TVON DEMAND We dig out the hidden gems so you don’t have to... DEATH TO 2021
NETFLIX, SKY/NOW, DISNEY+, BRITBOX, DISCOVERY+ & GLOBE PLAYER NETFLIX SATIRE
JFK: DESTINY BETRAYED SKY DOCUMENTARY
Having already directed the epic movie JFK, Oliver Stone returns to the subject for this fourpart documentary which, it’s claimed, offers new insights into the assassination of President Kennedy (above) in 1963. The project also reunites Stone with one of the movie’s stars, Donald Sutherland, who, along with Whoopi Goldberg, provides the series’ narration. From Tuesday
MARE OF EASTTOWN SKY/NOW DRAMA
For many, this seven-part drama set in a working-class town in Pennsylvania was the TV highlight of the year. Kate Winslet is detective Mare Sheehan, who is investigating the murder of a teenage girl while dealing with difficulties in her personal life. Winslet’s mantelpiece is already groaning under the weight of awards, but she is sure to bag more for this, arguably a career-best performance, while Evan Peters as Mare’s smitten police partner and Jean Smart as her sarcastic mother are also a joy to watch. Quite an achievement to have a show featuring both some of 2021’s most harrowing scenes and some of its most hilarious. Available now
STAY CLOSE NETFLIX THRILLER
Several of Harlan Coben’s pacy thrillers have been adapted for Netflix, as part of a 14-show deal, in Spanish (The Innocent) and Polish (The Woods), but those in English – Safe and The Stranger – are more gripping, with fine casts. This eight-episode series stars James Nesbitt, Richard Armitage and Cush Jumbo in a twisty tale of secrets and lies concerning a detective and a cold case (Nesbitt), a failed photojournalist (Armitage) and a working mum-of-three (Jumbo).
From Friday
THE FLIGHT ATTENDANT SKY SHOW
When the hardpartying, flirtatious flight attendant Cassie (Kaley Cuoco, left) wakes to find that the man she tumbled into bed with the night before is covered in blood and dead and she can’t remember what happened, she flees in a panic. By her own admission,
Cassie is a ‘public nudity, yelling on the subway drunk’ rather than a slit-a-guy’s-throat kind of drunk, so finding out what really happened is at the heart of this fast-moving, fun, eight-part black comedy with a hint of Hitchcock. Available now
A HIDDEN LIFE DISNEY+ FILM
The release of a new Terrence
Malick production is something of an event – he’s directed only ten films in a 48year career. His most recent effort, which received its premiere at the Cannes Film Festival in 2019, is an epic historical drama featuring the final performance of Michael Nyqvist. The plot follows the story of Austrian farmer Franz Jägerstätter (August Diehl), a devout Catholic who refused to fight for the Nazis.
With Valerie Pachner, right.
From Friday
YOUR HONOUR SKY/NOW DRAMA
When Adam Desiato (Hunter Doohan) kills another teenager in a car accident, he doesn’t stick around. His father Michael (Bryan Cranston) – a judge – persuades him to turn himself in but quickly changes his mind when he discovers the dead boy’s father is the local mafia boss. Can he and
Adam cover up the hit-and-run? Available now
GLOBE PLAYER THEATRE
A chance to view stage productions through Shakespeare’s Globe’s on-demand service. The repertoire includes all the shows from last summer, plus 12 other productions such as the award-winning, all-male
Twelfth Night from 2012 starring Mark Rylance and Stephen Fry, and Gemma Arterton in 2014’s The Duchess Of Malfi. player.shakespearesglobe.com;
£59.99 a year or £9.99 per show
CLASSIC FILMS BRITBOX
New to BritBox are some cinematic favourites: Hitchcock’s 1964 movie Marnie, starring Sean Connery and Tippi Hedren, plus the master of suspense’s lesser-known work Saboteur (1942), in which an aircraft-factory worker is wrongly accused of murder. An earlier version of Mary, Queen Of Scots from 1971 stars Vanessa Redgrave as the doomed Mary and Glenda Jackson (left) as Elizabeth; Jackson also features in 1973’s The Nelson Affair, as the vulgar Lady Hamilton to Peter Finch’s Nelson.
Plus there’s the 1933 version of The Invisible Man starring Claude Rains, Gloria Stuart and John Carradine. From Thursday
PETER CROUCH: SAVE OUR BEAUTIFUL GAME DISCOVERY+ DOCUMENTARY
During 2000, when he was still a teenager, the future England striker had a spell on loan at lowerleague Dulwich Hamlet FC. This eight-part documentary follows his progress as he returns to the club as a director, hoping to utilise his skills as a newly qualified coach to push them up the football pyramid. Crouch (above) also hopes his international experience will come in handy, although one wishes he’ll stop short of any robotic dancing goal celebrations… From Tuesday
Last year Charlie Brooker made Death To 2020, a satirical look back at a year many of us would prefer to forget. It went down well with viewers, so he’s taken the same mock-the-year approach to the past 12 months, poking fun at numerous situations and news stories. The cast is to die for – watch out for Hugh Grant, Tracey Ullman, Lucy Liu, Nick Mohammed, Stockard Channing and Brooker’s old mate, Diane Morgan. From Monday
THE SUICIDE SQUAD SKY/NOW MOVIE
The tenth film in the DC Extended Universe is a direct sequel to 2016’s very similarly titled Suicide Squad. Once again, a task force of supervillains is faced with sorting out a tricky situation, this time involving a giant alien starfish known as Starro the Conqueror. It’s fair to assume that it’s not based on a true story. Idris Elba, John Cena, Sylvester Stallone and Viola Davis star, but it’s Margot Robbie (above) who steals the show again as the crazed Harley Quinn. From Sunday
STAR WARS: THE BOOK OF BOBA FETT DISNEY+ SHOW
A Star Wars legend and the galaxy’s most legendary bounty hunter is finally getting his own show, after making a surprise cameo in Chapter 14 of The Mandalorian. Boba Fett (Temuera Morrison) is joined by mercenary Fennec Shand (Ming-Na Wen) as they return to Tatooine, the land once ruled by Jabba the Hutt, to infiltrate the galactic underworld and stake their claim of the territory by any means necessary.
From Wednesday
THE WHITE LOTUS SKY/NOW SHOW
Acerbic social satire about three sets of privileged guests at an exclusive Hawaii resort and their interactions with the staff. Armond (Murray Bartlett), manager of The White Lotus, is exasperated by the demands of the spoilt holidaymakers, including Alexandra Daddario (right), who drive him back to drug abuse. The most loathsome guest is probably student Olivia (Sydney Sweeney), whose performative wokeness melts away when it means she might have to make a personal sacrifice. Available now
YELLOWJACKETS SKY/NOW SHOW
A late entry for one of the best shows of the year. In one timeline we follow a girls’ soccer team in 1996 on their way to a tournament when the plane comes down in a remote part of the Rockies. In the second, we follow some of the survivors in present-day America when they are hiding a terrible secret. Available now
GOMORRAH SKY/NOW DRAMA
The grim but hugely popular Italian drama about Neapolitan gangsters returns for its fifth and final season. Although a hit for Sky, it is not without controversy. In 2019 the mayor of Naples claimed that violent crime increased in the city whenever the show was on, and some say it humanises gangsters. Available now