Lydia Jenkin: My picks for 2013, so far

Superman movie Man of Steel could be this year's Dark Knight. Photo / Supplied

Happy New Year! Sorry it's a little late. Obviously we're back to work now, so to help with the post-holiday blues, I've decided to round up a selection of good stuff that should be coming our way in 2013 - just a few things that have shone through the avalanche of offerings.

In the movie category, there will be the usual sequels (Kick Ass 2, and Sin City 2 may have potential), and remakes - Carrie and Robocop both look to be getting worthy treatments, while Top Gun in 3D sounds like an awesome idea and the new Superman could be this year's Dark Knight. But there seems to be a recurring theme of apocalyptic events on Earth too, with some likely future classics in the form of Oblivion (with Tom Cruise) and After Earth (with Will Smith). Not so sure about Brad Pitt's zombie flick World War Z, but slacker comedy This Is the End (with Seth Rogen, Jonah Hill, James Franco and many more) looks mysteriously hilarious.

There's also a large clutch of actors telling the stories of famous men: Daniel Day Lewis as Abraham Lincoln, Anthony Hopkins as Alfred Hitchcock, Michael Douglas as Liberace (the press pics for that one are certainly worth a look), Bill Murray as F.D. Roosevelt, and Ashton Kutcher as Steve Jobs are all on the list.

Two traditional tales get a fantastical action-packed twist too, with Jack the Giant Slayer seeming rather more epic than I remember, and The Great and Powerful Oz telling the wizard's wondrous back story, with a cast including James Franco, Rachel Weisz, and Michelle Williams.

Of the trailers I've seen so far there are a handful that stand out - Baz Luhrmann's vision of the roaring 20s in The Great Gatsby looks to be as multi-hued and dazzling as one could hope. And I'm a sucker for films about magic or con artists, so the impressive stunts they pull in Now You See Me with Jesse Eisenberg, has already got me hooked.

In the box of new TV shows lies a few interesting options too. Anyone who's a fan of Downton Abbey should like Mr Selfridge, a new British drama about the wildly ambitious, larger-than-life American who changed the world of shopping forever.

If you like your TV dark and grisly, then The Following, starring Kevin Bacon and James Purefoy could pull you in. On the local front, all the Outrageous Fortune stars are spreading out into new series, with Tammy Davis joining Oliver Driver in promising-looking Sunny Skies, while Siobhan Marshall and Antonia Prebble star in mystery/comedy The Blue Rose, and Robyn Malcolm has become a divorcee real estate agent in Agent Anna. Malcolm also appears in Jane Campion's chilling six-part miniseries Top of the Lake, which will be one to set the MySky for.

Album releases are always a bit more of a gamble, but the upcoming record from Thom Yorke, who's been collaborating with Nigel Godrich and Flea as Atoms of Peace, is definitely going in the greatly anticipated pile.

We've also heard rumours that Kanye West, Daft Punk, Phoenix, Arcade Fire, Jamie Liddell, Johnny Marr, Lady Gaga, Wu-Tang Clan, Eminem and Beyonce should be putting out exciting releases, while on the local front we're already amped to hear Unknown Mortal Orchestra's second record, plus we know the Phoenix Foundation have been working away on their fifth album, so fingers crossed that will arrive soon.