TVreviews

MAYANS M.C. Saturday 2, BBC Two

This spin-off from the hit American crime drama Sons of Anarchy revolves around a drug-running Mexican biker gang based in a fictional California border town. The protagonist is an intelligent and secretly sensitive young beefcake who’s struggling to cope with a violent lifestyle he never intended to adopt. It’s hip, stylish and boasts a great soundtrack, but those cosmetic details only serve to highlight a nagging lack of depth and pace. The characters and storyline aren’t exactly compelling, it feels like we’ve been here a billion times before. Sons of Anarchy fans might welcome this expansion of its universe, but it’s a slog for the uninitiated.

AFRICA WITH ADE ADEPITAN Sunday 3, BBC Two

The ebullient wheelchair basketball player began his informative journey around Africa – “the most exciting continent on the planet” – with visits to Cape Verde, Senegal, Ivory Coast and Nigeria (where Adepitan was born). Celebrity-fronted travelogues are often bland affairs, but this one digs beneath the sunny scenery to expose a bleak trail of tragic, brutal history and worrying present-day problems. Adepitan met fishing-reliant communities almost entirely descended from slaves and their European masters. These impoverished, hardworking people are still having their resources stolen by foreign interlopers. As one despairing fisherman put it, “There’s another kind of slavery now.” Adepitan also met Nigerians scarred by civil war. A commendably thoughtful series.

THE DEFIANT ONES Friday 8, BBC Four

When legendary producers/moguls Dr Dre and Jimmy Iovine sold Beats Electronic to Apple for $3 billion in 2014, it was one of the biggest deals in music history. Fast-paced, witty and irreverent, this documentary miniseries traces the unusual story of two men from working-class backgrounds, one AfricanAmerican, the other Italian-American, rising up the ranks and forming a powerful alliance. The dynamic duo have some of the biggest names in the business on speed-dial, hence the presence of talking heads such as Snoop Dogg, Bruce Springsteen, Bono and Eminem.