Cold hard truths of war
THE latest episode of PORTILLO’S HIDDEN HISTORY OF BRITAIN (Channel 5, 9pm) is easily the most terrifying to date. Not because Michael has dug out his yellow trousers again (or, worse, that frightening lime blazer of his) but because his investigations take us back to the height of the Cold War.
It may seem like ancient history to some, but it’s a sobering reminder of just how close the world came to nuclear conflict. That, and how hopelessly illprepared we appear to have been.
He begins by investigating a huge concrete nuclear fortress in Cambridge (just a mile from where he spent his university days, though he had no idea at the time), designed to allow a select handful of individuals to take refuge in the event of an attack.
Built in 1953, this grim, colossally ugly, windowless structure (I say “colossally ugly” but actually I’ve seen Kevin McCloud enthusing about worse on Channel 4’s Grand Designs) has been abandoned now for 30-odd years but Michael, torch in hand, gets to take a look inside.
What greets him is eerie and unnerving. Within its 5ft-thick walls he discovers a labyrinth of stark rooms and musty corridors scattered with endless tiny reminders of what might so easily have been. A noticeboard still hangs on one of the walls, giving the occupants instructions on what to do in the event of further lifethreatening emergencies.
“Whoever was coming here was coming for the long term,” Michael (right) concludes.
But who exactly were those people, whose role was clearly deemed essential if society was to stand even the remotest chance of rebuilding itself?
Surprisingly, it doesn’t appear to have included TV critics. Instead, the dusty signs fixed to the various office doors suggest that every government department would have had its own base here, among them the Board of Trade, the Treasury and, perhaps most optimistic in a post-apocalyptic environment, the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries.
A little earlier on the same side, THE GADGET SHOW (Channel 5, 7pm) seems to be going through yet another of its “let’s see how easy it is to break stuff” phases.
In this case, it’s testing gadgets that claim to be extra-sturdy.
So would an allegedly rugged mobile phone, for example, still be in working order if you’d accidentally left it in your freezer?
Would your super-tough camera still work if you’d inadvertently ran it over?
And, perhaps most importantly of all, would your television remain in one piece if, while this item was being broadcast, you were to scream: “For God’s sake, what sort of clumsy doofuses do you think we are?” and threw a shoe at it? Meanwhile, talking of doofuses (I’m assuming that’s the correct plural), Nick Tilsley is cosily reminiscing with his ex-wife Leanne in tonight’s CORONATION STREET (ITV, 7.30pm, 8.30pm). “We had some great times,” he tells her, a pretty clear sign that the head wound from that car crash has caused somewhat irreparable damage to his memory.