Cold Feet to return for new eight-part series

Bafta-winning comedy Cold Feet will be making a return to TV after 12 years off air.

After months of speculation that the much loved show could be making a comeback, ITV have confirmed that a new eight-part series will begin filming in Manchester in January 2016.

James Nesbitt, Fay Ripley, John Thomson, Hermione Norris and Robert Bathurst will reunite with writer Mike Bullen to pick up the group's story as they approach 50.

Cold Feet began in 1997 and ran for five series following the lives of couples Adam and Rachel, Pete and Jenny, Karen and David.

More than 10 million people tuned in for the finale in 2003 which featured the funeral of character Rachel, played by Helen Baxendale.

Bullen said: "This feels like the right time to revisit these characters, as they tip-toe through the minefield of middle age.

"They're 50, but still feel 30, apart from on the morning after the night before, when they really feel their age.

"They've still got lots of life to look forward to, though they're not necessarily the years one looks forward to!"

ITV announced the return alongside two new commissions at the inaugural ITV gala.

Set in Goa in India, new series The Good Karma Hospital will follow a team of British and Indian medics at an over-worked and under-resourced cottage hospital.

Written by Dan Sefton, who has penned episodes of Mr Selfridge and Death In Paradise, the six-part series is described as "a feel-good drama full of warmth and characters we will love".

Casting has yet to be announced but filming will begin next year.

The second commission is HIM, a "domestic horror" drama about a 17-year-old, known only as Him, who hides a supernatural power inherited from his grandfather.

Caught between his divorced parents' new families, a taboo attraction to his stepsister threatens to see him lose control of his dangerous powers.

The "bold, surprising and emotional" three-part drama is written by Paula Milne, best known for writing The Politician's Husband, White Heat, Small Island and The Nightwatch.

ITV's Director of Dram Steve November said, "HIM tells the gripping story of a boy capable of psychic phenomena. It's extraordinary and unlike any drama we've commissioned before."

HIM will begin filming in London in January 2016.