Friday 4 January 2019

Must see TV - Week beginning Saturday 5 January 2019

Christmas and the festive season as now gone it was not the best Christmas for TV, I can remember. The opening schedule of the New Year doesn’t look to healthy either but I am feeling a bit punch drunk after all the TV watching over the last two weeks. Loving at The Orville is back on Fox for its second series with 8 Out Of 10 Cats Does Countdown back on Channel 4 and away from comedy The Hotel Inspector Returns is also back but as been given the grave yard shift of past 11pm. I remember when the delectable Alex Polizzi (presenter) was prime time TV.

Sunday - George Clark’s Amazing Spaces (New Series)


George Clarke checks out some unusual mobile homes, including a converted railway cattle carriage, a vintage Morris Minor Caravanette in need of extensive renovation, and a 1970s builders' van being transformed into a luxury camper. He also begins a tour of Spain's tiny homes in the Sierra de Las Nieves Mountains in southern Andalucía.

Sunday - Semi–Detached (New)


Sitcom pilot broadcast in real time, starring Lee Mack as a man enduring the worst 20 minutes of his life. When his girlfriend goes into labour, Stuart is forced to rely on his ex-wife to help get her to hospital - but he also has to contend with his promiscuous father, estranged brother, and a naked neighbour who has had an accident with a circular saw.

Monday – Alaska: Battle on the Bay (New Series)


With potential fortune swimming just below the surface, five captains prepare to battle the unforgiving bay, the battering ram of boats jockeying for position and the law, which strictly monitors the season with recon choppers and police squads. On the bay, fishing for the nearly 44 million salmon is necessary for the environment, and arm of the law is long, tempers are short and every single decision is the difference between drawing a huge income and settling for pennies.

Tuesday – Home Town (New Series)


Following the work of husband and wife Ben and Erin Napier as they restore homes together. Ben is hoping to encourage young families to settle down in small towns and this show as turned out to be popular stateside. Around the world more and more are leaving small towns and villages for the bigger cities. This time, help a couple find a home with a space for their business.

Tuesday – 24 Hours in A&E (New Series)


The return of the programme following life at the A&E department of St George's hospital in south-west London. Doctors suspect a blood clot when David, 69, is rushed in with severe leg pain and a pale foot, and vascular specialists are called to assess him for surgery to save his leg. Annie, 90, has been brought in after struggling to breathe at home. Her daughter Francesca and granddaughter Tamara wait by her side in resus, as doctors battle to uncover the cause of shadowing on her lungs.

Tuesday – The Hotel Inspector Returns (New Series)


Alex Polizzi finds out what has happened to some of the struggling hoteliers she helped previously, beginning with The Regency Rooms, a Peaky Blinders-themed hotel in Southport. Owners John and Mel quickly started renovating the flats above into a hotel, despite having no experience. That was in 2017, so have they taken Alex's advice on assorted problems and made the place work?

Wednesday Gold Rush: White Water (New Series)

The Dakota Boys put together a team of intrepid divers, mountaineers and bush mechanics to go where no miner has ever managed to explore - the depths of freezing plunge pools in white water rapids that have only recently become accessible. Nothing will stop these guys - they'll dive in raging torrents with a six-inch suction dredge where one wrong move could have deadly consequences.

Wednesday – Cleaning Up (New Series)


Sheridan Smith plays another downtrodden every day woman like we recently saw over on BBC 1 in the drama Care where she fights for her mum after she suffers life  changing health problems after she (mum) suffers a stroke and develops dementia. In this new drama she attempts to turn her life around after battling a gambling addiction, struggling mother Sam takes up a cleaning job, where she stumbles upon access to lucrative and illegal stock market information at the office she cleans, and her life is thrown into disarray.

Thursday – Hospital (New Series)

Return of the documentary showing the realities faced by the NHS in unprecedented times, this time following six trusts across Liverpool, whose hospitals have a catchment area stretching beyond the city to north Wales, Cheshire, and the Isle of Man. The Royal Liverpool University Hospital faces an emergency when two floors of the building are flooded, meaning critically ill patients have to be re-routed around the hospital to get to intensive care and staff divert incoming patients to other hospitals. Across the city at Alder Hey Children's Hospital, three-year-old Charlie is about to undergo high-risk surgery to remove a rare brain tumour.

Thursday – Hunted (New Series)

The return of the reality challenge in which 10 ordinary people go on the run, with an elite team of hunters trying to track them down - and those that evade capture for 25 days can pocket a share of £100,000. The action begins with a speedboat chase through Liverpool docks, after which Essex girl Loren places her trust in the wrong people, and ex-con Nick and his friend Paul get a taste of their old lives in a dash across the country with the hunters in hot pursuit.

Thursday – The Orville (New Series)

This sci-fi comedy drama has real heart, and it’s the closest thing on TV to Star Trek: the Next Generation since Patrick Stewart handed in his phase in 2002. Now, in the first episode of the second series, we see a riff on some classic Next Generation holodeck episodes when one crewmember becomes obsessed with the “simulation room”, while Captain Mercer (MacFarlane) and the team race to rescue citizens of a planet doomed to be destroyed by its own sun.

Friday – 8 Out Of 10 Cats Does Countdown 9pm (New Series)


Jimmy Carr hosts the comedy panel show's version of the words-and-numbers quiz, with team captain Sean Lock and Johnny Vegas taking on guest captain Alan Carr and Lou Sanders. Lexicographer Susie Dent is joined by the Brett Domino Trio to adjudicate in Dictionary Corner, while Rachel Riley looks after the numbers and letters.

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