Daily Mail - Daily Mail Weekend Magazine
Pick of The DAY
8PM, ITV1
COUNTRYFILE 6PM, BBC1
The picture-postcard village of Staithes, on the north Yorkshire coast, was once a major fishing port – now, there is just one fisherman left. Joe Crowley and Steve Brown head to the northeast to find out how the traditional community is adapting for the future. Joe meets a skipper who has swapped his nets for a career in wildlife tourism, while Steve tours Staithes’s winding cobbled streets and characterful cottages, enjoying the village’s art heritage before sampling some locally smoked goods. Plus, Charlotte Smith investigates one of Britain’s biggest ecological marine disasters, and Adam Henson learns about the challenges facing a sheep dairy.
DINOSAUR WITH STEPHEN FRY 7PM, CH5
Dino-enthusiast Stephen Fry steps into a TV time machine for this ground-breaking new series, which uses the latest developments in CGI to re-create the dinosaur era. The cutting-edge technology is so good that it really does seem like Stephen is face to face with the prehistoric creatures (below). In the first episode, he’s transported 155 million years back to the Jurassic period, where he wanders through conifer forests and fern prairies, trying not to get squashed by a 20ft tall diplodocus before meeting a deadly predator, the allosaurus, which has 34 razor-sharp teeth. With the help of palaeontologist Dr Susie Maidment, Stephen delivers the science with his trademark sense of humour, making this an informative and enjoyable watch for the whole family.
VERA
The murder in this episode hits close to home for DCI Stanhope and her team as the body of a copper is found floating in a park lake. The officer in question,
Joel Kingston, came from respected policing stock, so Vera (Brenda Blethyn) must be resolute in her convictions as she questions members of the force, inevitably ruffling a few feathers along the way. Soon, she discovers that PC Kingston led a far more complex life than he had ever let on, juggling family dynamics with tensions at work and brushes with the criminal underworld. But who killed him?