The WORST episodes of Channel 4 (UK) Documentaries
Every episode of Channel 4 (UK) Documentaries ever, ranked from worst to best by thousands of votes from fans of the show. The worst episodes of Channel 4 (UK) Documentaries!
Channel 4, in common with the other main British stations, airs a highly comprehensive range of programming. It was established in 1982 with a specific intention of providing programming to groups of minority interests, not catered for by its competitors, which at the time amounted to only the BBC and ITV.
#1 - Russian Spy Assassins: The Salisbury Attack
Season 2018 - Episode 16 - Aired 3/26/2018
Matt Frei explores the poisoning of Russian Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in Salisbury, searching for clues to potential motives that could explain why the former British double agent was targeted. The search takes him into the murky world of espionage, politics and crime, examining whether the latest chapter in a number of suspicious deaths of Russians on British soil could all be linked. The Kremlin denies it, but were these simply tragic endings or brazen state-sponsored assassinations?
#2 - How to Get Fit Fast
Season 2018 - Episode 25 - Aired 5/25/2018
With warmer weather on the horizon, the idea of stripping off the layers and getting beach-body ready can be intimidating. How can you get your exercise and weight loss plans back on track? Anna Richardson and Amar Latif continue their mission to help viewers find out the exercise that's right for them, bust the exercise myths, and offer shortcuts and hacks based on up-to-date scientific research. Anna heads to the Peak District with her four-legged friend Tig, to find out how hill walking offers a great physical workout as well as being good for mental wellbeing too. Amar investigates high altitude work outs without leaving the gym, as he finds out how hypoxic chamber training can increase your calorie burn by up to 26%.
#3 - Hitler's Favourite Royal
Season 2007 - Episode 53 - Aired 12/6/2007
Hitler's Favourite Royal is the extraordinary but little known royal story of the British prince who became a convicted Nazi. Prince Charles Edward was Queen Victoria's youngest grandchild. Brought up at Claremont House and educated at Eton until he was 14, Charles Edward was forced by Queen Victoria to take up the Dukedom of Coburg in Germany after a series of unexpected deaths of uncles and cousins. Transformed overnight from a British Prince to a German Duke, the course of his life was altered in ways he could never have imagined as he found himself in the wrong place at the wrong time. Narrated by Oscar-winner Tilda Swinton Hitler's Favourite Royal features interviews with one of the Duke's grand-daughters who had never spoken publicly about him before.
#4 - Mo Salah: A Football Fairy Tale
Season 2018 - Episode 24 - Aired 5/22/2018
This compelling documentary charts Liverpool footballer Mo Salah's rise from humble origins in Egypt to shooting to world stardom in the English Premier League and the Champions League.
#5 - My F-ing Tourette's Family
Season 2018 - Episode 22 - Aired 5/1/2018
Cameras follow Hayley and Richard Davies-Monk, and their sons Spencer, 13, and Lewis, nine. They're an Oxfordshire family who confront the daily challenges of living with the boys' Tourette's syndrome, the neurological disorder expressed in uncontrollable physical and verbal `tics' that can include inappropriate or taboo phrases
#6 - The Transylvanian Job
Season 1997 - Episode 2 - Aired 7/7/1997
Two avid metal detectors head out to Transylvania looking for Dacian treasures.
#7 - Fatberg Autopsy: Secrets of the Sewers
Season 2018 - Episode 21 - Aired 4/24/2018
There's an epidemic of fatbergs under Britain's streets. But why? A team of experts analyse one of the biggest ever seen, revealing the nation's dirty secrets.
