Opinion: Fenland Citizen reporter lists some of her favourite telly picks from 2024

Where to begin when it comes to listing the top telly shows of 2024?

Ask ten people what their favourite show was in 2024 and you’re more than likely to get ten different answers.

This year has brought us eighties’ moustaches in Rivals, electrifying thrillers such as Black Doves, and heartbreaking dramas in One Day.

So with hopefully time to curl up in front of the television this Christmas here is just a selection of what you could catch up on if you missed them over the last 12 months.

For those who enjoy a good love story then there probably has been nothing better than ‘One Day’ – an adaptation of the David Nicholls novel.

Don’t worry if you watched the big screen version with Anne Hathaway – this is way better. Ambika Mod and Leo Woodall are simply fabulous as the protagonists.

If you haven’t seen the film, read the book, and don’t know the story, it is basically about a couple who meet on July 15 1988 just as they are graduating from university.

He is a playboy type, she is not his typical girl, but they strike-up a friendship that spans the years meeting every July 15 for the next 20 years.

I won’t spoil the ending but be prepared with a tissue or two – definitely worthy of a top ten place on my list.

As an aside, if you decide you love Leo Woodall and want to see more of him you could tune into The White Lotus season 2.

Guy Rtichie was at his best when he brought us The Gentlemen at the start of the year.

This is a genuine must-watch – but be warned there is some gory violence thrown in among the hugely entertaining tale of an aristocratic weed-dealing family.

This is a funny, at times impossibly witty, intelligent, if also a little insane crime ‘drama’ and it is coming back for a second season, so now would be a good time to binge-watch it.

I totally loved it, and fell a little bit in love with Theo James – well who wouldn’t?

For those who enjoy their crime drama with a bit of humour on the side then Only Murders in the Building on Disney is superb.

It was back for a fourth series, so you could binge-watch the whole lot. Starring Steve Martin, Selena Gomez, and Martin Short –this is basically a who dunnit with the trio solving killings that happen in their apartment building – and surprisingly there are a number.

There are also a surprising number of Hollywood A-listers popping up for cameo roles – these include Meryl Streep, Paul Rudd, Zach Galifianakas, and Eva Longoria among others.

Definitely a top tenner for 2024…

I haven’t seen much on it elsewhere but I really enjoyed The Decameron, another rather quirky drama. This one is set at the time of the Black Death and looks at class, power, and surviving a pandemic – sound familiar?

A rich bunch of nobles and their servants are invited to escape the Bubonic plague in Florence by staying in a villa in the Tuscan countryside and partying and whatever else their way through it.

From there the idyll of safety, kind of spirals into chaos. I really enjoyed it, but it might not be for everyone.

Lovers of true-life dramas and missed Mr Bates versus the Post Office may like to tune into this.

It was one of the most talked about dramas of the year and tells the story of what happened within Post Offices where the past masters were accused of theft, many were prosecuted, lost their homes, and suffered immense hardship as a result of the Horizon scandal.

I was not fully aware of everything that happened as a result of this and just what it did to the poor people caught up in it, so definitely an interesting and informative watch. And if you don't feel really angry by the end of it, I will be truly surprised. Toby Jones – was great as the eponymous Mr Bates.

While we’re on the topic of true life – one of the documentary series that gripped me this year was Cold Case Who Killed JonBenet Ramsey.

JonBenet was a beautiful six-year-old girl from Boulder, Colorado who was murdered in her family home on Christmas Day night in 1996. It is a story that has stayed with me as my own daughter was six at the time, and so the horror of the killing truly resonated with me.

This docuseries reinvestigates the murder and highlights the flaws in the police investigation at the time.

The case prompted a media circus and a lot of suspicion fell on the dead girl’s family. This is definitely not a family watch, and just like the original story the details outlined in this series stayed with me long after the credits rolled.

No list of top shows would be complete without Rivals – based on Jilly Cooper’s saucy book this is just straight-up good fun.

It may not be high-brow, or serious drama, and it makes no apologies about that. The producers have embraced it and have come up with one of the most entertaining shows of the year.

It is uproariously naughty, funny, with a gem of a cast – it is impossible to pick one out above the rest they are all brilliant. Danny Dyer in a wig with a fringe and a huge 1980s moustache is a sight to behold.

The style of the era is captured brilliantly right down to Danny Dyer’s character Freddie riding in a Sinclair C5. It is a sumptuous romp of a show that will leave you definitely baying for season two – personally, I can’t wait.

I love a thriller and 2024 has come up with some crackers putting Only Murders and The Gentlemen aside.

It is hard to pick a favourite, The Lincoln Lawyer, Day of the Jackal, Bodkin, Until I Kill You, After the Flood, and Trigger Point have all been excellent among so many.

But I think it comes down to two for me Black Doves with Keira Knightley and Strike (which has only been released this week).

Black Doves is a spy thriller series with Keira Knightley as Helen Webb, the wife of the Secretary of State for Defence, who learns that her secret identity as a Black Dove spy is in danger after her lover is killed by London’s underworld.

It is as you would expect with Ms Knightley starring, really well done, and a gripping watch.

Strike was back for a sixth series, hard to think we're on season six, and I have to say it has lost none of its zing. The relationship between Tom Burke’s Cormoran Strike and Holliday Grainger’s Robin Ellacott is as complicated as ever while The Ink Black Heart is a tale with many twists and turns before the baddie is revealed.

I have left horror off this list, but 2024 was the year that brought us a plethora of Walking Dead spin-offs and if you loved the original series then these won’t disappoint, my personal favourite was the one telling Darryl’s story in France but I also enjoyed the Maggie and Negan one.

I’m sure I have forgotten some other gems that I have enjoyed along the way, but these are the ones that stayed with me, so if you have a chance sit back and see what you think…