As the battle for streaming service supremacy wages on, there’s thankfully been plenty of new stuff from the United Kingdom that’s reached a broad international audience (plus the typically great original programming of the BBC).
Here we’ve collated the absolute fave homegrown shows of 2022 from our intrepid UK critics Lillian Crawford, Rory Doherty, Matt Glasby, and Clarisse Loughrey, with everything from colonial western drama to biting workplace black comedy. Make sure you didn’t miss any of these highly-recommended shows, from another year of diverse and ever-more-daring local creations!
The English
Hugo Blick’s unmissable Western follows British aristocrat Lady Cornelia Locke (Emily Blunt) and ex-cavalry scout Sergeant Eli Whipp (Chaske Spencer), a member of the Pawnee Nation, across the brutal badlands of America circa 1890. Highlights include the beautiful big-sky scenery; any number of super-tense Mexican stand-offs; and the normally genial Rafe Spall as terrifying hatchet man David Melmont. The only thing better than the supporting cast (Toby Jones, Stephen Rea, Nichola McAuliffe) is the chemistry between the two leads. The takehome? Always bet on Blunters. — Matt Glasby
The Essex Serpent
Perhaps Apple TV+’s six-episode adaptation of Sarah Perry’s 2016 novel was only ever an excuse to see Tom Hiddleston storm around the desolate countryside in a half-unbuttoned shirt and flowing overcoat. But you won’t see me complaining: though there’s a dash of prestige TV here, and a sprinkling of the Gothic aesthetic, The Essex Serpent is really the most delicious period melodrama of the year. Claire Danes’s Cora Seaborne, a naturalist recently widowed, travels to the village of Aldwinter to investigate reports of a “sea dragon” in the Blackwater Estuary. Passions ensue. — Clarisse Loughrey
Everything I Know About Love
This BBC adaptation of Dolly Alderton’s semi-autobiographical novel of the same name offered a lighter counterpart to Normal People. Centring on 24-year-old Maggie, played by Emma Appleton, and her housemates, the series explores the complexities of female friendships at the dawn of true adulthood, with plenty of sex and drugs along the way. Its conclusion that those forms of love are so much more meaningful at that stage of life than heterosexual romance is a resonant one, and will surely ensure its legacy for years to come. — Lillian Crawford
Heartstopper
One of the unexpected hits of 2022 was Netflix’s adaptation of a series of queer graphic novels by Alice Oseman. Starring Joe Locke as gay schoolboy Charlie and Kit Connor as his closeted boyfriend Nick, their sweet relationship captured the hearts of a generation. It’s their little community that really set Heartstopper apart, especially Yasmin Finney as Elle, giving hope for improved representation for younger audiences in the future. With at least two more seasons on the way, it’s one of the most exciting TV discoveries of the year. — Lillian Crawford
Industry: Season 2
Is Industry HBO’s most underrated drama series? It’s been largely swept under the Succession rug, but this story of self-serving profiteers working at a fictional investment bank is an intoxicating cocktail of empathy and repulsion. It’s full of sadness. And cruelty, too. That’s especially true of season two, which sees Harper (Myha’la Herrold) still licking her wounds after ruthlessly betraying her mentor (Freya Mavor’s Daria). Sure, the financial jargon is a total mystery to me, but I could still feel the hairs pricking up at the back of my neck every time someone started clacking away on their keyboard. A deal’s a deal. — Clarisse Loughrey
Life After Life
Kate Atkinson’s 2013 novel is a subtly bizarre timetwister, and it was brought elegantly to the small screen by playwright Bash Doran in 2022. The four-part series followed Ursula Todd, tenderly played by Thomasin McKenzie, who is reborn every time she dies with some vague memory of the previous lives she has lived which pull her away from the mistakes of the past. With a supporting cast including Sian Clifford, Jessica Hynes, and Jessica Brown Findlay, as well as narration by Lesley Manville, it’s well-worth catching up on. — Lillian Crawford
The Responder
Starring a career-best Martin Freeman—Liverpudlian accent and all—as, yes, a close-to-the-edge Merseyside copper Chris Carson, this superb British drama was conceived by former police officer Tony Schumacher, and it shows. Instead of trading in Line of Duty-style thrills, it details the daily grind of life on the force, and the effect it has on Carson and his family. Emily Fairn and Josh Finan are heartbreaking as two petty criminals trying, and failing, to break free. A second series is on the way. — Matt Glasby
Slow Horses
How can British telly compete with the huge budgets and escalating stakes of American espionage shows? How about a show exclusively about a bunch of screw-ups! Slow Horses is a welcome refresher about the grunt work of spy work and the consequence of messing up in the field. Our spies always have their noses to the ground, the perfect underdogs whilst their higher-ups routinely embarrass themselves. Never shying away from political tensions, Slow Horses’ greatest feature is its ruthless sardonic sense of humour and a stand-out cast—and we even got two seasons of grumpy spies in one year. — Rory Doherty
Starstruck: Season 2
The first season of Starstruck was BBC Three’s biggest comedy of last year, streamed almost five million times on iPlayer. And its follow-up is no less of a wonder, building off the romantic whims of its “realistic Notting Hill” premise to ask the more difficult question: after you’ve risked it all for love, what exactly do you do next? How do Jessie (Rose Matafeo) and movie star Tom (Nikesh Patel) build a life out of all that feeling? Guided by Matafeo, and her co-writers Nic Sampson and Alice Snedden, Starstruck is a messy, beautiful mix of sweeping fantasy and agonising reality. — Clarisse Loughrey
This Is Going to Hurt
We’ve reached the point that avoiding being political with stories that concern current affairs would be blatantly disingenuous. A great example of programming that would flat-out not be commissioned if the BBC was privatised, this adaptation of Adam Kay’s powerhouse NHS memoir casts the indispensable Ben Wishaw as a doctor on the verge of a breakdown within a health service that’s going through several. It’s a series with great edge; both in its snappy style and wit, and in the confronting and upsetting glimpses we get into the violence of austerity. — Rory Doherty
