Sadly, the current series of fantasy drama Merlin is going to be the show’s last. After five series, the BBC’s youthful retelling of the Arthurian legend will wrap things up with what the producers call a “natural and dramatic” ending in a two-part Christmas special finale.

Creators Johnny Capps and Julian Murphy insist that the plan was always for Merlin’s story to wrap up in five series, but multiple factors – including the drama's ratings success and the fact that we’re four and a half series into it and Arthur still doesn’t know about the stupid magic – made it appear as though there was certainly more life to be had in the franchise. (At one point there were talks about a possible Series 6, as well.) Series 5 of Merlin doesn’t even air here in America until January on Syfy (preview); I hope that the Christmas finale will be tacked on to the end of the US broadcast so we’ll at least get to see everything up to the end in one go.

Series 2 of The Hour officially kicks off on BBC America starting November 28 (it’s already airing in the UK, but we’ll only be a couple of weeks behind, woohoo!).  However, there’s no reason to wait that long if you’re really dying to see where the story of Hector, Bel and Freddie goes in the new season. (Or just really like Ben Whishaw in suits. I won’t judge.)

BBC America has made the full first episode of Series 2 available online prior to its official broadcast start date, so you can settle down this weekend and dig right in.

Downton Abbey star Michelle Dockery will be stepping off the Crawley estate and into the world of international espionage this December in the new mini-series Restless, which is set to screen on the Sundance Channel here in the States in just a couple weeks.

Dockery plays Ruth, a young woman who discovers that her mother Ruth was once a spy for the British Secret Service in World War II and has been living a double life ever since.  The two-part series also stars some other notable British talent, including Charlotte Rampling, Hayley Atwell, Rufus Sewell and Michael Gambon. It’s based on a novel by William Boyd who, incidentally, will be penning the next James Bond novel.

The trailer looks quite interesting – and the material actually seems rich enough to support the level of talent involved.

The Hour, the series that many called Britain’s answer to Mad Men last year, is back for a second series this month. If you’ve never seen The Hour, well, it’s sort of what would happen if you crossed Mad Men with HBO’s The Newsroom and also you were given the extra bonus present of Ben Whishaw in snazzy 1950s suits as the icing on top. (Yes, newly swoony geek girls everywhere, this is your new Q from the latest Bond film, Skyfall. He’s also quite a good actor. Enjoy.)

Series 1 ran here in America in the summer of 2011 and was one of my surprise favorite dramas last year –extremely well-acted, very suspenseful, and the sort of intelligent television that respects it viewers enough to assume that they’re going to keep up with it.

The news drama returns to BBC Two tomorrow night in the UK, but we won’t have to wait very long to see Series 2 for ourselves here in the States, as The Hour will premiere as part of BBC America’s Dramaville block on November 28, so we’ve only got a couple of weeks to wait! Huzzah!

Click through for all the latest on the return of this fabulous – two trailers, some cast interviews, and a quick way to catch yourself up on Series 1 in 90 seconds.

BBC America has released their first preview for upcoming period thriller Ripper Street starring Matthew Macfadyen, Jerome Flynn and Adam Rothberg. Set in the Whitechapel neighborhood in the immediate aftermath of the Jack the Ripper murders, Ripper Street  will focus on the infamous H Division of the London police department and their attempts to keep the peace in the East End following these grisly crimes.

The first (supertiny) teaser for this highly anticipated series aired following the closing ceremonies of the London Olympics, but this is the first clip in which we can actually see some real footage from the show. Well done, BBC America, for starting the promotional wheels for this series turning earlier rather than later – and not just because the BBC’s tendency to drop trailers two weeks before series premieres is often occasionally frustrating.

Anyway, this clip is well worth a look – Macfadyen is looking predictably dishy in period dress and his performance seems predictably solid, even in these brief snippets. What’s most interesting here, though, is the show’s surprisingly dark and grisly tone. This shouldn’t be a total surprise, given that the series is set right after the Ripper murders, but sense of atmosphere, of place and moment in history, is palpable.  I’m intrigued! Hopefully, this won’t doesn’t turn out to be some sort of boring procedural cop drama that happens to feature detectives in period dress, because I quite like the feel of this thing so far. Take a look for yourselves below. 

CBS announced yesterday that it’s giving a full-season order to its freshman drama series Elementary. This news isn’t a huge surprise - the modern-day Sherlock Holmes adaptation has been performing admirably for the network on Thursday nights. It’s the second most popular new series of the season and averages somewhere in the 11-14 million viewers per episode range, even if their demos do skew rather on the older side. (This is CBS though, so I’m sure that fact wasn’t terribly unexpected, either.)

