This week's must-see telly includes the long-awaited adaptation of Sally Rooney's Normal People, the final leg in Race Across the World and the latest drama from Ryan Murphy, Hollywood on Netflix.
Here are 7 shows you can’t miss this week...
1. Normal People
Sunday 26th April from 6am on BBC Three
This week finally sees the long-awaited adaptation of Sally Rooney's modern love story Normal People, arrive onto BBC Three as a 12-part boxset (repeated in double-bills, Mondays on BBC One) starring Daisy Edgar-Jones as Marianne and Paul Mescal as Connell, a young couple who profoundly impact each other’s lives.
In a school in a small-town west of Ireland, Connell is a well-liked, good looking and athletic football player, whilst Marianne is a proud, intimidating and unpopular loner who actively avoids her classmates and challenges teachers’ authority.
Sparks fly between the two when Connell comes to pick up his mother Lorraine from her job at Marianne’s house and a strange and indelible connection grows between the two teenagers. One they are determined to conceal from their peers.
A year later, they’re both studying in Dublin and Marianne has found her feet in a new social world but Connell hangs at the side lines, shy and uncertain.
1-12/12
2. Race Across the World
Sunday 26th April at 8pm on BBC Two
After 21,000 kilometres, two continents and 17 countries, the remaining teams embark on a 4,800km journey to complete the final leg of their epic race to reach the final checkpoint in Ushuaia, Argentina, the most southerly city in the world. But after 54 days, which team will be triumphant and win the £20,000 prize?
Following a dramatic start to their finale, just under nine hours separates the remaining teams. But with budges running perilously low, each team has to call on all the skills, ingenuity and strategies developed over the past seven weeks in order to win the race.
The lead changes hands throughout as as the teams navigate their way down through Patagonia towards Ushuaia and have to constantly juggle the desire to win the race with the need to work. Living hand to mouth, they negotiate tricky connections and sold-out buses and endure hours by the side of roads, desperately trying to hitch rides.
There are remarkable twists and turns as the race culminates in an incredibly tight and dramatic finish, all set against the backdrop of some of the most breathtaking scenery in the world and the travellers complete the race very different people from the ones that started.
8/9 (Next week's episode is a reunion episode.)
3. Blood
Monday 27th April - Friday 1st May at 9pm on Channel 5
This week sees psychological drama Blood return to Channel 5 for a brand new series stripped across one week with a feature-length finale on Friday, as Adrian Dunbar and Grainne Keenan reprise their respective roles as Jim Hogan Fiona Crowley.
With Fiona facing the same affliction that killer her mother, Motor Neuron Disease, a devastating car crash has raised serious questions after the body of Fiona’s husband Paul turned up in the boot. But how did he get there, and who was responsible? Who killed Paul Crowley, and what circumstances led to the night of Fiona’s fateful crash?
As the series tracks back over preceding events, the past will reveal a tangled web of family life in the wake of Jim’s return from a year abroad. The troubles that occurred since he was away will emerge to complicate all of their lives as events unfold.
1-5/5
4. Code 404
Wednesday 29th April on Sky One
Best-known for starring in superb dramas like Line of Duty, Daniel Mays and Stephen Graham haver teamed up to play a police duo, DI John Major and DI Roy Carver, in new Sky One comedy Code 404.
While working undercover on a sting operation, things went south and Major was gunned down in the line of duty. Someone had set him up, and he paid for it with his life... until a year later when he gets rebooted.
Reluctant to let anyone with his shining track record go, police Chief Superintendent Dennett, played by Rosie Cavaliero, chooses him as the prototype for a new A.I. driven initiative and he is brought back from the dead... but something isn’t quite right. Some wires must have been crossed or some lines of code must have been missed because the augmented John Major is a few quid short of six million dollars.
Meanwhile, Roy feels conflicted. On the one hand he feels partly responsible for Major’s untimely death. On the other, John was no angel and before he died, he’d gotten cocky and had started taking all the credit for their work. Basically, John had been a bit of a jerk. The only person who understood Roy, tragically, was Kelly. One thing led to another and they developed feelings for each other and on the night of his death, John had cottoned on.
1/6 All episodes available
5. Trying
Friday 1st May on Apple TV+
This week sees Apple launch their first UK comedy Trying, which stars Esther Smith and Rafe Spall as Jason and Nikki, a couple desperate for a baby.
But the one thing they really want, is the one thing they can't have. So they decide to adopt, but with their dysfunctional friends, screwball families and chaotic lives, will the adoption panel agree that they're ready to parents?
It's a new comedy about growing up, settling down and finding someone to love.
1/8
6. Hollywood
Friday 1st May from 8am on Netflix
Ryan Murphy is responsible for writing a number of hit TV shows including Glee, American Crime Story and Pose and this week he launches his latest drama, Hollywood on Netflix which follows a group of aspiring actors and filmmakers in post-World War II Hollywood as they try to make it in Tinseltown, no matter the cost.
Each character offers a unique glimpse behind the gilded curtain of Hollywood's Golden Age, spotlighting the unfair systems and biases across race, gender and sexuality that continue to this day. Exposing and examining decades-old power dynamics, Hollywood looks at what the entertainment landscape might look like if they had been dismantled.
It stars David Corenswet, Jeremy Pope, Darren Criss and Jake Picking as well as Laura Harrier, Samara Weaving, Dylan McDermott, Holland Taylor, Patti LuPone, Jim Parsons, Joe Mantello and Maude Apatow.
1-7/7
7. Friday Night Dinner
Friday 1st May at 10pm on Channel 4
It's now Channel 4's most successful sitcom since The IT Crowd and All4's most-watched comedy EVER and this week as the current series of Friday Night Dinner comes to an end, it's time for Adam and Jonny to bring their 'females' home to meet the parents.
Lucy One, played by Pearl Mackie and Lucy Two, played by Rebecca Humphries arrive in Adam's crappy car and before they can make it out of the car, Adam and Jonny rush into the house to give Mum and Dad a last-minute rundown of the 'rules. Mum Jackie is not allowed to embarrass them with any baby stories, there's to be no kissing on the head and no crying or getting emotional. As for dad Martin, he's not to to talk about the economy, Britain's waterways, physics, dustbins or how he once saw a man 'kill a duck with a hammer'.
When Mum finally meets the 'lovely Lucys', it's a dream come true. Dad, however, doesn't make the best first impression... Taking the boys into his 'office' (the downstairs loo), he admits that he accidentally smashed the light bulb above the stove and now there's glass in Mum's chicken soup, but they mustn't let her find out.
Meanwhile, Jim pops round and can't get his head around the fact that there are two girls with the same name. Saving the evening from becoming a total disaster are some exciting revelations!
6/6