"Baby Reindeer" has become a phenomenon since its Netflix debut, and is now one of the streaming platform's most watched shows ever. The series focuses on bartender and aspiring comedian Donny Dunn (Richard Gadd) who inadvertently becomes the subject of stalking and obsession by Martha Scott (Jessica Gunning) after he offers her a free cup of tea out of sympathy. The series is "darker and more disturbing" than suggested by its "trailers and marketing", said Erik Kain at Forbes. At its core, the series tackles difficult issues including sexual abuse, victimhood and mental health, and its claim to be a true story has caused real-life dramas outside the series. Be warned, said Kain, "it's not an easy watch".
The first series of "The Responder" gave us "five of the most riveting and harrowing hours of television there have been for many years", said Lucy Mangan at The Guardian, and the second series "feels earned by the quality of what went before and also unforced". The series focuses on Chris Carson (Martin Freeman), a frontline urgent-response police officer who is "clearly just trying to keep his head above water" after "years in the force left him struggling with his mental health", said Wales Online. The second series picks up with Carson "heavily traumatised" by the events of series one, said writer, and former police officer, Tony Schumacher, and he's "looking to do it differently this time”.
In this six-part series from the Danish production company that created "The Killing" and "The Bridge", Sofie Gråbol ("The Killing") stars as a prison officer struggling to keep control. It is "superbly shot" with "sensational performances throughout", said The Telegraph, and the only thing that might stop you from binge-watching "will be the fact that it is utterly unrelenting – but then you don't head to chokey for oranges and sunshine".
Series two of the "Belfast-set drama about police trainees" is set a year after the first. As well as "our regular 'peelers'", Jen (Hannah McClean) is retraining as a solicitor "and exploring a certain historical bombing case)", and there's an "ambitious new officer (Frank Blake)", said The Guardian. As in the first series, they "switch on the lights and the sirens, bicker about snacks and shrug on protective clothing", and it's "business as usual (robberies, disturbances, turf battles), until it isn't". Although, "inevitably", this second season "doesn't feel quite so unexpected", it "continues to be big, brutal and vivid".
"The publicity made this one sound like a standard police procedural, with added water", said The Guardian, but it soon "gets really good". In the aftermath of a river bursting its banks, a murder mystery unfolds "sparked by the discovery of a man's body in a lift in an underground car park". At first presumed trapped by floodwater, the post mortem revealed that he died at least three days before that. Out to investigate is Jo (Sophie Rundle), a heavily pregnant police officer who "races against the clock to solve the murder case before her baby arrives", said Radio Times. "You'll want to stick around to find out how this messy business concludes."
Making his directorial debut, Michael Sheen also stars in this three-part drama, set in "his beloved hometown of Port Talbot", said the Mirror. This "dystopian drama" is the tale of a Welsh family forced to flee their small Welsh town for the English coast following civil unrest, broadcast "just weeks after real-life demonstrations" in Port Talbot after Tata Steel announced its closure. Adding to the narrative is "skilfully used" archive footage. The first episode is "different and fresh", said Lucy Mangan in The Guardian, with a "slightly dreamlike (or nightmarish) off-kilter quality" that "surely makes you sit up and take notice".
This "gripping police drama" is centred on two "warring star detectives", played by Peter Capaldi and Cush Jumbo, in a "twisting story" that explores institutional racism, sexism and malpractice in the Metropolitan Police force, said The Independent. "Squaring off as adversaries", Capaldi and Jumbo are "mesmerising", said Lucy Mangan in The Guardian. "If ever there is going to be an award invented for best joint performance, make it this year, for them." The eight-parter leads us to ask "whether we should hold officers of the law, and whether they should hold themselves, to higher standards than the rest of us". This, of course, "resonates amid the onslaught of real-life headlines about police corruption and disregard for (particularly women's) rights and safety".
Serving as a sequel to the "immensely successful" three-season "Suburra: Blood on Rome", said TickerTV, Netflix's spin-off series continues the "gripping" and "gritty" storyline of the Italian capital's criminal underworld. "Spiritually", said Johnny Loftus on Decider, "Subterraeterna" has picked up right where "Suburra" left off. It extends the "Suburra" universe in "typically entertaining fashion", with lots of testing of family bonds, bold action on lasting vendettas, and an "overarching stretch of political theatre that reaches all the way into the Vatican". The city of Rome feels like it's "about to explode".
