TV Picks of the Week

PICK OF THE WEEK EpisodesFriday, BBC2, 9pm

BEST DRAMA

Mad Men

Tuesday, Sky Atlantic, 9pm

BEST MUSIC

Later Live... with Jools Holland Tuesday, BBC2, 10pm

Did you stick with the first series of this show-within-a-show starring Matt LeBlanc, Tamsin Greig and Stephen Mangan? No, neither did I, although apparently it got better. This is the second season and it begins with the “prem-eer”, as the Americans would have it, of Pucks! amid all the off-screen drama of Bev (Greig) having bonked the big US star. Sean (Mangan) reads out the first-night reviews, typical of which is: “I was totally prepared to hate Pucks! Well, the good news is I was prepared.” That’s pretty funny, as is “Pucks! sucks. LeBlanc shoots le blank”, so maybe Episodes doesn’t suck after all. Then the ratings come in: they’re great. “No 1 show of the night,” smirks LeBlanc. “This is gonna kill Schwimmer.” But can the husband-and-wife writing team continue on a business-only footing?

“What’s Mad Men like these days?” you ask post-the switch to Sky. “Please tell us it’s still great.” It is, and when you get the boxset you’re going to love the episode where Roger goes to a counter-culture party and tries LSD. For a couple of weeks there’s been a groundswell of female dissatisfaction with the men, including Don, but here Pete tries to stray.

You can’t get away from Tom Jones right now. Maybe last night you caught him in Sky’s King Of The Teds playing a teddy boy (he was a real one way back when in Pontypridd). That came a few hours after another edition of his big BBC ratings-buster The Voice, and here he is on Jools Holland’s show singing a couple of choice cuts from his new album Spirit In The Room.