Coming Up This Week: April 7th-13th

Return trips to Westeros, Middle-Earth and S.H.I.E.L.D. are on the agenda for the next seven days...
If it wasn't apparent already, April is well and truly shaping up to be the best month of entertainment so far in 2014, and the first full week of the month is packed with much-vaunted new releases to prove it. Whether it's an encounter with Elves, dragons, conspiring secret agents or ring-desiring cave-dwelling creatures that you're looking for, there's something to sate every viewer / player's appetites this time around.

Let's waste no further time explaining in non-specifics why this week will rock. As ever, there's no better place to find a definitive guide to the next seven days' biggest and most potent offerings than right here:

• NOW THAT'S WHAT I CALL MUSIC! 87- Another season, another compilation courtesy of NOW Records to remind us of the highlights and lowlights of the past few months in pop. To its credit, Now 87 is packed with memorable tunes from recent times including Pharrell Williams' Happy, Miley Cyrus' Wrecking Ball (don't lie to yourself, you enjoyed the melody itself really), Ellie Goulding's How Long Will I Love You, John Legend's All of Me, Bastille's Of The Night and American Authors' sensational Best Day Of My Life. In short, if you missed out on any of these late 2013/early 2014 greats when they débuted, this is the best opportunity you'll get to remedy that mistake. (Monday 7th)
• GAME OF THRONES: TWO SWORDS- Get ready to have Game of Thrones' infuriatingly infectious theme tune stuck in your head for the next ten weeks, as everyone's favourite US fantasy drama returns to the UK via Sky Atlantic. Two Swords is set to act as a recap of sorts of the devastating events of the Red Wedding and the realm-altering consequences the tragic event will have for Westeros' immediate future. New alliances will be formed, loyalties will be tested and after next week's second episode The Lion and the Rose, nothing will ever quite be the same again for Tyrion and the gang! (Monday 7th- Sky Atlantic)
• MARVEL'S AGENTS OF S.H.I.E.L.D.: TURN, TURN, TURN- In the past, fans could skip big-screen Marvel Cinematic Universe outings if they so desired without their ignorance having much of a detrimental effect on their continued viewing of Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. This time, however, it's absolutely essential that you catch Captain America: The Winter Soldier in cinemas before witnessing the eighteenth episode of Season One, Turn, Turn, Turn, lest you hope to find yourself confounded by the dramatically altered state of affairs for the Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement and Logistics Division that has emerged since last week's End of the Beginning. To put it bluntly, if the words "Hail Hydra" mean nothing to you as of yet, then you'll be missing out on a lot of what the show's coming instalments have to offer...(Tuesday 8th- ABC)
• LEGO THE HOBBIT- While April is a relatively quiet month for the video gaming industry on the whole, it does at least have one or two treats in store for gamers, with LEGO The Hobbit coming first and foremost on the list. This spiritual successor to TT Games' accomplished 2012 effort LEGO The Lord of the Rings will once again feature an open-world Middle Earth, adapting the events of Peter Jackson's hit films An Unexpected Journey and The Desolation of Smaug and adding several new team-based gameplay mechanics into the mixture to boot. Middle-Earth: Shadow of Mordor and The Hobbit: There & Back Again's launches may be a way off yet, but until then, this should be more than enough to appease the Tolkienites amongst you. (Friday 11th- PS4, PS3, PSVita, One, 360, WiiU, 3DS & PC)
• AND THERE'S MORE- As if one Tolkien-based product wasn't enough to keep us busy this week, we're also getting The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug on DVD and Blu-Ray tomorrow, April 7th. Add to that the disc débuts of Silk Series 3, My Mad Fat Diary Series 2, Moonfleet, The Office US Season 8 and Midsomer Murders- The Killings of Copenhagen and you've got a week which can't possibly fail to thrill!

Looking ahead to next week, expect to see The Amazing Spider-Man 2 wall-crawling its way exclusively into UK cinemas, plus a return from a much-needed ally in Marvel's Agents of SHIELD: Providence, a deadly shift in Westeros' status quo in Game of Thrones: The Lion and the Rose and an enlightening psychological analysis of Oliver Queen's superheroic duties in Arrow: The Man Under The Hood...