Don’t Panic – How To End Poverty In 15 Years
8pm, BBC2
Swedish statistician Hans Rosling revives the hologram graphs he employed to explain population growth on BBC2 two years ago, this time to look at the UN’s target of eliminating extreme poverty by 2030. Easy, insists the prof: we’re already doing better than you think, and re-targeting aid could finish the job. Case studies in Malawi and Cambodia reinforce what are, for an hour-long TV spectacle, rather simple points. You could sum it all up in five (admittedly important) paragraphs. Jack Seale
Doctor Foster
9pm, BBC1
Gemma’s plan swings into action right under Simon’s nose and he apparently has no idea what she’s up to. She sends out agents to find out what his mistress intends for the potential baby and consults a divorce lawyer on the best way to get what’s rightfully hers. Every effort and every friend is deployed in the polite screwing over of her cheating spouse. The strength of this is in Suranne Jones’s utterly plausible performance and restraint during the truly emotional moments, particularly tonight with the car keys. Splendid. Julia Raeside
Midwinter Of The Spirit
9pm, ITV
New three-part supernatural drama starring Anna Maxwell Martin as Merrily Watkins, a vicar with a remit a little more demanding than the stereotypical sermons and sandwiches. As one of Britain’s few female exorcists, Watkins is called to assist the investigation of a particularly gruesome ritualistic slaying, coaxing her towards Hereford’s satanic underbelly. A sufficiently engaging opener to a miniseries that unsurprisingly owes more to Swedish import Jordskott than The Vicar Of Dibley. Mark Giddings-Jones
The Engine That Powers The World: Timeshift
9pm, BBC4
Diesel engines. Boring. Not so, says former vet Mark Evans, a man seemingly at ease around even the wildest grease monkeys and whose documentary argues we need to recognise Rudolf Diesel’s invention as the driving force behind globalisation. Building his case, Evans explains why leaky petrol engines weren’t a good idea for powering submarines, manoeuvres a diesel shunter and sees an ultra-large marine engine, a vast machine that powers a vast container ship. Bigger fun than you might expect. Jonathan Wright
World Of Weird
10pm, Channel 4
Sarah Millican narrates this show in which millennial TV personalities seek out oddities across the globe – a sort of Vice lite if you will. Joel Dommett explores the Japanese “rent-a-family” industry putting the con in konichiwa, while Billie JD Porter ingratiates herself with an Indian man who has 39 wives. Also, Matt Rudge meets “doomsday preppers” in the US, and Michelle de Swarte visits the world’s largest My Little Pony convention. Amusingly odd, but packing this many items into an hour makes for quantity over quality. Hannah J Davies
Nurse Jackie
10.10pm, Sky Atlantic
This dark hospital drama had its finale in June, bringing its seven seasons tracking the trials of Edie Falco’s drug-addicted nurse to a close. Now, the penultimate series gets its UK premiere. Using again, Jackie is managing to conceal her relapse, appearing clean-living thanks to a pre-work exercise regime – the gym handily also being the place she scores. But one crack that can’t be so easily papered over is the rift between Jackie and her daughter, who has acquired some bad habits of her own. Rachel Aroesti
The Strain
10pm, Watch
The proliferation of vampire/dystopian-themed series of indeterminate length feels strained itself right now; this adaptation of Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan’s novel series has its thrills but the cliched, pulse-quickening soundtrack is sometimes tiresome. This week, Captain Kowalski’s team raid a housing development only for some of them to become infected, Eph finds himself in a stand-off on a train, while the mysterious landing of a plane at an isolated New Jersey airport alerts the authorities. David Stubbs
Film choice
Master And Commander: The Far Side Of The World (Peter Weir, 2003) 6.20pm, Film4
Weir crafts a wonderful seagoing adventure out of two novels from Patrick O’Brian’s peerless Aubrey-Maturin series. This is a truly ripping yarn of Napoleonic war, rolling on the heft of the ocean, but the heart of the film, just as in the books, is the joshing, bickering, loving friendship between Russell Crowe’s man of action, Captain Jack Aubrey, and Paul Bettany’s man of science, Stephen Maturin. Paul Howlett
Hard Rain (Mikael Salomon, 1998) 11.35pm, BBC1
Armoured car guard Christian Slater is up to his neck in it in this slick, entertaining action thriller. Morgan Freeman and his gang are after the $3m in the back of his truck, and he’s stuck in a soggy little midwest town with the flood waters rising. Meanwhile, stranded art restorer Minnie Driver needs a hand, and can local sheriff Randy Quaid really be trusted? Good soggy fun. PH
Today’s best live sport
Tennis St Petersburg Open Day three of the ATP event, held at the Silbur Arena in Russia. 6pm, British Eurosport
Capital One Cup Football Tottenham Hotspur v Arsenal Third-round league cup clash from White Hart Lane. 7pm, Sky Sports 1
World Cup Rugby Union Scotland v Japan Coverage of the opening fixture of the day comes from Kingsholm, Gloucester, where the Pool B rivals meet. Australia v Fiji follows (4.30pm, ITV) with France v Romania rounding things off (7.30pm, ITV4).
