The Kids Are All Right, BBC1…which we’ve reviewed here

Doctor Who, BBC1

…which we’ve reviewed here

All Star Mr & Mrs, ITV1

…which we’ve reviewed here

Britain’s Got Talent, ITV1

…which we’ve reviewed here

Pushing Daisies, ITV1

…which we’ve reviewed here

Shipwrecked: Battle of the Islands, Channel 4

…which we’ve reviewed here
Mad Men, BBC4 A great episode this week – as the US drama about a 1960s advertising agency reaches the halfway point – focusing on the macho competitiveness of the Madison Avenue men. Roger Sterling (John Slattery) enhanced his slimeball credentials (we already know ginger Joan is his mistress – poor thing) by making a play for Don’s sweetly innocent, very beautiful wife Betty, and trying to outdo Don when it came to vermouth and oyster consumption. Nice comeuppance, though, when Don paid the lift attendant to pretend it was out of order, forcing Roger to crawl up 23 flights of stairs, which knackered him so much he only had enough strength left to do some projectile vomiting in front of Richard Nixon’s presidential campaign team.

Gavin & Stacey, BBC3

We’re so glad Gavin and Stacey have seen the light and now realise they can’t live apart. Again, it was Ness who stole the show, busking as a silver statue and confessing to an affair with John Prescott (“This reminds me very much of my time with John Prescott. I had the lot – flat in Westminster, full use of one of the Jags. Didn’t even have to cook. We had a little Filipino do it for us. Cracking social life. Many a night we’d have Dave Blunkett and his bitch over for dinner.”). Foam night at the disco looked like fun, too. Gavin has some really nice mates (especially the one played by Russell Tovey).

Pulling, BBC3

Another hit thanks to three good plots: the great kebab caper (Donna’s meaty feast is snatched), the Karen v Chris encounters (he’s far too nice for that slut) and Louise’s Dragon’s Den moment, attracting investment for her Cock Lollies brainwave.

Grange Hill: New Beginnings, BBC1

Let’s all cry. It’s the last series of a TV institution. Seemed a little boring to us, though. Maybe it always was. Plotlines included a dog smuggled into school, a trauma over asking a girl out, pupils being cheeky about uniform transgressions and a lad who hung upside down. Acting was as variable as ever. As were the nicknames (eg Tigger, Ducket and Paxo).

Waking The Dead, BBC1

…which we’ve reviewed here

The Fixer, ITV1 The series came to a pretty good climax with Andrew Buchan’s John Mercer forced to decide who to kill: sinister hardman Lenny or sinister smoothie Richard Blakeny. He made the right choice. Lenny lives to fight another day. Highlight of the episode: Jody Latham’s Callum dancing around to Black Is Black (the La Belle Epoque version). Should this be recommissioned? We hope so because it has been one of ITV’s better dramas, but the latter episodes failed to thrill as much as the first three, so we won’t be setting up a petition if it goes the way of The Palace, its axed predecessor in the Monday 9pm slot.

Skins, E4 Series two is over, after a good start followed by some poor episodes – and so it’s farewell to all the characters we’ve come to love and the one we’ve come to hate (Cassie). The last episode centred on Chris’s funeral, featuring the casting against type of Mark Heap as Chris’s sour father and an Italian Job replica scene when Tony and Sid stole the coffin and, with it strapped to the roof of their Mini, plunged down stairs to shake off the undertaker (played with great tactlessness by John Thomson). Sid’s gone to New York because he is still daft enough to love Cassie, Tony and Michelle are university bound, Jal remains traumatised after aborting Chris’s baby, while Maxxie, his new boyfriend and Anwar boarded a coach to London for a lifetime of fun (“No one wears pants in London”, Maxxie assures us).