TV Times tops picks for tonight
What’s on telly tonight? Here the TV Times team of expert reviewers highlight three of the best shows on telly tonight for Sunday 26th November
Coastal Railways with Julie Walters, 8.00pm, C4
Ms Walters is an agreeable companion in this four-part series in which she travels on some of Britain’s most picturesque coastal railways, stopping along the way to meet the locals. In this first episode, the actress is in the Highlands, where she rides on The Jacobite steam train, which is better known to Harry Potter fans as the Hogwarts Express – something she never got the chance to do in her role as Ron Weasley’s mother. There’s lots of cheeky humour along the way, as Julie tries her hand at smoking herrings and applying tick spray to cattle. ‘Has Michael Portillo been on this train?’ she wonders at one point. ‘I just thought I could smell Lynx…’ Rating: ****
Blue Planet 2, 8.00pm, BBC1
Sir David Attenborough unveils more remarkable treats in the ‘green seas’ of marine forests, where competition for food and space is fierce. While a plankton ‘banquet’ attracts shoals of fish, which then provide a feast for humpback whales, an octopus uses shells as armour against a shark and a cheeky cuttlefish pretends he’s female to nab a mate from a bigger rival. Elsewhere, a Garibaldi fish turns bouncer to protect his patch of algae from sea urchins. Fortunately for the brightly-coloured aquatic, sea otters find the urchins a tasty, albeit prickly, delicacy! There’s also amazing footage of spider crabs marching across seagrass plains to find a place to break out of their shells – if they can dodge a hungry stingray! Rating: *****
Howards End, 9.00p, BBC1
What romantics the Edwardians were! Henry proposes to Margaret by pretending he’d like her to rent his house. Then, after she says she’ll give him her answer by letter (!), they have a serious chat about their finances. However, their families are not exactly thrilled by the engagement. Helen hates her sister’s new fiancé’s lack of humanity, while Henry’s son Charles accuses the Schlegels of ‘artistic beastliness’. But everything is thrown into disarray when a now destitute Leonard Bast turns up, and when Helen makes a bid to assist, a revelation has far-reaching consequences for all concerned. Rating: ****
More previews tomorrow.
