Documentaries
Actor Joseph Fiennes tests his mettle in Egypt with the World’s Greatest Explorer (National Geographic, Sky 072, Sunday, 7.30pm), in which he and cousin “Ran” take a trip along the Nile.
That would be Sir Ranulph Fiennes, known as the world’s greatest living explorer, who led a hovercraft expedition up the Nile in 1969, completed the first transglobe expedition (a vertical traverse of the globe), discovered a lost city in Oman and was the first to cross the Antarctic continent unsupported. We could go on.
Joseph, for his part, has done some acting, most
recently playing the creepy commander in The Handmaid’s Tale. He grew up, he says, with stories of his cousin’s exploits, and this three-part series is, in part, an attempt to understand what makes Ran so adventurous.
If the first episode is anything to go by, it’s because
Ran is preternaturally calm in the face of danger. He is completely unfazed when their Land Rover gets stuck
in a sand dune, barely moves a muscle in the presence of deadly snakes and spiders and casually shows Joseph how he cut off his own frostbitten fingertips with a saw.
In China’s Megatomb
Revealed (Choice TV, Monday, 8.30pm), Albert Lin explores China’s incredible Terracotta Army, made to protect the first Emperor, Qin Shi Huang, in the afterlife.