The Rig; The Apprentice; The Madame Blanc Mysteries

“Iain Glen, Emily Hampshire and Martin Compston lead a strong cast who just about manage to keep things on the right side of the utterly preposterous. It is, of course, high-purity binge nirvana. You should, and will, gobble The Rig up like a tin of Quality Street.”
Benji Wilson, The Telegraph

“It’s a modern take on an old narrative form, and if there’s nothing as earthshaking dramatically speaking as whatever the Big Bad is managing as it comes for our crew, the need to know what’s what and the faith that it won’t all descend into a Lost-style debacle will keep you going until the end.”
Lucy Mangan, The Guardian

“The Apprentice has been looking jaded and tired for years, but in the wake of last month’s superb new reality format The Traitors, it seems more dated than ever. We’ve seen it all before: the boasting, the cat-fights, all amplified by camera cutaways to reaction shots as rivals glower and pout.”
Christopher Stevens, Daily Mail

“It might have been paint-by-numbers, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t entertaining. Watching 18 people of varying levels of competence earnestly try to outdo each other and getting caught up in the madness makes for brilliant TV. Some say The Apprentice has had its day. I’d say we’ve entered its renaissance.”
Emily Baker, The i

“The show’s producers seem to be engaged in battle against the law of diminishing returns. To keep the viewers still interested, they have to make the contestants more and more grotesque, and stretch that chasm between their self-perception and reality ever wider. It’s a battle they are winning, even though I suspect that there was a little bit of coaching required to make the young wannabes sound as ludicrous as they do.”
Sean O’Grady, The Independent

“All those tight waistcoats and newsreader dresses looked even more ridiculous than usual when worn on a beach. It is a peculiarity of The Apprentice that the contestants look more dated than the format. At least the challenges vary slightly each year, and Lord Sugar gets a fresh batch of scripted quips. The candidates just trot out the same tired slogans and wear the same Karen Millen frocks, and it’s hard to care about any of them.”
Anita Singh, The Telegraph

“The Madame Blanc Mysteries is a refreshingly light and satisfying detective serial set in the South of France. With a regular cast of eccentrics, an ingenious murder in each episode and an entertaining balance of romance and bickering between the sleuth and her sidekick, the show mixes all the right ingredients in the perfect proportions.”
Christopher Stevens, Daily Mail