Dramatic TV Divorces Have Their Moment With New HBO and BBC Series

Divorce is having a moment on British television, with the near-simultaneous arrival of two new drama series exploring the subject, according to The Guardian. HBO's legal thriller 'War' launched on Sky Atlantic on Friday night, while the BBC has introduced 'The Split Up,' a Manchester-based spin-off of Abi Morgan's earlier series 'The Split.'

'War' has been described as chronicling what it calls the highest-profile divorce case in UK history, presented across an eight-part run. 'The Split Up' follows a British Asian family law firm that specializes in handling elite divorce cases.

A Long-Running Fascination

The pairing of the two shows in the same weekend schedule highlights a broader pattern in television of dramatizing the legal and emotional fallout of marriages ending, a theme that has recurred across multiple series over the years.

The renewed focus on divorce storylines arrives alongside real-world data cited in the report: according to the UK's Office for National Statistics, there were 105,002 divorces recorded in England and Wales last year.

With two high-profile series now exploring the subject from different angles — one framed as a prestige legal thriller and the other centered on a specialist family law firm — television's appetite for the drama surrounding divorce shows little sign of fading.