2 w. ago Blue Lights is more than great TV. It might be the best chance Britons have of reckoning with the Troubles | Jonathan Freedland

The reaction to the Bloody Sunday trial makes it clear: those of us outside Northern Ireland just don’t understand the painful legacy of this brutal conflictForgive me if I’ve mentioned him before, but at moments like this I remember a news editor I worked for as a young reporter at the BBC. When it came to the interests of our audience, he said, there was a key fact to bear in mind: “The two most boring words in the English language are ‘Northern Ireland’.”It was an attitude with a long history. In 1924, Viscount Cranbourne, the fifth Marquess of Salisbury, mused that the average English voter has “little interest in, and less understanding of, Irish affairs”. This week brought some evidence that, 101 years later, much of his observation still holds true. But a challenge to it has come from an unlikely quarter, via what might be one of the most compelling TV dramas of recent years. Continue reading...

Events

3 w. ago CHRISTOPHER STEVENS reviews The Iris Affair on Sky Atlantic: A wonderfully loopy thriller that pays homage to classic Hitchcock

Don't worry, there's a simple way to escape detection. Just put on a pair of glasses... and you'll be unrecognisable.

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3 w. ago The Iris Affair review – it takes real guts to write TV this thrillingly preposterous. Strap in!

Tom Hollander and Niamh Algar star in this fun, propulsive tale of a genius code-cracker, an oddball entrepreneur and an evil supercomputer known as Charlie Big Potatoes trapped in a secret lair. Brace yourself for a wild rideThere’s in media res and then there’s the opening of The Iris Affair. The new caper-drama opens with a man being beaten half to death while a woman (Niamh Algar) looks on unmoved and refusing to hand over a MacGuffin to the man ordering the beating (Tom Hollander, channelling Michael Caine). They are watched by a rather more concerned teenager, Joy (Meréana Tomlinson), who becomes infinitely more concerned when Hollander-Caine’s character realises that jamming a gun into her neck might be a better way to elicit a response from MacGuffin lady. Then he realises he can’t quite bring himself to shoot the child. But he can order his heavy to do so. The hired gun swings around and we cut to Sardinia, Italy, the day before. And that, my friends, is how a prologue shou...

Politics

3 w. ago The Iris Affair review: Luther creator's absurd Sky thriller is ridiculously entertaining

The British tech thriller set in Italy is streaming from today on Sky

Politics

3 w. ago The Iris Affair review: Sky’s deliriously entertaining tech thriller is brilliantly silly

A glossy new sci-fi thriller from Luther creator Neil Cross is about to entertain and baffle Sky subscribers this week

Science

3 w. ago The Iris Affair's Niamh Algar was 'weighed down underwater' for terrifying stunt on first day of filming

Niamh Algar was thrown headfirst into a "frightening" stunt for her very first day of filming Sky's new thriller The Iris Affair

Events

3 w. ago The Iris Affair's full cast from Pride & Prejudice legend to Game of Thrones favourite

The Iris Affair is a new action thriller series on Sky and now on TV, with a star-studded cast that includes a handful of actors who will be familiar to TV fans

Politics

4 w. ago The Iris Affair's Tom Hollander addresses Elon Musk comparisons in Sky's new tech thriller

Sky thriller The Iris Affair stars Niamh Algar as a brilliant woman who's hired by a wealthy tech investor to unlock a supercomputer

Science

4 w. ago The Iris Affair villain Tom Hollander shuts down comparisons to Elon Musk

Tom Hollander has claimed he wasn’t inspired by Elon Musk while portraying The Iris Affair’s tech investor baddie

Politics

4 w. ago The Iris Affair’s Niamh Algar admits she got ‘carried away’ during Sky thriller’s key action scene

The Iris Affair's Niamh Algar has teased a high-speed car chase scene in the gripping new Sky thriller

Politics