Just couple of weeks after spring finally arrived, the Easter Bank Holiday weekend is here, and some fantastic options on the TV schedules have arrived with it.
If you're a sci-fi fan looking for what to watch over the four-day weekend, then you can check out the newly recovering episodes of Doctor Who: The Daleks' Master Plan on BBC iPlayer, or new animated Star Wars series Maul - Shadow Lord on Disney Plus.
Meanwhile, drama fans are in luck, as there are new episodes of Beyond Paradise season 4, Grace season 6 and The Capture season 3 all on the way over the next few days.
If it's reality shows, entertainment programmes or docuseries you're looking for, then there are a whole host of options – from David Attenborough's latest series, Secret Garden, to the new season of religious travel series Pilgrimage, to Ronan Keating's Wild Atlantic, a new season of Have I Got News For You and I'm a Celebrity... South Africa season 2.
Last but not least, comedy fans can look forward to The Young Offenders season 5, and sports fans can enjoy The Boat Race, airing on Channel 4 for the first time ever.
Read on for our list of what's worth watching this Easter Bank Holiday weekend.
Doctor Who: The Daleks' Master Plan
Friday 3 April, 6am, BBC iPlayer
The original Doctor (William Hartnell) and his companions arrive on the jungle planet Kembel in the year 4000, where the Daleks are forging an alliance in a bid to conquer the universe.
Episodes two, five and 10 of this 12-part 1960s classic have been available on iPlayer for a while, but now, to the delight of fans, the long-lost first and third instalments (The Nightmare Begins and Devil’s Planet) have returned miraculously to the BBC and can be enjoyed for the first time in 60 years. It’s a gritty if rambling tale told with dramatic conviction and skilled direction.
Patrick Mulkern
Beyond Paradise season 4 episode 2
Friday 3 April, 8pm, BBC One
When it comes to the use of dissociative identity order in mysteries, opinion is split. Granted, it can be utilised to provide audiences with the ultimate in unreliable protagonists (see Psycho, for instance). But there is a risk of stigmatising sufferers, especially when the condition is equated with aggressive behaviour. Here, someone with DID is at least suspected of being the perpetrator of a crime due to the possibility of them having a violent alter. Whether or not they turn out to be guilty is the job of this episode to reveal. But it does at least toy with the prospect of this being the case, something that isn’t particularly helpful when research suggests that those who’ve been diagnosed are far likelier to harm themselves than others.
David Brown
Have I Got News For You season 71
Friday 3 April, 9pm, BBC One
Back in September 1990, HIGNFY’s first-ever panellists had topics to discuss such as the looming prospects of war in the Gulf and recession in the UK. Plus ça change, eh? Throw in the rise of Reform and the Greens at the expense of Labour and the Conservatives, the turmoil caused by the Epstein files and the latest nonsensical utterings to have come from the White House and the week in current affairs should serve up a feast fit for those two kings of comedy, Paul Merton and Ian Hislop.
Joined for tonight’s first episode in this 71st run by Armando Iannucci and C4 News’s US editor Anushka Asthana, they may find their satirical fangs sharpened by the arrival of a new generation of topical comedians in Saturday Night Live: UK. Tonight’s presenter has benefitted from a cultural exchange in the other direction, with Roy Wood Jr, host of CNN’s version of Have I Got News for You, back for his third stint in the hot seat.
Gabriel Tate
The Young Offenders season 5
Friday 3 April, 9:30pm, BBC One
From Jessie Buckley to Cillian Murphy, and Marian Keyes to Sally Rooney — and not forgetting Mrs Brown, Irish culture is enjoying a purple patch — or should that be a green patch? In the midst of this “Guinnaissance”, the return of the cartoonish Cork comedy for a fifth series is well timed.
Lifelong friends Conor (Alex Murphy) and Jock (Chris Walley) are reunited after serving jail time on different continents. Despite vowing to grow up and settle down, the hapless petty criminals soon slip back into their old ways. Posing as stag weekenders with the unlikely names of Diego and Juan, the fugitive pair accidentally take a retired married couple hostage in a remote house. However, the lads are surprised to find they have more in common with them than they imagined. Cue potty-mouthed bickering and knockabout humour with an undertow of warm sentiment.
Michael Hogan
The Boat Race 2026
Saturday 4 April, 1:30pm, Channel 4
The Boat Race will not be broadcast by the BBC for the first time in 99 years but you can still expect the same drama on the River Thames.
In 1927, the first radio broadcast of the event was transmitted from the deck of the Magician, a launch carrying half a ton of broadcasting equipment, a generator and batteries. The Oxbridge teams would duel on TV for the first time in 1938, 11 years before the corporation was able to broadcast the full race to home audiences.
In 2026, Channel 4 offers TV coverage of the men's and women's races coxed by the steady hand of Clare Balding, while Times Radio will command the airwaves.
However, beyond broadcasting technicalities, the river still arches the same route from Putney to Mortlake and the will to win is as strong as ever. Cambridge have racked up six wins in the last seven men's races, while the women boast a clean sweep of the last eight. Can Oxford turn the tide to begin this new era for a great British institution?
Michael Potts
Secret Garden
Sunday 5 April, 6pm, BBC One
In a tribute for his 99th birthday, one admirer suggested David Attenbourough’s genius was to have built a bridge between ordinary British homes and the exotic wildlife of faraway places. Now, as Attenborough approaches 100, he leads us home again: this gorgeous series takes us not to distant jungles and savannahs but to “the hidden world right on our doorstep.”
