The second season of the mesmerising House of Cards will arrive at Netflix on Friday. That's Valentine's Day, just in case you'd forgotten. If your significant other is a fan of edgy political dramas, perhaps it might be worth ditching that fancy restaurant meal in favour of curling up on the sofa to watch Francis Underwood (Kevin Spacey) scheme and murder his way into the top job in American politics.

''All politicians are murderers or have to be willing to be murderers,'' creator Beau Willimon said. ''Here you have a dramatisation of that thing in them which allows them to do the unspeakable, whether that is facilitating the death of a congressman or sending 100,000 troops to war.''

Spacey -- as ever -- is excellent, and it's refreshing to see him relishing the different dimensions of a TV series, as opposed to the big screen. ''You get the time to examine a character or a series of circumstances over a long arc that you just can't in film,'' he said in a recent interview. ''Film is very condensed ... I feel like the last 10 years that I've lived in London has in a way been preparing me for something like this. This is a long commitment, it's a remarkably interesting and complicated character. ''

Robin Wright, who plays Underwood's wife, Claire, is also magnificently cast in her role. It won her a Golden Globe for 'best actress in a television drama series', although she's keen to downplay the achievement. ''I am still in shock," she said. "No, really. I didn't prepare a speech, because I truly thought, 'There's no f- way. There's no way I'm going to be up there.' Even when I heard my name, my first instinct was, 'They've got it wrong.'''

With a third season on the way (also set to be released on Netflix), House of Cards could prove to be as enduring as the irresistibly superb Boardwalk Empire.