
Michael Grade reveals the story of General Tom Thumb, the world's first global show business celebrity who went from humble beginnings in America to international superstardom.

In medical science, there’s been no longer harder fight than against malaria. This is the inside story of a historic new vaccine - from the Oxford lab behind the COVID jab.

Documentary telling the real story of the Cambridge Spies - subject of the drama series A Spy Among Friends.

As Brexit Britain prepares to draw up new rules on who is welcome here, Ian Hislop takes an entertaining and provocative look at the decades from the Victorian era to the First World War, when modern Britain introduced its first peacetime restrictions on immigration.

The extraordinary story of the most disturbing witch trial in British history and the key role played in it by one nine-year-old girl. Jennet Device, a beggar-girl from Pendle in Lancashire, was the star witness in the trial in 1612 of her own mother, her brother, her sister and many of her neighbours and, thanks to her chilling testimony, they were all hanged.

Professor Jim Al-Khalili looks at how we have created machines that can simulate, augment, and even outperform the human mind - and why we shouldn't let this spook us. He reveals the story of the pursuit of AI, the emergence of machine learning and the recent breakthroughs brought about by artificial neural networks. He shows how AI is not only changing our world but also challenging our very ideas of intelligence and consciousness. Along the way, we'll investigate spam filters, meet a cutting-edge chatbot, look at why a few altered pixels makes a computer think it's looking at a trombone rather than a dog and talk to Demis Hassabis, who heads DeepMind and whose stated mission is to 'solve intelligence, and then use that to solve everything else'. Stephen Hawking remarked 'AI could be the biggest event in the history of our civilisation. Or the worst'. Jim argues that AI is a potent new tool that should enhance our lives, not replace us.

An animation about a disabled penguin who lives on a rocky island in the southern seas where she feels isolated from the rest of her colony. She is inventive, resourceful and tough but frustrated about what she cannot do.

A sharp, witty, mind-expanding and exuberant foray into the world of logic with Computer Scientist Dave Cliff. Following in the footsteps of the award-winning The Joy of Stats and its sequel, Tails You Win - The Science of Chance, The Joy of Logic takes viewers on a new Wingspan roller-coaster ride through philosophy, maths, science and technology all of which, under the bonnet, run on logic. Wielding the same wit and wisdom, animation and gleeful nerdery as its predecessors, this film journeys from Aristotle to Alice in Wonderland, Sci-Fi to Supercomputers to tell the fascinating story of the quest for certainty and the fundamentals of sound reasoning itself.

How to have a happier life and a better world all thanks to maths, in this witty, mind-expanding guide to the science of success with Hannah Fry. Following in the footsteps of BBC Four's award-winning maths films The Joy of Stats and The Joy of Data, this latest gleefully nerdy adventure sees mathematician Dr Hannah Fry unlock the essential strategies you'll need to get what you want - to win - more of the time. From how to bag a bargain dinner to how best to stop the kids arguing on a long car journey, maths can give you a winning strategy. And the same rules apply to the world's biggest problems - whether it's avoiding nuclear annihilation or tackling climate change.

A witty and mind-expanding exploration of data, with mathematician Dr Hannah Fry. This high-tech romp reveals what data is and how it is captured, stored, shared and made sense of. Fry tells the story of the engineers of the data age, people most of us have never heard of despite the fact they brought about a technological and philosophical revolution.

Ian Hislop presents this film about the colourful, seriously wealthy Victorian financiers whose spectacular philanthropy shows that banking wasn't always associated with greed or self-serving financial recklessness. Ian looks at attitudes to money and morality when the London first became the world's financial centre.

Inspired by the poetry of Edwin Morgan where natural and domestic worlds collide and the hidden animal instincts of humans rise to the surface, this poetic visual narrative features voices from interviews recorded around the UK, woven into an evocative soundtrack. Stop motion puppets and live action footage combine to tell a dark love story.

In a post-pandemic world, a grieving young widow struggling with her own self-destruction, fights to save people as part of a crisis response team. Embedded with the fire department, she is battling the men who don't want her there, the clients who fight her tooth and nail, and her own wounded psyche. She wants to save the world, if the job doesn't kill her first

An audio-driven animated documentary covering a day of life in Yorkshire.

The illustrator and author paints scenes from a 70-year-long career, including his work with Roald Dahl. With David Walliams, Joanna Lumley, Peter Capaldi, Ore Oduba and Michael Rosen.

Frank told a bad joke at his new place of work. Nobody laughed. Now at 3am in the morning he is unable to sleep as he obsesses and ruminates over this social faux-pas, leading him to ponder on the nature of memory itself.

Malaria is one of the most deadliest diseases worldwide: more than half a million people die from it every year, most of them are children under the age of five. So far there has been only an approved vaccine, which was expensive, but was not available. Now the world is facing a turning point in the fight against malaria ...

This animation takes place in a ravaged London street in the midst of war. Between mounds of rubble and bomb craters stands the house of a lonely old blind man. Late one night he receives three unexpected visitors.

Inspired by the loneliness experienced by older people in our society, Ladder to You is an insight into the life of Eric, an old man dealing with the loss of his wife. We follow Eric’s day-to-day life and become immersed in the solitude he is trying to overcome. Through his feelings and memories of better times we get to see what it’s like for the thousands of old people who live every day without any human contact. Ending with a message that love can beat despair, Ladder to You can also hopefully inspire people to give a little more time to the older folk who live amongst us.
Richard Alwyn's intensely moving film, inspired by the experience of his brother-in-law, follows two stroke survivors who can no longer take language for granted.

Presented by Victoria Coren, it was companion to the Oxford English Dictionary's Wordhunt, in which the writers of the dictionary asked the public for help in finding the origins and first known citations of a number of words and phrases. The OED panel consisted of John Simpson, the Chief Editor of the OED; Peter Gilliver, who was also the captain of the Oxford University Press team in University Challenge - the Professionals; and Tania Styles, who also appeared in "dictionary corner" in Countdown.

An exploration of the history of bohemians - weird and wonderful artists and writers who have chosen to defy convention, from radical romantics to sandal-wearing vegetarians and sexual-experimenters.

Ian Hislop explores the British obsession with the past. He reveals how and why, throughout our history, we have continually plundered 'the olden days' to make sense of and shape the present.

Ian Hislop asks when and why we British have bottled up or let out our feelings and how this has affected our history.