The 14 brand new TV shows you’re about to get obsessed with

Whether you love thrilling TV dramas, guilty pleasure reality shows or romcoms so good they make your heart hurt, 2025 is gearing up to be a year of fantastic entertainment.

Daily Mirror columnist Jessica Boulton brings you a rundown of the best new TV and streaming shows you can look forward to in the next 12 months.

Each pick has been given an excitement/anticipation rating on the scale of one to five to help you separate the shows you’ll be watching the day they drop from the ones that can wait their turn on your watchlist.

So forget the likes of White Lotus and The Bear, because one of these gems is about to become your next favourite show…….

The Pitt, Sky/ NOWTV (This Thursday, Jan 9)

Noah Wyle (ER’s Dr John Carter) is heading back to ‘emergency room’ for a gritty new medical drama, set to resuscitate the genre from the recent shift towards Grey’s Anatomy-style sentimentality.

Wyle plays Dr. Michael Robinavitch, an overworked doctor at a busy Pittsburgh hospital, and each episode will play out in real time with the story centring on just one hour of his busy shift. Simply put, it’s ER meets 24. So fans of either will want to watch it, stat!

Excitement level: John Carter back in the ER? Oh, it’s got to be 5/5. In fact someone better check my blood pressure with all the excitement.

Zero Day, Netflix (Feb 20)

Netflix doesn’t do things by halves – and neither does Oscar-winner Robert De Niro.

So when the streamer asked him to make his TV debut by playing a President of The United States who saves the world? Well, it was an offer he couldn’t refuse.

Zero Day is a gritty political thriller with an all-star cast including Angela Bassett, Nashville and Friday Night Lights’ Connie Britton, her former FNL co-star Jesse Plemons and Mean Girls/Masters of Sex’s Lizzy Caplan. The story centres on De Niro as a former POTUS pulled out of retirement after a devastating and deadly global cyberattack. He soon finds himself back in the political ring, as he’s chosen to chair the ‘Zero Day Commission’ responsible for hunting down the terrorists responsible.

Excitement level: If The Pitt is ER meets 24, this is The West Wing meets 24 – with a dash of Designated Survivor. 5/5

A Knight Of The Seven Kingdoms, Sky/ NOW TV (Release TBC, but expected in summer)

Following the success of Matt Smith’s House of Dragons, this new HBO series will be the second prequel to Game Of Thrones, and is set 90 years before the events of the original show.

The story is based on George R.R Martin’s novella Tales of Duck and Egg and is set in a rare time of relative peace in the Westeros. It follows the adventures of Ser Duncan the Tall (played by a relative newcomer Peter Claffey) and a young Aegon V Targaryen, nicknamed Egg, played by Dexter Sol Ansell, Emmerdale’s Lucas Taylor. It’s a different tone from some of GoT’s darkest episodes but from the look of the latest teaser trailer it will still be a crowdpleaser.

Also, a fun fact: Dexter’s dad Jonathan Ansell was in G4, who came second on the first series of The X Factor. So Dexter won’t be the first in the family to face a dragon. His dad won over Sharon Osbourne.

Excitement level: 3/5. Mainly because of GoT’s lacklustre finale.

Bergerac, U and U&DRAMA (February, exact date TBC)

Any Brit aged 40 or above will no doubt have fond memories of John Nettles racing round Jersey, solving crimes, in his 1949 Triumph Roadster.

Because from 1981 to 1991, there was one BBC show many families would never miss on a Sunday night – Bergerac.

And now 34 years later, the Channel Island’s maverick detective is back – albeit with a brand new star, Being Human’s Damien Molony, taking on the role.

The series will open with Bergerac, still grieving for his recently departed wife, being called back to Jersey to investigate the death of one of its wealthiest residents.

