Pick of the week
The Perfect Couple
More drama about the genteel torments of extreme wealth, adapted from Elin Hilderbrand’s 2018 novel. It follows the preparations for the wedding of Amelia Sacks (Eve Hewson), a quirky young woman about to marry into one of Nantucket’s richest and most insufferable families. As the guests assemble at their beautiful beachside mansion, rivalries emerge, grudges are aired and microaggressions mount. When a body is found in the water, it’s impossible to rule anyone out. The dialogue isn’t deadly enough to match its most obvious precedent, The White Lotus, but the fine cast (Nicole Kidman, Dakota Fanning and many more) keep things scurrilously watchable.
Netflix, from Thursday 5 September
***
First Blood
More true crime to temporarily slake our seemingly insatiable vicarious bloodlust. This series takes a very specialist look at a number of serial killers via their first murders and the events leading up to them. What turns horrific fantasy into deadly reality, and could a better understanding of this psychology help us stop such killers before they begin? Featuring episodes exploring the lives of the likes of Aileen Wuornos, Robert Hansen, Danny Rolling and Richard Ramirez, it’s a grim trawl through the very darkest corners of human dysfunction.
Channel 4, from Monday 2 September
***
Phil Wang: Wang in There Baby!
Phil Wang’s amiable, dry, gently surreal humour has seen him become a TV panel show staple. But this comedy special – his second for Netflix – finds him in a more exploratory and even slightly reflective mood. Filmed at the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse at Shakespeare’s Globe theatre in London, Wang is pondering identity in the form of his mixed heritage, but also in the context of minor celebrity and its pitfalls. He’s not offputtingly earnest, however; sharp observational wit and daft flights of fancy are never far away.
Netflix, from Tuesday 3 September
***
Outlast
“Let’s go and trash their entire camp!” This reality show – in which 16 survival experts are dropped into the Alaskan wilderness, forced to form groups and then compete to be the last team standing – is getting a bit Lord of the Flies in its second season. Sabotage is now on the agenda but, with some participants trying to keep things honest, will good triumph over evil? There’s a share of $1m for the winners but the real intrigue lies in seeing how (and if) these often prickly lone wolves can bond together for the greater good.
Netflix, from Wednesday 4 September
***
Slow Horses
There remains something almost miraculous about the balance this drama locates between the deadly serious nature of the work undertaken by the slack and scuzzy occupants of Slough House and the dry, unsentimental tone of the dialogue and performances. Quality control shows no sign of dipping in season four: after a shocking attack in London at Christmas, Jackson Lamb (Gary Oldman) and co face challenges on multiple fronts – personal backstories open up this time, to striking effect. But the show remains brilliantly slippery – in the world of espionage, nothing is quite as it seems. Another triumph.
Apple TV+, from Wednesday 4 September
***
Dr Death
The gruesome true story of Italian surgeon Paolo Macchiarini is the subject of the second season of this medical crime drama. Played here with sinister smoothness by Edgar Ramírez, Macchiarini specialised in transplants and, for a while, seemed a pioneer and a lifesaver. But when journalist Benita Alexander started examining his practices, something horrific emerged: Macchiarini was experimenting on his patients, many of whom were apparently not seriously ill. However, the closer she got to her quarry, the more blurred the line between personal and professional became.
Paramount+, from Thursday 5 September
***
Bordertown
This Finnish crime drama counts Stephen King among its admirers and it’s easy to see why – it’s not an entirely original premise, but it is unpredictable and pleasingly sinister. Ville Virtanen is lugubrious detective Kari Sorjonen, who moves his family to a seemingly tranquil town on the border between Finland and Russia. His hopes for a peaceful environment in which to raise a family are dashed as a series of murders hit the area. Much is made of the harsh, beautiful landscape and the claustrophobia of Sorjonen’s close but occasionally fraught family life.
Channel 4, from Friday 6 September
