Are we still living in a golden age of television? Hard to tell. Netflix’s first generation of more refined offerings – Top Boy and The Crown – ended last year. As did Succession and Happy Valley. And there’s a general consensus that prestige peaked some point in the last decade. But there’s certainly a lot of television arriving this year, and the return of a few familiar faces. Anyone hankering after the halcyon days of Westeros will be happy to see the return of a Thrones spin-off as well as a new sci-fi series from the original show’s creators. Below you can find our previews of the most promising upcoming series as well as our pick of the best shows already out. Happy viewing.
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Doctor Who (11 May)
For some time, the question of whether Doctor Who is any good or not has been sort of irrelevant. It's been going for 61 years now, and exists almost in its own pocket universe where it can both get away with murder compared to other big legacy TV shows, and make narrative decisions which would be met with a shrug by most other fandoms but which are, to Whovians, tantamount to cultural vandalism.
But it feels like right now, after the 60th anniversary specials last November, it might be actually good again. From one angle, there's a lot of continuity – Russell T Davies is back as showrunner, and former showrunner Steven Moffatt is doing some writing too. From another, it's basically a ground-up reboot.
It's the first series for 15th Doctor Ncuti Gatwa, who is his usual luminous self, and the shape and scale of the stories which have been teased so far feel way bigger and way less kitchen sink drama than recent series: a new teaser shows that Gatwa's off to see some dinosaurs instead. And that's because Who is now a BBC-Disney collab, launching on both iPlayer and Disney+, and it looks like it too. It's a big swing. It might just come off.
Doctor Who starts with two episodes on iPlayer and Disney+ on 11 May, and each Saturday afterwards
Eric (30 May)
Learning that this new six-parter takes its title from the name of Benedict Cumberbatch’s imaginary friend in the show – a seven-foot blue and purple monster puppet – might give you a slightly misleading indication of its mood. In fact, Cumberbatch’s character, Vincent, a puppeteer in 1980s New York who runs a Sesame Street-esque kids show, begins imagining Eric only when his nine-year-old son, Edgar, goes missing on the way to school, kickstarting the kind of nightmarish descent into madness and despair that you wouldn’t wish on your worst enemy. Eric’s creator – the show, not the puppet – is Abi Morgan (The Hour, The Split), so of course expect a series that is gripping, psychologically inquisitive and whip-smart (with some natty early Eighties fashions for good measure).
Eric will be available to watch on Netflix from 30 April
House of the Dragon Season 2
Has any show ever benefitted so much from spoilers? Going into House of the Dragon, we knew exactly where these families would all end up thanks to eight seasons of Game of Thrones, which meant the pleasure was all about learning how those relationships came to be. Thanks to a stellar cast – Matt Smith and Emma D’Arcy on fine, pulpy form – the first season was a welcome return to George R.R. Martin’s fantasy word. The second season, which dive once more into this fractured family, will be big. The only question is how big. Our guess? Dragon-sized (one of the really big ones!).
House of the Dragon is expected to debut in the summer, and you’ll be able to watch it on Sky Atlantic/NOW in the UK
The Penguin
If superheroes are on the way out, perhaps it was inevitable that villains would start taking up prime real estate. So here is The Penguin, with Colin Farrell as the titular bad guy (he first appeared in 2022’s The Batman with Robert Pattinson as Bruce Wayne). The eight-part series will follow the rise of Gotham’s devious gangster. Comic book adaptations are no longer sure fire hits but there’s enough here – a grungy, gangster vibe, Farrell’s moodiness – to pique our interest.
The Penguin is expected to debut on Max in the autumn
Dune: Prophecy
If Denis Villeneuve’s blockbuster sequel were not enough (Dune: Part Two, trailer above, arrives in March), Max has another helping of Frank Herbert’s fantasy world for you. This one takes place 10,000 years before the action of the main novel and changes its focus to the Bene Gesserit, the shadowy sisterhood that plays a key role in the movies. Emily Watson and Mark Strong are on board for this Duniverse expansion, which is due later this year (though it has been a troubled production, so watch this space for announcements).
