from-the-headlines stories: the first episode is based on a fire in an Oakland warehouse last year that killed 36 people.
The Blacklist: Redemption (TVNZ Duke, 9.40pm). Tom from The Blacklist gets his own show: it does not go well. In this spin-off, Ryan Eggold teams up with Famke Janssen, who plays the head of a private military contractor who, you know, does the jobs the CIA doesn’t like to. There are silly missions, shoot-outs, split screens, technology. It lasted eight episodes.
THURSDAY JULY 27
Insecure (SoHo, Sky 010, 9.00pm). Issa Rae’s awesome, awkward comedy returns for a second season; having lost her
boyfriend at the end of season one (which screens as a box set on Saturday), there’s plenty of cringe-inducing Tinder dates to come. Meanwhile, her best friend, Molly, a lawyer, discovers that her white male colleague earns more than she does. At the opposite end of the scale is Ballers, the Dwayne Johnson comedy, which returns for its third season at 8.30pm.
Insert Name Here (TVNZ Duke, 10.00pm). The Sue Perkinshosted panel show pops over to TVNZ Duke, which is fast becoming Home of the British Panel Shows that Are Not QI. They’re really just excuses for comedians to be funny: this competition is based on famous people with the same name. Team captains are Josh Widdicombe and Richard Osman.
FRIDAY JULY 28
Return to Uluru: Bruce Munro (Sky Arts, Sky 020, 8.30pm). British artist Bruce Munro has become known for his largescale, site-specific installations known as Field of Light, but he’s rather outdone himself with his largest to date, Field of Light Uluru, an installation of 50,000 solar-powered spheres of light covering 49,000sq m near the iconic Australian inselberg, Uluru. Munro describes it as an expression of the joy he felt when he visited Uluru in 1992 with his fiancée, now wife, Serena. This doco looks at Munro’s life and work leading up to the installation.