Monday, December 23, 2024

TV tonight: Park Chan-wook’s adaptation starring Hoa Xuande and Robert Downey Jr

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The Sympathizer

9pm, Sky Atlantic
Park Chan-wook’s adaptation of Viet Thanh Nguyen’s Pulitzer prize-winning novel follows a French Vietnamese communist spy, the Captain (Hoa Xuande). Held in a North Vietnamese re-education camp, he writes his story – from his time in the special police before the fall of Saigon (now Ho Chi Minh City) to being a refugee in the US, all while reporting to the people keeping him captive. It’s an ambitious production, which also stars Sandra Oh and Robert Downey Jr. Hollie Richardson

D-Day 80: We Were There

9pm, BBC Two
Rachel Burden gathers remarkable first-hand accounts from the British veterans involved in the Normandy landings 80 years ago. As they tell their tales in thorough detail, archive footage helps bring to life the reality of what they endured. “Shortly, I saw the outline of France – and that was the first time the adventure ceased to be an adventure,” says one. HR

Dispatches: Kill Zone – Inside Gaza

9pm, Channel 4
After the 7 October attack, a top Israeli military official said: “Hamas has opened the gates of hell into the Gaza Strip.” Filmed over 200 days by a team of Palestinian journalists, this is an utterly harrowing but necessary record of what has happened since, featuring heartbreaking testimony from children, doctors and forcibly displaced civilians. Ellen E Jones

Dara O’Briain with a pyramid. Photograph: Jaimie Gramston/Channel 5 Television

Mysteries of the Pyramids With Dara Ó Briain

9pm, Channel 5
“I call this episode Pyramids: You Had One Job!” The host’s evident enthusiasm for his subject elevates a breezy exploration of ancient architectural marvels. This week sees Ó Briain back in Cairo to hear about the battle of wills between lofty pyramid architects and crafty tomb raiders keen to redistribute pharaonic wealth. Graeme Virtue

Cumbria’s Red Squirrels

9pm, BBC Four
No lush valley or magnificent forest is left unfilmed by this delightful documentary, profiling the squirrel community’s auburn underdogs. As well as the mighty Cumbrian landscape, the other outstanding supporting character is Sarah, a dedicated conservationist whose hand-rearing of an abandoned baby squirrel is a labour of love. Jack Seale

The Jinx: Part Two

9pm, Sky Documentaries
You’d say this was the final act in a truly extraordinary saga, but even after Robert Durst’s death, it’s hard to be totally confident of that. This concluding episode explores the aftermath, and there’s plenty to sort out. What was behind the decision of Durst’s wife, Debrah, not to testify? And does the fact that Durst’s conviction was vacated posthumously mean that even in death, he escaped justice? Phil Harrison

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