Lenora Crichlow

Strong lead performances (Hayley Atweel, Lenora Crichlow and Daniel Rigby) have made the most of the nightmartish, almost ludicrous set-ups in Charlie Brooker's latest blast of three dystopian futures. Rigby is in perhaps the best of them, as a comedian who voices a rude satirical cartoon bear that ends up standing in a by-election.

The second of Charlie Brooker's creepily believable trilogy of techno-future tales casts its chilly spell from the moment Lenora Crichlow (Being Human) opens her eyes as haunted, hunted Victoria.

Waking to the debris of what looks to have been a suicidal night before, Victoria can't remember anything about anything - why do TV screens keep playing white noise at her? And why does a strange cipher keep flashing into her mind?

As she steps outdoors, she finds herself in a world where looking at any kind of screen is the most dangerous thing you can do. And where onlookers would sooner point their phone at somebody who's running for their life than try to help...

A traumatised young woman (Lenora Crichlow) wakes up with a headache and bandaged wrists. Pills are spilt on the floor. Her TV's showing static. She can't remember who she is. When she goes outside, people film her on their phones from nearby houses. Then it gets worse. A man in a balaclava gets out of a Rolls-Royce and starts hunting her with a shotgun. Things gets darker and nastier from there as we try to work out what Hunger Games sort of hell she has woken up in. It's a horribly well realised nightmare world that delivers the blackest of satires.

Nothing is quite what it seems in this latest Charlie Brooker drama. At the very least, it's a bravura feat of sustained rug pulling. At various points, you'll feel like you're watching a shoddy 28 Days Later knock-off, a heavy-handed treatise on our increasing capacity to observe and be controlled, an experiment in perspective and audience sympathy or something else entirely. Ambitious, even audacious, then.

Lenora Crichlow is superb as terrified, traumatised Victoria, a girl who awakes in distress to find she can remember nothing of her life. When she leaves the house, her day gets worse. Anyone who isn't physically attacking her is cheerfully filming her plight on their smartphones. But then salvation arrives. Or does it? Saying too much more would spoil the fun. But suffice to say, this is a black mirror indeed.

The opening episode was relatively gentle, but make no mistake, Black Mirror is back on brutal, nasty form tonight. Being Human's Lenora Crichlow plays Victoria, who wakes up with a severe headache and no memory of who she is. When she staggers into the outside world, she meets an army of passive observers who film her on their phones while she's tracked by "hunters" in terrifying masks. Nothing is as it seems, but you've got to admire a TV show that seems so intent on putting you off looking at screens for good.

The second of this trilogy of edgy dystopian dramas, White Bear is a horror-thriller starring Lenora Crichlow (Being Human) on extraordinary form as a girl who wakes up unable to remember her own name. A mysterious beamed signal has turned most of the population into dumb, apathetic voyeurs, while the unaffected have become murderous "hunters". Unsettling, satirical stuff.

This comedy drama pilot has a lot going for it. Being Human's Lenora Crichlow in one of the main roles for one thing. And it's written by Catherine Johnson, who's best known for making the film Mamma Mia! such a massive hit. Single mums Ashley and Faye are the eponymous dappers (see above for this and other Bristolian sayings) who live - with their respective toddlers - in adjacent housing association flats and are always coming up with money-making scams. Or, as the fl ashy ex-boyfriend of Faye (Ty Glaser), puts it they're "like Del Boy and Rodders in thongs". It's nowhere near as filthy as Shameless, but there will inevitably be comparisons with Little Britain's Vicky Pollard. The comic clichés (such as the "odd couple neighbours" played by Gwen Taylor and Eddie Large) wouldn't be given house room in Little Britain, though. Its success will depend very much on whether you take to ballsy Faye and Ashley. Earlier, there's more bold new drama in Stanley Park.

Scripted by Catherine Johnson of Mamma Mia! fame, Dappers is a comedy pilot that follows the misadventures of two young mums (Ty Glaser and Lenora Crichlow) on the dole in Bristol. The plot revolves around the duo, AKA "Del and Rodders in thongs", setting up a dog-walking service after losing their cash-in-hand cleaning job. It has energy and vim and the set-up, with the duo living in housing association flats next to well-heeled neighbours in posh Clifton, is promising, but there aren't enough decent one-liners to carry the day.

Dappers is about two young mums on benefits in Bristol. In a well-meaning but cringeworthy and explicitly telegraphed BBC edict that it would be futile to parody, it aims to Show So-Called Broken Britain In A Good Light etc. We are invited to see the girls not as foul-mouthed ASBOs but as "Del Boy and Rodders in thongs" as they attempt to make ends meet, stay out of the clutches of the benefit fraud police and deal with the hilarious problems involved with living next to a Posh Couple.

Lenora Crichlow, very much the shiniest bulb on the BBC3 Christmas tree (see recent documentary about Nelson Mandela et al), stars. One of the girls' schemes is a dog-walking enterprise. Who knew that dog poo could be so funny?

Catherine Johnson is most famous for writing the hit musical and movie Mamma Mia! In this pilot, she delivers a cheery take on broken Britain with her tale of two best mates - "dappers" in Bristol-speak, apparently - Faye and Ashley, and their two toddler daughters.

They're not strictly single mums. Ashley's boyfriend Ryan is still on the scene, although he's more of a liability than a help.

Lenora Crichlow (Annie the ghost from Being Human) stars opposite Ty Glaser (who briefly played posh blonde Libby Charles in Emmerdale).

The laboured accents get in the way of the performances and the girls' attempts to earn cash come straight out of the Big Sitcom Book Of Cliches but there's a nice energy about these friends on benefits (not to be confused with Friends With Benefits).

"They're Del Boy and Rodders in thongs," is how Ryan describes them - and you might think that's recommendation enough. The kids are sweet, too.