Documentary AreaSimply the best Documentaries

Ideas about time and space are explored in the changes that constellations undergo over time, the redshift and blue shift measured in interstellar objects, time dilation in Albert Einstein's theory of relativity, the designs of both Leonardo da Vinci and spacecraft that could travel near light speed, time travel and its hypothetical effects on human history, the origins of the Solar System, the history of life, and the immensity of space. In Cosmos Update, the idea of faster-than-light travel by wormholes (researched by Kip Thorne and shown in Sagan’s novel Contact) is discussed.

Professor Robert Bartlett explores the impact of the Normans on southern Europe and the Middle East. The Normans spread south in the 11th century, winning control of southern Italy and the island of Sicily. There they created their most prosperous kingdom, where Christianity and Islam co-existed in relative harmony and mutual tolerance. It became a great centre of medieval culture and learning. But events in the Middle East provoked the more aggressive side of the Norman character. In 1095, the Normans enthusiastically answered the Pope's call for holy war against Islam and joined the first crusade. They lay siege to Jerusalem and eventually helped win back the holy city from the muslims. This bloody conquest left a deep rift between Christianity and Islam which is still being felt to this day.

The final episode of the series visits the frontline of the conflict with the world's top predators, meeting the scientists fighting to save them. Crossing five continents and combining landmark natural history footage with real-life human drama, it checks the pulse of the earth's iconic animals, including lions, tigers, polar bears and blue whales. With three-quarters of the planet's carnivores now in decline, can people find ways to live with predators before they disappear forever?

Al Capone moves back to Chicago and takes over two floors of the city's finest hotel, the Lexington. With a thriving business and Chicago politicians in his back pocket, Capone soon reaches a level of celebrity normally reserved for athletes and entertainers. As Capone's profile grows, he begins to indulge in all that the Roaring '20s have to offer, including cocaine. While Capone enjoys his reign at the top of the Chicago underworld, Irish gangster Bugs Moran seeks to take him down as revenge for the deaths of his partners Dean O'Banion and Hymie Weiss. On March 7, 1928, Moran orders a hit on one of Capone's top associates, Jack McGurn, the man who took out Hymie Weiss. McGurn survives but Capone decides to retaliate by taking out Moran and as many of his men as possible - all at once. On February 14, 1929, Capone's men dress as law enforcement and raid the liquor buy. They order Moran's men to face the wall for handcuffing, but while their backs are turned, Capone's men shoot all of them. Firing 70 rounds of ammunition in less than 10 seconds, the assassins carry out the biggest gangland hit in American history that will come to be known as the St. Valentine's Day Massacre. Through a stroke of luck, Moran avoids the massacre, but knows he's been defeated.

China's last empire, the Qing, lasted from 1644 to 1912. It began in violence and war as the Manchus swept down from the north, but invaders became emperors, with three generations of one family ruling the country. Among them, Michael Wood argues, was China's greatest emperor - Kangxi. Under the Qing, China doubled in size to include Xinjiang in the far west, as well as Mongolia and Tibet, creating the essential shape of China today. The new dynasty tolerated a diversity of cultures and religions, including Islam. In Kaifeng, Michael visits a women's mosque with a female imam, a delightful scene that ends with laughter and selfies! The Qing also undertook huge cultural enterprises. At a traditional printing house where the wood blocks are hand-carved, we see how the Complete Tang Poems were reproduced - all 48,000 of them. We travel through the wintry countryside to a remote village where a hardy audience watch open-air opera in the snow and visit a painter's studio, and 'storytelling' houses in Yangzhou. In the 18th century, China was arguably the greatest economy in the world, and we get a fabulous sense of the rich culture that came with prosperity. But then came the clash with the British, in the first Opium War, when a British expedition destroyed the Qing navy and extracted territory and trading rights. We leave with a glimpse of the future. 'Every dynasty has risen and declined,' says Michael, 'and has needed new life to regenerate, and this time the catalyst was the British.' Among the ports China ceded was an almost uninhabited island, Hong Kong, one of today's greatest financial centres, and Shanghai, a small town then but now one of the greatest cities in world.

Jeremy Clarkson decides to open a farm shop to sell his own produce. This sounds like it should be easy. It isn’t. Discover the shortest farm shop business in history.