Week 3 highlights

4 January 2012

Here are the best programmes on Channel 4 for week 3, Saturday 14th - Friday 20th January.

If your birthday is between 14th - 20th January, you will have a terrible egg-based mishap on June 27th of this year, causing you to lose the end of a finger, and break the small blue vase you keep on the kitchen dresser.

Because Venus is moving into Mars this week, you will feel an overwhelming urge to write lovely things about Channel 4 programmes. Follow your instincts. If you do not, you will develop leprosy in your teeth.

Your all-time favourite Channel 4 programme is The Hoobs.

Tip: Fortune wears a magenta robe and watches Deal or No Deal while eating a Flake.

 

 

Saturday 14/01/2012
12:20pm
T4: Playing it Straight 1/8
Eleven boys and one girl arrive in Barcelona to participate in what they believe to be the Dream Date show. But host Jameela Jamil shocks some of them with the revelation that they are actually taking part in Playing It Straight. Some of the guys are straight, and genuinely there to try and win our girl Cara's heart. But the others are merely 'playing it straight' and hope to deceive Cara into thinking they are the right man for her.

 

Sunday, 15/01/2012
7pm
Hugh's Three Hungry Boys 1/4
In this brand new series, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall challenges three best mates, Tim, Thom and Trevor, to the adventure of a lifetime. The boys have five weeks to travel from River Cottage in Axminster, Devon, to Lands' End in Cornwall, without any money at all. The boys must complete their five-week mission in a three-tonne, 1980s electric milk float with a top speed of 17mph. To survive they must hunt for food for themselves and renewable electricity for their milk float.

 

Sunday, 15/01/2012
9pm
The Reader
(2008) Kate Winslet won a lead actress Academy Award for her role in Stephen Daldry's multi Oscar-nominated drama, an adaptation of German author Bernhard Schlink's best-selling novel Der Vorleser (The Reader), which reflects upon the difficulties faced by Germans growing up in the shadow of the horrors of the Second World War. Network premiere.

 

Monday, 16/01/2012
5pm
Celebrity Coach Trip
Boarding the celebrity coach for another Mediterranean trip are ex-Tory MP Edwina Curry and her husband John Jones; comedians Tommy Cannon and Bobby Ball; former royal butler Paul Burrell and etiquette queen Jean Broke Smith; ex-EastEnders actors Derek Martin and John Altman; and Big Brother starlets Nikki Graham and Aisleyne Horgan-Wallace. The tourists arrive in Ljubljana, Slovenia, for a clown lesson and an afternoon down on the farm. But who'll pick up the yellow card at the first vote of the series?

 

Monday, 16/01/2012
5:30pm
Come Dine with Me
The new series starts in east Lancashire with Vicki Fairbrother, who cooks up sexy steak and banging banoffee cake for self-confessed snob Chelsea Symcox, perfectionist Chris Slater, hot-shot entrepreneur Jenna Tattersall and hairdresser Nigel Womack. There is also a game involving a helmet and water.

 

Monday, 16/01/2012
8pm
Richard Wilson on Hold
From shopping to banking, parking the car or booking an evening out, customers are increasingly dealing with computers and automated phone systems rather than real people. Actor Richard Wilson returns to Channel 4 to investigate the rise of automated services across Britain and to put the machines to the test, to reveal who's really benefiting from the switch to DIY technology.

 

Monday, 16/01/2012
9pm
Coppers 2/8
The acclaimed documentary series captures shocking scenes as Nottingham's frontline coppers find themselves in the middle of some of the worst anti-police violence in a generation, with police cars and stations under sustained attack from bricks and petrol bombs. Filmed during the summer when the shooting of Mark Duggan by police in London sparked the biggest civil unrest for decades, this high-octane episode offers a unique insight into the riots through the eyes of police as the 'thin blue line' is stretched to breaking point.

 

Monday, 16/01/2012
10pm
Secrets of the Shoplifters
Britain is now the shoplifting capital of Europe - the crime has increased by over 12% in the last year. The summer riots highlighted that Brits are prepared to break the law and steal to get what they want. Secrets of the Shoplifters heads to the front line of the battle between the shops and the robbers, revealing the cunning and clever up-to-date tactics employed by both sides.

 

Tuesday 17/01/2012
9pm
15 Kids and Counting 1/3
Most people stop at two, a few brave souls go on to have three or four. But when it comes to having kids, there are a handful of families who are bucking the trend. This new three-part series explores the lives of some of the UK's biggest families. The first programme meets two couples who can't stop having babies and ask why not.

 

Wednesday 18/01/2012
10pm
talhotblond
talhotblond is the true story (and screen name) of a beautiful teenage vixen who uses internet game rooms to lure men into her cyberspace web. When she discovers she's been double crossed and lied to by one of her victims, she wants revenge, and unleashes a fantasy online that escalates into real-life murder. All because of a girl no one ever met in person. Drawing from exclusive access to internet messages, secret notes and letters, as well as police evidence files and exclusive prison interviews, talhotblond details the horrific results of what can happen when people lie online.

 

Thursday, 19/01/2012
10pm
Gypsy Blood: True Stories
True Stories, which commissions and showcases the best feature-length documentaries, comes to Channel 4. Gypsy Blood examines the violent culture that some gypsy and traveller fathers hand on to their sons. The Dohertys are Irish Traveller royalty. While Hughie Doherty, 27, becomes embroiled in a fight to defend his family's name, his seven-year-old son Francie is caught between two worlds, learning to read at primary school while learning to fight with his fists at home. Fred Butcher is Romany but torn between the gypsy fighting tradition and his love as a father. His nine-year-old son, Freddy Cole, is terrified his father will be badly hurt in a fight.

 

Friday, 20/01/2012
10:35pm
Chris Moyles' Quiz Night 6/8
Chris Moyles' Quiz Night returns. John Bishop, Ruth Jones and Jason Derulo join Chris to flaunt their general knowledge with the aim of claiming the top spot on the leader board to avoid singing out the show

 

For highlights of programmes on More4, E4, Film4 and 4Music, please visit the Listings section of the site (available to registered users only).