Betwixt-mas, Chrimbo-limbo, the merry-neum: whatever you call that strange time between Christmas and New Year, it’s usually the point when we’re all emerging from a food and booze coma, too skint to leave the sofa and sick of Mrs Brown’s Boys repeats, and susceptible to getting obsessed with a new show. It’s a magical time where all highbrow cultural taste is put on hold, and the nation sneaks off to sit on a single bed, desperately trying to get the wifi signal to stream a chosen binge-watch while WhatsApping everyone to talk about it. Here are this year’s contenders …
Shrill
Based on feminist writer and former Guardian columnist Lindy West’s memoir, this comedy about a Portland journalist suffering a series of boyfriend disasters, career struggles and weight-related indignities has already been a huge hit on Hulu in the US. Starring SNL’s Aidy Bryant as Annie, Shrill is extremely 2019 (podcaster boyfriend! Online trolling!) and – shocker – actually manages to take on body issues without being patronising or shaming. The full box set is available to binge in one go from Sunday.
Sunday 15 December, BBC Three
Don’t F**k With Cats: Hunting an Internet Killer
Remember getting really into Making a Murderer over Christmas 2015 and returning to work in January with an expert-level knowledge of Wisconsin police corruption? Consider this your next true-crime binge. Don’t F**k With Cats tells the tale of the Canadian killer Luka Magnotta, who was caught after internet sleuths hunted him down via the animal-torture videos he posted online. Will you spend the entire festive period 60 pages deep in a Reddit conspiracy theory thread? No comment until your lawyer arrives.
From Tuesday 18 December, Netflix
You
Is it even Boxing Day if you’re not hiding in your childhood bedroom, binge-watching the bloke from Gossip Girl behaving like a scumbag? Last year, Netflix’s so-bad-it’s-amazing series – in which student Beck, is stalked by her boyfriend Joe (Penn Badgley) – had everyone screaming at the telly. (Why didn’t Beck have curtains in her ground-floor New York apartment?!) Now it is back with more graphic murder, public masturbation and impossibly beautiful victims as Badgley’s hot psychopath heads to LA.
From Boxing Day, Netflix
Liam Gallagher: As it Was
Liam Gallagher’s “rockumentary” starts out with an unflinching list of everything that’s gone wrong for our kid since Oasis broke up: his marriage to Nicole Appleton, flop band Beady Eye, fractious family relationships, and rock-star levels of partying to forget it all. If you thought last year’s post-Christmas obsession Bros: After the Screaming Stops was the most embarrassing examination of a past-it pop star ego, wait until you see Liam’s drunk tour diary.
Sunday 29 December, 10.15pm, BBC Two
