Love Island

Monday

ITV2, 9pm

It wouldn’t truly be summer without the return of a new cohort of buffed, tanned singletons looking for love (allegedly) in the Love Island villa.

With power couple Laura Whitmore and Iain Stirling returning to their respective roles as host and witty narrator, tonight’s episode will see the first eleven contestants couple up in a brand-new villa. From football legend Michael Owen’s daughter Gemma from Chester to fishmonger Luca from Brighton, the series promises more drama, muggings off, romance and, of course, memeable moments. 

Everything I Know About Love

Tuesday

BBC One, 10:40pm

Dolly Alderton’s hit millennial memoir Everything I Know About Love saw the writer wax lyrical on dating disasters, wild nights out, bad breakups, and the enduring power of female friendship in the tumultuous years that are your twenties.

In this adaptation, Emma Appleton (Clique) stars as Maggie, with Bel Powley (The Diary of a Teenage Girl) as her childhood best friend turned platonic soulmate Birdie.

Living in a Camden houseshare with university pals Amara (Aliyah Oddofin) and Nell (Marli Siu), the crew set out on a series of ill-advised adventures as they adapt to their new adult life in the big city.

We Own This City

Tuesday

Sky Atlantic, 9pm

David Simon and George Pelecanos, the creators of perhaps the most revered series in television history, The Wire, join forces again for a new crime drama chronicling the rise and fall of the Baltimore Police Department’s Gun Trace Task Force.

The series looks at the corruption and moral collapse that befell the American city as policies of drug prohibition and mass arrest were championed at the expense of actual police work. We Own This City stars Jon Berntha; (The Walking Dead), Wunmi Mosaku (Lovecraft Country), Jamie Hector (The Wire) and Josh Charles (The Good Wife).

My Name Is Leon

Friday

BBC Two, 9pm

Based on Kit De Waal’s award-winning novel of the same name, My Name Is Leon charts the quest of Leon, a mixed-race boy in 1980s Birmingham, who is desperate to reunite his family after being separated from his blue-eyed baby brother when taken into care.

Set against the backdrop of the 1980s race riots and told through the young boy’s eyes, the film will follow Leon on his hopeful journey, while shining a light on the touching relationship he has with his caring foster mum Maureen.

The film will star Sir Lenny Henry CBE, Malachi Kirby (Small Axe), Monica Dolan (A Very English Scandal), Olivia Williams (Counterpart), Christopher Eccleston (The A Word), Poppy Lee Friar (In My Skin), Shobna Gulati (Everybody’s Talking About Jamie), and Cole Martin in his first ever TV role as Leon.

Avoidance

Friday

BBC One, 9:30pm

Written by and starring comedian Romesh Ranganathan, this new comedy drama follows Jonathan (Ranganathan), a man with severe conflict avoidance issues whose life revolves around his nine-year-old son Spencer.

Having deferred every decision to his partner Claire (Jessica Knappett, Ghosts), Jonathan is finally forced to face conflict when Claire asks him to leave her. In an attempt to grow a backbone, Jonathan runs away with his son Spencer, but only makes it as far as his sister Danielle’s house (Mandeep Dhillon, Afterlife). There he must learn to live with his sister and her wife Courtney (Lisa McGrillis, The Pass) in a mismatched, completely dysfunctional family unit.