The award-winning comedy-crime-drama Jonathan Creek is to return for a one-off episode next Easter, the BBC announced today.

Starring Alan Davies as the eponymous mystery-solver and with Sheridan Smith returning as his sidekick Joey Ross, the 90-minute special - entitled The Clue of the Savant's Thumb - has been written by David Renwick, who created the show and who wrote all its previous episodes. It is to be made by BBC In-House Comedy for BBC One, with filming starting later this month.

In the story, Creek and Ross are drawn into a complex case involving a secret society, seemingly supernatural events at a girls' boarding school, and the miraculous disappearance of a body in front of three witnesses.

Davies said:
Pete Thornton, the creative head of BBC In-House Comedy, added:
No director has been announced yet, but it will be produced by Rosemary McGowan, with Pete Thornton as the executive producer.

Jonathan Creek first aired in 1997 and there have been four series and two specials so far. In 1998, it won the BAFTA for Best Drama Series. Julia Sawalha, who played the Doctor's assistant and love interest Emma in Steven Moffat's Doctor Who spoof The Curse of Fatal Death for Comic Relief in 1999, was Creek's assistant Carla Borrego between 2001 and 2004, while guest stars have included Peter Davison, Colin Baker, Paul McGann, Maureen O'Brien, Mary Tamm, and Geoffrey Beevers.

A quartet of pictures from the penultimate episode of Merlin was released today by the BBC.

The title is yet to be confirmed by the BBC but it will be the first instalment of a two-parter believed to be called The Diamond Of The Day, which will end the show's final series.

It guest-stars Peter Guinness as Ari and is currently scheduled to air on BBC One at 7.55pm on Saturday 22nd December.


As previously reported, pictures from episode 11 will be released tomorrow. Images from the show's final episode were released last month.

UPDATE - 4.25pm: The final episode of Merlin will air on BBC One on Monday 24th December at 8.15pm, it was announced today.

The BBC today released pictures from the forthcoming TV adaptation of the children's novel Mr Stink.

Originally written by David Walliams, who along with Simon Nye has adapted the comedy for BBC One, it will air at 6.30pm on Sunday 23rd December. (It had been provisionally scheduled for Boxing Day.)

It stars Hugh Bonneville as the eponymous tramp, Sheridan Smith - companion Lucie Miller to the Eighth Doctor in the Big Finish audio dramas - as Mum, with Walliams playing the Prime Minister.


The one-hour production was filmed in October in both standard definition and in 3D - the first time the BBC has filmed a fictional programme in 3D. The free-to-air broadcast in 3D will be available to anyone who has access to a 3D TV set and to the BBC HD channel, regardless of which digital TV provider they use.

The BBC today released a set of ten images from episode 10 of the current - and now known to be final - series of Merlin.

The Kindness Of Strangers, written by Richard McBrien and directed by Declan O'Dwyer, guest-stars Sorcha Cusack as Finna, Barry Aird as Beroun, and Gary Lewis as Alator. It is currently scheduled to air at 7.55pm on Saturday 8th December.



Pictures from episode 11 - whose title is yet to be confirmed - will be released this coming Thursday.

Earlier this week, it was announced that this series of Merlin - its fifth - would be the last one.

UPDATE - MONDAY 3RD DECEMBER: Episode 11 will be called The Drawing Of The Dark.