Ireland excels at a lot of things. Literature. Preachy rock stars. Potato-based snacks. But in television we have long punched below our weight: compare and contrast our history of underachievement on the small screen with the ambitious, cutting-edge TV produced by nations of a similar size, from Borgen (Denmark) to Wellington Paranormal (New Zealand). Still, … Read more
I grew up in Finglas in Dublin, but I don’t often go back there. We ended up in Phibsborough in my teens, so general northside is home. I don’t go home as much as I would like to, so when I do, I’m back in Phibsborough or I’m hanging around town. I went to university … Read more
“Do you think the vibe is weird in here?” asks Robyn (Sinéad Keenan) in How to Get to Heaven from Belfast, Lisa McGee’s new Netflix comedy-mystery caper. Weird vibes are now normal in television shows set in Ireland. As Saoirse-Monica Jackson’s character might say, it would be strange if there weren’t any weird vibes, babes. … Read more
A charmer on social media called me an unrepeatable name after I expressed misgivings over the finale of Lisa McGee’s Derry Girls, which, at the very last moment, lost its footing and was swept away in a deluge of saccharine. I suspect I shall have to don a hard hat all over again with the … Read more
Pick of the Week Lord of the Flies Sunday, BBC One, 9pm It might surprise you to hear toxic masculinity didn’t start with TikTok. Seventy years ago, author William Golding addressed the issue, though his setting was not a social media platform but a desert island in the Pacific. Now the BBC launches its highly … Read more
In a small, cramped room in Belfast a group of people are huddled in the cold, watching live footage of three women entering the same hotel room again and again. This is not some sort of law-enforcement sting operation but the set of How to Get to Heaven from Belfast, Lisa McGee’s excellent new comedy … Read more
The Lincoln Lawyer From Thursday, February 5th, Netflix Mickey Haller is back in the driving seat – or the back seat if you want to be literal about it – for a new batch of legal cases. In this fourth series based on the bestselling novels by Michael Connelly – in this case it’s on … Read more
Beef I watched the first series of this thinking it would be about the delicious foodstuff namechecked by the title. It was, in fact, an enjoyably dark and deranged comedy about two characters, played by Ali Wong and Steven Yeun, who, after a road-rage incident, spiral into an obsessive feud, aka what elderly millennials call … Read more
Irish music stars CMAT, Fontaines DC frontman Grian Chatten and hip hop artist Jordan Adetunji have made Forbes magazine’s prestigious 30 Under 30 list of the “most talented and influential individuals under 30 making waves” across Europe. Irish writer-director Ronan Corrigan also appears on the list, which was put together by judges including Derry Girls … Read more