A different angle on the Anne Frank story in 'A Small Light'

A SMALL LIGHT A different angle on the Anne Frank story in a Disney drama

Bel Powley, Liev Schreiber and Joe Cole star in Disney's new eight-part drama

The Diary of Anne Frank became a Broadway play and has formed the basis of a lengthy catalogue of films and TV series, but the name of Miep Gies is rather less well-known. Yet without Gies the Anne Frank story might never have reached the wider world, since it was she who helped the Frank family, along with four other Dutch Jews, to remain in hiding and evade capture by the Germans from July 1942 until their luck ran out in August 1944.

Fatal Attraction, Paramount+ review - Adrian Lyne's bunny-boiler blockbuster expanded onwards and outwards

★★★★ FATAL ATTRACTION, PARAMOUNT+  A fascinating series trips over its own ambitions

A fascinating series which sometimes trips over its own ambitions

Directed by Adrian Lyne, Fatal Attraction was the biggest-grossing film of 1987, and gave the world the term “bunny boiler”. Lyne isn’t aboard for Paramount’s new eight-part series, but the film’s screenwriter James Dearden is a major script contributor alongside the show’s creators Kevin J Hynes and Alexandra Cunningham.

The Diplomat, Netflix review - can London's new American ambassador prevent World War Three?

★★★★ THE DIPLOMAT, NETFLIX Can London's new American ambassador prevent World War Three?

Sorkin-esque drama takes a satirical look at the 'special relationship'

Does the “special relationship” really exist? Judging by Netflix’s sparky new political drama, yes it does, with London-based CIA agent Eidra Graham (Ali Ahn) going out of her way to spell out the unique intelligence-sharing arrangements between the US and the UK. Just as long as everyone remembers that the Americans are well and truly in charge, nothing can possibly go wrong.

Why Didn't They Ask Evans?, ITV1 review - Agatha Christie gets a tense and twisty reworking by Hugh Laurie

★★★★ WHY DIDN'T THEY ASK EVANS? Christie gets a tense, twisty reworking by Hugh Laurie

Lucy Boynton and Will Poulter shine as a pair of intrepid amateur sleuths

With Magpie Murders currently airing on BBC One, Why Didn’t They Ask Evans? is another gem from the BritBox stable, where it made its debut last year. Its secret weapon is Hugh Laurie, who’s all over it as screenwriter, director and actor.

Magpie Murders, BBC One review - zinging TV adaptation of Anthony Horowitz's bestseller

★★★★★ MAGPIE MURDERS, BBC ONE Zinging TV adaptation of Anthony Horowitz's bestseller

Not only a whodunnit, but also a two-dunnit

Finding a fresh twist on the traditional detective mystery is virtually impossible, but Anthony Horowitz has made a bold stab at it with Magpie Murders. This TV adaptation (which appeared on the BritBox streaming platform last year) has been masterminded by Horowitz from his 2016 bestseller, which ingeniously features two interlocking stories, one set in the present day and one in the 1950s.

Rabbit Hole, Paramount+ review - sabotage, subterfuge and corporate skulduggery

★★★★ RABBIT HOLE, PARAMOUNT+ Sabotage, subterfuge and corporate skulduggery

Can Kiefer Sutherland save the world from a megalomaniac mastermind?

Kiefer Sutherland has proved to be a hardy perennial over the decades, from movies like Young Guns and Flatliners to TV shows including Designated Survivor and especially the much-lauded 24. And he seems to have picked another winner with Rabbit Hole.

Succession, Season Four, Sky Atlantic review - powerful beginning for the endgame

★★★★★ SUCCESSION, SEASON FOUR, SKY ATLANTIC Powerful beginning for the endgame

Patriarch vs pretenders: a primal story that's never been more compellingly told

How much more is there left to be said about the excellence of Succession? It’s back for a final season, and devotees will pore over every detail, every conversational ploy from robust to downright crude, every chess move on this volatile board. As they should, because nothing comparable has appeared on television.

Great Expectations, BBC One review - modernised, muddied and muddled

★★★ GREAT EXPECTATIONS, BBC ONE Modernised, muddied and muddled

Steven Knight gives the Dickens classic a Peaky Blinders feel

There’s no point in being upset with the writer Steven Knight for doing what he usually does; even so, many viewers will find what he has done with Charles Dickens’s Great Expectations far too Peaky for their tastes. 

Fleishman Is in Trouble, Disney+ review - mid-life crises in Manhattan

★★★★ FLEISHMAN IS IN TROUBLE, DISNEY+ Mid-life crises in Manhattan 

Taffy Brodesser-Akner adapts her hit novel about high-flyers losing their bearings

As films and television series based in New York City tend to do, Fleishman Is in Trouble opens with an aerial shot of Manhattan – except, significantly, this sequence is presented upside down. To the celestial sound of tinkling arpeggios, the slim skyscrapers of the Upper East Side hang down from the sky into a blue cloudless ocean like futuristic stalactites, the camera moving gently through them before dipping, Psycho-style, through a window.