Overwhelmed by choice in the TV schedules? Toby Earle is here with a pick of the best shows on the box.
This week, help re-open The X-Files, watch the astonishing true story at the centre of UWantMe2KillHim? On London Live, and return to Sarah Lancashire’s not really that very Happy Valley.
Here’s a few suggestions of what to watch this week.
The X-Files, Monday, Channel 5, 9pm
Wait, what’s that strange light in the sky? Oh, it’s obviously a weather balloon and in no way an extraterrestial vehicle, nor have I been pressured by sinister government agents dressed all in black to say that. Not that Fox Mulder would believe me.
A genuine pop culture phenomenon which made superstars of David Duchovny and Gillian Anderson, The X-Files’ presentation of minor-to-vast series-defining conspiracies perpetrated by governments was infectious, subversive, and even at times comical. Barring a full-blown musical episode, there was no genre the show didn’t touch; what pressure then for X-Files creator Chris Carter for this brief six-episode run.
So what has he delivered in the first episode? A very ‘X-Files’ X-Files adventure which ticks off all the key elements: Mulder and Scully reuniting, references to their personal and professional past, the crash of an alien craft, a former government employee disclosing the existence of aliens, alien abductions, an abductee with psychic powers, and a new, unconsidered threat to keep up with the times.
It’s is a scene-setter, complete with a very odd first two minutes which recaps the entire show’s premise as if Mulder is reminding himself what it is that he used to spend his time doing. Not a classic, but, oh, that chemistry between Duchovny and Anderson - that’s still otherworldly.
Happy Valley, Tuesday, BBC1, 9pm
When the first series of Happy Valley was scheduled in the same week as the first series of Fargo, there was a danger that it would be swamped by the excitement zipping around the transfer of the Coen brothers’ grisly Minnesota nice farce to TV.
Such danger was swatted away before the end of the first episode. Though Fargo was the best TV show of 2014 (and perhaps even last year), Sally Wainwright’s work generated a buzz to match that of Broadchurch’s first series, fuelled by Sarah Lancashire’s formidable performance as police sergeant Catherine Cawood.
There were depths to Cawood’s hurt and rage which Lancashire allowed to flash to the surface, before this fury sunk again, a small ripple left where it momentarily basked. Cawood’s dormant turmoil was teased out by Tommy Lee Royce, Wainwright supplying a callous and cowardly human to balance the fortitude of Cawood; James Norton’s indifferent cruelty made Royce as much as Royce made him a star.
Expectation is piled upon Wainwright to match or better her ratings and critical success and she has found a way to achieve this - demand Cawood thwack a sheep over the head with a rock. That’s how to grab an audience’s attention. This spot of battlefield veterinary medicine introduces us to a long-dead body (I’d say more but I’ve been threatened with arrest) and an excellent new cast of Julie Hesmondhalgh, Kevin Doyle, Amelia Bullmore, Vincent Franklin, Shirley Henderson, and Katherine Kelly. There’s a storm coming in this crackling opener and the script raises the hairs on the back of your neck.
UWantMe2KillHim, Thursday, London Live, 10pm
This is a story so convoluted it couldn’t possibly be real, other than in the mind of a soap writer on an away day instructed to concoct a year’s worth of plot which avoids the usual murders, kidnappings, or monorail hostage situations that dog our dear serial dramas.
It is almost inconceivable that truth is at the heart of this award-winning film, a story which made British legal history earlier this century. Produced by X Men and The Usual Suspects director Bryan Singer, and starring Joanne Froggatt, Toby Regbo, Jamie Blackley, and Jaime Winstone, UWantMe2KillHim continues to be a relevant warning of how the anonymity of the internet can be warped by parties with ulterior motives. Some of which might never even be discernible.
This psychological thriller finds popular schoolboy Mark enter into an exclusive online relationship with Rachel, a girl he believes to be in a witness protection programme and who requests he stick up for her brother, John, who happens to be in Mark’s class. What follows is murder, an approach from MI5, and a demand that Mark commit a crime - what’s wrong with an old-fashioned online argument over the secret messages hidden in Dana Scully’s hairstyles?
First Dates: Be My Valentine, Friday, Channel 4, 9pm
A confession – I’m drifting away from a show I was once head-over-elbow in love with, a show I would have done anything for, a show that I even introduced to someone else’s mum and dad. At the end of the majority of episodes this series I’ve retreated from the telly, swathed in a melancholy from the lack of successful matches and a dearth of happiness. In other series there was a blend of both; this run has been sadder than a northern white rhino lonely hearts column. And now we have a Valentine’s special. Oh, the woe.
Those of you who share this deflation will tense your stomach muscles in anticipation of the sucker punch when this begins with a charming pair who share a love of cosplaying. Neither of their choices promise much of a happy future; one dresses as a character from the Xbox HALO games and the other as Daenerys from Game of Thrones – environments where Cupid’s arrows are dipped in scalding poison.