
Sherlock, Celebrity Big Brother, The Bletchley Circle, Dancing On Ice, Silent Witness, Stargazing, David Blaine: Real Or Magic, The Voice UK, Outnumbered, Splash!
Yes, I know what you're going to ask. You're going to ask why I'm just listing random names of television programmes. Fair question, I suppose. Any idiot can do that.
The reason, quite simply, is that all those shows turn up within the first few weeks of 2014. And the fact they're so diverse (I doubt there are many viewers who either love or hate all ten) is a neat reminder of how brilliantly, healthily varied British TV continues to be.
Built into our menu this coming year, of course, we also have three of the world's top sporting events the Winter Olympics, football's World Cup and the Commonwealth Games, all free to air. More on those in a moment.
Big dramas, it's fair to say, remain a huge draw, and along with the return of many favourites (Mr Selfridge, Inspector George Gently, Death In Paradise, DCI Banks and Call The Midwife are all back within the first few weeks of the year), there are some intriguing new shows in the pipeline.
Take BBC1's The Musketeers, writer Adrian Hodges' take on the Alexander Dumas classic. An action packed 10-parter centred on an elite group of soldiers D'Artagnan (Luke Pasqualino), Athos (Tom Burke), Aramis (Santiago Cabrera) and Porthos (Howard Charles) it also stars Peter Capaldi (who'll be back to do his Doctor Who thing later in the year, of course) and Hugo Speer.
Then there's ITV's six-parter Grantchester, set in early-50s Cambridgeshire and centred on a clergyman who turns detective, investigating the suspicious death of one of his parishioners. That, plus The Lost Honour, based on the true story of retired schoolmaster Christopher Jefferies, arrested when his tenant Joanna Yeates was found murdered on Christmas Day, 2010.
Also, John Simm, Rosie Cavaliero, Craig Parkinson and Adrian Edmondson feature in ITV's high-octane thriller Prey. the story of a copper on the run, desperate to clear his name.
Channel 4's New Worlds, meanwhile, is an historical drama set in the 17th century (a follow-up to 2008 drama The Devil's Whore), with Eve Best and Jamie Dornan among the cast. There'll also be a second series of Channel 4's critically acclaimed The Mill.
Channel 5's Suspects, coming up in February, is a bold new improvised crime drama, with Fay Ripley, Damien Molony and Clare-Hope Ashitey. And other top dramas coming up on 5 include the return of Iain Glen in Jack Taylor, plus Betrayal, about an affair between two people on opposite sides of a murder investigation, starring Stuart Townsend, Henry Thomas, James Cromwell and Hannah Ware.
ITV has also lined up the two-part thriller Undeniable, starring Claire Goose and Peter Firth about a woman who recognises her mother's murderer, 23 years after the crime and The Great Fire Of London, a new four-parter by Tom Bradby.
And BBC1 has The Ark, a First World War drama set in a field hospital, with Suranne Jones, Oona Chaplin and Hermione Norris. That, plus Jamaica Inn, with Jessica Brown Findlay and Matthew McNulty, a three-part adaptation of Daphne du Maurier's 19th century Cornish gothic romance.
On the same side, Jonathan Strange And Mr Norrell, with Charlotte Riley, Marc Warren, Paul Kaye and Eddie Marsan, is set during the Napoleonic Wars, in an England where magic once existed and is about to return.
There's also The Casual Vacancy, a BBC1 adaptation of JK Rowling's first novel for adults, and From There to Here, a family saga set in 1996, about a man whose life is rocked to the core on the day an IRA bomb explodes in Manchester city centre (that one stars Philip Glenister, Bernard Hill, Steven Mackintosh, Saskia Reeves, Liz White, Daniel Rigby and Morven Christie).
We'll also be seeing BBC1's The Game, a gripping Cold War drama set in the 1970s.
The centenary of the outbreak of the First World War will naturally be marked by a plethora of programmes, including 37 Days, a BBC2 factual drama with Ian McDiarmid, Sinead Cusack, Tim Pigott-Smith, Bill Paterson and Kenneth Cranham. It reveals the complex, behind-closed-doors story of what triggered the conflict. There's also a new Tony Jordan drama, The Great War.
Bill Nighy returns to BBC2 as MI5 spy Johnny Worricker in the second and third parts of David Hare's Worricker Trilogy Turks & Caicos and Salting The Battlefield.
