The streets of Manchester have been transformed by a huge film set this week, with street signs and posters subtly transforming the city centre into London.
The area surrounding Spring Gardens is at the heart of the filming, with scenes being shot in the dead of night this week.
Film crews are working on a new Channel 4 thriller from the creators behind hit shows like Top Boy, Mobland, and The Day Of The Jackal.
Army of Shadows will star major names like Kit Harrington, Paddy Considine, and Olivia Colman, along with Susan Sarandon, America Ferrera, and Alex Hassell.
While filming is mostly taking place after dark, traces of the film sets have been left in Manchester today – including red phone boxes, Greater London Police signs, and posters of a fictitious resistance movement.
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And there are several road closures in place, including Chancery Place, Chancery Lane, Brown Street, Booth Street, Kennedy Street, and parts of Tib Lane and Clarence Street.
In a note shared to local residents and businesses, StudioCanal said the scenes being filmed in Manchester involve ‘a group of people running through the streets putting up posters on properties’.
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Fake posters in ManchesterThe film set includes Greater London Police signsFake posters in ManchesterProp bikes in Manchester as a huge film set appears
According to Channel 4, the new drama is inspired by Jean-Pierre Melville’s 1969 film and Joseph Kessel’s seminal book of the same name, which dramatised the emergence of the French Resistance to the Nazi Occupation of France during World War 2.
Army of Shadows is a ‘bold new story’ from Ronan Bennett of how resistance takes shape in an occupied Great Britain.
The show summary says: “Britain looks almost normal, but the flags are different, the news is careful, and nobody says certain things out loud anymore. But everyone can feel it. Somewhere beneath the surface of ordinary life something has gone terribly, quietly wrong.
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“Out of the shadows emerges a former soldier known only as Berry, who starts building a secret resistance network. He knows one thing above all else: don’t act before you’re ready.
“An unlikely group starts to coalesce around him – people who’ve decided they can’t look away any longer: a soldier, a student, a radiographer, a journalist. Ordinary people, with ordinary lives, making an extraordinary and irreversible choice.
“Against them: a state with unlimited reach, a ruthless minister who’ll do whatever it takes to maintain “order”, and an American intelligence operative called Jessie, who is very, very good at her job.”
Mancs wanted to take part in a new series of the ‘hardest quiz show on TV’
Emily Sergeant
Call yourself a clever clogs? The BBC is currently looking for contestants to take part in what is widely considered the hardest quiz show on TV.
That’s right – Only Connect is back for another series on BBC Two.
Presented by Victoria Coren Mitchell and first broadcast all the way back in 2008, Only Connect takes TV quizzing to the next level, as it sees two teams compete against each other by finding connections between seemingly unrelated clues.
In this quiz show – which viewers have dubbed one of the most challenging there is – knowledge only takes you so far, as the ability to think laterally is also deemed ‘vitally important’.
A casting call for the upcoming 2027 series has been shared on the BBC website, with people from Greater Manchester encouraged to apply.
Mancs wanted to take part in a new series of the ‘hardest quiz show on TV’ / Credit: BBC
The casting call reads: “The popular BBC Two quiz show presented by Victoria Coren Mitchell returns for a new series in 2027.
“Only Connect is seeking teams of three players OR single applicants or teams of two looking for like-minded teammates to pool their combined wits to solve fiendish conundrums and vexing puzzles.
“This is the quiz series where, as in life itself, knowledge will only take you so far: patience and lateral thinking are also vital. It’s all about making connections between things which may appear, at first glance, not to be connected at all.”
Reckon you’ve got what it takes then? Applications are now open, and all applicants must be aged 18 or over and a resident in the UK or Channel Islands.
Channel 4 is looking for Mancs who think they can survive the apocalypse for a new TV series
Lydia Mastrolonardo
Have you always wanted to see how long you’d last in an apocalypse?
Well now’s your chance, as Apocalypse is potentially coming back to Channel 4 for a second series, with producers having put out a nationwide casting call for contestants willing to take part.
The casting call simply reads: “Do you think you have what it takes to survive the end of the world?”
Described as a dystopian series designed to test the creativity, resourcefulness, and resilience of our nation, Apocalypse sees players are pushed out of their comfort zones and put to the ultimate test.
In the series, ordinary people are tasked with surviving for 28 days in an abandoned city – used previously only for the military to practice urban warfare – with no food, running water, electricity or heat.
Produced by The Garden – which is part of ITV Studios – for Channel 4, the show’s creators are now calling on Mancs and people up and down the country with the ‘courage and ingenuity’ to compete, to get in touch and apply for the potential second series.
Does your mate always bang on after watching a post-apocalyptic film that they would’ve done things differently? Or is the news at the moment freaking you out and you want to give the end of the world a bit of a practice run? Either way, sign up, test that plan you’ve built in your head, and see if you’ve really got what it takes.
Applications are now open, and all you need to do is fill in a short application form and one of the production team will get back to you if they would like to proceed. Come on, let’s prove what Mancs are made of.
Daisy Jackson -
30th September 2026 