#8 - The Elephant: Life After Death
Season 2011 - Episode 46 - Aired 2/16/2011
Elephants can live for seventy years. But what happens when one of these magnificent beasts dies in the wild? This stunning film turns normal wildlife documentaries on their head to find out what happens after death, as a five ton adult elephant is transformed into six million calories worth of fat, meat and guts, feeding a whole new cycle of life. The documentary gives scientists the chance to watch close up, day and night, as animals from leopards, hyenas and vultures, to flies and beetles, take just days to reduce the largest land animal on earth to bare bones. Biologist Simon watt leads a team of experts watching the events unfold in Tsavo West National Park in Kenya. They will be following the action as never before, using remote cameras and night vision equipment under the supervision of animal behaviour expert, Warren Samuels. The elephant, a young adult male, had to be put down by a vet after being mortally wounded by ivory poachers. But his remains will provide a feast for the local ecosystem and a new source of research. Raptor expert, Simon Thomsett, is keen to study the behaviour of local vultures, whose increasing timidity could mark a shift in the food chain. Meanwhile big cat expert Alayne Cotterill is treated to the incredibly rare sight of leopards feeding on the elephant and insect expert Dino Martins marvels as flies and maggots swarm across the body and attract other predators in their turn. The eye-opening documentary is a unique insight into a natural spectacle that reveals how life has adapted to reap the bounty of death.
#9 - Paradise Hunters
Season 2018 - Episode 20 - Aired 4/17/2018
Two millennials hand in their notice and leave their friends and family behind to start very different jobs in far-flung locations. Katie turns her back on her role in London distributing music videos to work on a ranch set in 550,000 acres of wild land in Mexico. And Charlie leaves his call centre job in Brighton and the comforts of his mother's house, to become a salmon farmer on a remote Scottish loch
#10 - The Million Pound Holiday Club
Season 2018 - Episode 18 - Aired 4/2/2018
Four celebrities are thrown into the gold-plated world of luxury reportage, as they're assigned to review holidays and experiences that most of us could only dream of. Comedian Rob Beckett jets off to private island Petit St Vincent, while friends Fred Sirieix and Kelly Brook attempt to eat their way through 10 Michelin Stars in one day, on a gourmet food challenge in Paris. And Fun Lovin' Criminal Huey Morgan teams up with Hollywood stunt driver Ben Collins for an eccentric race in the British countryside with some of the world's most expensive vintage cars. The celebrities are reporting back to luxury lifestyle magazine Lusso's editor Robert Clayman, but will the lavish perks of the job distract them from their task?g.
#11 - Are You Autistic?
Season 2018 - Episode 17 - Aired 3/28/2018
A documentary challenging what people think they know about autism, exploring myths surrounding the condition and examining what living with autism is really like in the UK today. Anna Richardson, whose nephew has recently been diagnosed, and campaigners Georgia Harper and Sam Ahern, who are both autistic, set out to uncover the true face of autism in the UK, working closely with charities, experts and people from across the spectrum. In a unique experiment, a team of leading experts have agreed to adapt their research exclusively for the programme, and test two adults who think they are in need of a diagnosis.
#12 - 4 Men, 175 Babies: Britain's Super Sperm Donors
Season 2018 - Episode 26 - Aired 5/29/2018
Documentary following four men who have collectively helped to conceive more than 175 babies by donating their sperm to women who contacted them on unregulated websites and social media groups. These men, who donate for free, will often drive hundreds of miles to meet women at their homes, hotels or even car parks. For those featured, donating sperm sits somewhere between an obsessive hobby and addiction. Filmed over a year, cameras reveal the lengths these men will go to, as well as the potential consequences of their actions
#13 - Britain's Polar Bear Cub
Season 2018 - Episode 15 - Aired 3/18/2018
Behind the scenes at the Highland Wildlife Park near Kingussie in Inverness-shire, following efforts to breed the nation's first polar bear cub for 25 years as keepers mate Arktos with Victoria. Cameras reveal the highs and lows of the staff's attempts to breed one of the world's most recognisable and endangered animals
#14 - The FGM Detectives
Season 2018 - Episode 13 - Aired 2/27/2018
Filmed over two years, this documentary examines female genital mutilation, which is estimated to affect 137,000 women and girls in England and Wales. Reporter Cathy Newman investigates.
#15 - Working with Weinstein
Season 2018 - Episode 11 - Aired 2/20/2018
Under criminal investigation in Britain and the US, expelled from Bafta and the Academy of Motion Pictures, Harvey Weinstein's fall from grace has been swift since allegations of sexual abuse and harassment emerged against him last October. This programme hears testimony from those who worked with him across over 30 years of British film, and investigates how he kept his accusers quiet for decades.
