Blackbox

After a year of one-off specials and the like, a brand new series of Dr Who, with a brand new Doctor, hits screens next month. Well, computer screens anyway. Auntie will first screen the series on iView (Fri Apr 6 from 12am) before broadcasting on the telly (ABC1, Sun Apr 18). And it’s within a couple of weeks of the UK debut so you don’t need to worry too much about spoiler alerts. Those who watched The End of Time will know Matt Smith (the younger brother in Party Animals). An odd choice but then David Tennant took a while to settle into the role – and he has proved one of the most popular. And if you need extra incentive, the Daleks again feature heavily this season.

From the ‘thank god we’ve got extra digital channels because you would need to strap me down and pry my eyelids open Clockwork Orange style’ box comes The Matty Johns Show (Prime, Thu Mar 25, 7.30pm). It’s not enough that WIN takes up two hours with the kind of ramshackle theatrics on show in Eddie McGuire’s Olympics coverage and their Footy Shows – now we have to have another carbon copy to avoid.

The best show ever – James May’s Toy Stories (SBS1, Fri, 7.30pm) airs its best ep Lego (Apr 2). With the help of a lot of volunteers, James builds a full size lego house, replete with a lego toilet, and holds a house warming and then spends the night in it. If only Blackbox could find a way to make money out of fun things to do when you’re five.

James May’s Top Gear (WIN, Go! more times a week than anyone can possibly remember) compatriot Richard Hammond takes on real architecture with his Engineering Connections: Guggenheim Bilbao (SBS1, Sat Apr 3, 7.30pm).

New shows include Miranda (ABC2, Fri Mar 19, 8pm) – a semi-autobiographical sitcom from British comedian Miranda Hart, Whistleblowers (7TWO, Mon, 9.30pm) – a British political thriller, and Place of Execution (ABC1, Fri Apr 2, 9.20pm) – a psychological thriller. Docos not to be missed include Human Journey: Australia (ABC2, Thu Mar 18, 8.30pm) which charts Australia’s part in the spread of homiosapiens, Fire Talker: The Life and Times of Charlie Perkins (ABC2, Thu Mar 18, 9.30pm), Serial Killers (Prime, Tue Mar 23, 10.30pm) – a doco series like Gangs of Oz that predictably starts with the body-in-a-barrel case, Chachapoya (SBS1, Sun Mar 28, 7.30pm) about a lost civilisation found high in the Andes, An Englishman in New York (ABC1, Sun Mar 28, 8.30pm) which follows the life of Quentin Crisp, I. Psychopath (ABC2, Thu Mar 25, 9.25pm) which focuses on a suspected psychopath and becomes a kind of gonzo journalism and Not Quite Hollywood (SBS1, Sat Mar 27, 10pm) which looks at Ozploitation cinema and features interviews with the likes of Quentin Tarantino and Phillip Adams. It’s followed by the most famous of them all – The Adventures of Barry McKenzie (SBS1, Sat Mar 27, 11.45pm).

Still no news on a start date for Underbelly – you can enter a competition to attend a preview screening in Sydney on Thursday April 8 (channelnine.ninemsn.com.au/underbelly) so presumably it won’t be until after that.

Blackbox Tip: If you’ve never heard of The Young Ones (ABC2, Tue, 8pm), watch it – it’s where the sitcom changed forever (and good research for that uni paper on post-modernism).