And on an altogether lighter note, BBC2 also has Tubby And Enid a one-off musical with Imelda Staunton and Michael Ball, adapted from Victoria Wood's stage play That Day We Sang plus Stan and Ollie, a 90-minute film about legendary comic duo Laurel and Hardy.
Away from drama, Channel 4's latest celebrity challenge is The Jump, hosted by Davina McCall, where a dozen famous names attempt some of the most challenging winter sports. Olympic legend Sir Steve Redgrave is among the line-up for that. Others include Tara Palmer-Tomkinson, Darren Gough, Anthea Turner, Nicky Clarke and Melinda Messenger.
Channel 4 has also a feast of top comedy lined up, including a third series of the excellent Friday Night Dinner.
Channel 5, meanwhile, has lined up its love season a series of themed programmes which include Age Gap Love, Holiday Love Rats and Henry & Anne: The Lovers Who Changed History.
It also has Autopsy: The Last Hours Of , a series of powerful documentaries revealing the medical truth behind the sudden deaths of several major names, including Michael Jackson and Whitney Houston.
As for returning series, some of the most popular shows coming back to our screens include Inspector George Gently, Silk, Endeavour, Rev, Line Of Duty, Atlantis, Law & Order: UK, The Village, Episodes and Shetland).
Even now, I've really just skimmed
Most recent headlines
06/10/2025
France T l visions, France's leading broadcaster, has received the 2025 EBU ...
04/09/2025
Monumental Sports & Entertainment (MSE), in collaboration with Dalet, has been a...
30/08/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission has adopted its FY 2025 Regulatory Fees Order that establishes the regulatory fee rates for the broadcast stati...
29/08/2025
Australian Red Cross and SBS launch training to help workplaces in the fight aga...
29/08/2025
The National Film and Video Foundation (NFVF), an agency of the Department of Sp...
29/08/2025
L3Harris Technologies has concentrated decades of expertise across the entire enterprise to develop affordable and reliable best-of-breed solutions to rapidly c...
29/08/2025
BURBANK, Calif. The CW Network and the Pac-12 Conference have announced a new media rights deal that will extend their broadcast partnership beginning with the ...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK Gracenote has released a new analysis of its global video dataset showing that the number of FAST channels grew nearly 14% from Q1 2025 and 76% since 2...
29/08/2025
SAN JOSE, Calif. Harmonic has announced a series of improvements to its live sports streaming solution that the company said will improve fan engagement, protec...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK and LOS ANGELES Fox Corp. and YouTube TV last night announced a renewal of the full portfolio of Fox networks, including Fox News Channel, Fox Business...
29/08/2025
Budapest, Hungary, August 2025 - The integration of Microsoft Teams Rooms (MTR) with Lightware's Taurus universal matrix switchers delivers a new level of f...
29/08/2025
Frequency, the engine behind many of the world's best-known streaming television channels, today announced it will launch Studio Live, a next-generation uni...
29/08/2025
In an era when AI and cyber resilience are essential, Scality will mark the 10th anniversary of Scality Day on October 16, 2025 in Paris. This flagship global e...
29/08/2025
Disguise's In-House Creative and Technical Teams Pre-Visualised, Programmed and Delivered Content for the Experience, All Powered by EX 3+
Technology solu...
29/08/2025
Disguise will be demonstrating the latest workflows for TV, film and live events on a number of partner booths at the show
Disguise, the industry-leading tech...
29/08/2025
STOCKHOLM, Sweden Accedo will showcase Accedo Compose, its AI agent-powered modular orchestration layer that assists streaming providers in transitioning client...
29/08/2025
LOS ANGELES Cineverse has announced that it is working with Xperi to bring four of its streaming channels to automobiles for the first time as part of the DTS A...
29/08/2025
DALLAS & ATLANTA Gray Media has announced an agreement with the sports streaming service Victory+ to simulcast 17 Dallas Stars NHL games in 15 television market...
29/08/2025
NEW YORK AND CULVER CITY Comcast NBCUniversal and Amazon have announced new and extended distribution agreements that will expand the content available on their...
29/08/2025
FOOTHILL RANCH, Calif. RED Digital Cinema will feature its Cine-Broadcast Module supporting live broadcast workflows during IBC2025, Sept. 12-15, at the RAI Ams...