Excitement level: 3/5 because we all love a nostalgia fest

Brian And Margaret, Channel 4, (Released later this year)

It was said to be the beginning of the end of Margaret Thatcher’s reign. In 1989, she sat down for a 45-minute interview with TV journalist Brian Walden (nicknamed ‘The ‘Inquisitor’). The car crash that followed was said to have set in motion a chain of events that ultimately led to her leaving Number 10 in 1991.

The new Channel 4 drama has been written by Sherwood’s James Graham, based on political editor Rob Burley’s book, Why is This Lying Bastard Lying to Me? With two-time Oscar nominee Steve Coogan as Brian and Succession star Harriet Walter as Thatcher, it’s set to be ratings winner.

Excitement level: 3/5

Miss Austen, BBC (Later this year)

It is a truth universally acknowledged that every TV commissioner in possession of a good fortune must be in want of…. a period drama. (Or something like that, anyway)

This year marks 250 years since the birth of Jane Austen and the BBC – still famed for 1996’s Pride and Prejudice mini-series – will be bringing us lots of documentaries and literary treats.

But top amongst them is this sumptuous four-part historic drama set in 1830, which centres on the mystery around why Jane’s sister Cassandra burned the author’s personal letters after her death. What secrets was she protecting?

While there’s sadly no Colin Firth in a wet white shirt, there is[ital] an impressive and female-led cast including Keeley Hawes, Game of Thrones’ Rose Leslie, Downton’s Phyllis Logan and Condor’s Max Irons.

Excitement level: I’m more excited than Elizabeth Bennet, when she first sees Pemberley. 5/5!

Celebrity Traitors, BBC (TBC)

It’s the show where you can’t trust a soul, your every word is scrutinised and you could be stabbed in the back by anyone at any given moment.

But in the famously tough world of showbiz, that all means one thing:

It’s probably one of the nicer places to work.

Yes, we’ve been hearing more and more about the toxic workplaces on some of our favourite TV shows and films in recent years, so is it any wonder so many celebs reckon they can survive Claudia Winkleman’s ultimate game of deception?

Stephen Fry, Paloma Faith and Bob Mortimer are among touted for the first nine-part celeb special, expected later this year.

Excitement level: A killer 5/5.

RETURNING WONDERS:

It’s not just brand new shows, we’ll all be talking about. This year will bring us the fifth and final season of Netflix’s Stranger Things, which will see Linda Hamilton, aka Terminator’s Sarah Connor join the cast.

Also coming up are Black Mirror, Season 7, (Netflix); White Lotus S3 (Sky/NowTV); and The Bear S4 (Disney Plus).

One of the most hotly-anticipated returns will be the second series of Netflix’s surprise smash hit rom com Nobody Wants This. The first series sparked a viral meme last Autumn thanks to the sizzling chemistry between Veronica Mars star Kristen Bell and The OC’s Adam Brody. Even Kristen’s own husband Dax Shepard admitted he was gagging to see the pair get together on screen.

When asked, at a recent TV convention, about his and his wife’s “chemistry”, Dax quipped that it was “Not as good as her and Brody.”

The podcaster added: “My friend … we watched that scene together, the kissing scene, which I’d argue is the very best kissing scene ever, ever put on film.”

“My best friend, Aaron, from childhood, he goes, ‘Does she ever kiss you like that?’ ,” said Dax. “[I said] ‘No, I didn’t even know she could kiss like that!’.”

BEST OF THE REST:

One of the most exciting new dramas will be Netflix’s American Primeval (released Jan 9), a period epic set in the tough days of the frontier and the old west and starring Friday Night Lights’ ruggedly-charming Taylor Kitsch (think Yellowstone’s spin-off 1889).

Meanwhile, sci-fi fans are in for a spine-tingling summer when Disney Plus releases its first TV spin-off from the world of space horror Alien. Exec Produced by Ridley Scott, Alien: Earth will be set two years before the original 1979 film and will see Justified’s Timothy Olyphant face a deadly threat to all human kind. Actually one suspects it has plenty for non-sci fi fans too – if you still have a soft spot for Raylan Givens.