Mystery Road
Australian and New Zealand TV

Third-episode verdict: Mystery Road (Australia: ABC; UK: BBC Four)

11 June 2018 Rob Buckley 2 Comments

In Australia: Sundays, 8.30pm, ABC
In the UK: Saturdays, 9pm, BBC Four. Starts September 22

As a rule, most Australian cinema passes the UK by. Occasionally we get a breakout hit, such as Mad Max, Picnic at Hanging Rock, Priscilla: Queen of the Desert or Strictly Ballroom, but largely, we miss out on the industry’s richness. A slight exception to the rule is horror and thrillers, usually ones set in the Outback, with the likes of Wolf Creek often doing better than you might expect, which is perhaps why the Australian TV industry is waking up to their possibilities for adaptation as series.

Mystery Road is a sequel to not just one but two movies that might have largely passed the UK public by, were it not for the likes of Amazon: the original Mystery Road and its sequel Goldstone, both of which starred Aaron Pedersen (Wildside, Water Rats, The Circuit, City Homicide, Jack Irish, A Place to Call Home) as an impressively craggy, lone detective, working in Western Australia near Perth. Essentially, a Wild West sheriff, it’s up to him to stand up for truth, justice and the Australian way when no one else will – usually because there is no one else.

Mystery Road: the series

ABC’s new six-part Sunday night thriller Mystery Road is more or less a direct continuation of those films that expands them out, even if Pederson is virtually the only actor to make it over from the original movies as the action has moved onto another location. It sees the rather highly nominated Judy Davis playing a small town police officer who calls in Pederson to help her when a local boy goes missing. However, it’s not long before they discover another boy is missing and that it might all tie into an old crime involving the boy’s uncle, who’s just getting released from prison – which is something no one wants.

Continue reading “Third-episode verdict: Mystery Road (Australia: ABC; UK: BBC Four)”

People of Earth
News

Game of Thrones prequel greenlit; Damned cancelled; People of Earth unrenewed; + more

11 June 2018 Rob Buckley Post a comment

Film trailers

Internet TV

  • Trailer for Netflix’s The Good Cop
  • Netflix green lights: series of comedic, contemporary Greek myth drama Kaos…
  • …and mission to Mars drama Away…
  • …developing: adaptation of Jessica Pressler’s How Anna Delvey Tricked New York’s Party People

Canadian TV

  • Trailer for season 2 of CBC’s Anne with an E

UK TV

US TV

New US TV shows

New US TV show casting

Hang Ups
BAFTA events

What TV’s on at BAFTA in July 2018? Including Hang Ups and Judge Romesh

8 June 2018 Rob Buckley Post a comment

Every so often, TMINE flags up what new TV events BAFTA is holding around the UK

It’s been barely seconds since the previous BAFTA post on TMINE, but here comes another one, since BAFTA just revealed two more events, this time in July. If Hang Ups sounds familiar, BTW, that’s because it’s a remake of Showtime (US)’s Web Therapy.

Hang Ups

TV Preview: Hang Ups

Thursday, 5 July 2018 – 6:45pm
Princess Anne Theatre, 195 Piccadilly, London

A preview of the new Channel 4 comedy followed by a Q+A with co-writer and lead actor Stephen Mangan

Written by Robert Delamere and Stephen Mangan, Hang Ups is an unconventional comedy about an unconventional therapist trying to keep his unconventional life, and patients, from falling apart.

Mangan stars as Dr. Richard Pitt, a therapist who finds himself at a crossroads in life. After the collapse of his previous group therapy practice, Richard develops a new form of therapy – weekly quick-fire sessions with his patients through a webcam. The few patients on his list present a hilarious and outrageous catalogue of neuroses, phobias, issues, anxieties and psychopathies, but even these short sessions, where he’s confronted by everything from the sublime to the ridiculous, are not his greatest challenge… His patience and temperament are stretched to their limit by the daily interruptions of a demanding extended family, errant teenagers and his own trouble-filled past.

The all-star cast includes Richard E. Grant, Jessica Hynes, David Tennant, Arsher Ali, Charles Dance, Katherine Parkinson and Celia Imrie amongst others.

With thanks to the Channel 4

Book tickets

Judge Romesh

TV Preview: Judge Romesh

Tuesday, 17 July 2018 – 6:45pm
Princess Anne Theatre, 195 Piccadilly, London
A TV Preview of UKTV’s new comedy reality show. Followed by a Q&A with Romesh Ranganathan, Kerry Howard, Tom Davis, Dan Baldwin.

