If the noise of someone driving a tank down a street paved with cats sounds like music to your ears, be sure tune in to Eurovision this weekend, for what is sure to be a real treat for the senses. Witness the coming together of such artists as Alyona Lanskaya, Ivad Von Glooberchev and Roberto Bellarosa—singers who are able to make caterwauling to a backing track seem easy. Marvel at our own hopeful, Bonnie Tyler, who won’t win, not simply because the song is awful, but also because Europe hates us. Then have a drink and fall asleep before the winner has been announced.

But before all of this, here are some of the very best entries this year’s completion has to offer—by which I mean the very worst this year’s completion has to offer.

It looks as if it’s still the 1990s in Latvia, home of the androgynous pop trio PeR, whose music would likely have won the competition, if we were still living in the decade of Sugar Ray and Zig and Zag. “Here we go!” the band sing repeatedly throughout their energetic entry, never stopping for so much as a breath and looking incandescent in their glittery suits. But in spite of their enthusiasm, their cheery song soon begins to grate, until it becomes less “Here We Go” and more “Please, Just go”.

“I’m the man on the moon—call me Andy Kauffman!” raps the lead singer, as if driven to rap badly by an unmaskable disdain for all urban music. “Saga-ho! Saga-woo!” he continues, giving his faux-hawk-wearing band mate the special gesture to unleash PeR’s secret weapon: a blistering keytar lick with facial spasms to boot. Certainly, it’s a fair effort from the boys in PeR, but I doubt it’ll be enough to win the competition.

Our next hopeful may stand more of a chance. With his unashamedly suggestive eyebrow jolts, Andrius Pojavis of Lithuania apparently aims to win Eurovision by seducing music itself, courting it gently before defecating on its chest. At least this is what one can only deduce from his frankly terrifying rehearsal performance of his song Something—not to be confused with the Beatles song of the same name.

“I’m in your head! I’m in your heart!” he sings during the number, staring into the camera with all the psychotic intensity of a man who eats hearts for breakfast and heads for lunch. Still, you can’t argue that the passion isn’t there, as it quite clearly is. The problem is Andrius displays the wild passion of a drunk grasping his erect penis on the bus rather than the passion of a possible Eurovision winner.

Cezar of Romania is the most inspirational artist to appear on Eurovision this year: a man who has silenced his critics by actually finding a song that’s more ludicrous than his voice. In spite of his peanut-sized testicles and piercing vocal pitch, which is only audible to bats and certain breeds of dogs, he’s hoping to score big with It’s My Life: a song that regrettably shares its name with the song that it is so blatantly ripping off—i.e. the one by Dr. Alban rather than Bon Jovi or Talk Talk.

But you can’t accuse Cezar of plagiarism. Looking like a seal struggling to free itself from a bin bag, the man is obviously an original.

Cascada is likely the only Eurovision hopeful that most Brits will actually have heard of, largely due to her music being a staple of ringtone adverts and a sort of unofficial soundtrack to British drinking culture. It’s the sound of boob tube-wearing drunks puking into the gutter outside Oceana. It’s music that the producers of Hollyoaks might play if Tony were to gas himself with hose. It’s the sound of a headache in a clothes shop: a gaudy, overcompressed mess that makes ones ears feel as if they’re being operated on with a bit of rusty coat hanger.

All of which is why Cascada, with her inappropriately titled song Glorious, is unfortunately bound to win the competition. Still, on the bright side, at least it’s not this, which remains to this day the worst thing ever to happen to Israel:

Frankie

14 May, BBC 1 at 9pm

Few television characters are more inoffensive than district nurse Frankie Maddox, the title character in Lucy Gannon’s new six-part series. Frankie is the sort of smiley generic everywoman who typically features in adverts for Boots, where she’s seen skipping down the street with her girlfriends, seemingly chuffed with her purchase of some reasonably priced lipstick. She’s like a real person, except with the rough edges rounded off: a practically perfect woman whose only flaw is that she devotes too much time to trying to be nicer than she already is.

Of course, in a thirty second advert this completely inoffensive character works very well at suckering viewers into buying mascara and shower gel. But when a character whose sole feature is simply being nice fronts an entire television series, it’s often hard to find them quite as endearing as they’re intended to be.

