A Time to Live
9pm, BBC2
“This is not a film about death and dying,” says Sue Bourne. “This is a film about living.” She talks to 12 terminally ill people about what having months to live has taught them. It’s impossible to watch without tears, but ultimately life-affirming. Everyone offers some inspiration: from Lisa encouraging her teenage daughters to carry on without her to Steve being “too stubborn” to take antidepressants. Expertly and sensitively handled, without being morbid or cliched. Hannah Verdier
Trust Me, I’m a Vet
8pm, BBC2
Steve Leonard, with more advice for animal lovers as this series concludes. Tonight’s episode includes a investigation of canine behaviour by Judy Puddifoot. Can we anticipate aggression by understanding warning signs? Elsewhere, the show explores the mental and physical health of cats. Is fish-based cat food a good idea? And do we jeopardise moggies’ mental health by making them live with other cats? Various feline stress-solutions are pondered and tested. Mark Gibbings-Jones
Isis: The Origins of Violence
9pm, Channel 4
Historian Tom Holland explores the philosophical underpinnings of Islamic State’s fondness for grotesque and apparently gratuitous spectacles of violence – and in so doing, takes a measure of issue with the idea that none of this is anything to do with Islam. As Holland sees it, Isis’s hideous snuff movies are – in its interpretation – a modern iteration of an ideology of jihad and caliphate rooted in the foundations of the faith. Andrew Mueller
Michael Mosley vs the Superbugs
9pm, BBC4
Infections such as TB are becoming resistant to the drugs used to fight them. An “antibiotic Armageddon” that could claim 10 million lives a year beckons. What to do? Michael Mosley explores the latest research in a fascinating, if scary, documentary that begins with the “rather spooky” notion of creating a lifesize model of the presenter in agar and using it as a “giant Petri dish” for cultivating bacteria harvested from his own body. Jonathan Wright
The Murder of Rhys Jones: What Happened Next
10pm, Channel 5
Following ITV’s gut-wrenching Little Boy Blue, this investigation looks at what happened following the senseless murder of 11-year-old Rhys Jones. Interviews with friends of the Jones family, police who worked on the case and the trial, and politicians who dealt with the fallout tell the story of the boy who was tragically caught in the crossfire between gangs on the Croxteth Park estate in Liverpool on a summer’s day in 2007. Ben Arnold
Your Face Or Mine
8pm, Comedy Central
Was anyone really demanding a reboot of the early-2000s E4 gameshow inspired by the Am I Hot Or Not internet craze? Here it is anyway, with Katherine Ryan and original host Jimmy Carr inviting couples to nuke their relationship by rating the relative sex appeal of celebs, strangers and each other for cash prizes. Judging by the fun opening double bill, it’s funnier and more spontaneous than the similarly looks-obsessed Take Me Out. Graeme Virtue
Public Enemy
10pm, Sky Atlantic
The second part of this soberly gripping Belgian drama sees the police investigate the discovery of a young girl’s body lying serene and dead in a church, and a familiar marking on her corpse. Naturally, suspicion falls on the recently released child serial killer and psychopath Guy Béranger, being rehabilitated in a nearby monastery, but could there be an alternative explanation for the crime? Meanwhile, Chloé’s disturbing flashbacks continue to haunt her dreams. David Stubbs
Film choice
Things to Come (Mia Hansen-Løve, 2016) 10.10pm, Sky Cinema Premiere
The life emotional and the life intellectual are uneasy bedfellows in Hansen-Løve’s elegant drama. Isabelle Huppert is philosophy teacher Nathalie, mellowed since her anarchist youth and now dealing with an errant husband (André Marcon’s Heinz) who leaves her for another woman, her needy mother (Edith Scob), and feelings for her young student Fabien (Roman Kolinka). But what really upsets is when her publishers want to relaunch her long-running textbook. It’s a superbly performed, fascinating study of a middle-age life in flux.
The Omen (Richard Donner, 1976) 10pm, Syfy
When people call young Damien a little devil, they ain’t kidding: the adopted son of American ambassador Gregory Peck and Lee Remick is the son of Satan. This is quality horror that’s scary without being overly gory, Ave Satani screeching in the background and a cast (including David Warner, Billie Whitelaw, Leo McKern) that takes it seriously.
The Debt (John Madden, 2010) 1.25am Thursday, Channel 4
This tough remake of a 2007 Israeli thriller stars the characterful trio of Helen Mirren, Ciaran Hinds and Tom Wilkinson as retired Mossad agents obliged to revisit their stalking of a Nazi war criminal in 1960s East Berlin, which made them heroes: except that the official version masked a terrible cock-up. The cold war action is recounted in flashback, where Jessica Chastain, Sam Worthington and Marton Csokas play the three. Paul Howlett
Live sport
Cycling: Giro d’Italia 12noon, Eurosport 1. Coverage of the 11th stage of the Grand Tour race, from Firenze to Bagno di Romagna.
IPL Cricket 3pm, Sky Sports 1. The eliminator play-off match as the big money Indian T20 tournament approaches a climax.
Championship Football: Sheffield Wednesday v Huddersfield Town 7.30pm, Sky Sports 3. The play-off semi-final second leg from Hillsborough.