Dune: Prophecy is expected to land on Max later this year
Disclaimer
If there were one reason to switch on the television (or watch something sadly on your iPhone during a commute), it would look a lot like Disclaimer. Based on the novel of the same name by Renée Knight, the thriller stars Cate Blanchett, Lesley Manville, Sacha Baron Cohen and Squid Game’s HoYeon Jung. Another huge plus? It is written and directed by Alfonso Cuarón. The miniseries follows a journalist who realises she is a character in a novel that reveals a long-covered secret. Nightmarish premise, excellent entertainment.
Disclaimer is expected to debut on Apple TV this year
Alma’s Not Normal
One of the best sitcoms of the last five years or so, this, and it’s back for a second series. Alma Nuthall lives in Bolton with her heroin addict mum and stony grandma – what larks, you cry – and we left her at the end of the first series weighing up whether to stick by her mum or to go chasing her dreams with a theatre troupe. The phrase ‘like nothing else on TV’ gets bandied about a lot, but the mix of madness, earthiness and genuine drama is unique.
Alma’s Not Normal is expected to air later this year
Ready to watch
Baby Reindeer
There’s nothing about Netflix’s new drama Baby Reindeer that isn’t quite odd. Based on the real-life experiences of comedian Richard Gadd, which he has already turned into a successful play, it details his time working at a pub in his twenties during which he took pity on a lonely regular, who turned out to be a convicted (and mentally unstable, though that goes without saying) stalker. Gadd – who plays a version himself called Donny in the show, with Jessica Gunning as his admirer, Martha – is careful not to excuse himself for his fostering of their relationship as it plays out (platonic on his part, though it gets complicated; sexually fantastical on hers: “Baby Reindeer” is the pet-name she gives him). The seven-part series of mostly half-hour episodes starts in comedy-grotesque mode – Martha and Donny frequently look down and up at each other from alarmingly wonky angles – but four episodes in there’s a shift: a revelation, of sorts, as to why Donny has acted as he has, or rather, failed to act, to end his nightmarish situation. It makes for a twisty, thought-provoking drama that is both rich and strange.
Baby Reindeer debuts on Netflix
Fallout
Amazon’s big-budget TV adaptation of beloved video game series Fallout turned out to be very good, very gory fun. For those unfamiliar with the franchise, we are in America, 200 years after nuclear explosion that has forced a lucky few (known as “vault dwellers”) underground. One of those vault dwellers, Lucy (played by Ella Purnell), ventures into the world above to rescue her father after a disastrous wedding. After last year’s The Last of Us, we are two for two on successful video game adaptations (though, for our money, Fallout is a little more fun).Naturally, a second season has been announced.
You can watch Fallout on Prime Video
The Sympathizer
“Confessing secrets is the most exciting thing in the world,” announces Sandra Oh’s wide-eyed character in the trailer for The Sympathiser. If you share that worldview, you are in for a treat with HBO’s latest miniseries, an adaptation of Viet Thanh Nguyen’s 2015 novel of the same name. Xoa Huande plays the Captain, a North Vietnamese mole who flees to Los Angeles in the final days of the Vietnam War. In America, he learns that his days of espionage may not be quite over just yet. The novel – a debut which won the Pulitzer Prize – is an energetic mix of styles, part comedy, part political thriller, part immigration narrative. There is a memorable storyline in which the Captain consults on a film, which is a parody of Apocalypse Now-style Vietnam war narratives. Read the truth behind the fiction here.
The Sympathizer is out now in the US and will air on Sky in the UK
Curb Your Enthusiasm Season 12
Larry David shrugs his last in this final season, and manages to extraordinary feat sticking the landing with one of its strongest of all. Obviously we've been here before. Larry died in 2005 then got sent back to Earth, and Curb went on a six-year hiatus in 2011. So, you know, don't count your chickens. But if this is seriously the last series, it's a fine way to go out: as cantankerous and misanthropic as ever, as Larry's criminal trial for giving Leon's aunt a bottle of water while she waited in line to vote heaves into view.
