ITV

Liar

Monday

ITV, 9pm​

Liar returns for its second series, picking up from where they left off with disgraced surgeon and sex offender Andrew Earlham (Ioan Gruffud) lying dead in the marshes. 

Certainly, Jack and Harry Williams, the highly acclaimed brothers behind ITV’s Liar, had the issue of complexity in mind when writing the second series of the murder drama. 

Hollington Drive will focus on the lives of two sisters, Theresa and her older sister Helen, who works as a head teacher.

The series opens on a warm summer evening where Theresa and her partner Fraser are hosting a barbeque. When their ten-year-old son Ben asks to go to a nearby park with his cousin Eva, the parents begin to argue over whether they should let the children go.

Set in contemporary London, the six-part series portrays the death-defying and life-saving work of the Metropolitan Police Bomb Disposal Squad, also known as “Expo”.

A summer terrorist campaign wreaks havoc on the capital, and it’s up to Expo to defuse a series of improvised explosive devices.

Vicky McClure (Line of Duty) plays the experienced but reckless operative Lana Washington. As Lana begins to suspect her unit is the bomber’s true target, she sets out on a desperate search for proof and the bomber’s identity.

Sarah Williams, who had previously gained renown for adaptations and had never before written a TV thriller, was focused on the love/hate family dynamic before a conversation with Silverprint Pictures creative director Kate Bartlett who had asked her to come up with an idea for a joint project.

“At the start, I wanted to get to the heart of that thing you have with your family, where you’re full of love and support for them, but they can also wind you up and find your weak points,” Williams told an RTS Q&A session following an exclusive screening of the first episode.

When George Osborne first uttered the phrase “Northern Powerhouse” back in 2014, it’s fair to say that the TV industry wasn’t at the front of his mind. But, six years on, is it time to start thinking of it as such?

Back then, the mood in the TV industry across the North of England was very different. Both Leeds and Manchester were still struggling with the impact of ITV’s retrenchment to London, while the BBC’s project as the anchor tenant of MediaCity UK was barely into its stride.

Making a Monster

Monday: Crime+Investigation, 9.00pm

Adapted by Emer Kenny (Save Me Too) from Val McDermid’s novel The Distant Echo, the drama will follow a young Scottish female detective in the picturesque university town of St. Andrew’s.

While she may not be the type of unorthodox, slick copper who rises effortlessly through the ranks, the refreshingly normal Karen’s quick thinking and silver tongue lands her a promotion to Police Scotland’s Historical Cases Unit.

The six-part series will star Golden Globe winner Brenda Blethyn (Vera) as Kate, who owns a café in a rundown seaside town. Kate forms an unlikely and at times volatile friendship with an African asylum seeker, a doctor called Koji, played by Jimmy Akingbola (Arrow).

While the pair come from very different worlds, they find that they have a lot in common, including a furious determination to never back down from an argument…

Documentary: Diamond Dealers and Cockney Geezers

Channel 4, Monday 20^th January, 10pm

Dani Dyer narrates this documentary taking a deep dive into a diamond shop in London’s East End.