Natural World
BBC Two, 8pm
One of the most persuasive arguments for watching the BBC’s Natural World programmes is the chance to see things that you could never possibly hope to see. Even if you spent the whole of the summer months camping in the pristine wilderness of Ellesmere Island, high up in the Arctic at the northernmost tip of Canada, you still wouldn’t see a fraction of what has been filmed in this gorgeous programme: hares dancing; owls dive-bombing wolves; Arctic fox cubs blinking into the sunlight; a duck pretending to have a broken wing in order to distract a wolf from eating her young; and falcon chicks taking flight for the first time, the list goes on and on. Natural World is - once again – the most beautiful programme of the week.
The Choir: Boys Don’t Sing
BBC Two, 9pm
After only one episode, the new series of The Choir promises to be every bit as gripping as its Bafta-winning predecessor. On this occasion, the choirmaster, Gareth Malone, sets out to form a choir at Lancaster School, a single-sex state school in Leicester. Malone believes that singing is important: that nobody is able to sing with an unengaged brain, and that singing enriches lives immeasurably. To get the students involved, he brings to bear charm, enthusiasm and commitment, along with a new, steely resolve. It is impressive to watch him lose his cool. This is a series that shows an exceptional person trying to do something worthwhile.
Derren Brown: The System
Channel 4, 9pm
Whatever it is that Derren Brown does – whether it’s trickery or full-on hypnotism – he does it better than anyone else on television.
There was the occasion at the dog track a few years back when he went up to the cashier at the Tote, looked her in the eye and said: “This is the winning ticket” – even though it wasn’t – and she paid out. Here, once again, he gives the bookies a hard time. He picks a single mother and tells her which horses will win at the next day’s races. She can’t believe her luck, and bets ever-increasing amounts until she ends up betting everything on one horse in the final race. “Is it possible,” wonders Brown, “to predict every time which horse will win?”
Alan Carr’s Celebrity Ding Dong
Channel 4, 10pm
Alan Carr is a nice bloke. He’s outrageously rude and unashamedly camp, but he’s quick-witted and he knows a thing about basic human decency. (Watch the repeat of TV Heaven, TV Hell tonight at 11.55pm, and you’ll see what I mean). He has been described as the spiritual heir of Frankie Howerd, but he’s more like the love child of Kenneth Williams and Bernie Winters. In this new show, he hosts a quiz between a team of celebrities (Chris Moyles, Tara Palmer-Tomkinson, Duncan James, Zo? Ball and Jamelia) and a group of ordinary folk. It is a way of capitalising on fame culture while purporting to mock it, and it is loud, crass and dispiriting. In short, a typical Friday night show on Channel 4.