You can watch Curb Your Enthusiasm on Apple TV+ now
How To with John Wilson Season 3
Another big cult show hits its home straight. The third season of How To aired last year in America but has only just made it over here, and it's worth the wait: John Wilson's roaming POV of the weird, the gross and the oddly moving bits of New York and further afield hits some of its highest peaks as he explains how to find a public toilet, how to get really beefy and how to track your package. On the way he meets people who are freezing their brains to be reanimated in the future, giant pumpkin growers and a remote colony of people who can't bear being around electronics. The fourth ep, which takes him to a group of vintage vacuum cleaner enthusiasts, might be the best thing he's done yet.
You can watch How To with John Wilson on iPlayer now
Renegade Nell
Renegade Nell, the new series from Sally Wainwright (Gentleman Jack, Happy Valley), takes familiar genre tropes – period-drama jolliness, superhero-movie action sequences, and a little bit of Doctor Who eccentricity – and combines them into something defiantly and rambunctiously new. Derry Girls’ Louisa Harland plays Nell Jackson, a free-spirited young woman making her way in early 1700s Tottenham (with the accent ‘n’ all), who comes into surprise magical powers of strength and agility, which she uses to fight the corrupt ruling gentry who killed her father. It’s got swagger, energy, and glossy production values, plus a bonus sprite played by a mulletted Nick Mohammed.
You can watch Renegade Nell on Disney Plus now
Loot Season 2
I confess I had forgotten that this amiable comedy would be returning for a second season, but what happy news it is. Maya Rudolph plays Molly, the newly-divorced wife of a Bezos-like billionaire (Adam Scott), who is wondering what the hell to do with her life and very, very deep pockets. What would do with an $87 billion settlement? She decides to set up a charitable foundation. That was, as you may guess, a mixed bag as Molly learnt to balance hum-drum office life with her domestic luxury (she keeps celebrity chef David Chang in her kitchen). In Season 2, as she continues her efforts to make the world a better place, will there be mishaps? We would bet a few billion on the answer being a yes. Amid dreary dramas and plodding sci-fi series, a 20-minute sitcom with good jokes and a solid supporting cast (the stand-out is Nat Faxon, who plays a hapless numbers guy) is a very welcome diversion.
You can watch Loot Season 2 on Apple TV+ from 3 April now
Ripley
Every time you think Andrew Scott’s gone and popped off as hard as he can, he comes along with another banger. All of Us Strangers made you weep hot, sad tears to ‘Always on my Mind’; Ripley promises to have you swearing you’d not trust him as far as you could throw him. Scott’s Tom Ripley – of The Talented Mr Ripley, first Patricia Highsmith’s book and then the Matt Damon movie – is a grifter just about keeping his head above water in mid-Sixties New York, when he’s sent to Italy to convince an industrial magnate’s wayward son to come home. Fraud, murder, lies ensue.
You can watch Ripley on Netflix now
True Detective: Night Country
True Detective returned in fine (if sometimes uneven) form with Jodie Foster and Kali Reis taking the reins of the twisty crime series. We are in Alaska where detectives Liz Danzers (Foster) and Evangeline Navarro (Reis) are investigating the disappearance of six men from an Arctic research station. For many, this season was a reminder of what the show could be: a well-paced thriller with gory set pieces and a few existential questions. Just don’t ask the original series creator Nic Pizzolatto for his take.
