Here on Den of Geek, we know what summers are for: drawing the curtains, pouring yourself a frosty Ribena and watching TV. To that end, here’s a selection of new (and some returning) shows to look out for over the coming months…
Killing Eve
As a TV premise, ‘sociopathic assassin and MI5 officer locked in a cat-and-mouse pursuit’ sounds about as generic as they come, but Killing Eve is… not what you think. Adapted by Fleabag’s Phoebe Waller-Bridge from Luke Jenning’s series of Villanelle novels, it’s dark, violent, funny and subverts expectations at every turn.
Jodie Comer (Doctor Foster, Thirteen) plays the atypical assassin, with Sandra Oh (Grey’s Anatomy) as the spy tracking her down. Their chemistry, and Waller-Bridge’s script, are a joy that takes this psychological thriller to surprising places.
The eight-part series one began airing on BBC America in April to an excellent reception, and is due to arrive on BBC One and iPlayer later this year. It’s already been renewed for series two, so there’s no need to fear early abandonment.
Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan
Amazon Prime has bet heavily on its Jack Ryan TV series. It was teased at New York Comic-Con 2017, then again as the streaming service’s first ever Super Bowl ad in January of this year, and has already been renewed for a second season.
The Office: An American Workplace and The Quiet Place’s John Krasinski plays the former marine and current CIA analyst.
Showrunners Carlton Cuse (Lost, Bates Motel) and Graham Roland (Fringe) tell us to expect a version of Jack Ryan inspired more by Harrison Ford’s role in Patriot Games and Clear And Present Danger than by the Alec Baldwin, Ben Affleck or Chris Pine incarnations.
Season one sees Ryan pursuing a terrorist cell planning a massive strike against the US, a hunt that will take him across Europe and the Middle East. Expect car chases, shoot-outs, fast running and explosions (it is a Michael Bay/Platinum Dunes production, after all).
The ten-episode first season will make its international debut on Amazon on the 31st of August.
The Innocents
Not to be confused with the 1960s Turn Of The Screw adaptation of the same name, The Innocents is a Netflix Original. It’s an eight-part UK supernatural series with its sights set on the teen market, though early trailers suggest that those of us with mortgages and sciatica should also take a look.
Sorcha Groundsell, who impressed in BBC Three’s glossy YA thriller Clique, plays June, alongside Wizards Vs Aliens’ Percelle Ascott as Harry. It’s a star-crossed lovers deal in which the two teenagers run away from their repressive home lives and end up in a world of trouble. These aren’t ordinary teens, you see, they have special powers that make them vulnerable to dark forces.
Written by fresh talent, The Innocents’ UK setting and decidedly eerie tone promise to make it stand apart from the raft of Marvel/DC superpowered teen TV around at the moment. It arrives on Netflix on the 24th of August. Oh, and as a bonus, it also stars Mike from Neighbours (alright, Guy Pearce).
Bodyguard
Fans of excellent BBC crime thriller Line Of Duty know that the combination of writer Jed Mercurio and actor Keeley Hawes is a winning one. Mercurio’s new six-part drama Bodyguard reunites him with Hawes, who plays a cabinet minister paired up with a Specialist Protection Officer (Game Of Thrones and Lady Chatterley’s Lover’s Richard Madden).
Madden is war veteran David Budd, posted to serve as bodyguard to Hawes’ Home Secretary character Julia Montague. The problem for Budd is that Montague’s “politics stand for everything he despises” dividing him between his professional duty and personal beliefs. Bodyguard also stars Gina McKee, Sophie Rundle and Vincent Franklin, and arrives on BBC One later this year.
The First
The Handmaid’s Tale, season two of which is currently airing on Channel 4 in the UK, established Hulu as a home for quality, boundary-pushing drama. The US streaming service is working on cementing that reputation with yet more ambitious, original commissions.
One such is The First, a space-set drama from the creator of Netflix’s House Of Cards, Beau Willimon. The First tells the story of a group of astronauts on the inaugural manned mission to Mars. It’s about, Willimon says, “people working towards the greatest pioneering achievement in human history. And about the cost of that vision.”
The cost of Willimon’s vision will no doubt set Hulu back a pretty penny, not least because of a starry cast led Sean Penn and Natascha McElhone. Channel 4 has co-produced the series, so expect it to land there upon its UK arrival.
Castle Rock
Being kind, you might say that Stephen King TV adaptations haven’t quite lived up to their potential in the past. (Being unkind, you might say much worse than that.) Hulu’s solution is not to make one, but lots of adaptations in new series Castle Rock.
Set in King’s famous fiction Maine town, Castle Rock is designed as an anthology series that will weave together various strands and characters from the world of Stephen King. It has its sights set on longevity, with a plan for each season to follow a different set of characters and storylines while still being woven into an overarching, continuing tale. Written by Manhattan’s Sam Shaw and Dustin Thomason, it’s clearly an ambitious idea and one that King fans await with interest.
Castle Rock will be released on streaming service Hulu in the US on the 25th of July. A UK broadcaster has yet to be announced, but as Fox UK picked up Hulu’s previous King adaptation, JFK assassination time travel drama 11.22.63., we might expect it to land on the same channel here.
This Time With Alan Partridge
Don’t call it a comeback, Alan’s been here for years! (On Sky and online though, not on the BBC where he started twenty-five years ago, and where he is, yes, technically making a comeback.) Six new half-hour episodes featuring Steve Coogan as the veteran TV and radio presenter began filming in February and are due to air on BBC One later this year.