It's another "cheery tale of sex, drugs, death and madness", said Alison Rowat in The Herald, as Irvine Welsh's "Crime" returns for a second season. Playing the lead role of DI Ray Lennox, Dougray Scott is the "best thing" in this Edinburgh-set thriller, "as he was in the first run". Fans of "gritty storytelling" and "powerhouse performances" should turn to "Crime", said Anthony Morris on SBS. But "don't let the generic title fool you". With a story by "Trainspotting" author Welsh and with Scott in the lead, there's "more to this TV series than meets the eye".
The final series of "Top Boy", Netflix's hit London street crime drama, has "gone down well with TV critics", said Paul Glynn on the BBC. This series picks up where the last left off: with the murder of an upstart who had been tipped to take over the drugs empire presided over by gangster Dushane (played by Ashley Walters). Now, Dushane faces further problems with the arrival of a crew of fearsome Irish gangsters (led by Brian Gleeson and Barry Keoghan). At just six episodes, season three is a "frenetic final outing", said Morgan Jeffery on RadioTimes. The swan song is "pacy and powerful", but "leaves you wanting more".
This "intense" Apple TV+ series is set in "real time", said Alan Sepinwall in Rolling Stone, and sees Idris Elba’s "ace negotiator" navigate a hijacked flight from Dubai to London. Created by George Kay ("Lupin") and Jim Field Smith ("Litvinenko"), "Hijack" is "no-frills fun", said Angie Han in The Hollywood Reporter. Its premise is "as straightforward as its title", and were it not for, "you know, its terror-at-35,000-feet concept", the "24"-style seven-hour mini-series would be the "TV equivalent" of a classic plane read: "slick, exciting, unfussy". As it stands, it’s "ideal for a lazy weekend planted firmly on the couch".
Based on the book by Mo Hayder, "Wolf" is easily "the most harrowing thing I’ve had to watch" in years, said Sean O’Grady in The Independent. The drama centres around Jack Caffery (Ukweli Roach), a young detective haunted by his brother’s abduction when they were children. As he tries to get to the bottom of what happened, he gets entangled in the kidnap and torture of a well-off family at their Welsh holiday home. "Appalling violence of an apparently motiveless kind is a leitmotif", but the series is worth sticking with – provided "you’ve the stomach for a fright".
The second series of this Scottish cop drama sees the "excellent" Nicola Walker return as "wry" homicide detective Annika Strandhed, said Phil Harrison in The Guardian. Inspired by BBC Radio 4's audio drama "Annika Stranded", the show revolves around the fictional Glasgow-based "Marine Homicide Unit", said Patrick Cremona on RadioTimes.com, who are "tasked with solving various gory crimes".
Philip Glenister ("Life On Mars") and Steffan Rhodri ("Gavin & Stacey") lead the cast of the BBC's "prestige drama", said David Craig on RadioTimes.com. Set in both 1973 and the early 2000s, "Steeltown Murders" centres on the hunt for the killer of three young women in the Port Talbot area. It also tells the story of how – in the first case of its kind – the mystery was solved almost 30 years later using pioneering DNA evidence. The hunt for the "Saturday Night Strangler" could not be more "timely TV", said Lucy Mangan in The Guardian. This "illuminating" four-part series and its "deep dive" into police venality "really hits a nerve".
If you're in the mood for a "chilling true crime drama that keeps you on the edge of your seat until the very end", then look no further than "The Nurse", said Morgan Cormack on RadioTimes.com. This Danish thriller comes from the producers of another "chilling streamer hit", "The Chestnut Man". Much like "The Good Nurse" before it, the Scandi mini-series "dramatises the disturbing true story of one nurse's connection to a series of deaths at her hospital and how her crimes were brought to light", said Rebecca Cook on Digital Spy.
This political thriller, based on Matthew Quirk's 2012 novel, is "propulsive, slicker-than-slick fun", said Lucy Mangan in The Guardian. FBI agent Peter Sutherland (played by Gabriel Basso) saves a bunch of "ordinary joes" from a bomb on a subway train. Then he's put on desk duties in the basement of the White House, "doing admin while he waits by a helpline phone that undercover operatives can call to let the powers-that-be know they are in trouble".