And it’s a real treat. Clearly, having the most trusted, lyrical of voices narrating could make any nature series, but really, the filming here needs no help. What the camerafolk have captured in the garden (for this first episode) of a mill-house by the River Thame in Oxfordshire is wonderful.
They film a kingfisher sharing his catch with the female he hopes to impress – then later we see the resulting brood of chicks jostling inside their riverbank burrow. We see a hidden litter of vole pups, each “smaller than a jelly baby and completely blind” as well as the weird, Jaws-like drama of an otter hunting ducks on the mill stream. It’s exquisitely done and for anyone with any kind of garden, an eye-opener.
David Butcher
Grace season 6 episode 2
Sunday 5 April, 8pm, ITV1
Author Peter James may be prolific, but he’s in danger of getting outpaced by the series adapting his work. Hence this latest episode being an original storyline rather than one based upon a pre-existing novel. It does, though, come with James’s seal of approval and plenty of his hallmark themes. Psychological cruelty and stalking once again take centre stage, this time within a university setting where women are feeling under threat. It’s a timely premise, with stalking widely regarded as an under-reported crime on campuses across the UK. Reassuringly, the execution is more measured than sensational, avoiding the gratuitous excess that has occasionally marked this drama in its more lurid moments.
David Brown
The Capture season 3 episode 5
Sunday 5 April, 9pm, BBC One
So much of the content of this episode is embargoed, I can’t reveal much about it in case I end up like Ron Perlman’s character.
However, it does take us back a year to the late Home Secretary’s clever stunt with a deep fake TV interview and fills us in about Noah Pierson (Killian Scott) – his real identity, his earlier exploits and what that heart implant is all about.
“I’m a cog in a machine – and we cogs don’t always know what our fellow cogs are up to, or even who they are,” Pierson tells Rachel (Holliday Grainger). But why should she believe him when he’s lied so often?
Jane Rackham
Pilgrimage: The Road to Holy Island
Sunday 5 April, 9pm, BBC Two
The celebrity pilgrims in previous series have often walked religious routes through sunny Spain or Italy hoping to find out more about spirituality. However, this group are spending 12 rainy days hiking 290 miles from Whitby to Lindisfarne.
They have different beliefs. It could almost be the start of a joke – a Christian, an atheist and a Jew go for a walk – but, although this is entertaining at times, it’s a serious quest for enlightenment. Comedians Hasan al-Habib, an observant Muslim, and Ashley Blaker, formerly an orthodox Jew who still has strict Jewish beliefs, have especially interesting things to say about their religions.
Expect laughter, insights and some huffing and puffing, as well as honest discussions about faith. Continues tomorrow.
Jane Rackham
Star Wars: Maul – Shadow Lord
Monday 6 April, Disney+
If your only exposure to the Star Wars universe is the films, the premise of this series might be confusing. After all, the last time most people remember seeing Sith Lord Darth Maul was when he was chopped in half by Ewan McGregor’s Obi-Wan Kenobi in 1999’s Episode I: The Phantom Menace. So how is he back twirling that lightsaber?
Well, on the small screen he was resurrected – and given robot legs – in animated TV series The Clone Wars, and now Maul (he’s dropped the Darth) gets his own spin-off, in which he clashes with the evil galactic empire. A must-watch for die-hard fans.
Huw Fullerton
Ronan Keating's Wild Atlantic
Monday 6 April, 6:30pm, BBC Two
Wild, rugged and unpredictable may not be words that come to mind when you think of Ronan Keating, but it’s how the '90s boyband survivor describes the landscape of the Irish west coast, the real star of this charming travelogue. Feeling the call of his homeland since the tragic loss of his older brother Ciarán, Keating reconnects with his roots by exploring the area where Ireland meets the mighty Atlantic Ocean.
In the first of five nightly episodes, Keating is in Cork, the country’s largest southernmost county. The scenery is breathtaking, and Keating has fun with a spot of road bowling, taking on his professional footballer nephew Ruairí, and foraging for edible plants in a rewilding project. In a reflective mood, he visits Ireland’s first Tibetan Buddhist temple, where he confronts the grief for his sibling.
Johnathon Hughes
I'm a Celebrity... South Africa season 2
Monday 6 April, 9pm, ITV1
Lucky old Ant and Dec get two free holidays this year, with a spring edition of the jungle favourite joining their annual autumn trip to Australia. Back for a second all-star version after its 2023 debut, this series sees a greatest hits of previous campmates compete to be crowned the “ultimate legend” in the South African wilderness.
Although mostly prerecorded, a format tweak sees the grand final broadcast live from London – meaning viewers get a chance to vote for the winner. Bookies’ early tip is wheeler-dealing football gaffer Harry Redknapp. Also hotly fancied are former Goggleboxer Scarlett Moffatt and soap actor Adam Thomas. The field is completed by ex-Pussycat Doll Ashley Roberts, boxer David Haye, Coronation Street’s Beverley Callard, Olympian Sir Mo Farah, popstrel Sinitta, DJ Craig Charles, footballer Jimmy Bullard, comedian Seann Walsh and reality diva Gemma Collins – who lasted a mere three days on I’m a Celebrity... in 2014.
The intrepid dozen should know the drill by now – we’re promised “epic and extreme trials”. Best make sure you’ve finished your supper before tuning in.
Michael Hogan
Check out more of our Drama coverage or visit our TV Guide and Streaming Guide to find out what's on. For more TV recommendations and reviews, listen to The Radio Times Podcast.
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