The Split Up; The Blame; Strictly Come Dancing

“Now that the Beeb is based in Media City, and Andy Burnham has opened a Number 10 North, it makes sense for every TV show based in London to head up the M6. Remakes could include Gangs Of Manchester, Toast Of Manchester, Manchester’s Burning and Inside The Tower Of Manchester. Why not An American Werewolf in Manchester? The Split, that scandalously enjoyable romantic drama set at a top London family law firm, has made the journey north, too — reimagined with a completely new cast and retitled The Split Up. That should probably be pronounced The Split Oop.”
Christopher Stevens, Daily Mail

“The Split was a guilty pleasure of a show, a middle-class soap opera about a family of divorce lawyers, based around Nicola Walker and her enviable kitchen. Fans were bereft when it ended four years ago. Now we have a sort of spin-off: a new series following the same template and executive produced by The Split’s creator, Abi Morgan. The Split Up (BBC One) is a flashier, Northern cousin. It doesn’t live up to the original, but has enough warmth, humour and will-they-won’t-they romance to make it an enjoyable watch.”
Anita Singh, Telegraph

“The similarities to the original show can feel deadening at times, but there is life here and it certainly looks great. Aria and Neal’s Hindu engagement party is a particularly enjoyable riotous splash of colour with fab music and dancing, and this could well earn a place in the pantheon of other glam Manchester dramas like Queer as Folk and Cutting It. This cuts it. But only just.”
Ben Dowell, The Times

“I do like a soap that doesn’t hang about. That works itself up to a creamy lather and invites you to shut the bathroom door against real life and dive into a hot bath with it immediately for a much-needed break. The Split Up delivers full-on sudsy fun from the start. From the team behind The Split, it’s another glossy tale of a family-run family law firm specialising in the never-too-complicated divorce cases of any high net worth individuals in their vicinity. This time, it’s written by Ursula Rani Sarma instead of Abi Morgan, the family is British South Asian and the location is Manchester not London, but beyond that it’s very much business as usual. A case of the week functions as the still eye of the ever-growing storm composed of the love lives, personal concerns and professional ambitions of the interrelated lawyers and their friends, colleagues and enemies – who are often, of course, one and the same thing. Mild glamour meets much plot; viewer happiness ensues.”
Lucy Mangan, The Guardian

“A missing 16-year-old girl whose body is eventually found in the woods — police tape, rain, the usual. Only The Blame (ITV1) is keen to sing a slightly different tune in the moments leading up to the awful moment two coppers knock on the door of the grieving parents, who are — as so often on TV — surprisingly able to answer police questions about the death of their child when in reality most would be howling in agony or under extreme sedation. That new song is police sexism, which, after the murder of Sarah Everard and the MeToo reckoning, is certainly a timely subject, though perhaps not as fresh as the producers might want us to think. After all the loutishness of male coppers was a noxious theme of perhaps the best procedural of the lot, Helen Mirren’s Prime Suspect in 1991. Still, if you are going to ape a show, you may as well ape quality.”
Ben Dowell, The Times

“Eleven months of asking how Strictly could survive without Tess and Claudia, whether their departure spelled its demise, whether any replacement could have what it takes to steer the course, and what it meant for the BBC and all it took was one dance – a sublimely thrilling, playful opener loaded with details for superfans – to forget what all the fuss was about. When Dianne Buswell, who danced pregnant last year, pushed a pram across the dance floor and Peter Gabriel’s “Sledgehammer” exploded into Bad Bunny, my worries fell away. Strictly is so much bigger than its hosts. Pingu could have been presenting and it would still be the slickest programme on television.”
Sarah Carson, The i