ITV confirms return of The Larkins for series 2 after reboot branded a ‘Brexit Television abomination’

The Larkins will return for a second series this autumn, following a bumpy start with season one.

The ITV family drama is the latest adaptation of H E Bates’ 1958 novel The Darling Buds of May.

It stars Bradley Walsh and Joanna Scanlan as a married couple living in the Kent countryside with their children in the 1950s.

The 2021 series was met with negative reviews, with The Independent’s Sean O’Grady calling it a “Brexit Television abomination”.

“It is the kind of production that the new secretary of state for culture, Nadine ‘Mad Nad’ Dorries would greatly approve of, mainly because it is precisely the kind of opioid atavistic tosh she churns out in her novels,” he wrote.

“It’s a sort of Brexit Television, set in a post-war green and pleasant England that never was and never will be, but for which so many feel an overwhelming nostalgia (and so much so that they’re prepared to vote in their millions for a better yesterday).”

However, on Tuesday (2 August), ITV released their autumn slate and announced that The Larkins would be returning for a second series this autumn.

Joelle Rae will join the cast after replacing Sabrina Bartlett as eldest Larkin daughter Mariette.