This is largely true of Frankie, a character defined almost entirely by a warmness that could rid the world of its troubles. Played by the brilliantly talented Eve Myles, the character is driven by a desire to help others: at work she goes to extremes to tend to patients, while at home she finds herself treating her shiftless boyfriend with similar care.

In episode one, Frankie’s patients include an old man suffering from severe memory loss who is desperate to avoid going into care, and the pregnant wife of a serving soldier. She also has to deal with cuts to services that her department would have previously been able to provide. But while there is certainly drama at times, the tone of the episode is kept very light throughout, due mainly to Frankie’s wonderfully sunny disposition.

It’s the sort of series that makes a pleasant, although by no means essential, addition to an evening: a programme that one watches privately while wearing a duvet and eating an entire jar of jam. This is feel good television that is so starved of cynicism that it borders on being saccharine, and yet it never quite manages to turn the stomach.

Even though it uses practically every medical drama cliché in the book, there’s just something strangely admirable about a series that is so void of cynicism. In an age where television is saturated with sadistic dream crushing, one automatically assumes that Frankie is on the cusp of some sort of nervous breakdown or that something horrible is going to happen in her world, but it never does. There is no catch or sinister twist. Frankie is just pure unashamed niceness, from beginning to end.

Continuing to look at the genres anime and manga have themselves created, this week I am covering the world of “magical girls”. This is a fantasy genre which feature young girls (and on rare occasions boys) who have magical superpowers.

Most magical girl series follow a pretty standard format. With many, one girl discovers that she has some sort of power, and often undergoes a rather lengthy transformation (called a “Henshin” in Japanese) into their superpowered form. As the series goes on they often find more magical girls and form partnerships or groups. Most of these series are rather fun and light-hearted.

However, in 2011 this was all turned on its head with one of the most critically acclaimed anime series ever made. While most magical girl series are friendly and jolly Puella Magi Madoka Magica (usually shortened to Madoka Magica) is a tragedy, supposedly telling what “really” happens to magical girls.

Set in the futuristic-looking Mitakihara City, the series focuses on 14-year-old Madoka Kaname. She and her best friend Sayaka Miki come into contact with a small alien creature called Kyubey, who says it will grant them any wish they desire. In exchange they will turn into magical girls and will have to fight and kill evil monsters called “witches” who spread sadness amongst humanity.

Madoka is tempted by the deal, but there are conflicting forces at work. There is a new transfer student at her school, the cold Homura Akemi, a time-manipulating magical girl who tries everything she can to persuade Madoka not to go ahead with the deal. Then there is gunslinger Mami Tomoe, a veteran magical girl who wants Madoka to take the deal and help her. Lastly there is the gluttonous spear-wielder Kyoto Sakura, who only uses her magical powers to help herself.

During the series Madoka keeps pondering the decision, but it gets increasingly problematic as time moves on. She learns that rather than being friendly, the magical girls are not only fighting the witches but also each other. She also learns about the danger involved in the work, and some of the horrifying truths and sacrifices that magical girls have to make to survive, which are often in vain.

There are plenty of reasons why you should watch Madoka Magica. The main one is that it is it is just so prolific. It gained huge praise from critics both inside and outside of Japan when it was shown because it was so different from all the other magical girl anime that came before it.

It also has won loads of awards. The anime magazine Newtype held an award ceremony in 2011. Out of the 21 awards given out, Madoka Magica won 12 including “Title of the Year”, “Best Direction”, “Best Scenario”, “Best Art”, “Best Soundtrack.” Homura won “Best Female Character” and Kyubey won “Best Mascot Character”.

The award winning art is certainly a draw. One of the best parts in any episode is the battles with the witches. These all take place in hidden “labyrinths” created by the witches, which are all rather disturbing to look at. Then there are the witches themselves, which are not like the witches we are used to seeing. These monsters take on any number of vile guises. Watching these scenes is a bit like watching a cartoon created by Salvador Dali, complete with surrealist images all morphing and melting into one nightmarish visage.

If it is drama, tension, and perhaps even a little cry that you are after, then this is one of the most powerful anime series that you can watch. The entire 12-part series is on DVD and Blu-Ray.

Film of the week: Children of Men
ITV1, Sunday May 19, 10:15pm

Hollywood has had many half-decent stabs at depicting dystopian futures. Problem is, most of these attempts at showing us society on the brink of collapse have been so stylised they end up looking like the sort of worlds that only exist in big-budget blockbusters. Alfonso Cuarón’s masterstroke with Children of Men was to give it an air of documentary realism, employing hand-held cameras and lengthy single-shot sequences at locations in London and the South Coast to place us in the heart of the action.