29/08/2025
29 Aug 2025
Kyivstar Rings Opening Bell at Nasdaq Marking Landmark Listing and ...
29/08/2025
More than half of all NFL games live on Sky for the first timeFriday 29 August 2025
Sky Sports has announced a new three-year deal with the NFL, extending its ...
29/08/2025
Back to All News
RIV4LRIES: The Trailer of the New Series With Samuele Carrino ...
29/08/2025
Get ready for an inspiring and emotional insight into the world of competitive Irish dancing with My Story: Tomi Champion of the World airing on RT 2 this monda...
29/08/2025
RT has today announced that David McCullagh is to be the new presenter of RT Radio 1's flagship Today programme, which airs every weekday at 10am, replaci...
28/08/2025
By Kristin Feeley, Director, Documentary Film & Artist Programs
If you want to tell untold stories, if you want to give voice to the voiceless, you've got ...
28/08/2025
Directed by Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert, Sundance Institute-supported Amer...
28/08/2025
Corridos have been a cornerstone of M sica Mexicana for generations, telling stories rooted in everyday life. Now, a new chapter is taking shape: motivational c...
28/08/2025
Los corridos han sido un pilar de la M sica Mexicana durante generaciones, contando historias enraizadas en la vida cotidiana. Ahora, un nuevo cap tulo est tom...
28/08/2025
Earlier this month, we promised our Verano Forever party would bring the heat, a...
28/08/2025
L3Harris will provide the Polish F-16V fleet with the Viper Shield electronic warfare system as part of an upgrade program....
28/08/2025
Bilbao, August 26, 2025 - AgileTV, an international television and video technol...
28/08/2025
Ken Wilkinson is an Emmy Awards nominated New York audio engineer who specialises in production sound mixing for film, commercial, episodic and documentary work...
28/08/2025
NEW YORK FuboTV today announced that it will launch Fubo Sports, a skinny bundle that focuses on sports with a subscription price of $56 monthly....
28/08/2025
NEVADA City, Calif. At IBC2025, Sept. 12-15 at the RAI Amsterdam, Telestream will debut its new Global Ingest strategy, introducing a next-generation ingest arc...
28/08/2025
Dr. Rhoda Bernard Releases Groundbreaking Debut Book on Accessible Arts Educatio...
28/08/2025
TAG Video Systems, the leader in software-based IP end-to-end workflow monitoring, deep probing, and real-time visualization, has named Oliver Gappa as Sales Di...
28/08/2025
AI-based voice enhancement will be among a series of innovations making their IBC 2025 debut on the DHD stand B46 in Hall 8 at the RAI Amsterdam Convention Cent...
28/08/2025
Telef nica Servicios Audiovisuales (TSA), the leading system integrator and service provider in the media sector in Spain, with the support of Appear, the globa...
28/08/2025
To fully immerse sailing fans in the world's biggest offshore yacht race, production company, Optical Media turned to LiveU's On-site Production solutio...
28/08/2025
Working with Calrec on its most recent overhaul, radio and television broadcaster, WNED has migrated to a fully IP infrastructure with multiple Type R consoles,...
28/08/2025
Cleeng, the Subscriber Retention Management (SRM ) inventor, has unveiled Cleeng Pro, the first-ever direct-to-consumer (D2C) subscription management platform t...
28/08/2025
Zixi, the industry leader in live broadcast-quality video over IP, today announced that French media distribution platform OKAST has selected Zixi to enable rel...
28/08/2025
Solution offers a streamlined, speaker-free architecture to optimize integration with premium external loudspeakers and advanced loudness metering
Nixer Pro Au...
28/08/2025
Cinegy, the premier provider of software-defined television technology, has announced a strategic partnership with Vision One Touch Film Production Services L.L...
28/08/2025
Telestream, a global leader in media workflow technologies, will debut its new Global Ingest strategy at IBC2025, introducing a next-generation ingest architect...
28/08/2025
Tier 1 operator selects Broadpeak to power high-performance, unified CDN solution across Norway, Sweden and Finland
Broadpeak, a leader in streaming and moneti...
28/08/2025
Leading video software provider, Synamedia, today announced that 24 Frames Digital, one of India's leading live event streaming service providers, has chose...
28/08/2025
Meet VisualOn at IBC2025: See What's Next in AI-Powered Video Streaming Join VisualOn at IBC2025 and discover how our AI-driven Optimizer and advanced media...