The essential TV shows of the year, according to New Statesman staff.
Severance, Season 2 (Apple TV)
Severance’s principal subject is theft: of time and memory, of identity and humanity. The second season follows a mysterious company, Lumon, some of whose employees have elected to be “severed” – a microchip is inserted in their brains to bifurcate their consciousness between work and home. On the page, all this doubtless sounds irritatingly high-concept, but – forgive the hyperbole – it is the television show for our times, and all the more gut-wrenching for it.
Amandaland (BBC iPlayer)
The star of the peerless sitcom Motherland, Amanda (Lucy Punch), returns for her own spin-off series, Amandaland. A couple of years have passed since the original; following her divorce, she has had to replace her Chiswick vastness with the top half of a vaguely peeling Victorian terrace in south Harlesden. In the words of the late Rachel Cooke, “In short, it’s genius. Motherland is dead, long live Amandaland!”
White Lotus, Season 3 (HBO)
After two triumphant series, we know what to expect from The White Lotus’ sharp-eyed puppetmaster, Mike White. Another group of rich and obnoxious Americans arrives by boat at a Thai island resort, where the waving staff proffer first garlands, then the golf buggies that will transport them to their adult playgrounds – cue more trouble in paradise. Cartoonish though it may be at moments, The White Lotus is more subtle than it sounds, and herein lies its brilliance.
Adolescence (Netflix)
Adolescence, created by prolific writer Jack Thorne, is “a veritable pageant – albeit of a very low-key and sophisticated kind – of anxiety and dread, and watching it may make you feel oddly frail,” Rachel Cooke wrote. A 13-year-old boy is arrested for murder, and a single camera doggedly follows the superbly acting cast around the police station as the investigation unfolds. Adolescence is a one-take drama, and it is extraordinary.
I, Jack Wright (U&Alibi)
Chris Lang, best known as the writer of the brilliant Unforgotten, has gone for broke in I, Jack Wright. When the Wright family and various of the patriarch Jack’s employees – an estate manager, a long-suffering secretary – assemble in Marston Hall the day after the title character’s funeral, they are at once stock figures from a Golden Age detective novel – and compelling character studies. There is so much going on all the time – yet it remains utterly watchable.
Mountainhead (Sky Atlantic)
Jesse Armstrong (Succession) returns with a new television film, Mountainhead, a tech-bro horror story. Four industry friends – some of the richest men in the world – are spending a weekend at Mountainhead in the deepest snow of Utah. But tensions soon begin to crackle. Behind their nouveau riche façades lie problems fuelled by transfixing amorality, ones that could easily have been inspired by today’s tech moguls.
Black Rabbit (Netflix)
If there is a show about brotherly criminal activity you need to watch, it’s Black Rabbit. Two brothers, Jake (Jude Law) and Vince Friedken (Jason Bateman), could not be more different: Jake is a haute couture restaurateur in New York, while Vince seemingly has nothing going for him. Yet something connects them both: the dark underbelly of the city. Law and Bateman deliver magnetic performances as aggressively charismatic men under tremendous strain. “Black Rabbit is high-calorie drama,” George Monaghan wrote.
Down Cemetery Road (Apple TV)
How’s this for an explosive conversation? During a rather drab dinner party, a cigar is lit. Next thing you know, the kitchen windows are blown out. It isn’t the cigar at fault but a gas leak at the neighbour’s house. It’s dramatic enough, but things truly kick up a notch when the host, Sarah (Ruth Wilson), takes an interest in the neighbours’ surviving daughter. Full of dark comedy, unlikely heroes and lashings of espionage, the whole thing is hugely enjoyable.
Pluribus (Apple TV)
It is a brave thing, in our polarised, warring and fearful world, to create a TV series whose message appears to be: no, actually, everything would not be better if we all just got along. That is exactly what writer-creator Vince Gilligan (Breaking Bad) has done with his new show Pluribus. Successful romantasy novelist Carol’s world is tipped upside down when everyone except her is reprogrammed to be psychotically contented. If the price of peace is the subordination of the individual, is it worth paying?
The Death of Bunny Munro (Sky Atlantic)
If you found Nick Cave’s 2009 novel The Death of Bunny Munro difficult to stomach, the TV adaptation will be kinder to you – just about. Bunny, a sex-addicted travelling salesman, uses his dubious powers of persuasion to convince middle-aged clients to buy age-defying cosmetic creams. As the series progresses, his depravity spirals further, culminating in a desperate flight from social services with his young son, Bunny Jr. If you like your television escapist and cosy, this is probably not for you. But the brave will be rewarded: crushing, bruising, brilliant television.
[Further reading: Albums of the year 2025]
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