It resulted in one of the most vividly convincing yet utterly nightmarish visions of human disorder since Stanley Kubrick’s A Clockwork Orange. There might be plenty of artistic licence in having global female infertility threatening to bring about the extinction of our species as a major plot point, but most of it is not much more than one step removed from the world we live in today. In Children of Men, Britain’s response to its societal breakdown is to round up immigrants and deport them, a policy you could easily imagine the Conservative Party toying with as it veers right in a bid to head Ukip support off at the pass.

It is little surprise that the film appeared in so many critics’ top ten lists in 2006; in fact it is easily one of best made since the turn of the century. Clive Owen is superb as a cynic drawn inexorably to resistance, as are Julianne Moore, Chiwetel Ejiofor and the rest of the cast. Michael Caine gives quite possibly the best performance of his career. A buzz of excitement is already building for Gravity, Cuarón’s first film since Children of Men. Seeing just how brilliant the latter is, it’s not hard to understand why.

Set the recorder for:

The Fighter
Film4, Thursday May 16, 9pm

Thematically, boxing movies generally fall into one of two camps: Rocky or Raging Bull. Given that Micky Ward, the boxer on whose career The Fighter is based, is far more Rocky Balboa than Jake La Motta (i.e. likeable) David O. Russell’s sports biopic sits firmly in the former. It’s far more complex, however, thanks to Christian Bale’s Oscar-winning performance as Ward’s crack-addicted brother, faltering as he seeks to join his sibling on the road to redemption.

The Simpsons Movie
E4, Sunday May 19, 8pm

The Simpsons is undeniably one of the best TV shows ever made. But by 2007 it had started descending the slippery slope from consistently wonderful to consistently inconsistent. This was largely due to many of the original writers having moved on to pastures new. Fortunately, many of them returned to help creator Matt Groening draft the screenplay for the The Simpsons Movie. And guess what – it is consistently wonderful too.

The Social Network
Film 4, Sunday May 19, 9pm

David Fincher’s ‘Facebook movie’, as it was dubbed whilst still in production, sounded more than a little silly at first. I mean, who could make a narrative film about the virtual place we go to convince everyone we’re all so happy and living such wonderful lives, without it ending up as a Tron for the iPhone generation? You can’t, of course, so instead Fincher got Aaron Sorkin to knock up a belter of a script based on its creator, Mark Zuckerberg. A definite Like.

ITV2 has confirmed that there will be a second series comedy ‘reality’ series – Lemon La Vida Loca. It will go even further ‘behind-the-scenes’ and into the world of Keith Lemon as he tries to boost his career as well as his catastrophic love life.

Series one, which aired in August 2012, was the highest rated new series launch of 2012 with an audience of over 1.4 million.

Following a breakup from his long term girlfriend, Rosie, Keith is single and looking to make an impact on the celebrity dating circuit. Romantic highlights will include a brief fling with Jenny Powell, a disastrous date with Myleene Klass, and an explosive relationship with a Pussycat Doll.

Changes are also afoot in Keith’s professional life. Determined to prove that he is more than just a TV presenter he first embarks on a music career – and releases his debut single – I Wanna Go On You – and then throws himself into the world of acting. A journey which sees him move to Hollywood to live with Verne Troyer, launch Back To The Future The Musical with Danny Dyer and take a walk down the famous cobbles of Coronation Street.

Keith Lemon added: “The Lemon La Vida Loca cameras are back in me house. It’s a new house, a new chapter. A bit like when Peter Andre started his new chapter but with more women, a bit ruder and with the main subject much better looking and not obsessed with coffee. Gonna be going to LA this season (that’s American for series) should be a good’n! Oooosh!”

King of Coke: Living the High Life

Tuesday 14th May 10pm on National Geographic

This is the story of Larry Levin, a studious and charming young man with his sights set on the big time glamour of dentistry. On the way he uses his charisma and attention to detail to accidentally almost become one of the most significant coke dealers of the 80’s.

Born into a successful middle class family, Levin was used to having money and nice stuff but this all changed when his Dad’s business went kaput and suddenly his family were more or less ostracised from the ‘keeping up with the Jones’ lifestyle they had become used to and Larry had to fend for himself.

