God forbid I am ever diagnosed as terminally ill, but if it happens I shall be buying the complete series of Off Their Rockers and watching it on an endless loop. It wouldn’t actually …
You'd think that after 16 years and 28 episodes, Jonathan Creek might itself creak a little " how many more variations on the locked-room mystery can there possibly be? " but nothing could b…
"He doesn't have the background knowledge to be a traitor. He was just trying to be funny," protests Ethel Wodehouse (Zoe Wanamaker) on behalf of her husband, the world renowned writer, humo…
If the prospect of yet another zombie thriller makes you want to dig your own grave, lie in it and pull a duvet of earth over your head, let me immediately reassure you that BBC3's...
Shetland. I ask you. What a mind-numbingly boring and unimaginative title for a drama. It would be dull enough if the subject matter were a pony or a pullover, but naming a police procedural…
I should like to declare a moratorium on all TV dramas concerning the devastating effect the death/disappearance of a young person has upon a small, close-knit and invariably photogenic comm…
"I don't disturb you when you're working, do I?" snaps stand-up comic Jimmy O at a Comedy Store heckler. "I don't come in the alleyway and knock the cocks out of your mouth." Having honed...
Pity poor Thomas Briggs, catching 40 winks on his evening commute back home only to be bludgeoned across the head and thrown from the luxury of his first-class carriage on to the tracks. Bri…
The Spa stars the incomparable Rebecca Front as the long-suffering head of a health, beauty and fitness centre, where staff and clients alike prove a constant source of grief, inconvenience …
The problem with Dancing on the Edge is that it doesn't have much edge. At least, precious little is to be found in the first two episodes. It has intrigue, atmosphere and ostentation in abu…
Flick around the TV channels any afternoon, and soon they all begin to resemble the amorphous sludge that is ITV2. The exception to this rule is BBC1, which regularly serves up original, inn…
Having achieved a highly commendable runner-up position on Strictly Come Dancing, Dani Harmer's elevated star status is reflected in the fact her former CBBC show Dani's House has been upgra…
On a cold January night, few things warm the cockles more satisfyingly than a large serving of medieval mayhem. Channel 4's new big-budget drama series World Without End has it all " murder,…
Adapted by Dick Clement and Ian la Frenais from the Alan Furst novel, Spies of Warsaw is a two-part drama set in the espionage-riddled, pre-war Polish capital. David Tennant stars as French …
Harry Venning's guide to what to watch on the box this Christmas
My Christmas came early this year, courtesy of BBC4, and two splendid documentaries that turned out to have a lot more in common than their titles might suggest " Michael Grade's History of …
"Coming up," promised the continuity announcer during an ad break for The Royal Variety Performance 2012, "Alan Carr and David Walliams as you have never seen them before!" Which wasn't stri…
I have tried to like Full English, I really have. I love animated comedy " The Simpsons and South Park are two of my all-time favourite TV shows " and appreciate all the time, effort...
Most artistic endeavours carry with them a fundamental and irrefutable acid test that establishes whether they have achieved their aim or not. If you laugh throughout a comedy, it's fair to …
Harry Venning talks about Sky Arts' latest offering Nation's Best Am Dram and reports that amateur theatre is flourishing across the country
When I'm a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here! first hit our screens it was fresh, fun, original and compulsive viewing. Ten years on and the very jungle screams with the tedium of it all....
Charles Dickens, it is sometimes suggested, created the format for soap operas. A combination of melodrama, exaggerated characters and social comment, his works were written and published in…
First there were monsters versus aliens, then came cowboys versus aliens, and now CBBC wades in with its own genre mash-up, Wizards vs Aliens. Extraterrestrials, I can't help feeling, have e…
There is nothing quite like a BBC4 documentary to shake you out of your complacency. Take Chas and Dave " Last Orders, for example. I had hitherto been quite happy to dismiss Chas and Dave...
ITV2's new comedy drama Switch follows the romantic and magical misadventures of Stella, Jude, Grace and Hannah " four twentysomething, flat sharing female witches in super-trendy Camden Loc…