Best Culture so far of 2026 televion, books and podcasts

July 24, 2026

Discover what we’ve enjoyed watching, reading and listening to in 2026.

With June and July terrestrial channels dominated by the World Cup, it’s a good opportunity to highlight what we’ve enjoyed watching, reading or listening to so far in 2026.

Television

Waiting for the Out  BBC iPlayer

★★★★★

An exceptional drama that is extremely well written and performed. The details may seem uninspiring – a teacher, Dan played by Josh Finan, enters prison to teach philosophy to the inmates. However, Dan has his own demons to deal with including an obsession with his cooker and family members who all spent time in prison.

What vexes Dan also most as much as his cooker are childhood memories and hallucinations of his father, played superbly as a toxic combination of menace and vulnerability by Gerald Kearns.

It’s not uncommon to ask, “Do I really want to watch this, sounds like hard work” On this occasion if you don’t, you really are missing out on a drama with much to offer and entertain.

How to Get to Heaven from Belfast  Netflix

★★★★★

From the creator of the highly successful Derry Girls, this is a darkly comic, genre-blending Netflix series that combines mystery, emotional depth, and Irish wit.

Three old schoolfriends reunite to attend the wake of their close friend, Greta whom they’ve lost touch with 20 years ago when something went wrong for Greta. There’s something odd about Greta’s family and all manner of theories abound when one of the friends, Saoirse, lifts the coffin lid and tells her friends it’s not Greta.

What ensues is a hilarious ride as the three friends join forces and experience improbable scenarios whilst all the while there are flashbacks to them watching a shack burning which must be linked to what happened to Greta.

It’s all bound together by a sharply observed script and excellent performances by the principals.

Dynasty: The Murdochs Netflix

★★★★

Proof, if any were needed, that real life continues to outdo fiction when it comes to dynastic power struggles.

Charting the rise of Rupert Murdoch and the increasingly fraught question of succession among his children, the series unfolds like a corporate tragedy in slow motion. Interviews and archive footage paint a picture of ambition that is both relentless and, at times, faintly absurd as Rupert plays his siblings off each other to test their suitability for the crown. Bringing everything to a head is the News of the World hacking scandal and there’s much pleasure to be had revisiting that drama.

There are echoes of Succession, inevitably, though the absence of scripted dialogue only makes the underlying tensions feel more acute.

Blanca Ch4

★★★★★

A crime drama with a neat twist: its central investigator, Blanca—played with quiet assurance by Maria Chiara Giannetta—is blind, relying on acute hearing and instinct to navigate both cases and colleagues.

Set in Genoa, the series follows her work with the police as she pieces together crimes others struggle to see—literally and metaphorically. There’s a strong procedural backbone, but it’s Blanca herself who holds the attention: perceptive, self-possessed and refreshingly unsentimental. A strong supporting cast underplays the narrative across the six episodes with flashbacks to when and how Blanca lost her sight.

This is a stylish and engaging variation with sufficient originality to differentiate from other crime dramas.

RAFA Netflix

★★★★★

Although it helps, you don’t necessarily need to like sport to become engrossed in this documentary series.

Rafa Nadal was one of the triumvirate of players who became the most successful tennis players in history. The difference with Rafe is that he was competing against Roger Federer at his best and likewise against Novak Djokovic. Added to that, his career was blighted by a hereditary foot injury, and he won one of his 14 French Grand Slam titles without feeling in his foot.

Supported by his family throughout his career, his Uncle Toni coached him for nearly all of his career which started at the age of 4, Nadal had perhaps the strongest will to win of any sportsman.

Dutton Ranch Paramount+

★★★★★

Yellowstone continues to expand, and so do the horizons of some of its best-loved inhabitants. In this spin-off, Beth Dutton and Rip Wheeler (Kelly Reilly and Cole Hauser) are saying goodbye to Montana and moving to Texas.

However, trouble seems to follow this couple wherever they go and, before long, they’re finding that the Lone Star State doesn’t take kindly to outsiders – particularly if they arrive as potential business rivals.

