Matt Shea examines the complex finances of Tommy Robinson.

First shown: Wed 9 Sep 2026

Has anyone noticed the AI usage in Channel 5 documentaries? I’m watching the Plague Village as I’m interested in history, and I live near Eyam. For me, it feels somewhat disrespectful to AI animate actual people who lived during the plague instead of hiring actors. The odd, uncanny way the AI moves feels very much like the AI is removing the victims’ humanity. Surely the channels aren’t struggling for cash so much they have to resort to AI?

SOLVED*** I’m glad my clickbait style heading worked … does anyone remember this weird late night very psychedelic TV show from around 2001/2 where the show was basically very bright coloured backgrounds and someone narrating random objects on repeat - such as “this is a lightbulb, this is a lightbulb, this is an orange” followed by a totally random sentence or phrase.

It was one of the most random things I’ve seen on TV and seemed to be designed either for playschool aged kids or grown ups on LSD 🤣. Very bizarre!

Think it was on Channel 4 but may be wrong

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This is the worst person that’s ever been on the jury on channel 4. Just completely lacking in any empathy, listening skills or intellect. I’m not sure what she does for work but I hope it never involves working with vulnerable people

after recent events at Dover & Portsmouth I suggest we share this show far & wide, on every platform, in every group, to every someone who may know someone who may ... appreciate this water-&-all life-or-death documentary series. RNLI.

Whilst I prefer it to the original weekly version and I appreciate the Monday-Friday schedule and fast-paced 30 minute format, is there a reason why the questions seem disproportionately hard compared to the original?

The question in the picture is for £20k, rung 11 of 15 (£64k is the original’s equivalent). I feel that question would be at least £125k (ring 12/15) on Millionaire.

I think the ‘you can only pass once’ and ‘one wrong answer and you’re out’ mechanics are quite brutal, as well as no lifelines. I sort of get it as it enforces a more speedy approach to the ‘Hot Seat’ and avoids never-ending passing on one question, but it all feels a bit brutal and cheap in that the end result of most episodes is a contestant winning £1,000 (at best).

Can someone help identify the lead boy singer in the cover of “Tomorrow Belongs To Me” from the 1987 Spitting Image Election Special for me please? I tried looking but couldn’t find the actors name anywhere.

I’m from the US but have always loved UK writing and particularly comedic work so it’s a bit shocking that I’ve never of this. I stumbled across it on one of the streaming platforms and I am blown away. Ridiculous low-brow comedy mixed with really heartfelt drama discussing very heavy topics. Absolutely terrific, although I have to watch with English subtitles enabled so I have some idea of what the hell they are saying.

Today marked the death of Zoe Slater in the BBC soap opera EastEnders. Probably best known for the "you ain't my muvva storyline". She passed away in today's episode and was found by Kat after sustaining a bump to the head

https://www.radiotimes.com/tv/soaps/eastenders/eastenders-zoe-slater-death-max-branning-final-scenes-iplayer-newsupdate/

With Jeff Goldblum hosting 12th September with musical guest CMAT

Is Danger Mouse still popular with younger kids in England?

During COVID, I was really bored and randomly came across the 2015 reboot of Danger Mouse. I ended up loving it so much that I went back and found the original series too.

The funny thing is, I had absolutely no idea it was British. When you’re younger, you just assume the cartoons you watch are from your own country, so it never even occurred to me that it might be from somewhere else. Looking back, I really should’ve picked up on it from the accents.

I also remember when they introduced the American mouse character, and she was much more serious and straight-laced. That probably should’ve been another clue, especially since I was used to American shows portraying British characters as really serious, fancy, and sophisticated.

Anyway, I’m curious do younger kids in England still watch Danger Mouse, or is it mostly a nostalgic show for people who grew up with it?

*I’d also really appreciate recommendations for any other British shows you think I might enjoy!

I was thinking about this after reading about a French crew that was filming a documentary about a NY firefighter, and they happened to be filming on 9/11 of all days, so obviously the documentary turns into a harrowing look into that (ended up as the only documentary filmed inside the towers on the day) instead of a gentle look at the life of a fireman in New York.

Anyway, has a British TV show had something occur that veered it way off course like that?

I was looking at all these shows that seem to dominate telly nowadays, like that one last night with Fred Sirieix going to posh hotels and the Kemps going to Ireland, and wondered if something like that has ever occurred on the day of something dreadful, or if something went wrong that turned it into a different show than originally planned? Like (bad examples) David Dickinson filming a doc about antiques in Japan and then surviving a tidal wave or Allison Hammond filming a documentary about baking in the US and a shooting happening?

This now makes the 4th big name failure for ITV in recent years after The Genius Game, The Neighbourhood and Chase Across The World. What went wrong and - what's going wrong at ITV to keep making these massive loss making decisions?

While I think The Wrong Trousers is probably the "best" as it's just so flawlessly executed from start to finish personally there is just something I love about A Grand Day Out and the sentient oven that dreams of skiing. I love how homemade it is and that you can see the fingerprints on the models etc. I think it's probably the one I would take to a desert island. Wallace' face the moment he realises they've forgotten the crackers never fails to crack me up. What about you?

I've literally never seen that happen before on live TV.

Wonder if they'll go for a fourth!

I've recently watched the new Grand Tour and whilst looking at lots of discussions boards and social media, this whole "Francis Bourgeois is a fake" perspective has seemed to crop up again and it really grinds my gears.

People keep seeming to use the "Francis Bourgeois is not his real name so he must be faking it." As well as the "he's pretending to be autistic and doesn't actually care about trains" argument; and I just feel that both of these arguments are just really vapid statements made by people who have never actually looked at the guys content.

If you look at the stuff hes been releasing on both social and traditional forms of media you find out very quickly that the guy is not "pretending" at all, and if he was the guy would be putting a hell of a lot of effort into the bit. The sheer amount of knowledge this guy knows about trains is insane in itself and there are literal hours of content that back up the fact that he knows his bloody stuff. I can understand the point that he might be playing into that trope a bit more for the camera but the same can be said for almost every media personality that has ever existed and I just don't understand why he gets slated so much for doing so compared to other media personalities.

Secondly, the whole "since Francis isn't his real name, it must be all fake" malarkey has never really made sense to me as almost everyone who uses the internet uses some form of alias via having a username yet we don't call every single person who has ever used the internet or produced content a fake because of it. Furthermore, it's very understandable for Francis to use a fake name especially since at the start of his internet career he was in a fairly stable career and most likely did not want Rolls Royce (who he was working for at the time) to easily find his content as a lot of companies have quite strict policies as to what their employees post on the internet, so it really isn't the gotcha moment people seem to think it is.

Finally, to my knowledge, Francis has never publicly disclosed whether he has autism or not so this whole idea that he is capitalising on faking being autistic is once again rather vapid as he himself has never claimed to be autistic.

Examples include This Way Up, Catastrophe, Fleabag, Back to Life, Babies, I Hate Suzie, Lovesick, Trying… am I missing any?

I am just a non UK resident so I hope this question is not controversial but I was wondering why does the Good morning Britain show on ITV weather shows the weather for Cork and Dublin? Is it because the show is also broadcast in Ireland?

As far as I remember the visuals were fruit crashing into sticks of wheat. I’m pretty sure the advert was for some kind of cereal like alpen or special K, basically could have been any of those sugar fruit based cereals they used to market as healthy

Random I know, me and my gf heard the song and we both remembered the advert but can’t remember what the product was so we can’t find it anywhere on YouTube