You can watch True Detective: Night Country on Sky Atlantic/NOW now
Sexy Beast
Imagine Muppet Babies but for psychopathic gangsters…. And lo! Here comes Sexy Beast, the series: a prequel to Jonathan Glazer’s iconic 2000 film about the misadventures of Gal Dove and Don Logan. Now though, they’re not old and disaffected, but young and up to no good in naughty Nineties’ London, with James McArdle as Gal and Emun Elliott as Don, taking on the roles made famous by Ray Winstone and Ben Kingsley respectively in the original, with Stephen Moyer doing Ian McShane’s memorable drug lord, Teddy Bass. Will it have the staying power of the movie? That remains to be seen, but the tongue-in-cheek homage to the famous sunbathing scene in episode one shows it’s wearing its heritage lightly.
You can watch Sexy Beast on Paramount+ now
Expats
When Expats creator Lulu Wang spoke to Esquire ahead of the show’s launch, she said that it was a series about perspective. “It jumps around, both in timeline and perspective, to show you different sides of the same story,” the Farewell director told us. It turns out that this is both the best and at-times frustrating aspect of the Hong Kong-set miniseries, which tells the story of an American expat Margaret (played by Nicole Kidman) whose youngest child goes missing. While the series gains a lot of energy by jumping around – we also follow nanny Mercy (Ji-young Yoo) and Margaret’s long-suffering friend, Hilary (Sarayu Blue) – it can also prove dizzying and threatens, at times, to lose us. But stick with this strange, unexpectedly paced show, and you are in for a treat, especially as it builds towards its conclusion. There may not be easy answers (or any answers at all, really) in Expats, but it only adds to the show’s life-like appeal.
You can watch Expats on Amazon Prime Video now
Masters of the Air
This is the third instalment of a loose trilogy from executive producers Gary Goetzman, Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg (Band of Brothers debuted in 2001, The Pacific followed in 2010). This time round, we follow the explosive highs and devastating lows of the US army’s 100th Bomb Group during World War II. The cast is a who’s who of potential Bonds: Callum Turner (last seen on the big screen in George Clooney’s The Boys in the Boat), Austin Butler, Barry Keoghan, Ncuti Gatwa, Anthony Boyle, Raff Law. That starry cast elevate the war drama, which hits the exact right notes for fans of the genre: inventive fight sequences, romantic yearning and some really great aviator jackets.
You can watch Masters of the Air on Apple TV+ now
Mr. & Mrs. Smith
When a television remake of a 2005 flick (which, you may recall, brought together Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie) was announced in 2021, it sounded like a dream pairing: Donald Glover and Phoebe Waller-Bridge would take on the lead-roles. But then Waller-Bridge left, and it seemed to encounter development trouble (last year’s strikes also caused a delay). We are happy to report that the eight-part show is a subversive and surprisingly sexy slow-burn – can we thank Donald Glover’s bootcut jeans for that? – with superb sets and genuinely great action sequences, though the main characters’ spy skills are another matter. You can read our full review of the show here.
You can watch Mr. and Mrs. Smith on Amazon Prime Video now
Abbott Elementary
Even if you do not feel evangelical about this breakthrough mockumentary – as large swathes of the internet do – it’s hard to deny its small-scale, gently biting appeal. Quinta Brunson’s school-based comedy has provided two seasons’ worth of consistent laughter (and to a less successful extent, romance) and it still feels like it’s only getting better. This season experiments with the well-worn formula by separating Janine (Brunson’s character) from the rest of the gang, which provides some fresh scenarios and much-needed character development. As ever, it’s worth tuning in for the stand-out performance by Janelle James, who plays a disastrous but somehow-Teflon principal.
You can watch Abbott Elementary Season 3 now. In the UK, you can watch it on Disney Plus, and new episodes air weekly
One Day
For many people who treasured David Nicholls’ best-selling 2009 book, One Day, about a young man, Dexter, and a young woman, Emma, who meet at university and have a will-they-won’t-they friendship over the next 20 years, Lone Scherfig’s 2011 movie adaptation didn’t quite scratch the itch. Perhaps that’s because the book is about the lingering slow-burn, and was better suited to a drawn-out TV drama. Great news: Netflix arrived with a 14-part take, with The White Lotus’s Leo Woodall and This Is Going to Hurt’s Ambika Mod playing the compelling (kind of) couple. It was hard not to fall for this adaptation, with its nostalgic set pieces and charming performances, proving once again that romcoms are thriving on the small screen. You can read our interview with Nicholls about the streaming hit here.
