Pilot TV

The first three episodes of The Dropout, the new series charting the rise and fall of tech entrepreneur Elizabeth Holmes and Theranos, the company she founded, have landed on Disney+, and in the latest team-up between the Empire Podcast and Pilot TV Podcast, Chris Hewitt, James Dyer, and Beth Webb have a good old natter about it. In this very special crossover episode, in association with Disney+, they talk about the real-life events behind the show (created by Elizabeth Meriwether), the reasons why Hollywood is drawn to stories like this, the incredible cast, led by Amanda Seyfried, and much, much more. So turn on, tune in and drop out for The Dropout...

Martin Compston joins us on this week's show, fielding Boyd's questions about his new ITV thriller Our House, bemoaning the state of modern football, and giving an update as to what might be next in store for Line Of Duty. Plus we're on the hunt for Satan's concubines in BBC2 comedy The Witchfinder, and trying to solve a mystery with Samuel L. Jackson in The Last Days Of Ptolemy Grey on Apple. All that and the team talk through the things they most would (or wouldn't) want to see adapted, some of their other TV podcast picks and Boyd outlines the plot for the twelve-part miniseries of James' life.

This week's episode sees Joe Dempsie join us to talk all about his new show, Pieces Of Her on Netflix, as well as reflecting on sex scenes, intimacy and the pervading influence of Skins. Other than that, though, we have a particularly shambolic episode in which James, having come straight from an overnight flight with zero sleep and spectacularly failed to prepare, does his level best to derail the whole endeavour. But that doesn't stop us trying to reunite with Villanelle in the final series of Killing Eve on BBC1, watch Amanda Seyfried undermine the health system in The Dropout on Disney+, and chase demons with Courteney Cox in Shining Vale on Starzplay. All that and the team line-up their desert island streaming shows, Boyd and Beth have their weekly Euphoria rant, one of Boyd's famous friends calls mid-recording, and James falls asleep while Beth is talking.

We're a day late this week, by order of the Peaky Blinders (or more specifically the BBC's review embargo), but it's all good because Peaky creator Steven Knight drops by the show to talk about the show's final season and allow James to bend his ear about the joys of See. Plus we're mixing love and lycanthropy with Wolf Like Me on Prime Video and getting our Norse back on in Netflix's Vikings: Valhalla (where Boyd unveils his extraordinary Norse accent). All that and we give a loving (and belated) eulogy for Neighbours and officially rank our favourite Netflix originals.

It's a particularly anarchic show this week as chronology gets thrown entirely out of the window and sections collide, possibly as a result of too much Valentine's Day chocolate - who can really say? Still, we have a giggle looking at the most romantic shows every to grace our screens (Beth has absolutely no time for it), plus engage in an impromptu post mortem of The Book Of Boba Fett. All that and we take a look at Apple's Severance, Sky's Fresh Prince reconceptualisation, Bel-Air, and Netflix's teen detention murder mystery One Of Us Is Lying.

Adam Kay, author of bestselling medical memoir This Is Going To Hurt, joins us on the show this week as we look at the BBC adaptation of his work, starring Ben Whishaw as the man in the white coat. Plus we're investigating the kidnapping of Uma Thurman's son in Apple's Suspicion, getting stuck in a Turkish jail in No Return on ITV, and catching up with Rose Matafeo's celebrity shenanigans in the return of Starstruck on BBC2. Not only that but we take a long, hard (steady) look at the rapidly escalating penis count on our screens, list the TV characters we'd happily kill with fire, and get a much-needed update on the status of Risky the cat's drinking fountain.

If this week got off to a bumpy start for you, there can be no better medication than a prescription of Beth's raucous interview with Tiffany Haddish on this week's show, as the pair get surprisingly frank about the things they'd like to do to Jamie Demetriou (00:18:37-00:32:07). And not content with that, Beth also sat down with Mackenzie Davis to talk all things Station 11 and get tips on the finer points of knife-throwing (00:58:05-01:10:52). But that's not all, because we take a trip with man-mountain Jack Reacher in Prime Video's adaptation of the Lee Child novel series, Reacher, explore the origins of the world's most famous sex tape in Pam & Tommy on Star, and take up a sideline in cyberstalking thanks to Chloe on BBC1. Plus the team mull over their must-watch and must-skip title sequences and Beth explains why Risky, the world's most middle-class cat, has just acquired a drinking fountain.

Stanley Tucci and Carrie Coon are our guests on this week's show, talking to us about La Fortuna (23:00-32:51) and The Gilded Age (53:06-1:02:37), respectively. Plus we have a stupidly long lineup of shows to review, including Starzplay's post-apocalyptic drama, Station Eleven; Julian Fellowes' Downton-in-America drama, The Gilded Age; Apple's whodunnit comedy, The Afterparty; Martin Freeman's gritty BBC police drama, The Responder; and the long-awaited arrival of The Sinner Season 4 on Netflix. All of which was more than enough to keep James, Beth and Boyd glued to screens through most of last week. However, paying no heed to minor inconveniences like the laws of time and space, Boyd still found time to devour Archive 81 and bring us a full update, James gave The Tourist another go, and the team hoovered up the Yellowjackets finale (no spoilers) as well.

Ricky Gervais joins us on this week's show to discuss the finer points of blowing belly raspberries with Tony Way in After Life, plus Nell Tiger Free stops by to dispense childcare advice in the third season of Apple's Servant, where she and Boyd get into such varied topics as incest and the finer points of moth taming. In addition (and we apologise in advance) James finishes his rewatch of The Expanse just in time to watch the finale live, and proceeds to bang on about why it's amazing for what we can only hope is the last time (so sorry). Plus the team reviews bomb disposal thriller Trigger Point on ITV, comeback show Queens on Star, and Stanley Tucci's treasure-hunting adventure, La Fortuna, on AMC UK. NOTE: Ricky and Tony's After Life interview is, unusually, a spoiler interview and goes deep on lots of the third season's plot points, including the finale. If you've not seen it then you might want to do so first, or you can skip the interview entirely to preserve its secrets by avoiding 29:22-1:00:00.

Happy New Year! Can you hear us? We certainly hope so, because the first Pilot TV podcast of 2022 is brought to you by none other than Clem Fandango, Mr Shazad Latif himself, who joins us to talk all things Toast of Tinseltown. Plus, we take a look at all the TV we didn't cover over the Christmas break and line up Jamie Dornan's outback ordeal, The Tourist, for the full review treatment. Also in reviews are Maxine Peake-starring HR escapade Rules Of The Game, and the third (and final) season of Ricky Gervais' Afterlife (where Boyd decides that Ricky Gervais' character and James might share more DNA than is entirely healthy).