Critics’ choice
Pick of the day
President Trump — The Inauguration (BBC1/ITV, 4pm)
As tradition requires, Donald Trump will be accompanied by Barack Obama as he proceeds from the White House to the Capitol, there to become president at noon — on taking the oath of office — and give his inaugural address. The custom of staging inaugurations in mid-winter means the guests are likely to be dressed — aptly enough, Clinton supporters may feel — as if for a funeral rather than a ceremony of new beginnings such as a wedding or christening.
Later, President Trump (PBS America, 9pm) is a first-rate primer on the 45th president, covering in turn his childhood, his highs and lows as a property tycoon and his long stint in The Apprentice. He only began to think seriously about running for president, some contributors suggest, when Obama publicly humiliated him at a White House correspondents’ dinner.
John Dugdale
Rescue mission
Penguin A&E (C5, 7pm)
There doesn’t need to be a lot of spin on a programme about penguins to make it entertaining: just watching them waddle about is enchanting on its own. Even so, this programme, presented by Lorraine Kelly, shows how humans are threatening the existence of the African penguin, heading to Cape Town to explore the work of a veterinary hospital. With their population precarious, every penguin counts, and the team do everything they can to help those suffering from flipper infections and beak disease, and to rescue abandoned chicks.
Quality over quantity
Room 101 (BBC1, 8.30pm)
Not so long ago in Room 101, each celebrity trio had to come up with 10 contenders for banishment between them. Fewer are required in the current simplified format, which means there is more time for the whinges to be aired, scope that David Mitchell fully exploits here in amusing rants directed at sugar lumps and people who get upset when he fails to recognise them. Joining him are Judy Murray (griping about sniffers and daft road signs) and Anita Rani (clutter and eating while walking).
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Other side of the coin
Tina & Bobby (ITV, 9pm)
If the first episode of this drama about the life of Bobby Moore followed his climb to greatness, then this follow-up instalment concentrates on the aftermath of having all your dreams come true. It begins with the giddy, life-changing triumph of the England team at the 1966 World Cup — his wife, Tina (Michelle Keegan), shouting from the stands, Moore’s mother-in-law, Betty (Patsy Kensit), watching on a TV with a temperamental aerial. As the 1960s slide into the 1970s, however, that perfect moment slowly crumbles under the weight of commercial, professional and personal pressures, including a kidnap threat and the infamous “Bogota bracelet” incident.
All family life is here?
Delicious (Sky 1, 9pm)
As well as shouting matches in every other scene, the concluding instalment of this Cornish family saga features incest, adultery, lies, confessions, financial trickery, a suicide attempt, a visit to the afterlife and a mysterious flight to Switzerland by the elderly Mimi (Sheila Hancock) that everyone else seems too preoccupied to notice. All this arguing and agonising, which starts with Sam’s (Emilia Fox) discovery that Theresa (Tanya Reynolds) and Michael (Ruari O’Connor) have slept together, makes for a finale that is much livelier than the muddled episodes that preceded it, though it is somewhat marred by the disastrous use of a weepie 1960s hit as its closing music.
Hits all the right notes
Sound Of Musicals (BBC4, 9pm)
Neil Brand’s second programme runs from the mid-1950s to the mid-1970s, an era when, he says, “the musical grew up” and became “more relevant” and ready to incorporate harsher social and psychological subject matter. Lionel Bart’s Oliver! is the only British musical given a place in his otherwise all-Broadway selection, with West Side Story, Fiddler on the Roof, Company and A Chorus Line highlighted. There are interviews with Hal Prince and Robert Lindsay and the characteristically insightful Brand analysis of the musical subtleties of songs, including Leonard Bernstein’s Something’s Coming, Stephen Sondheim’s Send in the Clowns and Bart’s big number for Fagin, Reviewing the Situation.
John Dugdale and Victoria Segal
Sport choice
Africa Cup Of Nations (Eurosport, 3.45pm/6.45pm)
T20 Cricket (Sky Sports 2, 3.55pm) South Africa v Sri Lanka
Football Brighton & Hove Albion v Sheffield Wednesday (Sky Sports 1, 7pm); Lincoln City v Dover Athletic (BT Sport 1, 7.15pm)
Radio pick of the day
World On 3 (R3, 11pm)
Recorded last night at the opening of this year’s Celtic Connections winter festival in Glasgow is Laura Marling and the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, hosted by Kathryn Tickell. Hemingway In Havana (R4 Extra, 1.30pm/ 8.30pm), by contrast, offers Caribbean sunshine: made in 2011, it explores the writer’s relationship with Cuba, his creative home for 21 years and the setting of his most famous story, The Old Man and the Sea. Drive (R5 Live, 4pm) brings live coverage of Donald Trump’s inauguration in Washington.
Paul Donovan
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You say
In Plain Sight (ITV) “ruined” at the sight of a typeface shown two years before it was designed? Watching TV needs an extension of imagination.
Malcolm Courtney
Thanks, Alan Cooper, you made my breakfast. I enjoy You Say and would have no idea what a Routemaster even was without it, but I laughed out loud on reading your keen-eyed obsevation of a desk sign’s typeface. Brilliant.
Peter Gibney
You Sayers should keep up the good work.
Huw Benyon
Your correspondents’ pedantry has plunged new depths with Alan Cooper’s horror at a police-station sign displaying a Helvetica font two years ahead of its time. I had to wait 10 minutes for my toes to uncurl before I was able to stand up again!
Bruce Chalmers
Send your comments to: telly@sunday-times.co.uk
Film choice
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End Of Watch (2012)
Film 4, 11.50pm
David Ayer’s story of two close-knit street cops (Jake Gyllenhaal and Michael Peña) scores more highly for police work than for camerawork. Its presentation of several scenes in found-footage style is pointless, but a pretty good thriller nonetheless takes shape as the lawmen tangle with dangerous enemies.
Alice Through The Looking Glass (2016)
Sky Cinema Premiere, 1.45pm/8pm
The sequel to 2010’s Alice in Wonderland takes even less from Lewis Carroll than that film did, and its efforts to concoct a tale for the familiar characters are patchy. Mia Wasikowska’s Alice remains an appealing heroine, so it is a shame the movie is preoccupied with Johnny Depp’s hatter, who is now not so much mad as maudlin. Dir: James Bobin
Basic Instinct (1992)
C4, 12.05am
Paul Verhoeven’s film about a cop (Michael Douglas) seduced by a murder suspect (Sharon Stone) is remembered chiefly for its tacky flourishes, such as the moment when Stone’s vamp gives interrogators something they didn’t ask for. In its essential workings, however, it is an effective thriller.
The Survivalist (2015)
Sky Cinema Select, 3.40am
In a post-apocalyptic world where resources are scarce, this British film obtains everything it needs to tell a tense and absorbing story. A young man (Martin McCann) lets a woman (Olwen Fouere) and her teenage daughter (Mia Goth) share his simple home, but they all know they lack enough food for three. Dir: Stephen Fingleton
Edward Porter