Rip was always one of the most interesting Yellowstone characters and this series is boosted by the presence of two great actors, Annette Bening, playing the titular baddie and Ed Harris, the good guy.

Books

Dream State  Eric Puchner

★★★★★

When Cece arrives early at her future in-laws’ lake house in Salish, Montana, to finish planning her wedding to Charlie and meets his best friend Garrett from college, you know this is not going to be a straightforward tale.

Garrett is the antithesis of successful Charlie but is he better suited to Cece and how will the story of the three friends evolve over a 50-year span?

Reactions to this book have been varied, what isn’t disputed is the quality of writing and the crafting of characters that explains why matters of the heart can follow an unpredictable path.

London Falling – Patrick Radden Keefe

★★★★★

If you know some of the details of a true-crime story, there is less incentive to read 360 pages on the subject. But this is so well written and constructed it reads like a thriller..

The book centres on the 2019 death of 19-year-old Zac Brettler, who fell from a London apartment under circumstances the police ultimately deemed suicide. Keefe, however, is unconvinced, and retraces Zac’s final months—uncovering a teenage life built on elaborate lies, including a fabricated identity as the son of a Russian oligarch.

Those lies draw Zac into a murky world of money, status and dangerous men, and the book follows both the investigation and his parents’ attempt to understand how their son ended up there.

Keefe’s strength is in widening the lens: this becomes not just a mystery, but a portrait of a city shaped by wealth, illusion and the porous boundary between legitimate success and outright criminality.

Meticulous, unsettling and quietly devastating—a story less about how someone died than about the world that allowed it to happen.

Podcasts

The Other Virgin’s Baby  Wondery

★★★★★

We’ve highlighted in the past, Wondery’s series Great British Scandals and The Other Virgin’s Baby is one of the latest of its 66 tales.

Set in the 1920’s, it’s the story of a scandal that lasted more than 50 years. It involves the aristocracy, a dragon of a mother-in-law, her weak-willed son and his wife who is totally averse to consummating the marriage. How she produced an heir to the family title is at the centre of the scandal because when her pregnancy is diagnosed, she is still technically a virgin.

It’s a great story like many in the series and as always extremely well hosted by Alice Levine and Matt Ford.

Scam Inc Economist

★★★★★

“Scam Inc” is an investigative podcast series by The Economist, hosted by Sue-Lin Wong. The series delves into the intricate and expansive world of modern online scams, revealing a sophisticated, multi-billion-dollar underground economy that rivals the illicit drug trade. The FBI estimated that in 2023, US citizens lost $53 billion to scams.

Whilst we’ve heard numerous stories about various scams, what is particularly revealing is who the scammers are and how they operate. Through meticulous reporting, Wong uncovers how these scams are intricately linked to human trafficking, corruption, and money laundering. With scam farms operating in the Far East. Scams are becoming ever more personalised, and recently I was nearly scammed by phishing and what the scammers knew was that an Amazon delivery had not been delivered, that they could replicate texts I had received from my bank and what stopped them was when I said I would ring them back.

Scam Inc begins with the downfall of a rural Kansas bank and how a much-respected CEO was scammed for $41m. This is a great in-depth investigation about the scale and impact of online fraud.

Film

I Swear  Netflix

★★★★★

I Swear was the main talking point of the Baftas because of the inadvertent tics expressed by Tourette’s sufferer, John Davidson upon whom the film is based and the actor who portrayed him, Robert Aramayo, winning Best Actor against strong competition.

His award is fully deserved as it is an exceptional performance. Davidson educated the nation about a little-known syndrome and was awarded an MBE in 2019. This is a warm and engaging film which illustrates perfectly how Tourette’s behaviour can be misconstrued. Davidson didn’t start displaying symptoms until he was a teenager and the film captures how initially he was accused of making it up, how divisive it was for his family and how eventually he was saved by a mental health nurse who took him in when his mother couldn’t cope and by a community centre worker who gives him a chance.

There can be understandable apathy about watching such a film but amidst the hardship suffered by Davidson, there is humour associated with some of his experiences and it is a condition about which we should be better educated. 

Read our month by month recommendations in our Culture Section