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The very best of the week ahead

Sunday

Dal y Mellt

BBC iPlayer & S4C, 9pm

Adapted by Iwan Roberts from his Welsh language novel of the same name, Dal y Mellt (Catching the Lightning), there is a seductively scrappy energy about this six-part thriller which, while wildly derivative (Guy Ritchie and Quentin Tarantino are clear touchstones), remains, somehow, still distinctly itself. Released as a box set on BBC iPlayer, it follows a rogues’ gallery of outsiders and wrong ’uns across Gwynedd, Cardiff, Dublin and Soho. They are all connected by something – a heist? A murder? – which only becomes apparent as the series goes on, and first impressions invariably prove deceptive: there’s Dyfan Roberts’s avuncular farmer with some dark secrets, Siw Hughes’s sweet old lady with a penchant for conspiracy theories, Mark Lewis Jones’s gnarled thug with a sensitive side and, above all, Gwïon Morris Jones’s Carbo, a smart-mouthed car thief drifting way out of his depth. It makes the odd misstep (occasionally leaden dialogue and a hackneyed nightmare sequence) but with the endgame so hazy and the performances full of mischief and menace – not least the ever engaging Carbo – it is never less than intriguing. Gabriel Tate

Frozen Planet II BBC One, 8pm

The mesmerising fourth instalment plants its flag in Antarctica, where killer whales hunt Weddell seals and icy lakes hide the bafflingly giant stromatolites – pulsing, strange structures that raise questions about life not only on Earth but beyond. Tonight’s real coup, however, comes with unprecedented footage of male Antipodean wandering albatross partnering up. GT

Monday The Walk-In ITV, 9pm

Stephen en Graham PICK knocks ks another OF THE performance rmance WEEK out of the park as he plays Matthew Collins, a reformed neo-Nazi zi now working for the anti-racist nti- organisation Hope e Not Hate in Jeff Pope’s riveting five-part drama, based ased on real events. Using ng informants (or “walkalkins”), Collins tries to infiltrate National Action – the first far-Right organisation to be banned by the UK government since the Second World War – but isn’t having any success until, in 2017, a year after the horrific murder of Yorkshire MP Jo Cox, he receives an email from inside the organisation, telling him of a plot to kill Lancashire MP Rosie Cooper, and we see his attempts to prevent it. (Cooper has recently announced she is standing down from Parliament, acknowledging that the events had “taken their toll”.) The drama pulls no punches about what attracts some som young white men to far-Right politics, p and features brilliant performances from Dean-Charles Charle Chapman and Andrew Ellis. Veronica Lee

House of the Dragon

Sky Atlantic, Atlantic 2am & 9pm After two breathless b episodes, the t seventh instalment instalmen of the Game of the Thrones Thron prequel takes a more sedate sed pace. For a bit, at least. We W begin with the funeral of o Laena Velaryon, which is smirked s through by callous callou widower, Daemon (Matt Smith). His behaviour, behaviour however, pales compared to some of the internecine squabbles that take place after the wake. VL

Tuesday Paxman: Putting Up with Parkinson’s ITV, 9pm

“I’m not living with it, I’m putting up with it.” Thus the title of Michael Waldman’s revealing documentary was born, from a characteristically cantankerous outburst from the 72-year-old presenter and journalist. Jeremy Paxman was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in April 2021, and the cameras follow him as he grumpily engages in physiotherapy, reluctantly joins a dance class and bowls club, and meets doctors and fellow sufferers for shards of hope regarding a future cure or treatments. There are seldom-seen moments of reflection and vulnerability from Paxman, and coverage of some groundbreaking science (notably Joy Milne and her astonishing talent for “smelling” Parkinson’s). An entirely unalloyed portrait of terminal illness with all the physical and psychological toll that entails, both Paxman and Waldman deserve considerable credit. GT

