A broadcasting centenary, the end of iconic panel shows, and more spy/detective shows than you know what to do with—British telly has had a belter of a year in 2022, and that doesn’t even cover the top drawer Irish comedy we’ve been able to watch too.
2023 looks like it’ll continue the exciting highs we’ve come to expect, with the promise of splashy titles and nail-biting dramas. Here’s some of the titles Rory Doherty is most excited for: keep an eye on this page for more info as these anticipated release dates draw nearer.
Doctor Who 60th Anniversary
60 years since it first graced British screens, the sci-fi stalwart is refreshing itself with a bigger budget, and… an old creative team and cast. Russell T. Davies brought back the show in 2005, setting it up for the subsequent 15 years of adventures and regenerations, and in the meantime outdid himself with some brilliant miniseries (A Very English Scandal, Years & Years, It’s A Sin… what a run!)
He’s come back a stronger writer, and is indulging us with a trip down memory lane with one of the best ever Doctor-companion pairings—David Tennant and Catherine Tate. After 60 years of sets falling apart and minimalist alien designs, the supercharged budget will take a bit of getting used to.
Anansi Boys
After Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett’s Good Omens was the foundation for a hit show and a lifelong friendship between its stars, Gaiman is adapting another of his books with Amazon Studios (Good Omens was a co-production with BBC). Anansi Boys follows the sons of a West African spider-god (here portrayed by Delroy Lindo)—another case of ordinary people being thrust into an unseen world of deities and myth in Gaiman’s work. The cast consists of a great range of Black British and American actors, and will be an effects-heavy story that’s large in scope.
A Town Called Malice
Writer/director Nick Love (Bulletproof, The Football Factory) is back with more British petty thieves and violent thugs—this time, transported to the sun-kissed Costa Del Sol. It’s a common British gangster route, seen before in Sexy Beast and Love’s own The Business, but the robust cast and dazzling style glimpsed in the trailer will definitely set this Brits abroad crime series apart. As the central Lord family deals with bitter rivalries and faded glories, it doesn’t seem like they’ll sort things out with a friendly chat over sangria. The heat does horrible things to people…
Wilderness
It’s difficult trying to express the excitement generated for something like Wilderness—even looking up the 2017 novel it’s adapted from on Goodreads feels like you’re spoiling its pleasures. Jenna Coleman and Oliver Jackson-Cohen star in this rocky couple road trip Amazon series, Coleman continuing her exemplary series work and Jackson-Cohen playing (you guessed it) another shitty partner. It looks like a grisly, twisted commentary on marriage and infidelity with two powerhouse English actors in a quest for survival—lovely cosy stuff.
The Winter King
It’s been ages after Merlin’s cancellation, and a few years since the disappointment of Guy Ritchie’s King Arthur—but thanks to 2021’s luxurious arthouse The Green Knight, next year’s series The Winter King should hopefully kick off a new wave of Old English Arthurian Legend programming.
So that’s a wrap for me on @BadWolf_TV The Winter King. Genuinely loved every minute of it. Wonderful cast and crew, amazing sets and locations, brutal weather!! Looking forward to a few weeks in a cosy edit suite after Xmas. pic.twitter.com/Z7lYGZssSw
— Farren Blackburn (@FarrenBlackburn) December 17, 2022
It’s technically based on a series of novels by Bernard Cromwell; the Saxons are descending on a weak and fractured Dark Age England, Arthur in exile, Merlin a mad crone, and Lancelot in disgrace. With a creative team who brought us A Discovery of Witches and Silent Witness, it looks like a fearsome revival of dusty legend.
Waterloo Road: Season 11
Off the air for seven years, and 10 years after a relocation to a Scottish comprehensive school, Waterloo Road is back in Greater Manchester for, presumably, more people falling off scaffolding and students sleeping with teachers. With a whole host of returning cast members (and one relative of a former actor), it’s likely the show will deliver all the rough-and-ready, slightly trashy joys of the show’s early seasons—in the age of prestige dramas, it’s old-school thrills like these we’ve missed most.
From dealing with drunk weekenders to family disputes, suspected murder to workplace discrimination no two cases are the same in sunny Barcelona. Meet the main characters of our next big crime drama, #TheDiplomatOnAlibi. Coming 2023. @DannySapani @SerenaManteghi pic.twitter.com/gpw6zKfa4T
— Alibi Channel (@alibi_channel) October 18, 2022
The Diplomat
Another Spanish co-production to look forward to, this one on the polar opposite side of law and order. Peaky Blinders’ Sophie Rundle stars as the titular diplomat who works with Barcelona Consul colleagues to protect British nationals in crisis. It seems like the show will be more episodic, featuring lots of different conflicts rather than one overarching storyline, but seeing as the writer previously brought us COBRA and The Tunnel, The Diplomat looks to be in capable hands for pulling off some complicated and gripping stories.
Lockwood & Co.
Teenage ghost-hunters haven’t graced British screens since CBBC’s The Ghost Hunter, but Netflix have done more than enough to fill this obvious hole in the market. Former radio host and lover of British genre-mashes Joe Cornish (Attack the Block, The Kid Who Would Be King) writes and directs this series, based on Jonathan Stroud’s novels. Two young sword-wielding boys team with a psychic girl to battle the many, many ghosts that haunt the British isles. The only unbelievable thing about this paranormal show is that teenagers know how to run a tax-compliant business.
Three Little Birds
Lenny Henry, comedy legend and enviable dramatic actor, produces and writes this highly anticipated series based in part on his mother’s experience emigrating from Jamaica to Britain as part of the fraught and painful Windrush generation.
Three Little Birds: exclusive first look at ITV’s major new drama: woo hoo! Check this out!!! https://t.co/22dWp0yMqA
— Lenny Henry (@LennyHenry) November 18, 2022
Henry has spoken at length about his intentions and excitement with the series, as well as his “mentorship” with collaborator Russell T. Davies. If Three Little Birds is a success, it can’t be solely attributed to Davies’ productive 2023—there’s no doubt this story and series belong to Henry.
Nolly
Before he returns to the sci-fi series that made him a TV giant, we’ll get a nifty miniseries from Russell T. Davies about a uniquely British topic—a 1960s soap star. Crossroads became a daytime series staple in the 60s, known for its garish plotlines and low-budget style, and Noele Gordon was at the centre of it. Here played by Helena Bonham Carter, through Gordon we’ll likely see the turbulent lifespan of the iconic series, as well as her stage career and eventual cancer diagnosis. Davies has been knocking it out the park with period-set miniseries recently, so this should be no different.
