HDTV Heads-Up: July 7-13

TV3 will replace one Australian HD drama series with another when The Slap takes over from Bikie Wars on July 11.

“After luxuriating in the artfully crafted Cloudstreet earlier this year, it was hard to imagine how high-end Australian TV drama could get any better,” said The Age. “Then The Slap arrived …

“Based on the best-selling novel by Christos Tsiolkas, The Slap is simply great adult drama, as disturbing in its exploration of deep-set suburban prejudices as it is entrancing.”

The Guardian thought it “a very watchable drama, a sort of Australian Bouquet of Barbed Wire, about the fallout of one guest giving another guest’s extremely annoying child a hearty smack at a barbecue.

“Each episode followed the impact on a different character and this being grownup TV, of course, it logically followed that everyone was either secretly shagging someone they shouldn’t have been or were extremely messed up and unhappy.”

The eight-part series won five Australian Film Institute Awards, including best mini-series, was nominated for a Best International Bafta, and stars Melissa George, Jonathan LaPaglia, Sophie Okonedo and Alex Dimitriades.

Taking over Monday’s HD crime drama hour on TV One from July 9 is Unforgettable (Missing, which has a two-hour premiere on July 2, shifts to 9.30).

It’s another police procedural with a gimmick, this time a New York City cop’s knack for being able to visually remember everything (the rare medical condition’s called hyperthymesia and turns out to be as much a curse as a gift).

Unforgettable stars Without a Trace’s Poppy Montgomery and earned reviews ranging from “lots of good, crime-solving fun” (New York Post) to another “tedious procedural from CBS’ crime drama factory” (The Hollywood Reporter).

Other HD highlights for the week starting July 7 include:

❑ Re-runs of the The Simpsons Movie on Sunday (TV3, 7.30) and Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen on Monday (TV3, 8.30)

❑ Season finales of The Big Bang Theory on Wednesday (TV2, 7.30/8.00) and Glee on Friday (TV3, 7.30)

❑ Guest turns by Seinfeld’s Jason Alexander on Two and a Half Men and Lindsay Lohan on Glee

❑ Another chance to see the Billy T James biopic, Billy, on Sunday (TV One, 8.30) and An Idiot Abroad on Friday (TV3, 11.20)

❑ Another idiot goes abroad on Tuesday in Postcard From Afghanistan With Mike King (TV One, 8.30).