The very best of the week ahead
Today
MOTD Live: FIFA World Cup 2022: Qatar v Ecuador
BBC One, 3pm
An uncomfortable feeling of grubbiness hangs over the Qatar World Cup. There are the credible allegations of corruption surrounding Fifa’s awarding of the tournament, which former president Sepp Blatter recently labelled “a mistake”. There are Qatar’s human rights abuses, its migrant worker deaths, its intolerance of LGBTQ+ people. And then there is the fact that it’s taking place in winter (due to the nation’s intense summer heat), when the evenings are dark and the beer gardens are cold. Nonetheless, the competition begins today, as hosts Qatar face Ecuador in the opening match of Group A. Kick-off is at 4pm, although BBC One’s coverage will begin an hour earlier, with Gary Lineker at Al Bayt Stadium in Al Khor. Stephen Kelly
Why Ships Sink: The Zeebrugge Disaster
Channel 5, 9pm
In 1987, the MS Herald of Free Enterprise ferry set sail from the Belgian port of Zeebrugge with more than 600 people on board. Twenty minutes later it capsized, killing 193. This shocking film charts the series of errors that led to the ferry setting sail with its bow doors open. SK
Monday
David Baddiel: Jews Don’t Count
Channel 4, 9pm
Following superb films on the scourge of Holocaust denial and social media, this adaptation-cum-enhancement of David Baddiel’s bestseller establishes him as a formidable factual film-maker. He talks to prominent Jews, from Sarah Silverman and Stephen Fry to Neil Gaiman and Jonathan Safran Foer, to get to the bottom of why antiSemitism is never treated with the same urgency as other forms of racism. Baddiel covers a lot of ground, from Labour’s problems under Jeremy Corbyn to the historical weight of centuries of oppression and negative stereotypes. Equally valuably, he preempts plenty of familiar ripostes – most intriguingly, what about Israel? – and is happy to accommodate dissenters, engaging in amicable debate with Miriam Margolyes. The climax follows the first meeting between Baddiel and Jason Lee, the striker for whom Baddiel used blackface to mock on Fantasy Football League in the 1990s, in a showdown which proves cathartic to both men and allows Baddiel to tick off the “journey” element of a consistently witty and stimulating film.
Gabriel Tate
Abandoned Engineering
Yesterday, 7pm
The final episode of the series serves up a New Orleans joint that defied Jim Crow before being sunk by Katrina; the site of a large-scale Eastern Bloc military exercise in 1981; and an Indonesian fortress built for an unusual purpose. GT
Tuesday
Our Universe Netflix
Morgan Freeman narrates this sumptuous series produced by BBC Studios (David Attenborough has to take a day off sometime). Freeman’s warm tones describe the 13.8billionyear history of our planet and the living things on it, as directors Alice Jones, Stephen Cooter and Naomi Austin blend wildlife footage and an array of special effects to explore the connections that drive the natural world, all accompanied by a stirring soundtrack. It’s visually arresting and informative; “Our Sun blasts out the energy of four-and-a-half trillion atomic bombs every second,” is one of the many, many facts Freeman tells us. The first episode goes back to basics and explains why the Sun is essential to life on Earth – showing how a cheetah family in the Serengeti survives. Following episodes dig into the universe’s internal rhythms, the seasonal climate cycle, gravity and the origins of water on Earth. It’s dramatic stuff with plenty of “ahh” and “wow” moments. All six episodes are available today. Veronica Lee Green Lions: Cameroon ’90
BBC Four, 9.30pm
Even non-football fans will enjoy this heart-warming film on the Cameroon team, who stunned world champions Argentina in Italia ’90 – and whose breakout star was 38-year-old striker Roger Milla, who marked his goals with a dance that launched a thousand post-goal celebrations. VL
Wednesday
Into Dinosaur Valley with Dan Snow Channel 5, 9pm
During the late 1800s, the Wild West of America was caught not in a rush for gold, but for dinosaur bones. In this documentary, historian Dan Snow follows in the footsteps of two of the period’s most famous fossil hunters: Othniel Charles Marsh and Edward Drinker Cope. The pair were fierce rivals, even going as far as sabotaging each other’s dig sites. But between them, they discovered more than 130 species of dinosaur. Snow travels across the US to find out how the nation became such a hotspot for dinosaur bones, with Como Bluff in Wyoming proving so bountiful that palaeontologists are still digging there today. He also hears how Marsh’s discovery of the hesperornis, an ancient flightless bird, provided the missing link for Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution. Finally, Snow explores how Marsh and Cope’s legacies led to William Harlow Reed’s discovery of Dippy, the most famous dinosaur skeleton in the world. SK
Adrian Dunbar: My Ireland
Channel 5, 8pm
Line of Duty star Adrian Dunbar returns to his homeland of Ireland for this two-part travelogue. In this first episode he begins at Slieve League in Donegal, one of the highest accessible sea cliffs in Europe, which causes him to recall the death of an old friend. SK
Thursday
The English
BBC Two, 9pm
Hugo Blick’s magnificent Western is shaping up to be one of the year’s finest TV programmes, filled with intrigue, great performances and stunning landscapes courtesy of Spanish cinematographer Arnau Valls Colomer. Set in the 1890s on the sprawling Western frontier, this third episode takes us to Powder River, Wyoming, where Sheriff Robert Marshall (Stephen Rea) is still investigating the mysterious murder-suicide of an ex-cavalry soldier and his stay-at-home wife. Was it a pact between the pair, or was foul play involved? In this dark tale of morality, or a lack thereof, suspicions are pointing firmly at the latter. Elsewhere, Eli (Chaske Spencer) waits at the Clarkes’ farm for grieving and vengeful mother Cornelia (Emily Blunt, on fantastic leading form) to return, but is shocked to find out that the Clarkes’ business is not as innocent as it may first have appeared. It’s a confusing tale at times: with this many characters and locations on display, it commands your full attention. But this is an artistic triumph definitely worth your time (and effort). Episodes will continue to be broadcast weekly, with the full series also available now on iPlayer. Poppie Platt
Kubrick by Kubrick
Sky Arts, 9pm
This long overdue retrospective of Hollywood director Stanley Kubrick delves into his life and films, and features an array of unearthed interview recordings with the man himself, who died in 1999. PP
Friday
Agatha Christie: Lucy Worsley on the Mystery Queen
BBC Two, 9pm
For those who can look beyond Lucy Worsley’s occasionally arch delivery and propensity to ham it up, there is much to enjoy in this three-part profile of the Queen of Crime, which tonight takes Agatha Miller from a childhood both blissful and troubled through to literary breakthroughs and a first marriage to pilot Archibald Christie. Key to Worsley’s thesis is the idea that if Christie’s books spawned the all-conquering genre of “cosy crime”, it was inadvertent. Instead, her oeuvre tapped into the various anxieties and traumas of her era and subverted many tropes and conventions of the genre (even the “drawing-room denouement” was, in its way, a bold reversal of long-established formulae). Worsley looks, rewardingly, at a childhood of make-believe and unorthodox creativity, while a stint working in a hospital during the First World War instilled in her a healthy suspicion of authority and the establishment. But it was Christie’s own drive and ambition, allied to her authorial gifts and willingness to take advice, which made her both a cultural phenomenon and an emblem of financial independence. GT
Berlin Live: Eric Burdon &
The Animals
Sky Arts, 7pm
One of the great British blues howlers, Eric Burdon continues to tour and test the vocal cords to the limits. This 2015 performance finds him and The Animals delivering back catalogue gems including House of the Rising Sun and We Gotta Get Out of This Place. GT