While nothing quite beats the big screen for us, there’s no denying that we’re living in a golden age of television: from “Treme” and “Breaking Bad” to “Modern Family” and “Parks and Recreation,” it feels like there’s more good TV on than ever before, and more and more big names, including Martin Scorsese, Michael Mann and Todd Haynes, who are all making inroads into the format.
One of our most anticipated shows for later this year is Shane Meadows’ “This Is England ’86,” a four-part sequel to his 2007 masterpiece “This Is England.” The project, co-written with Playlist favorite Jack Thorne, picks up the characters from that film three years later, to the background of the 1986 World Cup in Mexico.
Baz Bamigboye at the Daily Mail has the first image from the series, showing the gang with natty new mod wear. Producer Mark Herbert tells him that “Three years on and it’s less a rites of passage of one character — it’s an ensemble piece.” Meadows seems keen on TV — when we spoke to him last September, he told us that “My life and everything that happened around “This Is England,” the stuff that happened afterwards, you can’t fit it all in. So the idea is very attractive to me of making four films, four hours.”
So much so that there may be a further continuation — Bamigboye reveals that there may be another series, set in 1990. Meadows is directing two of the episodes, with Tom Harper, who was behind the wonderful “Scouting Book For Boys,” directing the other two. It should air on Britain’s Channel 4 in the autumn, although there’s no word of if and when it’ll be seen in the States.