Murdered For Being Different, BBC Three review - unbearable but unmissable

★★★★★ MURDERED FOR BEING DIFFERENT Unbearable but unmissable real-life drama now on BBC iPlayer

Sophie Lancaster, killed for being a goth, is at the heart of the online channel's latest real-life dramatisation

Heaven alone knows we've pressing anxieties enough to preoccupy us, but if you have the emotional bandwidth to accommodate more, the iPlayer can oblige. Available now on BBC Three is the latest in what now becomes a trilogy of heartrending dramas with Murdered in the title.

Fleabag, BBC Three

TV BAFTAS 2017: FLEABAG, BBC THREE Phoebe Waller-Bridge wins for Best Female Performance in a comedy

Phoebe Waller-Bridge's brilliant dark comedy about loneliness and grief

Have you seen Fleabag yet? If not, here’s the one-word review: brilliant. You need three hours to watch the lot on the iPlayer, which is BBC Three’s main address these days. Do come back afterwards and read this longer appreciation, which contains spoilers.

Rise of the Superstar Vloggers, BBC Three

RISE OF THE SUPERSTAR VLOGGERS, BBC THREE Don't look now, but TV is dead: scary primer on the frontline of new media

Don't look now, but TV is dead: scary primer on the frontline of new media

This debate about the future of the BBC might be missing the point. In the black corner scowls the Dark Lord of Swingeing Arts Cuts John Whittingdale, while in the fluffy corner is everyone who doesn’t want anything to change. By their “I heart Lyse Doucet” shall you know the latter. We’re all of us, on both sides of the fence, of a certain vintage. The kids, who like it or not seem an absolute dead-cert shoo-in to inherit the future, haven’t got a dog in this fight. Why? Because they don’t watch TV. Any more than they buy newspapers. They watch YouTube.

Josh, BBC Three

JOSH, BBC THREE: Debut of bland twentysomethings flatshare sitcom 

Debut of bland twentysomethings flatshare sitcom

Josh Widdicombe is the tousle-haired guy at the end of the sofa on Channel 4's The Last Leg – where, as in his stand-up, he's permanently baffled by life and quickly reaches screaming pitch about the most minor of controversies. And so, in his new sitcom – written with Tom Craine, a fellow stand-up and his former flatmate – he plays to type as a tousle-haired guy who's permanently baffled by life and quickly, etc, etc.

A Nation Divided? The Charlie Hebdo Aftermath, BBC Three

A NATION DIVIDED? THE CHARLIE HEBDO AFTERMATH, BBC THREE Troubling investigation of the disaffection of French Muslims

Troubling investigation of the disaffection of French Muslims

All the politicians lined up to chorus "Je suis Charlie" after the nauseating massacre of the Charlie Hebdo cartoonists in Paris in January, but three months later, how is that emotional declaration of solidarity against murderous extremism holding up? For this documentary, British Muslim Shaista Aziz went to Paris to find out.

Stop Cutting Our Girls: a Comic Relief Special, BBC Three

Compelling documentary investigates FGM in the UK and Africa

Earlier tonight, I read - on Twitter, so I’m not vouching for its accuracy - that more people have now signed a petition to reinstate Jeremy Clarkson at the BBC than to take stronger action against female genital mutilation (FGM) in the UK. FGM, as actress Zawe Ashton (Fresh Meat) quickly finds out in a moving documentary for Comic Relief, is a hard thing to talk about, because vaginas are hard to talk about.

Cockroaches, ITV2 / Crims, BBC Three

COCKROACHES, ITV2/CRIMS, BBC THREE Two new sitcoms are run up the flagpole. How long will they stay there?

Two new sitcoms are run up the flagpole. How long will they stay there?

Commissioning new sitcoms is a notoriously imprecise science. The first episode, and sometimes the first series, finds a sitcom at its least sure-footed. Keen to tell you all about itself, it tends to behave out of character, gabbling nervously and exaggerating every gesture. It might never find its feet, but you can rarely tell from one half-hour introduction. My own personal hostage to fortune was to have a sense of humour bypass when reviewing Father Ted. (But then episode one wasn't that funny.)

Glasgow Girls, BBC Three

More drama than musical in TV adaptation of the inspirational true story

A few months ago, Glasgow Girls - Cora Bissett and David Greig’s 2013 musical based on the true story of seven teenage girls from Drumchapel, Glasgow and their campaign to end the forced removal of school-age asylum seekers - returned to the city’s Citizens Theatre for another sell-out run.

Murdered By My Boyfriend, BBC Three

MURDERED BY MY BOYFRIEND, BBC THREE Domestic violence drama single-handedly makes the case for axed channel

Domestic violence drama single-handedly makes the case for BBC Three

The BBC might have convinced itself that the only thing that will change in the way it caters to the youth market next autumn is the method of delivery, but Murdered By My Boyfriend makes the case for retaining BBC Three as a channel that can be idly flipped onto on a Monday night. Previews of the short drama, inspired by real-life events, were full of the usual cliches: the story that writer Regina Moriarty told was both “tragic” and “depressingly familiar”.

Cherry Healey: Old Before My Time, BBC Three

Depressing look at how young people are supposedly wrecking their health

Vivacious blonde presenter Cherry Healey’s latest three-part series aims to show how a dangerously large proportion of the nation’s youth are abusing themselves with booze, drugs and food “until their young bodies and minds are ready for retirement". Part one – about alcohol - opens, predictably, on the streets of Newcastle where the usual array of working class Geordie pissheads they snag for these programmes are staggering about Bigg Market and slurring that they just don’t care.