THE STATE WITHIN
BBC One, 9pm
The BBC’s much-hyped conspiracy series continues along its tortuous and tangled path, and still nothing is what it seems. Its reception to date has been decidedly mixed. Some critics have dismissed the plot as “incomprehensible”, the characterisation as “perfunctory” and the pace as “dementedly hectic”. One critic accused it of trying to be terribly clever when all it was doing was heaping one baffling plot strand on top of another. But another reckons it is terribly clever, and found it reassuring that the BBC was willing to dramatise the complexities of international politics without diluting them. In tonight’s episode, it transpires that US Secretary of Defence (Donald Rumsfeld trapped in Madeleine Albright’s body) has been up to no good at all. That at least sounds plausible.
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THE QUEEN MOTHER IN LOVE
Channel 4, 9pm
Ignore the title. There are no lurid revelations here; instead, this is straightforward and absorbing feature-length documentary about the late Queen Mother. As a young woman, Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon had everything — she was self-confident, charismatic, relaxed, charming, full of fun and socially adept. Men fell hopelessly in love with her; she was romantically linked to the Prince of Wales, and twice turned down marriage proposals from Prince Bertie before agreeing to marry him (thanks in part to the intervention of Queen Mary). The film pays tribute to the love and support she gave her husband in a role for which he was hopelessly ill-suited, and it pulls no punches when describing her pure and lasting hatred for Wallis Simpson. It is a familiar story, vividly told.
TROUBLE IN PARADISE: THE PITCAIRN STORY
Channel 4, 10.35pm
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The Pacific island of Pitcairn — one of the last outposts of the British Empire — is tiny and remote. Just one mile across, its 47 inhabitants are descended from Fletcher Christian, who led the mutiny on the Bounty. Until recently it had no roads or telephone, and the nearest airstrip is in French Polynesia, three days away by boat. In October 2004, six men — including the former mayor — were found guilty of indecently assaulting young girls over a period of 40 years. The defendants claimed that under-age sex was a Polynesian cultural rite; the prosecution argued successfully that this was systematic abuse of children by men who believed they were a law unto themselves. The case divided the population, split families and threatened the future of the island.
WORLD MUSIC AWARDS 2006
Channel 4, 11.35pm
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In the increasingly bloated world of the awards show, there can be few bashes more superfluous than the World Music Awards. Unlike other similar dos, where the artistic worth of the works is at least given consideration, the WMAs are designed to give gaudy prizes to the makers of the world’s highest- selling records. They exist simply to reward success, adding an extra layer of superfluous glitter to the lives of those who have already been amply compensated. The most garlanded male in WMA history — 15 times winner Michael Jackson — was supposed to be the star of this year’s festivities, but his truncated performance resulted in boos, even from his bused-in fans. Any remaining interest will lie with the host, Lindsay Lohan, and a less than pulse-racing line-up of performers including James Blunt and Enya.
MULTICHANNEL CHOICE
James Jackson
LIVE UEFA CUP
British Eurosport, 7.15pm
Feyenoord v Blackburn Rovers (Kick-off 7.45).
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VOYAGES OF DISCOVERY
BBC Four, 9pm
A new series in which Paul Rose, a cheerfully rugged action man, recounts tales of great nautical endeavours, taking to the high seas in replica vessels to add a suitably salty backdrop. Tonight, Rose — in between tying sheepshanks and levering a tiller — tells the story of Ferdinand Magellan, whose ship Victoria limped into the port of Seville in 1522 having just completed the first circumnavigation of the globe. But was Magellan the real hero? Rose, aided by dramatisations, reveals all.
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WORD WARS
Artsworld, 9pm
A compulsively watchable US indie-documentary from 2004 that adopts the same framework as the hit film Spellbound and applies it to the National Scrabble Contest in San Diego. Follow four Scrabble-addicted misfits as their board-game obsession heads to a climactic showdown.
AMERICAN MUSIC AWARDS 2006
ITV2, 9pm
One of the big three US music award shows, the AMAs offer the usual mix of live performance and whooping acceptance speeches from pop’s great and good (and, often, merely adequate). This year’s edition features Jay-Z, Beyoncé and Snow Patrol, and a show-stealing turn from the new-school blues man John Mayer.
MY SHOCKING STORY
Discovery, 9pm/10pm
Tonight’s double bill from that realm where wacko science meets bad taste prurience offers a sobering pair of films. The first, I Gave Birth to a Mummy, sounds like something from the fevered imaginings of a supermarket tabloid hack, but concerns the true tale of a woman whose dead foetus lay, encrusted in bone, in her womb for years, without her knowledge. Living without Skin looks at a brother and sister with a terrible genetic affliction that means their skin blisters and then simply falls off.
BLUNDER
E4, 10pm
Expect a motley bunch of cartoonish oddballs from this lively — and often very funny — new sketch series, featuring bright newcomers of comedy (among them David Mitchell) and shot live before a studio audience. The regular characters include a man endlessly annoyed by today’s dumb TV shows, a woman who can talk only in a “comedy” language and Tollund Man, the bog person come back to life. Repeated on Channel 4 tomorrow.
PULLING
BBC Three, 10.30pm
Donna is having doubts about her wedding — her fiancé Karl is starting to show his true colours as an ultra-dull dimwit, her friends seem staggeringly tactless and her hen night, in a cheerless bingo hall, is rubbish. She was meant for better things than this. But when she dumps Karl to start anew, he is catapulted into suicidal despair. What’s a volcanically frustrated girl to do? Watch this likeable, rather rude new comedy series — with an endearing turn by Sharon Horgan (Rob Brydon’s Annually Retentive) as Donna — to find out.