If Dickens were alive today, he'd be head writer on Corrie or Eastenders. So great is his knack for creating drama and suspense, both on the seedy streets of Victorian London and in the grand country houses of the upper classes, that it seems obvious he'd be happily occupied in creating "I'm yoor Muvva!!" type storylines for the soaps. And because he's the king of the chapter cliffhanger, his stories lend themselves perfectly to serial adaptation, which is partly what made the BBC's Bleak House such a gripping, suspenseful watch.

Andrew Davies has to take some of the credit as well. This man is an adaptation supremo, and Bleak House is, for me at least, easily his personal best. This was a show full of swerving story lines, misery, betrayal, romance, disease and - most important of all - money. There wasn't one dud in a long list of excellent performances, and somehow even Johnny Vegas sponaneously combusting seemed plausible (almost).

Shot in glorious high definition, with an atmosphere as dark and bleak as you'd expect from a show called Bleak House, this was easily one of the top highlights of the televisual year. [Katie]

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