What to watch on TV this week: 16th - 22nd November

That's not to mention Netflix's A Man on the Inside, Prime Video's Cruel Intentions and three-part BBC documentary Boybands Forever, all of which are on the schedule in a jam-packed week.

Elsewhere, returning series include Moonflower Murders, the first season of which was called Magpie Murders, and Cheaters, while I'm a Celebrity... Get Me Out of Here! is also back for its latest season.

Finally, as Strictly Come Dancing continues, this week sees the stakes reaching a new level, as the remaining celebrities and their partners take to the dancefloor in the Blackpool Tower Ballroom for the show's annual special.

Here, you'll find out top picks for this week – read on for our full choice of what to watch.

Strictly Come Dancing: Blackpool special

Release date: Saturday 16th November, 6:45pm, BBC One

There was a time when the Strictly judges would calmly give their comments and marks without too much theatricality. Well, obviously not Bruno Tonioli, who was renowned for his flamboyance, not to mention frequently falling off his chair. However, Craig Revel Horwood, Motsi Mabuse, Shirley Ballas and Anton Du Beke seem to be following Tonioli’s lead, turning what should be a supporting role into a stellar performance with frequent (faux) arguments, shouting and posturing. Len Goodman would be appalled.

As tonight’s show comes from the bigger, glitzier venue of the Tower Ballroom in Blackpool, we can only hope the judges’ shenanigans don’t reach the heights of the famous tower.

Jane Rackham

Moonflower Murders

Release date: Saturday 16th November, 9:15pm, BBC One

Writer Anthony Horowitz’s sequel to Magpie Murders provides catnip for crime drama fans, as he once again blends two mysteries: one contemporary, the other a golden-age Christie homage.

Navigating both is his returning hero Susan Ryeland (the ever-delightful Lesley Manville) who, since we were last in her company, has left her previous life as a book editor behind to open a hotel in Crete. But when the disappearance of a young woman in Suffolk is revealed to have similarities to a "fictional" case solved within the pages of a paperback by ace sleuth Atticus Pünd, Susan is lured back to the UK to investigate.

If you saw Manville’s first outing in the role, you’ll know to expect actors doubling up in dual roles, as well as scenes in which Susan confers with hallucinations of Pünd (played with dancing eyebrows by Timothy McMullan). Horowitz, meanwhile, never drops the ball as he expertly juggles his parallel stories. He really is a master of all things murderous.

David Brown

Boybands Forever

Release date: Saturday 16th November, 9:15pm, BBC Two

The fame and feuds surrounding trailblazing boy bands of the 1990s and '00s are raked over in this nostalgia-fuelled three-part documentary.

There’s the odd eye-opening nugget, but we’re largely on familiar ground in this opening double bill, which begins with the rise and rivalry between Take That and East 17. There’s the well-documented tension between Gary Barlow and Robbie Williams (the latter of whom is interviewed here, although he’s on less candid form than in his 2023 Netflix doc) and how Brian Harvey of East 17 was thrown to the tabloid wolves. Episode 2 features Five, 911 and contributors include Simon Cowell and Louis Walsh.

Frances Taylor

I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here! season 24

Release date: Sunday 17th November, 9pm, ITV1

Danny Jones and Oti Mabuse are among the celebrities entering the Australian jungle this year to squabble over rice and beans and eat kangaroos' unmentionables.

But the series’s biggest signing – and the person execs are no doubt hanging their cork hats on – is Coleen Rooney, who’s scooping up a reported £1.5 million fee for her appearance; the same figure Nigel Farage is thought to have picked up for the show last year. But refreshingly, there aren’t any politically controversial figures on the roster, which makes a pleasing change from the past few years. New companion show I’m a Celebrity… Unpacked, hosted by Joel Dommett, Kemi Rodgers and Sam Thompson, follows on ITV2 at 10:45pm.

Frances Taylor

Landman

Release date: Monday 18th November, Paramount+

The final season of Yellowstone is ongoing - it continues on Paramount+ this week - but its indefatigable creator Taylor Sheridan is already back with a new project. Yes, it's very Yellowstone-y, with tough men facing off against each other in power struggles that are almost as bruising as the ones they have with the tough women in their lives.

The setting is west Texas in the recent past, where an oil boom puts big companies, rogue billionaires, Mexican drug cartels and law enforcement on a collision course. Billy Bob Thornton is great as the oil man wielding terrible power in a lawless wasteland; Jon Hamm, Michael Peña and Demi Moore round out a strong cast. Some of the macho dialogue is a bit much, but the show effectively evokes the brutal reality of the oil business.