Directed by Ollie Bartlett and hosted by Romesh Ranganathan, this new reality show will offer a brutal and hilarious judgement on people’s real life domestic disputes. Each episode will see Romesh joined in court by comedians Tom Davis and Kerry Howard – together, they’ll find answers to the arguments of the everyman.

Executive produced for Hungry Bear Media by Dan Baldwin and Andy Price.

Book tickets

La-Fête_des_mères
French TV

What TV’s on at the Institut français in June? Including a Q&A with Audrey Fleurot

8 June 2018 Rob Buckley Post a comment

Very, very occasionally, TMINE lets you know what TV-related events the Institut français du Royaume-Uni will be presenting in London

Not technically a TV event, I know, but the Institut français will be screening the movie La fête des mères (Mother’s Day) on Sunday 25th June at 8.30pm, as part of its ‘Women Shaping the World’ season. So why mention it? Well, it stars Audrey Fleurot of Engrenages (Spiral), Les témoins (Witnesses), Safe et al, and she’ll be doing a Q&A afterwards:

La fête des mères (Mother’s Day)

103 mins
in French with EN subs
FRA | 2018 | dir. Marie-Castille Mention-Schaar, with Audrey Fleurot, Nicole Garcia, Clotilde Courau, Carmen Maura

Presidents, nannies, bakers, actresses, teachers, florists, journalists, doctors… These women are progressive, benevolent, clumsy, absent, omnipresent, overworked, guilt-laden… Their children both long and fear to spread their wings and leave the nest. When daughters become mothers, they realise it’s all fun and games! This ensemble film gathers on screen a first class cast including Audrey Fleurot and Carmen Maura.

Tickets are available here, standard price £12.

And if you miss her at that, she’s doing bilingual Molière in Tartuffe at the Theatre Royal Haymarket until 28 July.

Stitchers
Airdates

When’s that show you mentioned starting, TMINE? Including Stitchers

8 June 2018 Rob Buckley 4 Comments

Every Friday, TMINE lets you know when the latest TV shows from around the world will air in the UK

Last week, I talked about Walter (of Walter Presents)’s habit of acquiring things without telling us. Turns out he’s not alone and the BBC is getting in on the act.

For example, last week, lots of news services were reporting that BBC Two had picked up Picnic at Hanging Rock, thanks largely to the Beeb’s own press release. And it’s true that we didn’t know which channel it would air on until now. But the Beeb actually bought  it back in December.

Similarly, I noticed that tucked away in Stan (Australia)’s announcement that there’s going to be a No Activity Christmas special, there was this little nugget:

Nick Forward, Stan’s Chief Content Officer said “No Activity has made its way around the world, from Hulu in the US to the BBC in the UK. With another season of the US version to come later in the year, now feels like the right time to bring the team back to Australia for a very special production and we can’t wait to see what kind of havoc Trent, Patrick and the team wreak on Christmas 2018.”

Yep, apparently, the Beeb has bought the original Australian version of No Activity. It just hasn’t told anyone yet.

Meanwhile, it was announced today that Sky Living is going to rebrand as Sky Witness (ooh, puntastic). Tucked away in that announcement was the fact that it’s bought up not just ABC (US)’s For the People but also Epix (US)’s forthcoming ten-part, Patrick Dempsey-fronted The Truth About The Harry Quebert Affair.

No word on airdates for any of those, of course, but at least we know Sky has them. In fact, we have but one new airdate to focus our attention on this week.

Premiere dates

Thanks to TV Wise for this week’s no longer closely guarded secret.

Stitchers

Stitchers (US: ABC Family/Freeform; UK: Syfy)
Premiere date: Monday, July 23rd, 8pm

Girl with a brain disorder is able to enter the memories of newly dead people to find out why they were killed and solve the crime. Trouble is, it’s hard to deal with her newfound empathy and on top of that, it’s all part of a top secret government project run by young science nerds who may not know what the Powers That Be are really up to…

Basically, it’s Inception but “as stupid as a bag full of spanners wearing toupees”, to quote myself, so this is good scheduling by Syfy, since it’s a great summer show, breezy, silly and full of fun (each week, a fun game: guess the science-fiction TV show or movie the head nerd is quoting).

However, Freeform messed up by running the second season in the winter and nobody bothered tuning in, so it was cancelled. Equally, its summer scheduling and breeziness were a two-edged sword for me – it was fun enough to watch episodically, but I missed some episodes when I went on vacation and I didn’t care enough about it to play catch up when I came back.

Still, at least it’s better than NBC (US)’s rather similar Reverie…

Episode reviews: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8