Van der Valk; India 1947: Partition in Colour; The Real Windsors: Queen of Steel

“Van der Valk trod this worn and hackneyed TV path without bringing much new to the party. Yes, Marc Warren has great presence as the sexily inscrutable Van der Valk…Alas, all we got was him tied to a chair and set on fire. Disappointing. Amsterdam did look nice as the detectives rushed about trying to solve the Baruch Spinoza-themed mystery, but the plot was hokum.” 
Carol Midgley, the Times

“A thread about domestic abuse seems only there to offer up extra villainy to his character and is thrown away as quickly as it is raised.Instead, a weird amount of time is dedicated to Van Der Valk’s new romance, which seems entirely pointless and yet necessitates several cuts to his new squeeze gasping through the episode’s climax, despite us knowing nothing about her. Usually, multilayered would be a compliment, but Van De Valk muddies its own (canal) waters at every opportunity. The plot suggests it wants to tell a poignant story of social injustice; the execution fancies itself as a blood-soaked romp; the dialogue, full of oddly glib and sarcastic quips in the face of brutal murders, implies that it wants to raise a wry eyebrow at its genre; while the schlocky editing and thudding clichés seem like a painful homage to its 70s origins. There are no surprises here; only eyerolls. Amsterdam looks great, though.”
Rachael Sigee, The i 

“Now the cast has settled in and the pressure of reviving a well-known drama is off, the show is better…It’s a serviceable drama with a decent ensemble…But there is nothing to raise Van Der Valk above other detective dramas; only the Amsterdam setting marks it out as different.”
Anita Singh, The Telegraph

Van Der Valk (Marc Warren) is devoid of charm or small talk, so it must be his status as a walking stereotype that women find irresistible. Every character in this crime serial is cliched. Nothing about the show is original, certainly not the murders of young women. Van Der Valk isn’t unwatchable, but neither is it memorable.”
Christopher Stevens, Daily Mail

“Refreshingly, most of the talking heads are Indians and Pakistanis: professors, historians and authors, as well as Lakshman Menon, the silver-tongued grandson of VP Menon, Mountbatten’s chief aide. All are unsparing in their assessment.”
Chitra Ramaswamy, The Guardian 

“This version lays the majority of the blame on Nehru and his followers, contending that anti-Muslim violence across India left Jinnah fearing genocide.Mountbatten is depicted as a shallow, vain bumbler, whose snobbery made negotiation impossible. He dismissed Jinnah as ‘a psychopathic case’ and ‘a clot’…But though this documentary is well-informed and crisply entertaining, it doesn’t tell the full story.”
Christopher Stevens, Daily Mail

“What stopped the programme from feeling forced – and elevated it above many other royal documentaries – was the choice of contributors. Television producers tend to have the same, half dozen royal commentators on speed dial, who are wheeled out to say the same thing they said the last time they were asked. Here, we heard from a different set. Mary Pearson, daughter of royal aide Martin Charteris, provided insights. “My father always said the Queen had superb negative judgment: she knew what not to do, she knew what it wasn’t right for her to do.” The thought-provoking aspect was the consideration of what will happen to the monarchy once the Queen has gone.” 
Anita Singh, The Telegraph