You can watch One Day on Netflix now
Boarders
If Saltburn proved anything, it’s that the cloisters of privilege are perpetually fascinating to us. This new six-part comedy-drama from writer Daniel Lawrence Taylor is a delightful exploration of what might happen if a majority-white British private boarding school turned out – courtesy of an incriminating leaked video – not to be teaching its students excellent morals (imagine!) and sought to make amends (and definitely not enact a hollow PR exercise!) by offering scholarships to five black students from more modest inner-London backgrounds. The five young leads – Aruna Jalloh, Josh Tedeku, Jodie Campbell, Myles Kamwendo and Sekou Diaby – fill this energetic show with pathos, charisma and humour.
Boarders is available to watch on BBC iPlayer
Shōgun
Does it feel like you’ve heard this one before? This 10-episode FX creation is based on James Clavell’s novel of the same name, published in 1975 as part of his Asian Saga, a series which chronicles adventures of Europeans in Asia. Then there was an Emmy award-winning miniseries in 1980. And now a fresh adaptation, with Cosmo Jarvis taking on the lead role of John Blackthorne, a sailor who washed up in Japan and is swiftly thrown into a power struggle between feudal lords and Western traders. With spirited performances, gorgeous scenery and devious plotting, there’s plenty to like here. It is also the kind of television show that can cut through the crowded landscape, hitting a sweet spot between those interested in history but who are not historians (who would surely spend each hour pointing out that, actually, it didn’t happen quite like that).
Shōgun is available to watch on Disney Plus now
The Regime
Hmmmm, is anyone in the mood to watch the manic final days of a crumbling European regime? And no, it is not a documentary but a six-part miniseries written by Will Tracy (The Menu and Succession), directed by Stephen Frears and Jessica Hobbs, and starring Kate Winslet (as well as Hugh Grant, Matthias Schoenaerts and Andrea Riseborough). Although it is not entirely clear what The Regime is trying to say – dictators are bad? – it is watchable stuff: Winslet, in particular, is masterful at playing the hypochondriac leader whose grip on reality is crumbling.
The Regime is available to watch on HBO in America, and you can watch it in the UK on Sky Atlantic/Now from April
3 Body Problem
David Benioff and D. B. Weiss – whose names you will remember from the Game of Thrones opening credits – bring a major sci-fi epic to Netflix with 3 Body Problem. Based on a trilogy of novels – Liu Cixin’s The Three-Body Problem (no idea why they changed that title) – the series follows an astrophysicist who witnessed her father’s violent murder during the Chinese Cultural Revolution. Later enlisted at a military radar base, she makes a decision that will echo through time and space. Meanwhile, in current-day London, Clarence (played by Benedict Wong) is investigating a string of high-profile suicides among the scientific community which leads him to a group of former Oxford students and a shadowy organisation or two. At this point (spoilers, I guess!) I must tell you that aliens are involved, and your enjoyment of the show will hinge on your tolerance for extraterrestrials and physics problems. If you find those unappealing, avoid. But if they are your thing, jump right in. You can read our full review here.
You can watch Three Body Problem on Netflix from 21 March
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Henry Wong is a senior culture writer at Esquire, working across digital and print. He covers film, television, books, and art for the magazine, and also writes profiles.
Miranda Collinge is the Deputy Editor of Esquire, overseeing editorial commissioning for the brand. With a background in arts and entertainment journalism, she also writes widely herself, on topics ranging from Instagram fish to psychedelic supper clubs, and has written numerous cover profiles for the magazine including Cillian Murphy, Rami Malek and Tom Hardy.
