Stranger things

Usually, the return of Killing Eve would be pretty much guaranteed to provide the most unconventional, rule-busting TV programme of the week — where genres are mixed so thoroughly as to create a whole new one. This week, though, there were two new series that were even harder to classify.

One was ITV’s Wild Bill: a show so bonkers that the fact it stars Rob Lowe as the recently appointed chief constable of East Lincolnshire mightn’t be the weirdest thing about it. When the resolutely American Bill Hixon (Lowe) first arrived in Boston, Lincs, it looked as if we’d be in for a standard fish-out-of-water comedy, with the traditional differences between Brits and Yanks played for knockabout laughs. And for much of the opening episode we were. Bill tried his unavailing best to do irony. He failed to understand the words ‘marmite’ and ‘marmalade’. He gave a gung-ho address to a bunch of scruffy British coppers who seemed nearly as dumbfounded by Lowe’s presence as we were.