The WORST episodes of Channel 4 (UK) Documentaries

#1 - D-Day: The King Who Fooled Hitler

Season 2019 - Episode 18 - Aired 5/5/2019

In a tale of double agents and decoys, this documentary reveals, for the first time, the story of King George VI's elaborate ruse to divert German attention away from the Normandy landings in 1944

#2 - Battle of the Super Eaters: 3,000 Calories a Minute

Season 2019 - Episode 27 - Aired 6/13/2019

#3 - My Gay Dog and Other Animals

Season 2019 - Episode 26 - Aired 6/6/2019

Documentary setting out to explore same-sex behaviour in animals, which has been reported in more than 1,500 species and was even observed by the ancient Greeks and Egyptians. Traditional evolutionary theory cannot explain the purpose of being gay. So how are we to explain such behaviour? Scientists give their thoughts, including the difficulty of separating so-called `dominance' behaviour from pure sexual interactions, while a commercial sheep breeder reveals how some rams are exclusively homosexual, and no good to his business.

#4 - Guy Martin's D-Day Landing

Season 2019 - Episode 25 - Aired 6/2/2019

To mark D-Day's 75th anniversary, Guy Martin restores a Dakota plane, undergoes brutal training with the Red Devils parachute display team, and parachutes into the Normandy countryside.

#5 - The Final Mission: Foxy's War

Season 2019 - Episode 24 - Aired 5/30/2019

Former elite Special Forces soldier Jason Fox embarks on a highly personal journey back to Afghanistan, nearly a decade after he last set foot in the country where he endured harrowing combat experiences during multiple tours of duty. Afghanistan both defined Jason as a soldier and made him the man he is today. He spent more than three years fighting in a war that saw some of the fiercest battles in modern British military history. He saw friends killed and seriously injured in combat, and narrowly escaped death multiple times. This left him with a punishing personal legacy: PTSD. Because of this, Jason was discharged from the Special Forces and made to leave behind the life and job he loved. Now he's attempting to understand this complex country and the people he was sent to help. He meets old friends and former enemies, and asks whether the sacrifices were worth the traumatic legacy that he, the Afghan people and many of his fellow soldiers have been left to endure.

#6 - A Very British Sex Shop

Season 2019 - Episode 22 - Aired 5/27/2019

This eye-opening documentary follows the extraordinary Richardson family, who run a chain of sex shops in Brighton.

#7 - Carry-Ons at the Castle

Season 2019 - Episode 20 - Aired 5/19/2019

This film documents life at Bickleigh, England's oldest inhabited castle - witness to a thousand years of bloody wars, revolting peasants and blue-blooded aristocrats. Today, owners Sarah and Robbie Hay run the Devonshire castle as a top wedding and events venue. But in an age where the customer is always right and the staff working downstairs are no longer willing to be lorded over by those upstairs, can they hold it together for the all-important summer season? Key members of their team include Sarah's cousin John, who runs the B&B and is Bickleigh's unofficial online reviews handler, and groundskeeper, barman and all-round handyman Richard, who lives on site. With so much at stake for Sarah and Robbie, and endless jobs to do, things don't always run smoothly between the owners and Richard, who freely admits he is not a 'yes man'.

#8 - Klopp vs Poch: Battle of the Supermanagers

Season 2019 - Episode 23 - Aired 5/30/2019

As Liverpool and Tottenham prepare for the Champions League final, this insightful documentary examines their managers' methods and outstanding man management.

#9 - The Hunt for Jihadi John

Season 2019 - Episode 21 - Aired 5/20/2019

Documentary telling the inside story of Mohammed Emwazi's journey from an ordinary London boy to becoming terrorist 'Jihadi John', and the intelligence operatives' attempts to catch him.

#10 - Roads from Hell Caught on Camera

Season 2019 - Episode 19 - Aired 5/16/2019

Jaw-dropping real-life footage, from the funny to the dramatic, reveals exactly what can go wrong when we venture onto the roads.

#11 - The Great San Francisco Earthquake

Season 2006 - Episode 23 - Aired 1/28/2006

In April 1906, San Francisco was destroyed by earthquake and fire. Thousands were killed, and tens of thousands were left homeless. But three years later the city had been rebuilt. This film looks at the destruction and rebirth of San Francisco, and how this great natural disaster became a part of American folklore. Here is a spectacular and highly emotional account of this unforgettable event.

#12 - Hunt for the Arctic Ghost Ship

Season 2019 - Episode 28 - Aired 6/4/2019

Secret History has exclusive access behind the scenes of the momentous expedition that found HMS Erebus: the Royal Navy ship that disappeared in 1845 while searching for the Northwest Passage.

#13 - The Curry House Kid

Season 2019 - Episode 17 - Aired 4/29/2019

At their height there were 12,000 curry houses in Britain, the vast majority run by Bangladeshi immigrants. Akram Khan's father was one of them, and he expected his son to inherit the family business. But Akram had other ideas: he wanted to dance. Now he's one of the world's leading dancers and choreographers. This film sees Akram return to the curry houses of his childhood, meeting the chefs who created this culinary institution in the face of hostility and, often, violent racism. Exploring their stories of immigration, this effortlessly global artist comes face to face with his own past, his family history and the reasons why he became a dancer. All of this is woven into a poetic new piece of dance that tells a universal story - the immigrant experience in Britain.

