NOW THAT YOU’VE finished your ‘best of’ list for 2016, it’s time to set your sights on 2017 – what films, books and TV shows are you likely to be watching this year?
We’ve had a look at what’s coming up over the next 12 months and, well, it’s set to be an exciting 12 months indeed.
Here’s what to watch out for.
Stranger Things
We can’t wait for this season of Stranger Things, after getting thoroughly obsessed with the first. There’s no official date for release yet, but we can only hope we don’t have to wait too long.
Striking Out
Amy Huberman stars as Tara Rafferty, a Dublin-based solicitor who finds out on her hen night that her fiancé has been cheating on her. She dumps him, leaves her job, and starts life afresh. Airing on RTÉ One from tonight at 9.35pm.
Iron Fist
More Marvel comes to Netflix, with the fourth in a series that included Jessica Jones and Luke Cage. Iron Fist is Danny Rand, a Buddhist monk and martial arts expert, who also happens to be a billionaire. Just your average Joe with superpowers, then.
I Love Dick
Chris Kraus’s novel made a bit of a stir when it was re-published last year, and now it’s in the hands of the great Jill Soloway (Transparent), who is turning it into a TV adaptation for Amazon. Kevin Bacon and Kathryn Hahn are to star.
A Series of Unfortunate Events
Another Netflix series, this one based on the hugely popular Lemony Snicket book series, and starring Neil Patrick Harris, who’s fairly unrecognisable. Due to land in January.
Twin Peaks
We’ve no air date yet for this, but how about it, eh? Twin Peaks returning AND with David Lynch himself at the helm. We have all our fingers and toes crossed that this retains the delightful dark weirdness of the first season.
Big Little Lies
We tend to get HBO series fairly quickly – if not simultaneously – in Ireland, so this is one to look out for. A female-led cast about three women whose lives intersect due to a murder. Based on a novel of the same name.
The Handmaid’s Tale
The Margaret Atwood novel The Handmaid’s Tale is an eerily familiar story about a dystopian future – and it’s an essential read. It was previously made into a film, but now it’s set to be a TV series starring Mad Men’s Elisabeth Moss. Here’s hoping it arrives in Ireland.
Loving
Our own Ruth Negga has everyone talking thanks to her portryal of Mildred Loving, who along with her husband Richard helped change laws in America for people of colour. Due out in January, it’s an emotional watch.
La La Land
We’ve seen this forthcoming musical starring Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone, about a young couple who meet in Hollywood while pursuing their careers in jazz and acting respectively. It’s set to be quite the new year treat, due out on 13 January.
Handsome Devil
Irish director John Butler’s latest film, starring Moe Dunford and Andrew Scott, is about a young boy at a boarding school in Dublin. We’ve no trailer yet, but the buzz around the film is significant.
Fifty Shades Darker
Let’s be honest, even if you say you have no interest in the EL James series, you might find yourself dragged to this.
Wonder
The delightful Jacob Tremblay of Room plays a young boy with a facial deformity in the film version of this book by RJ Palacio. Due in April.
A Wrinkle in Time
One of this reporter’s favourite books, the Madeleine L’Engle story about three children in search of their father – who’s lost in a wrinkle in time – gets the Hollywood treatment thanks to Ava Duvernay. It’s due out in the US in July, so should land here soon after.
Brain on Fire
Chloe Grace Moretz stars in this Irish-Canadian-American co-production based on the autobiography of the same name by writer Susannah Cahalan. It details her ‘month of madness’ after she contracted the rare disease Anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis.
The Ministry of Utmost Happiness by Arundhati Roy
It’s been nearly 20 years since Roy’s gorgeous The God of Small Things (which won the Booker prize) was published. Now we can expect a new work from Roy, which her literary agent naturally says is well worth the wait.
Love in Row 27 by Eithne Shortall
Arts journalist Eithne Shortall promises that her debut novel – about a check-in attendant who plays cupid to unsuspecting fliers – will be like a comforting blanket for her readers. Due out in June, we’re looking forward to seeing what Shortall’s got in store for us.
Reservoir 13 by Jon McGregor
A teenage girl goes missing in an English village – and the event reverberates in the area for years after. McGregor’s latest has been described by Eimear McBride as “one of the most beautiful, affecting novels I’ve read in years”. High praise indeed.
To Be A Machine: Adventures among Cyborgs, Utopians, Hackers and the Futurists Solving the Modest Problem of Death by Mark O’Connell
O’Connell is a fantastic, erudite writer (and one of the funniest people on Twitter). With this, he looks at how people are trying to harness technology to solve the problem of ageing. No doubt the concept of ‘transhumanism‘ will be explored in his typically thoughtful and insightful way.
The Good People by Hannah Kent
Hannah Kent’s debut, Burial Rites, was a bestseller – now comes the follow-up, due out in February. It’s about a grandmother who tries to care for her grandson, who others believe is a changeling. She enlists the help of a local healer, a move which displeases the local priest.
What are you looking forward to watching and reading in 2017? Tell us in the comments.
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