Five things to watch this February – from 'The White Lotus' to 'Miss Austen'
It may be the shortest month in the calendar, but February is certainly making up for its lack of quantity with an abundance of quality. Not one but two megawatt shows are returning for eagerly awaited third seasons this month: the critically-acclaimed comedy Hacks and the zeitgeist dominating The White Lotus. There are also ambitious mini-series to get stuck into, from the compelling period drama A Thousand Blows to the political thriller Zero Day, starring Hollywood legend Robert De Niro. And then there is Miss Austen, the BBC’s enchanting take on the novel by Gill Hornby, which imagines the relationship between Jane and her sister Cassandra, starring Keeley Hawes and Rose Leslie.
Zero Day
An ambitious miniseries on a seismic scale, Zero Day is a scarily timely story about terror, corruption, conspiracy theories and attacks on civil liberties at the hands of the US government. The narrative follows the aftermath of a devastating terror attack and the measures taken by a president and former president to combat any further threats. Besides its arrival – right in the dawning days of a second Trump presidency – this political thriller was bound to court attention on the strength of its eye-wateringly impressive cast alone, which includes Robert De Niro, Angela Bassett, Connie Britton, Jesse Plemons, Lizzy Caplan and Joan Allen. This may well be Netflix’s water-cooler moment of 2025.
Zero Day is streaming on Netflix from 20 February
The White Lotus
Possibly the most anticipated TV arrival of the year, season three of the ludicrously popular anthology series is finally here. This time, the rich-people-behaving-badly-in-beautiful-places setup moves to Thailand, with stars such as Parker Posey, Jason Isaacs, Aimee Lou Wood and Michelle Monaghan checking in for another fateful stay. The first season revived the career of Jennifer Coolidge and the 2022 season practically defined the zeitgeist for a year, with even the theme music becoming a club classic. We wait with baited breath to see what dark comedic satire will be wrought from the specificities of the group and the location but one thing is certain: we’ll all be watching.
The White Lotus season 3 is streaming on NowTV from 16 February
Hacks
The award-winning comedy-drama is back with a third season – and on a new home for UK viewers. It follows the unconventional friendship-turned-mentorship between a fading comedy legend, Deborah Vance, and an aspiring writer, Ava, portrayed by the bitingly brilliant Jean Smart and the compulsively watchable Hannah Einbinder. Season three sees our protagonists separated, with their careers on refreshingly upwards trajectories after Deborah’s comedy special goes viral and Ava is hired to write for a political satire show. The pair are reunited when a late-night talk-show host spot becomes available, and Deborah enlists Ava’s help to get it.
Hacks season 3 is streaming on NowTV from 7 February
A Thousand Blows
Period drama at its grittiest and most entertaining, this six-part series is set in the world of illegal boxing and gangs in Victorian London, as the arrival of a Jamaican fighter causes chaos in an established criminal ecosystem. The brainchild of Peaky Blinders scribe Steven Knight, it stars Malachi Kirby, Stephen Graham and Erin Doherty, and brings an often overlooked but fascinating slice of British history to new light in vibrant and often very bloody technicolour.
A Thousand Blows is streaming on Disney + from 20 February
Miss Austen
As part of the year-long celebration of Jane Austen’s 250th birthday, the BBC has commissioned this beguiling adaptation of Gill Hornby’s bestselling novel, Miss Austen. The four-part drama imagines the intricacies and intimacies of Jane’s relationship with her sister Cassandra, played by Keeley Hawes, and splits the narrative between Cassandra dealing with her sister’s death and the preservation of her legacy, and her memories of a younger Jane, told in flashback. The plot centres the mystery of a stack of Jane Austen’s letters which may or may not expose a terrible secret – letters which the real Cassandra Austen did indeed burn.
Miss Austen is streaming on BBC iPlayer from 2 February.
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