Monday's best TV: Monkman and Seagull’s Genius Guide to Britain, Elementary and Strangers

On the road to nowhere: rival University Challenge captains Eric Monkman and Bobby Seagull
BBC/Label1 Television/Ryan McNamara
Katie Law @jkatielaw17 September 2018

Eric Monkman became a social media sensation last year after winning the semi-final of University Challenge.

As captain of Wolfson College, Cambridge, the Canadian economics student and his team saw off rivals, Emmanuel College, Cambridge, only to be beaten in the finals by Balliol College, Oxford. No matter.

As much as Jeremy Paxman’s boffin-off was a battle of superior knowledge, speed and intellect, what really captured the public’s attention was Monkman’s nerdy manner, intense facial expressions, furrowed brow and fierce staccato delivery when answering questions. The camera loved him. Gogglebox loved him. #Monkmania trended on Twitter.

Almost as popular was the cutely named Bobby Seagull, Monkman’s opponent, who captained the Emmanuel team.

The diminutive but dapper maths graduate had charisma, cool clothes and a winning smile. The two of them, who revealed they had become friends as the show progressed, were clearly heading for stardom. So when they sealed a book deal — The Monkman and Seagull Quiz Book came out last October — getting their own TV show was only a matter of time.

Following the format of the duo travel show, where two “personalities” are sent tootling round the countryside to riff off one another (think Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon or Andrew Graham Dixon and Giorgio Locatelli) Monkman and Seagull have been cast as a pair of genii, exploring the “hidden scientific gems” in Britain. “They’ll feed their insatiable curiosity and discover things even they didn’t know,” narrator Simon Callow tells us in fruity tones.

Selfie: Eric Monkman and Bobby Seagull at Jodrell Bank Observatory
BBC/Label1 Television/Bobby Seagull

Tonight (BBC2, 8pm) they begin their voyage of discovery in the North of England, in Blackpool, with Seagull at the wheel of a blue Mini Cooper, Monkman huddled beside him. “Apparently, one of the differences between the South and the North is that the bricks are a different colour,” Monkman observes. “Curiosity is an approach to life… and these are what you call, terraced houses?” “Yes,” replies Seagull. “Would all these houses be old then?” “Yes.” And so on.

Conversation perks up when they get to Blackpool Pleasure Beach, “the oldest operating fair ground in Europe” to try out the captive flying machines ride, designed in 1904 by Sir Hiram Maxim, inventor of the first portable machine gun. Cue Monkman and Seagull spinning around, Monkman explaining the principles of centrifugal force and Newtonian mechanics.

Pictured: Eric Monkman and Bobby Seagull
BBC/Label1 Television/Ryan McNamara

From here they go to Southport, to the British Lawn Mower Museum, where early examples of spinning blades intrigue them. “At the time it would have been one of the few machines a man would bond with,” explains owner and lawn-mower enthusiast, Brian. At the Emley Moor transmitting station in Yorkshire the pair show off their trigonometry skills by calculating the height of the tower using nothing more than a protractor, a piece of string and a notebook and pen. They then work out its height by calculating the speed versus time it takes to travel to the top in a lift. They take selfies in “the smallest museum in the world”, housed in a red telephone box and ponder the possibilities of extra-terrestrial life in a telescope at the Jodrell Bank Observatory.

But none of their observations is especially nuanced or perceptive. Nor is there sufficient chemistry between them. Seagull is obviously meant to be Monkman’s stooge, but they both seem more interested in rattling off what they do know, rather than learning about something they don’t. This approach may have been a winning formula for University Challenge but here in the big wide world, it makes them appear oddly ignorant and naive.

Pick of the day

Elementary - Sky Witness, 9pm

As Watson to Jonny Lee Miller’s updated Holmes, Lucy Liu has helped to redefine Arthur Conan Doyle’s detective stories.

Holmes is a recovering drug addict working with the New York Police Department, with Watson as a former surgeon who has been assigned to assist Sherlock in his rehabilitation. The show is now in its sixth series, and Liu directs this episode, in which a killer appears to be choosing his victims based on the predictions of a dead man, Norman P Horowitz, who claimed to be able to foresee the deaths of others.

Worryingly, one of his visions included the murder of Holmes, a thought that causes the great detective to start musing on his will, while also spending most of the episode in a white tuxedo.

Case: Jonny Lee Miller, Jon Michael Hill
CBS

Tom Everett Scott returns to the screen as Henry Baskerville, Holmes’s wealthy former client.

Liu has suggested that the long-running success of Elementary goes back to the literature that inspired the show’s creator, Rob Doherty.

And this episode proves that the Sherlock formula still has plenty of life in it.

Screen time

Strangers - ITV, 9pm

In part two of this high-gloss conspiracy thriller, hoodie-wearing Professor Jonah Mulray (John Simm) continues his quest. Last week his life was up-ended when his wife, Megan (Dervla Kirwan), was killed in a car-crash in Hong Kong. When Mulray arrived in this neon-saturated corner of China he found a city torn between its past and its future. He also discovered that his wife had been living a double life.

Things don’t improve much for the bleary-eyed prof this week, as he tries to convince David Chen (Anthony Wong) that Megan may have been killed. There’s an audible gunshot on her last tearful phone message, which may be a clue. “Let us have it analysed by a forensic technician,” someone suggests, helpfully.

The New EastEnders - London Live, 10pm

Gentrification, to some, is a plough driving through swathes of London, grinding its character into the ground and burying it under another glass tower or never-before-seen coffee shop. This reshaping of London is not new — this series meets those at the start of the new millennium as they react to Hackney and Shoreditch becoming fashionable.

Mud Men - Tonight, London Live, 8pm

West Ham fans aren’t alone in blowing bubbles after their first win of the season yesterday, because this evening Johnny Vaughan and Steve Brooker pucker up to craft replicas of much-sought after glassware. The difference being, we suppose, is that it hasn’t cost them £100 million for the pleasure.

In a root around Surrey Quays the duo excavate a torpedo bottle from the 19th century, this artefact being their entry into the Victorian history of boozing and why the pair end up have their breath taken away by glassware. After all this effort they’re rewarded with in-depth research into the era’s cocktails; research which requires learning about the state of London when it was sodden with gin and how the pub evolved...

Deep Dish

Thirteen - BBC iPlayer

Jodie Comer is currently dazzling as the glamorously blank assassin Villanelle in Killing Eve but she made a big impression in this 2016 drama about a girl who escapes from her kidnapper after 13 years in captivity. Comer’s character, Ivy, is a feral girl who knows little about the family she has returned to, and struggles to cope with normal life. Her sister even harbours doubts about her identity.

Serial box

Aggretsuko - Netflix

Served up in 15- minute episodes, this anime series follows the work adventures of a cute panda, Retsuko, who gets over the drudgery of her life in a Tokyo accounting firm by visiting a death metal karaoke bar at night. The visuals are sweet but the plots are aimed at adults. Retsuko’s boss is a pig (“My desk is a pigsty!”) who is also a male chauvinist. That’s perfect viewing for a Tube commute, but watch out for the horses on the train.

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