Britannia; Derry Girls; Great Art

“It definitely won’t be everyone’s cup of tea, but it is a bit of a riot. You might not expect that of something that has extreme violence as its meat and drink, but Jez and Tom Butterworth have created a historical drama full of serious actors that manages not to take itself too seriously.”
Carol Midgley, The Times

“Britannia is the kind of programme in which you need to keep your wits entirely about you in order to keep track of the games of three-dimensional chess every character is playing or abandon them altogether and just enjoy. I recommend the latter. Britannia rules!”
Lucy Mangan, The Guardian

“Will Britannia’s tick list of sex, violence and brash rock video pomposity sate Game of Thrones devotees? It’s too early to say but what’s fun so far is the way a nonchalant 21st-century sensibility is teleported back to 43 AD.”
Jasper Rees, The Telegraph

“This is Sky’s headline drama for the New Year, and it’s being billed as the next Game Of Thrones. But Britannia is more old-fashioned than that. It’s Braveheart meets Lord Of The Rings.”
Christopher Stevens, Daily Mail

“This is no Ben Wheatley-esque exercise in occult terror, and it fails to sustain a potent atmosphere. Instead, the opening hour-and-a-half is a somewhat preposterous beginning that’s difficult to take seriously, bordering as it does on bonkers self-parody. Britannia is close to being utter rubbish. But for all of that, it’s sporadically entertaining rubbish.”
Mark Butler, The i

“Derry Girls feels like an indie antidote to the full-on populism of Mrs Brown’s Boys. Its assault on sectarian pieties may feel a little sepia-tinted, but it’s still a hoot.”
Jasper Rees, The Telegraph

“Teen sitcoms can fall into two traps. They are obnoxious and scatalogical, like The Inbetweeners (which was mostly unwatchable toilet humour) — or they are smugly pleased with themselves, like Danny Baker’s memoir comedy Cradle To Grave, and Caitlin Moran’s psalm of self-praise Raised By Wolves. Derry Girls avoids both pitfalls. Writer Lisa McGee, though she’s drawing on personal experience, isn’t trying to impress us with how ‘crazy’ and ‘hilarious’ her schooldays were. She simply evokes the era and does it with characters far more than wacky situations.”
Christopher Stevens, Daily Mail

“Great Art is a remarkable, educational and hugely enjoyable series made more remarkable by being on ITV and not featuring a single celebrity. Not for a minute did this programme try to be overpopulist or dumb down. I don’t know why ITV hides such a cracker away at 10.45pm, but I hope it’s faring well against the snooker and Question Time.”
Carol Midgley, The Times