Feeling lazy after a busy bank holiday seeing pals? Well, luckily for you there’s some incredibly TV to look forward to this week.
So settle down and get stuck into Netflix’s new adolescent drama Heartstopper.
Or hang on… Is that another season of Better Call Saul? Don’t mind if we do.
Or head over to StarzPlay for a dive into the old Watergate Scan**l in Gaslit. How fitting!
Netflix
Heartstopper
Coming out – is it a big deal or isn’t it? Being gay or bi or whoever you want at school, is that possible or do too many kids still have to hide their true selves?
This drama, based on Alice Oseman’s popular graphic novel, takes all of those issues on board but never gets weighed down by them.
Instead, it’s the fledgling chalk-and-cheese romance between nerdy Charlie (Joe Locke) and sporty Nick (Kit Connor) that takes centre stage and is allowed precious room to breathe, making for a sweetly told but never sickly tale.
The one dislike click on this old-school modern romance? There’s no sign of Emiliana Torrini’s classic tune Heartstopper on the soundtrack.
Available from Friday.
Russian Doll
The ‘difficult second season’ tag has particular resonance here because the first run of Natasha Lyonne’s inventive comedy about trying not to die over and over at her own birthday party – watch it long enough and it starts to make sense – wrapped things up pretty neatly.
But Lyonne created a character (Nadia), who may or may not be herself, that was too good to pass over so Russian Doll is back – and playing by a whole new box of tricks.
Available today.
Better Call Saul
We won’t get stuck into a debate as to whether prequels can ever surpass the original that begat them but there’s a case to be made that Better Call Saul is every bit the equal of Breaking Bad, if not better.
Bob Odenkirk as sly legal sparrow Jimmy McGill and Bryan Cranston as teacher-turned-crystal-meth-maker Walter White. What will happen when those two meet in the middle… oh we already know.
The first half of the final (sixth) season) is available now.
Apple TV+
They Call Me Magic
You’ve got to be some player to wear the nickname ‘Magic’ lightly on your broad shoulders but when Earvin Johnson was firing on all cylinders for the LA Lakers in the 1980s, there was no one to touch him.
Basketball fans, still caught up on the hoop reverb from The Last Dance, will slam dunk this homage.
Available from Friday.
StarzPlay
Gaslit
Is there any new light to be thrown on the Watergate affair that unseated President Richard Nixon?
This starrily cast drama aims to do so by training the spotlight away from the front of the White House to players in the wings.
Sean Penn and Julia Roberts star as attorney general John Mitchell and his wife Martha, two cogs in the Scan**l wheel.
Episode one available Sunday.
