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Last night's viewing - The Greatest Shows on Earth, Channel 4; Rick Stein's India, BBC2

Who says television teaches you nothing? For example, I now know, though sadly do not exemplify, the Second Rule of the Beautiful Bottom, as explained by a plastic surgeon on one of Brazil's more popular television shows. Let your arms dangle by your sides... now, "the first metacarpal bone should be in line with the infra gluteal fold". Or in layman's terms, the first bone of your thumb should be level with the horizontal crease below your buttocks. The First Rule of the Beautiful Bottom, in Brazil at least, appears to be If You've Got It Flaunt It, which explains MissBumBum2012, the buttockular talent show that was Daisy Donovan's first port of call in The Greatest Shows on Earth, a new series about global telly.

Elizabeth Woodville in The White Queen

TV review: The White Queen is less historically plausible than Game of Thrones (despite being ostensibly true)

The White Queen, Sun, BBC1 // Goodbye Granadalan, Sayt, ITV

Matt Butler: As English as warm beer, as Scots as Douglas Jardine

View From The Sofa: Sport Nation, BBC2
Atherton felt compelled to defend his former methods

Sport On TV: Are pundits warned to avoid hard-hitting commentary?

So it wasn’t two o’clock in the morning and he wasn’t wearing a funny wig – that was Lasith Malinga – but how many times has Kumar Sangakkara wound up England now?

Paul McVeigh once played a match when he was still drunk from the previous night out

Read all about it: The Stupid Footballer Is Dead

England's footballers have again had their brain cells called into question after flopping in Israel. But now help is at hand: former professional Paul McVeigh has written them a self-help book

Radio review: Between The Ears, Radio 3, Saturday

Obsessively taping your conversations with a particular person is a suspiciously weird pastime – unless you're an artist. Sebastiane Hegarty is, and his decades' worth of recordings of his mother constitute a powerful exploration of the human condition.

It began here: Oliver Stone's series gives an account of US foreign policy since 1945

Television review: The Iraq War - It's the alternative history boys

Unsure of global politics since the war? Don't worry, Oliver Stone has it all sewn up

Thomas roaming in his garden with a cat-cam

TV review: Compare Your Life, Channel 4/
Horizon: The Secret Life of the Cat, BBC2

I hadn't heard of the "science of comparison" before last night. As far as I'm aware no Nobel Prizes have been issued in this field and there doesn't appear to be a Centre for the Science of Comparison in Oxford or Leeds or anywhere else for that matter. But I'd certainly heard of it after watching four minutes of Compare Your Life, because the programme's presenter, Carlton Hood, had already used the phrase three times.

TV review: The Iraq War, BBC2

Whatever else it has done, The Iraq War, Norma Percy's three-part history of the conflict and its aftermath, has greatly increased our understanding of diplomatic prevarication. Every colour in the spectrum of mendacity makes an appearance in these programmes, from the infra-red of the outright lie to the ultra-violet of polite euphemism.

Child Genius Michael
British comedian John Oliver had plenty of material to draw upon for his first week as guest host of the popular satiric news programme in the United States

TV review: John Oliver takes over at The Daily Show without host Jon Stewart

The new chap was nervous, certainly, but no less funny than his boss

Will Mellor in Dates, Channel 4

TV review: The Returned, Channel 4

Terror in the Skies, Sunday Channel 4

Michael Dunlop in action at the Gooseneck during Practice of the Isle of Man TT

Matt Butler: Fetch me my cords, the TT bikers have taken the island

View From The Sofa: Isle of Man TT, ITV4

Once again, we find bullying bound up as ‘banter’ in The Call Centre

Television review: The Call Centre - The oily boss with a touch of Brent crude

A real-life documentary from a UK office shows a Gervais-style mix of toxic bullying and pranks

 

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