Pilot TV

We kick off the new year (for us, that is, you of course had a podcast last week) with a bevvy of guests on the show, corralling Industry showrunners Konrad Kay and Mickey Down (28:09-43:56) as well as Dawn French and Mark Heap (57:57-1:09:30), whose show Can You Keep A Secret is now showing on BBC1. Hijack gets its second outing on Apple TV this week (1:09:30), while Industry returns to the Beeb (1:24:19) and we take a trip to sch...

Merry New Year! Yes, it’s 2026 and — after years of hectoring from Boyd — we have a New Year episode of Pilot TV for your listening pleasure (one that may or may not have been recorded before we broke for Christmas). We tackle all the big New Year’s Day shows this episode, from Tom Hiddleston’s return (10 years later) to the role of Jonathan Pine in The Night Manager’s long awaited second series on BBC1, Harlan Coben’s la...

That’s all folks, 2025 is done and dusted. But you didn’t think we’d leave you all to see in the new year without a big old Pilot TV retrospective, did you? James, Boyd and Kay unveil the official Pilot TV Best Shows of 2025 list and go through it in forensic detail here, while also flagging any number of other shows you might have missed over the course of the past 12 months. We even open a special 2025 postbag so you can have you...

Paul Bettany and Will Sharpe don their frock coats for Amadeus on Sky and we speak to both of them on this week’s show as they chat all things Mozart with Boyd. Plus we wrap up a festive haul of shows for under your Christmas tree, taking a look at Mart Gatiss’ latest Ghost Story For Christmas, The Room in The Tower on BBC2, getting drawn into the sweedy underbelly of Texan high society in The Hunting Wives on ITV, and finally gett...

They all float down here. Now that It: Welcome To Derry, the prequel to Andy Muschietti's It Chapter One and It Chapter Two, has finished its eight-episode run, the Empire Podcast has teamed up with Warner Bros. to bring you a special episode in which Chris Hewitt, Helen O'Hara, and James Dyer conquer their fears of clowns, spiders, and spider-clowns just long enough to talk about the Andy Muschietti/Barbara Muschietti/Jason Fuchs-...

On this week’s podcast you’ll be devastated to hear that we are unable to review Taylor Swift: The End Of An Era, however don’t switch off, because we do manage to rustle up some alternatives. Dark Winds makes its return to U&Alibi (43:45)and includes what is arguably the best meta joke of the year, Percy Jackson is back, causing trouble for the gods once again in Percy Jackson And The Olympians season 2 (59:00), and Alicia Sil...

The wait is over! Well, sort of, because Stranger Things returns to Netflix this week for the first part of its final season to whet our collective appetites for the final assault on the Upside Down at the end of the year (44:50). Plus the Notorious RTD is back with his latest spin-off to the Whoiverse, setting Russell Tovey on a collision course with Gugu Mbatha-Raw in Sea Devil spectacular The War Between The Land And The Sea on ...

There are chocolates in the studio this week — albeit ones that were initially destined for our editor Darren, but let’s gloss over that, shall we? In addition to raising our blood sugar levels while doing this week’s show, we take a look at the harrowing true story of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s imprisonment in Iran with Prisoner 951 on BBC1 (43:45), see if Sherlock’s assistant can make it without the man himself in Watson on...

Pluribus showrunner Vince Gilligan along with stars Rhea Seehorn and Karolina Wydra all piled into the Pilot TV studio this week to talk all about Apple’s excellent new sci-fi series (0:00-30:12). Then, James, Kay and Boyd embarked on a trio of shows about terrible parenting in Prime’s manny from hell thriller Malice (1:08:31), Channel 4’s vacation nightmare Summerwater (1:18:20), and Sky’s lothario-at-large series The Death Of Bun...

We get nothing from Malice from guest Jack Whitehall this week, who chats with Boyd about his new show. Malice (20:57-35:20). But on the rest of the pod, we’re all sweetness and light, mainly as we not only have a new Vince Gilligan show to watch, in the form of Pluribus on Apple TV (1:07:57), but it’s a show that depicts humanity at its happiest… with a cost. Outside this jaunt into the world of sci-fi, we follow Sarah Snook and D...

Ruth Wilson in uncovering a conspiracy this week, both in Down Cemetery Road on Apple TV (1:02:18), and on this very podcast, for she is this week’s guest (33:12-48:43). Plus we’re back among the branches of Sherwood for Robin Hood on MGM+ (1:14:37), and hanging out with some friends reunited in I Love LA on Sky Comedy (1:22:23). And yes, while Boyd and Kay do insist on some Traitors discussion (as well as something to do with knit...

Stephen Merchant joins us on the show this week, not only chatting to James about his recent zombie apocalypse debut in The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon, but ruminating on comedy, rhyming slang, the legacy of The Office and 24. Plus, we follow the exploits of some we’re hanging out with some very different Derry girls (and boys) in It: Welcome to Derry on Sky, take in a little fine art with Art Detectives on U&Drama, and find out ...

We have a Lazarus double bill this week as both showrunner Harlan Coben and Star Bill Nighy drop by for separate (but thematically connected) chats about the new Prime Video thriller (which is embargoed, so we’ll be reviewing it on Pilot+). Plus we go abseiling with Lauren Lyle in The Ridge on BBC2, head back to posh Victorian England with The Forsytes on Channel 5, and get a little ASMR from Julia Roberts in Leonard And Hungry Pau...

Kay rapidly wishes she’d never returned from holiday after coming back to this week’s show as she discovers that Boyd hasn’t saved her a copy of his book. But that’s at least partially made up for by the fact that she gets to talk to the legendary Sally Wainwright about her new BBC show Riot Women (1:09:56-1:24:35), which we also review. Plus Adjani Salmon and Ali Hughes are on to chat the latest series of BBC3’s excellent Dreaming...

We’re legitimately chatting all things movies on the (TV) podcast this week as Aimee Lou Wood and Suranne Jones join us to chat Film Club on BBC3 (37:11-53:10), Plus Jodie Whittaker (sans Suranne) pops by to talk all things Frauds on ITV (1:04:03-1:23:34). Meanwhile, we catch up with Adjani Salmon for the second series of Dreaming Whilst Black on BBC3 (1:38:38), and delve into ecclesiastical crime solving with Murder Before Evenson...

Jessica Chastain and Nnamdi Asomugha are our guests on this week’s show, chatting The Savant on Apple TV+ (47:34-57:53) — a show that unfortunately you can’t watch, the reasons for which we get into in some detail elsewhere on the podcast. Meanwhile, Tom Blyth stops by to talk Billy The Kid (1:14:38-1:28:46), which you CAN see on MGM+. Also, we try to discover why people want to hide GLen Powell’s face in Chad Powers on Disney...

It’s a Slow Horses special (kind of) this week as not only do we review the show’s fifth series but both Christopher Chung (Roddy Ho) and Ruth Bradley (Emma Flyte) are guests, with Ruth dropping into the studio mid-record almost as if she’d just been sent over from The Park by Taverner. Meanwhile, we take a look at the phone hacking scandal along with David Tennant in The Hack on ITV, and let Toni Colette scare the willies out of u...

We’re in Coldwater this week as Andrew Lincoln and writer David Ireland discuss the new ITV thriller (23:55-44:34). Plus Kay asks the question as to whether we take TV (or film, or book) recommendations from other people. And then there’s this week’s crop of shows, which includes Netflix’s brotherly strife miniseries Black Rabbit (53:45), Prime’s second series of The Boys spinoff Gen V (1:03:08), and the second series of Mawaan Riz...