"How do you create a unique police drama nowadays?" asked Charlotta Billstrom in the Evening Standard. With the "ever-growing choice" of streaming platforms comes an "equal amount of crime shows". But this glut "isn't necessarily a bad thing", especially when the set-up is "as juicy as the one" in "Six Four". Inspired by Hideo Yokoyama's best-selling novel by the same name and set in Glasgow, it "follows a story of corruption, kidnappings and an uncompromising search for the truth". Kevin McKidd ("Grey's Anatomy") and Vinette Robinson ("Sherlock") star.
The 1980s "sound like a great time to be a criminal" – especially in the world of "A Town Called Malice", said Vicky Jessop in the Evening Standard. The premise of the Sky Max show is that the police are "spectacularly incompetent", the outfits are "fabulous" and the music is "banging". And at the "first whiff of the law", you can "scarper off to Spain to avoid extradition entirely". This cocktail of crime thriller and family saga follows the Lords – a family of south London gangsters who've fallen to the bottom of the criminal food chain – and they're not happy about it.
In this six-part crime drama set in Dublin, DI Colette Cunningham (played by Paula Malcomson) is determined to get to the truth when her long-estranged daughter is found dead. "Redemption" offers "all the tropes of crime drama we know and love", said Kate Rice in the Evening Standard. While it is "by no means revolutionary", it' s a "worthwhile contribution" to the much-loved genre.
BBC One's six-part crime drama "bubbles away with the vigour of a red-hot crucible", said Nick Hilton in The Independent. Its subject is the 1983 Brink's-Mat robbery, when a gang of thieves broke into a depot near Heathrow expecting to steal £1m in foreign currency, but found £26m in gold bullion instead. The heist itself is swiftly dealt with: it's what happened next that interests writer Neil Forsyth. The thieves turn to Kenneth Noye (Jack Lowden) to fence the gold; he enlists a smelter (Tom Cullen), a crooked businessman (Sean Harris) and a dodgy solicitor (Dominic Cooper) to help. Can they outwit the law, in the form of DCI Brian Boyce (Hugh Bonneville)? "Filled with twists and turns, and a cast who veer between likeable and villainous, "The Gold" is pure primetime fun."
Roger Allam stars as investigative judge Antoine Verlaque, who along with his partner Marine Bonnet (Nancy Carroll), unpick the murders, mysteries, and dark underbelly of their idyllic home in the south of France. Adapted from the Verlaque and Bonnet novels by Canadian author M.L. Longworth, the role of the judge "could almost have been created for Allam", said Sean O'Grady in The Independent. He makes this great drama "sublime". With three two-hour episodes, "Murder in Provence" is "chic, sun-dappled" and set in France, yet it is the "most English drama on TV", said Anita Singh in The Telegraph. The "beautiful backdrops" of Aix-en-Provence are "more scintillating than the pedestrian plots", but Allam is "as watchable as ever".
The premise of "Black Bird" is so neat, it sounds like something dreamed up by scriptwriters; but in fact, it's rooted in a true story, said Anita Singh in The Daily Telegraph. Jimmy Keene (Taron Egerton) lived the high life as a drug dealer, until he was caught, and given a 10-year jail term. Then the FBI offered him a deal: if he elicited a confession from a suspected serial killer, he could walk free. Keene agreed to the challenge, and over six episodes, we find out if he pulled it off. The Apple TV+ show weaves together two timelines: Keene's dealings with the killer, Larry Hall (Paul Walter Hauser); and the investigation into Hall. The most moving performance comes from Ray Liotta in his final TV role: his turn as Jimmy's "regret-filled father" is a powerful testament to his range as an actor.
James Graham's six-part BBC drama is the television equivalent of "bowling a strike", said Lucy Mangan in The Guardian. "Everything you could hope for is here": a writer who knows the "setting and themes in his bones"; a dream cast; and "beautiful" direction, by Lewis Arnold and Ben A. Williams. The story draws on two real-life murders that took place in Nottinghamshire in 2004, close to where Graham grew up. Alun Armstrong plays Gary, an ex-miner who is killed by a crossbow bolt not far from the home he shares with his wife (Lesley Manville). When local detective Ian (David Morrissey) is tasked with solving the murder, it seems straightforward enough – until he learns that Gary's arrest records have been "inexplicably redacted".
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