#16 - X-Rated: The TV They Tried to Ban
Season 2005 - Episode 5 - Aired 3/6/2005
Documentary charting the most controversial TV moments of the last 40 years. Introduced by Tim Roth.
#17 - Lost Cities of the Maya Revealed
Season 2018 - Episode 9 - Aired 2/11/2018
This documentary has exclusive access to the startling results of a massive research project that is revealing an ancient hidden civilisation in the jungles of Central America and transforming what we thought we knew about the Maya. The Guatemalan jungle is one of the last great frontiers of archaeology. It's a tough and remote place to work in, and the sheer challenge of excavation has kept many remains of the ancient Maya civilisation who lived there hidden from view. Their spectacular ancient cities are pin-pricks in the dense jungles of Guatemala and Mexico. But now archaeologists have an extraordinary 'treasure map' of the Maya world. A cutting-edge aerial survey has made over 60,000 new discoveries that are astounding archaeologists. According to archaeologist Tom Garrison, this is the greatest advance in our understanding of the Maya in over 100 years, and it's being used alongside the latest in-ground archaeology, while complex Mayan inscriptions are also being deciphered.
#18 - The World's Most Luxurious Airline
Season 2018 - Episode 8 - Aired 2/12/2018
A look behind the scenes as Singapore Airlines bid to create a whole new level of opulence for first class travellers
#19 - My Millionaire Migrant Boss
Season 2018 - Episode 7 - Aired 2/7/2018
In this programme, Liverpool-based Palestinian and multi-millionaire Marwan Koukash offers four unemployed people a unique opportunity - a two week work trial, overseen and mentored by him. Can the British workers prove they have the right ethic and attitude to be offered a job at the end of the placement?
#20 - The Bulger Killers: Was Justice Done?
Season 2018 - Episode 6 - Aired 2/5/2018
For the first time since the murder of James Bulger in 1993, this documentary speaks to key individuals involved in the trial, to ask whether justice was truly served.
#21 - Can You Rebuild My Brain?
Season 2018 - Episode 4 - Aired 1/30/2018
When Lotje Sodderland was 34, her brain was permanently damaged by a stroke that almost killed her. It fundamentally changed her and how she saw the world but it also left her fascinated with the science that saved her life. In this documentary, Lotje meets neuroscience pioneers: scientists who are using the latest knowledge to repair 'broken' brains and developing ground-breaking treatments for everything from Parkinson's and Alzheimer's to autism. But as the brain is a complex organ and neuroscience is still in its infancy, Lotje examines the risks as well as the rewards associated with fixing something that we don't yet fully understand.
#22 - The Shopping Centre: Artist in Residence
Season 2018 - Episode 35 - Aired 8/5/2018
Artist Rachel Maclean spends a month living in Birmingham's Bullring Shopping Centre, meeting shoppers and staff and making an extraordinary new piece of art
#23 - Massacre at Ballymurphy
Season 2018 - Episode 43 - Aired 9/9/2018
Massacre at Ballymurphy is a forensic exposé of one of the most shocking and significant events of the troubles in Northern Ireland: a series of killings the British Army stand accused of which took place over three days in West Belfast's Ballymurphy estate in 1971. Among the 11 who died were a priest who was attending another man who had been shot, but survived - and a mother of eight children. This important film presents evidence suggesting that, contrary to the claims of the army at the time, all of the victims were innocent and unarmed. The families of the dead accuse Britain's elite Parachute Regiment of carrying out the shootings, the same regiment which, less than six months later, was to shoot dead 13 unarmed people on what became known the world over as Bloody Sunday.
#24 - Spying on my Family
Season 2018 - Episode 42 - Aired 9/6/2018
One family gets to see into every corner of each other's lives, with every social media post and text message laid bare and cameras tracking their every move
#25 - The Extreme Diet Hotel
Season 2018 - Episode 41 - Aired 9/5/2018
“We will whip you into shape and you will say thank you and pay us [£750] for the privilege!” Not the demand of a dominatrix, but the greeting offered by formidable weight-loss guru Galia Grainger to new arrivals Kirsty, Tony and Liam at Slimmeria, AKA Britain’s poshest fat camp. Laughter, tears and real results.
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