Michael Palin: Into Iraq

Channel 5, 9pm

Michael Palin concludes his journey along the River Tigris as he began it: thoughtfully. His final, fascinating encounters include Baghdad schoolchildren, Shia pilgrims at Imam Husayn, families living in

the southern marshlands and a trip to see the progress of a $7billion port project at Al-Faw. GT

Wednesday

The Bear

Disney+

It is rare to watch television as deliciously well-written, directed and performed as The Bear, the frantic culinary drama that has had American critics drooling since its US release in June. It stars Jeremy Allen White as Carmen “Carmy” Berzatto, a young chef who has forsaken the world of fine dining to take over his family’s Italian beef sandwich shop in Chicago. The restaurant was passed to him after the suicide of his older brother, who left behind sky-high debts, a dilapidated kitchen and a strong-willed staff of disobedient old-hands. From the very first scene, in which Carmy jolts awake at work, the show immerses you in the intense, unrelenting stress nightmare that is running a busy kitchen. The show’s other characters provide the biggest laughs and most illuminating dialogue, especially Richie (Ebon Moss-Bachrach), the shop’s streetwise front-of-house manager. Stephen Kelly

Head On: Rugby, Dementia & Me BBC Two, 9pm

Former England rugby star Steve Thompson has been diagnosed with early onset dementia at the age of 44. In this moving documentary, he reveals the devastating impact that it’s had on his life (he remembers nothing from his career, for example), while trying to illuminate the disturbing correlation between unsafe rugby practices and a spate of former players suffering similar conditions. SK

Thursday

My Grandparents’ War: Toby Jones

Channel 4, 8pm

It strikes us as extraordinary today how little past generations spoke of their experiences during the Second World War. It’s a subject that the actor Toby Jones ponders deeply in this edition, while looking into the fascinating histories of his beloved maternal grandparents Reggie and Doreen “Dorki” Heslewood. Jones uncovers previously unknown information that he describes as “mind-blowing” – of Dorki’s experiences in France as a 21-year-old actress with the Entertainments National Service Association (sharing a stage with Gracie Fields, no less) and evacuation from Boulogne. And of Reggie’s rather darker experiences of jungle warfare in Burma, fighting with the Indian army against the Japanese in “hellish conditions” and his key role at the Battle of Imphal in northeast India. Fortunately, the military record-keepers, private diarists and photo-takers of the world were quietly working away as always, allowing the programme’s researchers to piece together a fascinating story that not only sheds light on some of the less appreciated heroics of the war, but also on a loving bond, forged in conflict, that lasted a lifetime. Gerard O’Donovan Jon Richardson: Take My Mother-in-Law

Channel 4, 10pm The comedian embarks on a madcap road trip through Spain with his mother-in-law, Gill, in search of a retirement home where she can grow old disgracefully. Armed only with a GCSE in Spanish and the cheapest rental car available, it’s not long before they run into trouble. As hilarious, and chaotic, as you’d expect. GO

Friday

A Friend of the Family

Peacock

This nine-parter opens with a message from Jan Broberg, the victim behind this extraordinary tale, who tells viewers that she wanted her story

dramatised “because so many people think that something like this could never happen to them – especially at the hands of someone they know and trust”. In the 1970s, Broberg (Hendrix Yancey) was kidnapped multiple times by Robert Berchtold, a family friend who manipulated both her parents (played here by Anna Paquin and Colin Hanks) through blackmail and coercion. Berchtold is played by The White Lotus’s Jake Lacy, whose all-American “aw shucks!” veneer gives his actions a sinister edge. Premiering with three episodes, we’re shown how his obsession with 12-year-old Jan leads to him brainwashing her into believing that they have been given a special mission by aliens – one which involves getting married and having a baby. SK

Dispatches: Britain’s Evicted Kids Channel 4, 7.30pm

In the first three months of 2022, more than 25,000 families with children became homeless in England or were at risk of becoming so. Dispatches follows one such family, whose eviction from their two-bed flat leaves them cooped up for weeks in a hotel room and facing a battle to find a new home. SK

Television & Radio

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Daily Telegraph