#14 - Inside Jaguar: A Supercar is Reborn

Season 2019 - Episode 16 - Aired 4/27/2019

Car enthusiast Mark Evans is witness to the resurrection from scratch of the XKSS, a legendary lost supercar from the 1950s and one of the most sought after cars in the world.

#15 - Britain's Viking Graveyard

Season 2019 - Episode 15 - Aired 4/21/2019

A mass Viking grave has been found in a Derbyshire garden. It reveals the extraordinary stories of female Viking warriors and new evidence of a massive military encampment.

#16 - The Massacre That Shook the Empire

Season 2019 - Episode 14 - Aired 4/13/2019

Writer Sathnam Sanghera explores the events leading up to 1919's Jallianwala Bagh massacre, in which hundreds of peaceful protesters in Amritsar, India, were gunned down by British troops. Sathnam explores the profound implications of the massacre on modern attitudes to the British Empire, and travels to Punjab to meet descendants of the survivors.

#17 - The Escort Agency

Season 2006 - Episode 22 - Aired 8/9/2006

#18 - Torture: The Guantanamo Guidebook

Season 2005 - Episode 25 - Aired 2/28/2005

Guantanamo Guidebook films seven British volunteers - three Muslims and four white Britons - locked up in a makeshift detention center at a warehouse in east London as they are subjected for over a period of 48 hours to a range of torture techniques known to be used at the Guantanamo Bay by US interrogation experts, Reuters said. The show, produced by the Production company Twenty, is seeking answers on whether the torture methods applied by US investigators at the US navy base in Cuba, Iraq and Afghanistan can be justified in efforts to combat terrorism. We want the viewers to watch techniques that we know are used at Guantanamo and really to raise questions about whether torture is justified and if it works and what does it say about our values as a western society, a spokesman for the British station told Agence France Presse (AFP) Tuesday, on condition of anonymity.

#19 - Can I Improve My Memory?

Season 2019 - Episode 13 - Aired 3/22/2019

Fashion guru Gok Wan, reality TV star Joey Essex and veteran presenter Valerie Singleton each want to improve their memories, so accept the challenge of a unique contest in which they must memorise hundreds of facts. The aim of the competition is to encourage them to master new memory techniques taught by world memory grandmaster Mark Channon. Gok Wan learns the periodic table. Valerie Singleton studies UK grime artists. And Joey Essex swats up on William the Conqueror. Whose memory comes out on top?

#20 - Skeletons of the Mary Rose: The New Evidence

Season 2019 - Episode 12 - Aired 3/17/2019

A unique, cutting-edge scientific investigation reveals surprising new information about the crew of Henry VIII's favourite warship, redefining what we thought we knew about Tudor England.

#21 - Ice Age: Return of the Mammoth

Season 2019 - Episode 11 - Aired 3/3/2019

In the wilds of northern Siberia, a team of international scientists search for the frozen remains of long extinct beasts. Could their findings lead to the return of the woolly mammoth?

#22 - Opus Dei and the Da Vinci code

Season 2005 - Episode 24 - Aired 12/12/2005

#23 - George Clarke's Council House Scandal

Season 2019 - Episode 38 - Aired 7/31/2019

George Clarke embarks on a campaign to kick start a housing revolution, and attempts to uncover the reasons behind the steep decline in affordable council house building. George meets visionary architects of the past, and visits the best and worst examples of housing on offer, and a trip to Vienna - where social housing can come with indoor and outdoor pools - proves inspirational for his housing vision for the future. Back in the UK, George challenges government to reform housing policy, before taking matters into his own hands on his campaign to kick start a new wave of council house building.

#24 - 50 Years of the Troubles: A Journey Through Film

Season 2019 - Episode 47 - Aired 9/1/2019

Mark Cousins presents a personal perspective on the Northern Irish Troubles through the prism of film, revealing how his passion for cinema was fuelled by his formative years in Belfast.

#25 - Britain's Extreme Weather: Superstorms & Heatwaves

Season 2019 - Episode 46 - Aired 8/26/2019

Tornadoes, torrential rain, lightning storms, flash floods and a record breaking temperature of 38.7C. We haven’t even reached the end of August yet. This programme features archive footage, personal stories and striking visuals of Britain’s recent heatwave. We delve into the latest science and ask why this is happening. Is this part of a developing global pattern of record extreme weather, and as a country, can we cope? With 15 of the 16 hottest summers on record occurring since 2001, we look at climate change and its link to severe weather events – exploring how they are likely to hit harder and more often in the years ahead. The unfolding scene at Whaley Bridge has prompted deeper questions on how prepared we are for these potentially devastating changes to our climate. Can our ageing infrastructure – with damaged dams, melting roads, buckled railways and burst sewers – cope with this ever more brutal onslaught? What effect will this have on our agriculture and the cost of living? How will we live in our overheated cities? We examine calls from many climatologists to change our lifestyles – now. If we’re going to press pause on Britain’s extreme weather, what practical steps can we take to help stop this climate crisis destroying Britain?