Jack Seale

Dune: Prophecy

Release date: Monday 18th November, 9pm, Sky Atlantic

For some reason, there’s a growing TV trend for massive fantasy properties getting prequels set centuries, if not millennia, earlier than the original story. So now, following House of the Dragon (300 years before Game of Thrones) and The Rings of Power (at least 5,000 years before Lord of the Rings), welcome Dune: Prophecy, which is set more than 10,000 years before the recent films starring Timothée Chalamet.

At this point, his character Paul Atreides isn’t even a glint in a sandworm’s eye – but other familiar forces from the film (and Frank Herbert’s classic sci-fi novels) are in place. We’re still in a galaxy with a weak emperor (Mark Strong), depending on a magical drug called "spice" to keep his grip on power. And still pulling the strings are the Bene Gesserit, the all-knowing cadre of witchy soothsayers led by Emily Watson’s Valya Harkonnen and her sister Tula (Olivia Williams).

As various parties scheme and snipe, it rattles along nicely, albeit a little confusingly. But it’s Watson, as the ruthless Valya, who keeps your attention.

Huw Fullerton

The Listeners

Release date: Tuesday 19th November, 9pm, BBC One

This unsettling drama focuses on what seems initially like the most innocuous of matters: a dull, low-frequency hum. The problem is that the sound can only be heard by secondary school teacher Claire (Rebecca Hall), whose life is about to be upended by the intrusive nature of this noise.

Thanks to its unwanted presence, Claire finds herself deprived of both sleep and maybe even reason. And as her nose bleeds apparently without cause and the world turns migraine grey, we too start to feel haunted by this persistent throb, the source of which cannot be found.

This being a four-part adaptation of a novel by Jordan Tannahill, there’s obviously a way to go before any explanation is offered. But as Claire begins to reach for nonsensical notions about 5G phone masts, the sense grows that she’ll eventually be siloed away from husband Paul (Prasanna Puwanarajah), whose reality is suddenly markedly different from hers. Might the hum be a metaphor for our worrying conspiracy theory culture?

David Brown

Cheaters season 2

Release date: Tuesday 19th November, 9:45pm, BBC One

Complicated, relatable and entertaining, Oliver Lyttelton’s bite-size romcom — each episode is 15 minutes long — is back for a second run, set a few months after season 1 left off. The giddy excitement of Josh (Joshua McGuire) and Fola’s (Susan Wokoma) affair has worn off and they’re becoming increasingly couple-y — but the speed at which things are moving and Josh’s inability to play it cool is freaking Fola out.

Kay Ribeiro

A Man on the Inside

Release date: Thursday 21st November, Netflix

Michael Schur, creator of The Good Place and co-creator of Brooklyn Nine-Nine and Parks and Recreation, returns with a gentle comedy drama that reunites him with several cast members of his old shows. The lead here is Ted Danson as Charles, an elegant but lonely widower who signs up to go undercover as a private investigator in a retirement community.

Danson is excellent as a sharp, playful but vulnerable man and, while the jokes are funny and the shaggy-dog story about a spate of thefts in the old folks' home is engaging, really it's all an excuse for tender observations about the pains and joys of one's twilight years.

Jack Seale

Cruel Intentions

Release date: Thursday 21st November, Prime Video

It doesn’t have the naughtiness of the 1999 movie, but this tale of rich young Americans using sex to get what they want is not far off. At a super-privileged college — the sort of place that attracts politicians’ offspring — the arrival of the vice-president’s daughter could be the key to the battle for the coolest frat/sorority house. She seems ripe for manipulation, but might love get in the way of the step-siblings who currently rule the roost?

With a randy professor complicating the matrix of betrayals, and a script sharp enough to make us as delighted as we are disgusted, it’s a fine guilty pleasure.

Jack Seale

Return to Paradise

Release date: Friday 22nd November, 8pm, BBC One

The Death in Paradise brand extends out to Australia, though, as its title suggests, this cheerful spin-off is centred on a returning daughter, not a fish out of water. DI Mackenzie Clarke (Anna Samson) has left London’s Met under a cloud and headed home to Dolphin Cove, which appears to be a haven of white sand and surfers, but is really a hotspot for homicide.

All the familiar staples are here, including daffy officers, some unconventional living arrangements and the slightly ramshackle police station. But because lead detective Mackenzie has ties to the area, time is given over to explore her backstory, something that’s a relative rarity in the DiP universe.

So, in this opening episode, we also meet Glenn Strong (Tai Hara), whom Mackenzie hasn’t clapped eyes on since leaving him at the altar six years prior. He’s ostensibly the team’s forensic pathologist, but seems to spend far more time shirtless than he does in scrubs.

David Brown

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