Netflix
Gilmore Girls
Over seven series, this sentimental teen drama attracted a cult audience for its rapid-fire dialogue and weighty issues, so much so that Netflix have decided to revive the series for four seasonally themed films, the first of which is expected later this year. Before they arrive you can catch up on the previous series, which features, among others, a pre-fame Melissa McCarthy. (Don’t worry, Gilmore Girl superfans, she’s returning for the revival.)
Available now
BBC iPlayer
Genius Of The Modern World
Sprawling, multistranded docu-series are what BBC4 was made for and this three-parter is a fine case in point. Each of its episodes looks at a thinker who, in presenter Bettany Hughes’s words, “dragged the world as we know it, kicking and screaming into being”, beginning with Karl Marx’s analysis of capitalism before moving on to Nietzsche’s findings on morality and finally the psychoanalytic work of Sigmund Freud. Redoubtably clever stuff.
Available now
Amazon
American Gothic
Another addition to the neverending list of TV shows, films and books to have taken their title from Grant Wood’s endlessly reproduced painting, this soapy series concerns a Boston family, who learn that their patriarch may have been a serial killer. Intriguingly, it’s co-created by James Frey, the man responsible for notorious memoir A Million Little Pieces, much of which was found to be fabricated. Hopefully he’ll bring that rampant imagination to bear here.
Available now
The Bureau
Sadly not an updating of The Day Today’s Eldorado-style soap opera, this French thriller stars actor and La Haine director Mathieu Kassovitz as an intelligence officer looking to readjust to civvy life in Paris after six years spent in Syria. Things, as you might expect, don’t quite pan out that way. All of series one is ready to watch, with series two following in August.
Available now
All4
The Hunter
More Francophone fare, this time with a comic bent. Samuel Delaunay is a professional hitman who works for his mother. When she signs him up to carry out a murder in the manner of a notorious serial killer, it spells danger for both him and his family. Unlike so much contemporary European drama, it doesn’t take itself too seriously, hopping from energetic action scenes and well-observed comedy at the flick of a switch.
Available from Friday
Podcast
Andy Zaltzman’s Summer Of Sport
Euro 2016 may have colonised the TV schedules like a bunch of Northern Irish fans singing “Will Grigg’s on fire” in a French town square, but there’s more to this summer’s sporting calendar than the beautiful game. In this Guardian podcast series, Bugle presenter, and a man who has never met a pun he didn’t like, Andy Zaltzman provides a weekly primer on all sport that isn’t football, joined by Guardian journos as well as comedians such as Al Murray and Mark Steel to discuss everything from the NBA final series to more niche events such as the World Nettle-Eating Championships.
Available now
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