Winning a scholarship to an Ivy League college, Levin had no more than a 100 bucks in his pocket when he first rocked up to the privileged institution. Desperate for cash, he soon turned to hustling weed to maintain his existence and much more importantly, to fit in amongst the moneyed set of his new environment. Fortunately for him, his looks, charm and what can only be described as ‘coolness’ made it easy for him to establish himself as ‘the man’.

Then as the 70’s moved into to the 80’s and as the show puts it “long hair gave way to big hair” marijuana was no longer the drug of choice for the fashion conscious and the old Bolivian marching powder came back into vogue.

Levin shifted into this higher gear effortlessly and by seeking out money motivated and attractive slicksters like himself he was able to build and run his rapidly growing Chang Dynasty and still be a dentist.

His life soon became a cliché of 80’s glamour. Full of pastel coloured suits, fast cars and busty ten foot blondes you could shake a Duran Duran at. Of course as you know from the mere existence of this doc, it all went very wrong very quickly.

King of Coke is a pretty standard old school documentary. Lots of interviews with the people involved with just a wee bit of dramatic reconstruction to help highlight certain situations.

It is also an engrossing subject, nearly 30 years on, the now middle aged Levin, talks about his success and downfall with a casual, almost aristocratic air. He clearly loves what he did and is unable to hide the pride he has in almost getting away with it.

It is this appealing arrogance on display that no doubt enabled him to make so much money without intimidation or violence in business that is drenched in blood and guts. It is also very much part of the hubris that meant he was always going to get caught.

The Fall

13 May at 9pm BBC2

I had hoped this would going to be a dramatisation of Albert Camus’s philosophical novel ‘The Fall’ when I first got the go ahead and review it.

It isn’t, and my disappointment only sharpened when I saw it was in fact going to be another detective show about another arsing serial killer. Then I saw Gillian Anderson was in it and I breathed a sigh of relief, maybe this was not going to be that painful after all.

I am a big fan of Anderson and not because of her iconic turn as Agent Scully in the X-Files, sure I liked the show (the first few series anyway) but she never particularly blew me away and I was not caught up in the whole Gillian Anderson as a sex symbol thing either (not that she wouldn’t get it but she didn’t get my teenaged blood up like a Erika Eleniak or a Nora Batty).

No, the reason I am a big fan is that once she was shorn of her break through role she went on to do some interesting projects and proved herself to be a very charismatic and effective actor. More than capable of carrying a piece as a lead or adding a touch of class to a character part.

This can only be a good omen for ‘The Fall’ but from the opening episode it’s quite hard to properly judge. I found it interesting that it was set in Belfast, Northern Ireland is not the most common of TV locations and I also liked playing spot the Hollyoaks actor ( I definitely saw two) but not a huge amount happens.

The story moves around handsome young psycho Paul Spector (crass? Yes, I think so) as he tries to balances his night time hobbies of lurking outside windows, sniffing knickers and ‘moidering’ attractive young professionals, with his career as some kind of guidance/bereavement/marriage councillor.

When he’s not doing these things he likes to nothing more than ponce around naked in shadows, allowing shafts of moonlight to perv tastefully over a bit of muscle, sinew or half buttock.

The local police force are finding him very difficult to track down basically because they refuse to see any connections between the deaths. But they still draft in Detective Stella Gibson to help track down the culprit even though don’t think there is ‘one’.

As I said at the beginning serial killers are the go-to villains in modern detective shows and have been pretty much since Anthony Hopkins hammed it up as Hannibal Lector in ‘Silence of the Lambs’ many years ago.

While I like a serial killer as much as the next person; like many people I have more than one book on my shelves discussing the various individuals and psychoses that fuel their blood soaked carnality. However, this familiarity does mean that we have a good idea where the show will go: more profiling and forensics than traditional detective work as they have no real motive to investigate other than the perp likes to fuck and kill!

The Fall though might prove to be a bit more substantial, it’s got a slow drip, drip vibe to it, taking time to round out all the characters. The writing is smart and all about suggestion and subtlety not pointing and shouting and I have high hopes for part two.

The Suspicions of Mr Whicher

12 May at 8pm on ITV

I was looking forward to this. I love a bit of Victorian sleuthery, the fog, the gas-light and mangled faces of the supporting casts have always evoked great comfort and pleasure in me.

