TV tonight: David Attenborough's skin-crawling new nature series

The Guardian

a day ago

Sunday, 7.20pm, BBC One
A sleepy newborn gorilla resting on its mother's chest might be the sweetest opening to a nature series ever, but give it 10 minutes and we're soon watching lions rip open a buffalo. Welcome to David Attenborough's wonderful new series about animal parenthood – witnessing the highs, the lows and the grisly (a mother needs to feed her kids!). The opener also takes us into the ocean to meet a gutsy 'super mum' boxer crab about to hatch eggs while fighting off predators. And inside a tangled nest of webs, dying African social spiders are hunting food for thousands of spiderlings – but will they make the ultimate yummy mummy sacrifice? Fascinating stuff, if slightly skin-crawling. Hollie Richardson
10.20pm, ITV1
Neonatal nurse Lucy Letby was jailed for life in August 2023 after being found guilty of murdering babies in her care. But two years after her sentencing difficult questions are still being raised about the statistical and clinical evidence used to convict. The contested areas of an extraordinarily emotive case are examined in detail here. Graeme Virtue
8pm, ITV1
In the final episode of the series, the discovery of a body in the caves of East Rotheswell sends DI Pirie's (Lauren Lyle) cold case inquiry in several directions. Does Fergus Sinclair (John Michie) know more about the 1984 kidnapping than
he's previously admitted? And what will Mint (Chris Jenks) and Isla (Saskia Ashdown) find in Malta? Ellen E Jones
9pm, BBC Two
It's the concluding part of an unsettling investigation into the Jesus Fellowship Church, which hears from former members who were abused there. But also, the big question is put to a former elder: why didn't you report any of the abuse that you were told about? There is no satisfying answer. HR
9pm, Channel 4
This celebrity hazing ritual is one of TV's finest guilty pleasures. It returns with a promising lineup including former footballer Adebayo 'The Beast' Akinfenwa, drag icon Bimini and dance professional Louis Spence. Billy Billingham and friends will be meeting them in the wilds of Wales – but how many will survive the brutal early stages? Phil Harrison
9.20pm, BBC One
The haunting adaptation of Richard Flanagan's Booker prize-winning second world war epic continues. In a slower third episode, war hero and surgeon Dorrigo recalls intense feelings of guilt and failure not just about being unable to save the lives of fellow prisoners of war, but also concerning the affair he had with his uncle's wife. HR
The Room Next Door, 7.35am, 10.10pm, Sky Cinema Premiere
Pedro Almodóvar's latest divided the critics at last year's Venice film festival – though not the jury, who awarded it the Golden Lion. Some felt his first English-language feature awkwardly transplanted his Hispanic melodrama to a Manhattan setting, in which terminally ill war photographer Martha (Tilda Swinton) reaches out to her old friend, bestselling author Ingrid (Juliette Moore). Others reckoned it was just as lush and seductive as ever, a third entry after Pain and Glory and Parallel Mothers in a death-preoccupied run of work. What can't be disputed is how it rages against the dying of the light, both on a personal and planetary level, led by a cadaverous Swinton orchestrating her own exit. Phil Hoad
Kensuke's Kingdom, 3.35pm, BBC One
A stirring, classy adaptation, scripted by Frank Cottrell-Boyce, of the Michael Morpurgo novel about a shipwrecked child who encounters a Japanese war veteran on a remote island. Recalcitrant lad Michael (voiced by Aaron McGregor) is bugging his parents on their sailing trip – but once washed ashore with his dog, learns his place in the scheme of nature courtesy of the enigmatic Kensuke (Ken Watanabe). With its rich hand-drawn animation, it hews close to the purist likes of The Red Turtle – without an anthropomorphised talking animal in sight. PH
The Killers, 9pm, Legend Xtra
Dirty Harry director Don Siegel's 1964 remake of the 1946 noir classic strips away the shadowy romanticism of the high noir era and streamlines it into a lean heist pic. It starts with headstone-faced hitman Charlie (Lee Marvin) set to assassinate former race-car champion Johnny North (John Cassavetes). Deemed too violent to be shown on TV as originally planned, its unvarnished mayhem and brisk direction looked ahead to the gritty urban crime epics of the coming decade. PH