This Time With Alan Partridge sees Coogan’s best-known character make his first return to live television since his 1990s chat show Knowing Me, Knowing You. He’ll be temporarily hosting a weekday evening magazine programme that, with “a heady mix of consumer affairs, viewer interaction, highbrow interview and lightweight froth,” doesn’t sound a million miles away from The One Show. Tim Key and Susannah Fielding will join him, along with Felicity Montagu as PA Lynn Benfield. A-ha!
The Little Drummer Girl
If news that Park Chan-wook is directing Michael Shannon, Florence Pugh and Alexander Skarsgård in a new BBC co-production doesn’t get you excited then, well, you probably just have other interests that are every bit as valid as ours. If it does get you excited though, come and join us rubbing our hands in glorious anticipation.
Chan-wook (Old Boy, The Handmaiden, Stoker) is directing all six hour-long episodes of The Little Drummer Girl, adapted from a 1983 John Le Carré novel. It’s the 1970s-set story of a young actress (Florence Pugh) who meets a mysterious stranger on holiday in Greece and becomes entangled in a high-stakes plot orchestrated by a Spymaster (Michael Shannon).
The series, which began filming in February this year, will air on BBC One in the UK and on AMC in the US.
A Discovery Of Witches
While development continues on Philip Pullman adaptation His Dark Materials, new production company Bad Wolf (led by former Doctor Who producers Jane Tranter and Julie Gardner), has sunk its teeth into A Discovery Of Witches for Sky One.
Adapted from the millions-selling novel by Deborah Harkness, it’s a supernatural tale set against the backdrop of a fantasy version of Oxford populated by vampires, sorceresses and demons. Matthew Goode plays geneticist Matthew Clairmont with Teresa Palmer as historian Diana Bishop in this supernatural escapist fantasy romance, which is scheduled to air in autumn 2018.
Picnic At Hanging Rock
Already a 1960s novel and a cult 1970s film, Picnic At Hanging Rock is now also a six-episode TV series. It’s the eerie story of a group of Australian boarding school students who disappear on a trip to the titular Hanging Rock landmark.
A period drama set in 1900, Picnic At Hanging Rock explores the aftermath of the girls’ disappearance on the local community. It’s a story about obsession and suspicion, and if Peter Weir’s 1975 film is anything to go by, creepy atmosphere.
The miniseries has already aired in its home country of Australia, and is streaming on Amazon in the US but will be available on BBC Two here in the UK later this year.
Sharp Objects
Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl was such a gigantic hit in the book world that it’s now technically illegal to publish a thriller without the word ‘girl’ in the title (Stieg Larsson, you also played your part). The rush to snap up Flynn’s three-novel back catalogue has already resulted in two feature films and soon, this HBO TV adaptation.
Sharp Objects, a Southern Gothic serial killer mystery, was Flynn’s 2006 debut. Set in Missouri, it’s the story of a journalist who returns to her home town to report on a series of unsolved murders, and the dark family secrets she uncovers there. The eight-episode thriller comes from showrunner Marti Noxon (UnReal, Buffy The Vampire Slayer) in collaboration with Gillian Flynn, and stars Amy Adams in the lead role. It airs in the US this July, and will arrive on Sky Atlantic in the UK at a later date.
Marvel’s Cloak And Dagger
A new Marvel comic book adaptation based on characters created by Bill Mantlo and Ed Hannigan, Cloak And Dagger debuts in the US on the 7th of June, and here in the UK at a later date on Syfy. This take on the super-powered characters is teen-slanted, and stars Disney Channel’s Olivia Holt as Tandy Bowen (aka Dagger) with Aubrey Joseph as Tyrone Johnson (you guessed it, Cloak).
Heroes and comic book writer Joe Pokaski has created the TV series, which is an official MCU tie-in, so expect Easter eggs alongside the action and teenage romance.
Also coming… but a bit later on
The War Of The Worlds: This three-part H.G. Wells adaptation is tipped to be the BBC’s big new drama over the Christmas and New Year period. Adapted by Doctor Who’s Peter Harness, it stars Rafe Spall and Eleanor Tomlinson.
Good Omens: A six-part adaptation of Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett’s Good Omens starring David Tennant and Michael Sheen arrives on Amazon Prime in 2019.
His Dark Materials: UK production company Bad Wolf has nabbed Jack Thorne to adapt Philip Pullman’s trilogy, with Logan’s Dafne Keen cast in the lead role of Lyra Belacqua.
Untitled Discworld Series: BBC Studios is developing a six-part TV series based on Terry Pratchett’s long-running and much-loved Discworld novels.
Untitled Dracula Series: Sherlock co-creators Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss are in talks with the BBC to develop a series of feature-length episodes adapting Bram Stoker’s Dracula.
A pick of 2018’s Returning shows
Humans: Series three of the AI drama started on Channel 4 on the 17th of May, and sees battle lines drawn between human and Synth.
Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt: The first half of this fourth and final season arrived on Netflix on the 30th of May.
Arrested Development: The Bluth family returned to Netflix for season five on the 29th of May.
Sense8: A two-hour finale special arriving on the 8th of June will tie up Sense8’s multiple story threads for fans.
Marvel’s Luke Cage: Mike Colter and co. return for season two of this Marvel/Netflix collaboration on the 22nd of June.
Preacher: Dominic Cooper returns as supernatural man of the cloth Jesse Custer in Preacher season three, arriving on Amazon on the 25th of June.
Doctor Who: The adventures of Jodie Whittaker’s Thirteenth Doctor won’t arrive until the autumn, but that doesn’t stop us from being very, very excited about them. Brilliant.