What a romp this is. Any notion of second season nerves for the surprise Disney+ hit Rivals (Jilly Cooper was hardly hot property) are quickly dispelled in a gleeful continuation of the bonking, big hair and hilarity where there’s a belly laugh every 30 seconds. It picks up straight from the end of last season, when boss of Corinium Television, Lord Tony Baddingham (David Tennant), was struck around the head with an award by his former mistress Cameron Cook (Nafessa Williams), and left to bleed to death on the floor of his office. Did he succumb? Far from it. Baddingham survives to plot his revenge, Tennant never better as his character warps into out-and-out cigar-chomping villain.
Meanwhile his rivals at the new TV company Venturer — led by the fragile alliance of Olympian showjumper turned Tory MP Rupert Campbell-Black (Alex Hassell) and Irish TV presenter Declan O’Hara (Aidan Turner) — are riding high (and often; on stairs, in the shower, etc etc) after their apparent triumph, celebrating with a willies-out pool party at the house of Freddie Jones (Danny Dyer).