I am also a big fan (who isn’t?) of Mr Paddy Considine, he has a rare charisma that I find hard to pin down and is extraordinarily watchable so the combination of the period, the actor and ‘moider’, should have made for an excellent nights viewing.

Unfortunately it did not. Following on from ‘The Suspicions of Mr Whicher: The Murder at Road Hill House’ from 2011, we meet up with our titular hero as he looks out for one Susan Spencer; who he spies on a desperate mission to prise information about a missing child from the denizens of the seedier, grimier parts of town.

After emancipating her purse from a young oik, Whicher offers his services as an ex copper to help her track down her missing charge.These services seem to consist of wandering around, mumbling questions to an assortment of undesirables and getting useful and immediate answers. They just tell him everything at the slightest prompt, it’s quite bizarre.

I have been watching the classic ITV Sherlock Holmes of Jeremy Brett of late, (I say of late but I never really stop watching it, it’s been on for about ten years now) and I guess ITV are in some manner trying to recreate that show in the ‘Suspicions of Mr Whicher.’ If they are to do so they really need to up the ante on the writing.

The detective’s ability to evoke honest answers from everyone around him is a microcosm of the script as a whole; everyone seems to spout exactly what is on their minds without any subtlety or sub plot. None more so in the utterly wasted Olivia Coleman as Miss Spencer. She is hamstrung by the weakness of the writing, taking a layered and cultured actress and turning her (and the rest of the cast) into little more than exposition machines. Which is just such a shame, as one of the greatest pleasures of period drama is often the effortless use of elegant language.

Despite this, the atmosphere and Paddy C manage to make this ‘on the nose’, unsophisticated stuff pretty watchable at first, but at the hour mark I found myself focusing on the frivolities, like the similarity of one of the main characters to Sir Digby Chicken Caesar, instead of what was actually occurring.

By the time we got to the reveal of the main villain and the reason for their schemes my head was thick with lethargy and didn’t know what was happening and nor did I care.

However, I like to think there is potential in this and if ITV do go onto make many more, it could be thrilling. If they trust the audience to understand and enjoy a less obtuse script that is.

All the winners from last night’s TV Baftas:

Leading Actor: Ben Whishaw – Richard II (The Hollow Crown)

Leading Actress: Sheridan Smith – Mrs Biggs

Supporting Actor: Simon Russell Beale – Henry IV Part 2 (The Hollow Crown)

Supporting Actress: Olivia Colman – Accused (Mo’s Story)

Entertainment Programme: Graham Norton for The Graham Norton Show

Entertainment Performance: Alan Carr – Alan Carr: Chatty Man

Female Performance in a Comedy Programme: Olivia Colman for Twenty Twelve

Male Performance in a Comedy Programme: Steve Coogan for Welcome To The Places Of My Life

Single Drama: Murder

Mini-Series: Room At The Top

Drama Series: Last Tango In Halifax

Soap and Continuing Drama: EastEnders

International: Girls

Factual Series: Our War

Specialist Factual: All In The Best Possible Taste with Grayson Perry

Single Documentary: 7/7: One Day In London

Features: The Great British Bake Off

Reality and Constructed Factual: Made In Chelsea

Current Affairs: The Shame Of The Catholic Church (This World)

News Coverage: Hillsborough – The Truth At Last (Granada Reports)

Sport and Live Event: The London 2012 Paralympic Games

Comedy Programme: The Revolution Will Be Televised

Situation Comedy: Twenty Twelve

Radio Times Audience Award (voted for by members of the public): Game of Thrones

Special award: Clare Balding

To the delight of about twenty recession proof households in SW10, Made in Chelsea can now be prefixed with “award-winning.” Although that award is “Best Reality and Constructed Reality TV show.”

Much like winning a “Beauty Contest” in Monopoly, there was a lot more luck than skill involved. Nonetheless, like a student with a stolen traffic cone it will still be brandished as though it actually means something.

Francis Boulle, well known ginger and bench enthusiast later asked: ‘Who would have thought you’d win a Bafta for just being posh?’ A question which successfully echoed the whispers of the entire attending audience.

Past winners have included I’m a Celebrity and The Only Way Is Essex, and stars from those shows have since gone on to established careers as…

There were some suggestions that the cast were a little bewildered by the whole thing, but regular viewers of E4 have assured OnTheBox that this is in fact a quite normal look for Spencer, Binky et al.