TV Tonight: our highlights for Tuesday, September 20, 2022

Double-barrelled Keeley Hawes! (Image credit: BBC)

On TV tonight, edgy new drama Crossfire begins on BBC One and who will crumble and who will triumph in the tent as The Great British Bake Off continues on C4 with Biscuit Week. There's a new travel series on Channel 5, Michael Palin: Into Iraq and a new series of Mel Giedroyc: Unforgivable begins on Dave. Here's what you shouldn't miss on TV tonight.

Our hand selected recommendations for what's on TV tonight include four TV shows, a film, live sport and the latest trending need-to-binge-on-now box set
Keep up to date with the latest soap spoiler storylines on TV tonight with our daily soap synopsis
For more information about what’s on TV tonight see our TV Guide

What's on TV tonight

Our expert TV journalists have picked the best things on TV tonight...

Best TV shows on TV tonight

*Please note that these TV shows are subject to change — we will update this page if any alterations should be made to the TV schedules.*

Crossfire, 9 pm, BBC One

Anneika Rose and Keeley Hawes star. (Image credit: BBC)

Keeley Hawes takes on dangerous masked gunmen in this intense three-part action thriller, which is so nail-biting that you may need a pillow to hide behind! She stars as mum Jo, who’s on a luxury Canary Islands holiday with her kids, husband Jason and their best friends when shots ring out by the resort’s pool, turning their world upside down. As ex-copper Jo bravely decides to take on the snipers, it transpires that she’s also hiding a terrible secret, which is set to tear the lives of her loved ones apart. The top cast also includes The A Word’s Lee Ingleby, The Bay’s Daniel Ryan and Line of Duty’s Anneika Rose, but don’t expect all their characters to survive… Continues until Thursday.

★★★ HD

The Great British Bake Off, season 13, 8 pm, C4

Presenters Noel and Matt. (Image credit: C4)

It’s crunch time as Biscuit Week arrives, but some of the bakers are not getting into the spirit of things by saying things like, ‘Biscuits - I like to eat them, not really make them!’ and ‘Who makes biscuits nowadays? You usually get them from the supermarket!’ We’re not sure if the fabulous but fiendishly tricky challenges will win them over, either – the Signature requires them to make illusion macarons – ‘There are 87 things that can go wrong,’ frets one baker! Then for the Technical, they tackle a fruity classic, before creating an upright 3D biscuit mask for the Showstopper. But who’ll be feeling crummy when they’re sent home?!

★★★★ CC

Michael Palin: Into Iraq, 9 pm, Channel 5

Michael joins in the preparations for the Kurdish New Year in Akre. (Image credit: Channel 5)

Iraq was the birthplace of civilisation 6,000 years ago, but in recent decades it has been redefined by war. Wanting to see how life is now, Michael travels 1,000 miles across the country following the course of the Tigris River through cities now familiar from news broadcasts – from Mosul through Baghdad and Basra to the Persian Gulf. In Mosul, he comes across smiling children happily playing among the ruins of the devastated city. There is more joy when he goes to the mountain town of Akre for the chaotic, exuberant celebrations of Newroz – the Kurdish New Year. And in Erbil, he finds a wealthy, glitzy city where ostentatious buildings include a replica of the White House.

★★★★ JE

Mel Giedroyc: Unforgivable, season 3, 10 pm, Dave

Lou and Mel decide what is... unforgivable. (Image credit: Dave/UKTV)

The comedy panel show that’s all about guest celebrities confessing to wrongdoing returns for a third series. Mel Giedroyc oversees the proceedings with dishonourable assistant Lou Sanders (a Taskmaster champ!) adding her own unedited insights and summaries after each round. This week, Rhod Gilbert, Susan Wokoma and Dermot O’Leary reveal their guilty secrets. But who confesses to stealing a dog, tipping a bag of smelly fish entrails through the sunroof of a stranger’s car or… snogging host Mel!?

★★★ MC

Best box set to watch on TV tonight

Simon Reeve's South America, BBC iPlayer

Simon with soldiers from the French Foreign Legion. (Image credit: BBC)

The adventurer is in South America to complete an epic 4000-mile trip from Peru to Paraguay with five new episodes. As usual Reeve takes on a journey that isn’t for the fainthearted, as he meets refugees, warlords and forgotten tribes. His new journey starts in the Guiana Shield, an area of pristine rainforest that spreads through Venezuela, Guyana, Suriname and French Guiana, which is being ravaged by the illegal gold mining trade. There, he visits a remote Wild West-style mining town where everything is paid for in gold, joins a former rebel fighter at his gold mine in the Suriname jungle and even raids an illegal mine with the French Foreign Legion. He also visits Brazil, Peru, Bolivia and Chile, finding extraordinary stories and meeting remarkable people along the way. Epic stuff.

Best film to watch on TV tonight

Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood, 9 pm, Film4

Brad Pitt and Leonardo DiCaprio star. (Image credit: Film4)

Quentin Tarantino’s sprawling, rollicking love letter to a long-gone Hollywood has moments that shine as well as those that misfire. What it has is wonderful roles for Leonardo DiCaprio as a fading star now forced to play the guest villain in TV Westerns and Brad Pitt as his laconic stunt double/best bud. It follows their minor adventures back in 1969, giving Tarantino a chance to put together a scorching soundtrack. The writer/director also get his mitts on the Manson Family and Sharon Tate, played well by an underused Margot Robbie. It’s a long haul of a movie, but one with some stand-out sequences along the way.