BBC April highlights include The Diplomat, Whodunnit?, Who Do You Think You Are?, The Green Planet, Spectacular Earth, Exploration Volcano and Andy’s Global Adventures.
The Diplomat
Australian Premiere
Fridays at 8.30pm from April 14
Available on Foxtel On Demand and Binge
Starring: Sophie Rundle, Danny Sapani & Steven Cree
6 x 60′
Sharp and slick new crime series shines a light on the secretive world of diplomacy. From the producers of Bodyguard and Line of Duty.
Laura Simmonds and her Spanish friend and colleague Alba Ortiz are working hard to protect British nationals in trouble in Barcelona. It isn’t an easy job. They’ll need to work as a cop, counsellor and lawyer. The series opens with the unexplained death of a British barman working around Barcelona’s notorious marina. Neither the Spanish police nor Foreign Office is keen to pursue a murder enquiry. As Laura and Alba dig deeper, they discover links to organised crime – and the British security services. But what price will they pay to expose secrets that the British and Spanish will protect at any cost?
Whodunnit?
All Easter Long Weekend from 3:45pm Good Friday
From stunning coastal backdrops to the English countryside, from crime-fighting priests to stylish, energetic detective duos, UKTV has got you covered this Easter with dramatic landscapes and a host of special stars. Tune in this Easter Long Weekend as we air some of the best British murder mysteries back to back.
Series include Mallorca Files, The Coroner, Midsomer Murders, New Tricks, Father Brown, Shakespeare & Hathaway plus more.
Who Do You Think You Are? Series 18
UKTV Premiere
Wednesdays at 8.30pm from April 19
4 x 60′
The Emmy-Award winning Who Do You Think You Are? returns with a new group of celebrities ready to delve into their lineage and get answers to the questions they’ve wondered about their entire lives. The series follows the journeys of some of the most well-known names in British popular culture. Watch as celebrities discover unknown details about themselves and their families while researching their ancestry with the help of historians and genealogical experts.
Celebrities this series include Sue Perkins, Richard Osman, Matt Lucas and Ralf Little.
Earth Week
All week at 7.30pm from April 17
This April, BBC Earth marks Earth Day with a week of documentaries celebrating the natural world. Admire the masterpiece that is our beautiful home, the science behind some of nature’s fascinating behaviour and the people dedicated to preserving it. Earth Week features a vast range of programmes including David Attenborough’s The Green Planet, Spectacular Earth, Exploration Volcano plus much more.
The Green Planet (PG)
BBC Earth Premiere
Mondays at 7.30pm from April 17
Presented by: Sir David Attenborough
5 x 60′
Step into a magical hidden world full of remarkable new behaviour, emotional stories and surprising heroes. Presented by Sir David Attenborough.
Plants live secret, unseen lives. Using specialist cameras, this spectacular series allows us to travel beyond the power of the human eye, to look closer at their interconnected world, showcasing over two decades of new discoveries. From deserts, tropical jungles and underwater worlds to seasonal lands and our own urban environment, each episode introduces a set of plants, reveals the battles they face, and the ingenious ways they’ve found to survive. New stories, never-seen-before animal behaviours, surprising heroes. This is Planet Earth from the perspective of plants.
Premieres with double episodes on April 17.
Spectacular Earth
Australian Premiere
Tuesday and Wednesday at 7.30pm from April 18
4 x 60′
Get closer than ever before to some of the world’s most stunning natural phenomena and discover the extraordinary global forces that coincide to make each spectacle happen.
Breakthrough scientific knowledge and cutting-edge filming techniques mean it is now possible to get thrillingly close to some of the world’s most beautiful spectacles. Specialist jet-ski cameras ride giant waves in Portugal, drones fly into one of Guatemala’s most explosive volcanoes and ultra-slow-motion footage captures thousand-foot-long lightning bolts in Arizona. Experts and scientists reveal the science beneath the spectacle. The explanations are fascinating – but our planet is home to such incredible phenomena that sometimes you have to see it to believe it.
Double episodes airing on Tuesday and Wednesday from April 18.
Exploration Volcano
Australian Premiere
Thursdays at 7.30pm from April 20
Presented by: Chris Horsley
8 x 60′
Chris Horsley is a volcano access specialist, explorer and all-round daredevil. In this eight-part series, he drags a group of reluctant documentary filmmakers all over the globe, responding to volcanic eruptions as they wreak havoc and threaten communities. His expeditions span the rebel-held jungles of Congo to the lava-scorched towns of the Canary Islands; from Iceland’s unmistakable glacial plains to Italy’s smoking archipelagos. In each episode, the team must tackle unique but volatile terrain. Chris and the gang stop at nothing to complete each mission; whether it’s collecting molten lava straight from the source or installing cutting-edge monitoring systems. Each experience is essential to gaining a deeper understanding of the behaviours of these merciless natural giants.
Premieres with double episodes on April 20.
Andy’s Global Adventures (G)
Australian Premiere
Mondays at 4.00pm from April 3
15 x 15′
Andy, Jen and new AI team member Scout return for a new series where they explore all seven continents, meeting an incredible range of wildlife along the way.
In his latest set of adventures, Andy travels all corners of the globe, meeting an amazing new cast of animals – from chameleons in Sri Lanka to emperor penguins in Antarctica. Accompanied by tech wizard Jen and new information-seeking AI Scout, Andy travels the globe in a hi-tech expedition truck, a scientific research station that houses Jen’s database of incredible facts about fauna and flora that inhabit our planet. In each episode, the team are sent on a mission by HQ to solve a puzzle from natural history. The intrepid trio must complete their mission and upload their findings to the database before they can continue their journey.
See more TV Central BBC stories HERE
BBC programming info can be viewed HERE
April on BBC
All our channel content is available on Foxtel and Fetch.
About BBC
BBC First, BBC Earth, UKTV, CBeebies, BBC World News, BBC Kids and BBC Brit are channels owned by BBC Studios featuring our content. Selected channels are available through a Foxtel, Fetch or Binge subscription.
