Tolkien rubbish
A couple of years ago, in that near-forgotten era when we could travel almost freely, I canvassed social media as…
I saw a film today, oh boy
My late friend Alexander Nekrassov loathed the Beatles, which I used to think was a wantonly contrary position akin to…
Formula milquetoast
If it weren’t for this job I sometimes wonder whether I’d even bother watching TV at all. This mood strikes…
How’s your father?
I was turned on to Midnight Mass by Ricky Gervais who raved about it in one of his social media…
Dutch courage
The Forgotten Battle is a Dutch feature film commemorating the desperate and relatively little-known Allied assault on the Scheldt estuary…
Heart and Seoul
Should we be worried that Squid Game is the most popular show in Netflix’s history? If it’s a case of…
Man and boy
So how exactly did Tony Soprano become a New Jersey mob boss? It’s 1967 and young Anthony is struggling to…
Sub standard
Tense, claustrophobic, gripping, thrilling, realistic: just some of the adjectives no one is using to describe BBC1’s Sunday night submarine…
White mischief
Every now and then, you see a new series — Succession, say, or Chernobyl or To the Lake — which…
Cosy catastrophe
When the apocalypse comes, I want it to be scripted by a 1970s screenwriter. That’s my conclusion after watching the…
Marathon man
I’ve not been allowed anywhere near the TV remote control this week because of some kind of infernal sporting event…
The totalitarian handbook
How to Become a Tyrant(Netflix) is ideal history TV for Generation No Attention Span. Presented in six bite-sized chunks by…
The best thing on TV ever
I’ve been trying to avoid the house TV room as much as possible recently because it tends to be occupied…
Agricultural revolution
I was at a party the other day when who should accost me but Jeremy Clarkson. There were lots more…
The only way is Israel
Tragically it wasn’t my turn to review when Channel 5’s groundbreaking Anne Boleyn came out so you’ll never find out…
Skins in togas
I’ve been looking at the reviews so far of Sky’s new Romans series Domina and none seems to have noticed…
Under the radar
I’d been expecting the BBC to make a dreadful hash of The Pursuit of Love, especially when I read that…
‘Where are the Rambos?’
James Delingpole talks to comic-book writer Mark Millar about the joy of Catholicism, our sorry lack of male action figures and his childhood superpower
My rekindled love for the BBC
Here’s a thought that will make you feel old. Or worried. Or both. The poke-fun-at-celebrity-houses series Through the Keyhole —…
Ill-judged sanctimony
I’m really not enjoying Your Honor, the latest vehicle for Bryan Cranston to play a good man driven to the…
So damned French
For the past few weeks I have been binge-watching the Netflix series Call My Agent! (or Dix pour cent, as…
Nothing to see here
Calls is the very antithesis of televisual soma. In fact it’s so jarring and discomfiting and horrible that I think…
The Covid Macguffin
Why do current events read like a bad movie?
Dumb and dumber
Here’s a worried question I want to plant in your head: when is TV drama going to start depicting the…
Three plots for the price of one
ZeroZeroZero is the impossibly exciting new drugs series from Roberto Saviano — the author who gave us perhaps my all-time…
