October is the calendar equivalent of a shrug. July gets the sunshine, April gets the blossom, December gets Christmas and an excuse to get shit-faced. October gets… clocks going back and, like, maybe a new coat? It just about has Halloween, but I’m not sure the journey is worth the destination. It\u2019s a stop-gap month. A Libra month. A weary, indecisive, unable-to-commit-to-a-temperature-or-timezone month. I should know, I was born in it. <\/p>\n
Here\u2019s one good thing about October, though: it\u2019s when telly gets good. The schedules ramp up ready for the cold fronts to sweep in. <\/p>\n
Here\u2019s what\u2019s coming up next week. <\/p>\n
Treasure Island (new series)<\/p>\n
Arggh, the Black Spot! We haven\u2019t had a good pirate series since the delectably daft Black Sails (which you can stream on Channel 4). Paramount+\u2019s six-part adaptation of Robert Louis Stevenson\u2019s seminal 1883 book of the high seas is likely to be less horny than Black Sails, but I\u2019ll venture it\u2019ll shiver yer timbers just as well. David Oyelowo plays Long John Silver, Hayley Atwell is Bess Hawkins, and Tom Sweet as young Jim. To the Hispaniola, me hearties, as we set a course for Skeleton Island.<\/p>\n
Treasure Island premieres on Monday 12 October on Paramount+<\/p>\n
The Party (new series)<\/p>\n
Based on Elizabeth Day\u2019s 2017 novel of the same name, this five-part psychological head-scramble pits two men against each other: Martin (Luke Evans), a journalist, and Ben (Tom Cullen), a charming, moneyed politician. Flicking between Ben\u2019s lavish, disastrous birthday party and the police investigation afterwards, it\u2019s a study of class anxiety and an unhealthy, decades-long friendship. There\u2019s a touch of The Talented Mr Ripley about it, but with a lot less sunshine and a lot more shame.<\/p>\n
The Party premieres on Sunday 11 October on ITVX.<\/p>\n
Time (Season 3)<\/p>\n
Oscar Wilde, or someone impersonating an incarcerated genius, said that you should not judge a society by its palaces, but by its prisons. Well, say that to David Tennant, who, fresh from the champagne-soaked sexathon of Rivals heads to a different kind of lock-in: Jimmy McGovern\u2019s gritty tour of the British prison system. Season One (starring Sean Bean and Stephen Graham) was set in a hard-knocks male jail; season two, with Jody Whittaker, unravelled in a women\u2019s prison, and now, we\u2019re off to a young offender\u2019s institution where a prison tragedy brings buried secrets, guilt and divided loyalties to the surface. <\/p>\n
Season Three of Time premieres on Sunday 11 October on BBC One and iPlayer.<\/p>\n
TYSON (four-part documentary)<\/p>\n
Talking of prison\u2026 here\u2019s a documentary about Mike Tyson \u2013 wordsmith, actor, convicted rapist, and cement-fisted destroyer of men. He is a lot of things, and this four-parter claims to cover it all. In his own words: \u201cMost people are too scared to look at their lives objectively, wanting to paint themselves as the hero of their own story. But if we are truly objective, we know we can never be the hero in our own story. We have to be able to face the man in the mirror \u2013 taking the good with the bad \u2013 to give a full account of our contributions in this life.\u201d Netflix describes it as \u201cunflinching\u201d. It\u2019ll be interesting to see how far Tyson is really prepared to go: whether self-scrutiny is the same thing as self-reckoning.<\/p>\n
TYSON premieres on Tuesday 13 October on Netflix<\/p>\n
The Diplomat (Season 4)<\/p>\n
It was as if its creators\u2019 closest brush with Britain had been an episode of Downton Abbey: the overwrought pomp and pageantry, the Dick Van Dyke-y coppers, the weary everywoman diplomat rolling her eyes at the \u201cBritishness\u201d of it all. But then I found a corner of my brain to hang my disbelief, and actually, it got pretty rollicking. Series four picks up where the cliffhanger left off. Hal (Rufus Sewell) and President Grace Penn (Allison Janney) are plotting to steal Russia\u2019s most powerful weapon, so Kate (Keri Russell) teams up with Grace\u2019s husband Todd (Bradley Whitford) to stop them. It\u2019s a soap opera with a nuclear arsenal. <\/p>\n
Series 4 of The Diplomat premieres on Wednesday 14 October on Netflix<\/p>\n
Tulsa King (Season 4)
<\/p>\n
Like a well-nurtured grudge, Sylvester Stallone never gets old. At 80, he’s still slugging away in the ring of prestige TV, back for another round as exiled mobster Dwight \u2018The General\u2019 Manfredi. As good-guy-gangster shows go, it’s not The Sopranos, but it’s a classy affair that keeps the goons from the door. It’s part of the Taylor Sheridan stable, so you know what to expect: sweeping storylines under big skies about men of few words. This series, Dwight has corrupt politicians, dangerous new enemies and a heavy personal loss to deal with… all while trying, like Sisyphus on the mountain, to go legit. Only his mountains are in Arizona and are spectacular. <\/p>\n
Season 4 of Tulsa King premieres on Friday 16th October on Paramount+<\/p>\n
VisionQuest (new series)
<\/p>\n
A note to superhero fans: Marvel hasn’t run out of idea just yet. Paul Bettany returns as Vision, the android who has died, been resurrected and had fell down a rabbit hole of an existential dread. So a good theme for October. Rebooted and trying to regain his memory and his humanity, Vision’s joined by James Spader\u2019s Ultron, in a story about fathers, sons and intergenerational trauma. It closes the trilogy that started with WandaVision and Agatha All Along.<\/p>\n
VisionQuest premieres, with a two-episode special, on Wednesday 14 October on Disney+
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