For many Sherlock Holmes enthusiasts, this is probably very welcome news – and I agree that more Holmes in any incarnation is almost always excellent. While Elementary did not turn out to be quite the trainwreck I had originally envisioned and I mostly enjoyed the pilot, personally, I’ve found its subsequent episodes to be somewhat mediocre.  Since it’s now confirmed that we’ll be seeing a lot more of Jonny Lee Miller and Lucy Liu for the rest of the year – American seasons run for 22 episodes after all – there’s plenty of time for the show to work out its kinks. Here are a few suggestions.

E4 has confirmed which cast members will return for the final series of its groundbreaking teen drama Skins. The show will bow out with three two-part specials, each focused on a different character and their journey into adulthood.

The finale specials will primarily feature Kaya Scodelario’s Effy, Jack O’Connell’s Cook and Hannah Murray’s Cassie, though it’s looking likely that several of the other regular Skins cast members will make appearances in each of these episodes. For example, Lily Loveless and Kat Prescott are set to appear as fan favorites Naomi and Emily, though none of the specials will technically be centered on their characters.

The episodes – titled Skins Pure, Skins Rise and Skins Fire - will be written by series creators Brian Elsley and Jamie Brittain, with some help from Jess Brittain. Series 7 is described by producers as being “more adult” and “more uncompromising” than previous installments, since the teens are now young adults facing real-world problems. Well, well, well, huh? Click through some for some plot details about each of these new episodes and my thoughts on all this madness. (Spoiler: It’s a mixed bag.)

My relationship with upcoming CBS Sherlock Holmes adaptation Elementary is already rather fraught and complicated, and the series hasn’t even premiered yet. Since way back when this was announced as a pilot – well before it was even greenlit to series – I have not been entirely thrilled about the prospect of another modern-day Holmes TV show, and transplanted to New York no less!  (I know that I was not alone in this initial reaction either, so I don’t feel too badly about it.)

My opinions toward Elementary, however, have softened considerably since seeing the pilot episode at Comic Con this summer. While it’s certainly got nothing on BBC’s masterful Sherlock series, the CBS adaptation does have its moments and star Jonny Lee Miller is interesting enough in the role of Holmes to at least merit a couple of episodes’ worth of our attention. It will certainly be interesting to read all the initial reactions to this series once it premieres on September 27 (that';s day after tomorrow, if you're counting).

Unfortunately the promotional material surrounding the series’ debut seems determined to play up the most cliché, cringeworthy and even, yes, elementary elements prior to its launch. When everyone who follows any sort of entertainment television at all is automatically going to compare this show to the BBC’s highly stylized and super intelligent Sherlock series, the decision to release an initial series of promos and clips that appear designed to showcase the most banal and expected moments from the American version seems ill-advised. And that’s before we get to this, the latest set of promotional posters that have been released. Which are…not good. Like, really, really not good.

There is literally no way to prepare you for how bad this is, so click through and just look at them for yourselves.

The first trailer for BBC Two’s sumptuous-looking costume drama Parade’s End starring Sherlock’s Benedict Cumberbatch and The Town’s Rebecca Hall has been released. Finally. The whole idea of Cumberbatch + period drama + romantic angst is basically my personal kryptonite, so I’ve pretty much been refreshing my Google feeds daily for any information about this upcoming series. And in my obviously quite biased opinion, this looks fantastic. Lush and romantic and full of class issues, all the sorts of things that those of us who love costume drama tend to crave.

The five-part miniseries is written by no less than Sir Tom Stoppard (Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, Arcadia) and is based on a series of four novels by Ford Madox Ford. Parade’s End will follow the story of English aristocrat Christopher Tietjens (Cumberbatch) and his wife Sylvia (Hall) from the last years of the Edwardian era through the end of the First World War.

Click through, take a look for yourself, and leave your thoughts in the comments.

The BBC used the closing ceremonies of the London Olympics last night to kick off their promotional campaign for upcoming period/crime drama Ripper Street, with what I assume must be one of the shortest teaser trailers in existence.

“As the sun sets on the Olympics, darkness rises,” intones an ominous sounding voiceover, as three men chase (presumably) a criminal through a shadowy alley. That’s literally it as far as new footage goes, but since Ripper Street is pretty high on my list of 2012 programs I’m excited about, I don’t mind so much. It’s all terribly atmospheric.

Created by Mistresses’ writer Richard Warlow and starring MI-5’s Matthew Macfadyen, Game of Thrones’ Jerome Flynn, The Twilight Saga’s Myanna Buring and Luther’s David Dawson, this eight-part period drama will attempt to make the oft-depicted Jack the Ripper murders interesting again by focusing on the aftermath of the famous crimes instead of identity of the murderer. Ripper Street will dramatize the life of London’s H Division, the police precinct charged with keeping order in the Whitechapel neighborhood in the days following the Ripper killings.

Click through and take a look. There’s certainly not enough (any?) actual footage to make any sort of judgment about the series, but if this sort of thing is your cup of tea, it’s enough to get you excited for more.