Blood brothers

9:25am Tuesday 22nd April 2008

Holby City (BBC1, 8pm); Blood, Sweat and T-Shirts (BBC3, 9pm) WHAT on earth is the difference between Holby City and Casualty? People have tried to explain this to me, but I'm convinced that they are exactly the same thing. As a licence payer, I feel pretty short changed. It's like asking for an apple and an orange at my local fruit and veg shop and being handed two Granny Smiths.

Praiseworthy

12:00pm Monday 21st April 2008

How To Build A Cathedral (BBC4, 9pm); A Time Team Special: The Lost Dock Of Liverpool (C4, 9pm) THE master masons who built York Minster could've had no idea that one day their toilet habits would be exposed to the nation.

Shark’s skin

9:54am Friday 18th April 2008

Shark (five, 10pm); A Place In The Sun: Home And Away (C4, 8pm); The Big Bang Theory (C4, 11.55pm) AS soon as LA prosecutor Sebastian Stark refers to a delay in a court case as "a temporary setback - we've got nothing to worry about", you know that he's going to get something to worry about.

Dog-eared

9:19am Thursday 17th April 2008

Inside The Medieval Mind (BBC4, 9pm); House (five, 9pm); Come Dine With Me (C4, 8pm); DON'T moan the next time you're fined for failing to return your library book on time.

Dead good

10:27am Tuesday 15th April 2008

Waking The Dead (BBC1, 9pm); Age Of Terror (BBC2, 9pm) AFTER last night's opener, you'll be as confused as me as to who's doing what and to whom in Waking The Dead. The key images repeated over and over again are flashbacks to a gagged woman hanging from chains in a container in a railway siding. Whenever you're in danger of dropping off, the director gives a quick flash of the unsettling sight to jolt you back into life.

Press call

10:16am Monday 14th April 2008

Stephen Fry and the Gutenberg Press (BBC4, 9pm); Extraordinary People: Half Man, Half Tree (five, 9pm); Quest for the Lost Ark (C4, 9pm) THE original title of Stephen Fry And The Gutenberg Press was The Machine That Made Us. Attaching a celebrity to the programme was presumably a bid to make it more enticing to viewers.

Family values

10:32am Friday 11th April 2008

My Family (BBC1, 9pm); Unreported World (C4, 7.35pm) DON'T be in any doubt. I have tried, believe me I've tried, to like My Family. Series eight begins tonight so I've given it another go, especially as the Radio Times previewer hints that it's saucier than before.

Abbey habits

9:59am Thursday 10th April 2008

In Search Of Medieval Britain (BBC4, 7.30pm); Chinese School (BBC4, 10pm) THIS is a tale of monks going commando and a tightrope walker falling to his death at Durham Cathedral.

Talking dirty

9:55am Tuesday 8th April 2008

Jaguar Adventure With Nigel Marven (five, 7.30pm); Massacre At Virginia Tech: This World (BBC2, 9pm); How To Look Good Naked (C4, 8pm) FIRST things first: Nigel Marven doesn't actually see any jaguars in the opening episode of his wildlife encounters in a "monster swamp bursting with a diversity of weird and wonderful animals".

The fears of a clown

10:23am Monday 7th April 2008

Clowns (BBC2, 9pm); Young Mums' Mansion (BBC3, 9pm) A MAN is standing on the pavement by his parked car, getting dressed for work. He goes through his preparations: "Clean shirt, clean trousers, sort out some balloons, check my balloom pump, lipstick, false glasses, clean hat, clean wig".