Telly Today: From pottery to the ice rink

TV highlights plucked from what the broadcasters have suggested is their best offerings this evening, January 17.

Dancing on Ice is back for a brand-new series. Phillip Schofield and Holly Willoughby once again return to present the show and the expert Ice Panel of Torvill and Dean, John Barrowman and Ashley Banjo will all resume their roles as judges.

The celebrities heating up the ice this year in the hope of winning the competition are musician and presenter Myleene Klass; actor Joe-Warren Plant; actress, singer and presenter Denise Van Outen; actress Faye Brookes and Capital Radio DJ Sonny Jay

This year also sees actor and singer Jason Donovan; Olympians Graham Bell and Colin Jackson CBE; TV personality Rebekah Vardy; musician Lady Leshurr; TV personality Billie Shepherd; actor and comedian Rufus Hound all taking to the ice.

Six of the celebrity skaters and their partners will compete in the series’ opener and the remaining six will compete in the following week’s show.

New Series: Dancing on Ice, ITV, STV and UTV, 6pm

Charles (Tahar Rahim), Marie-Andrée (Jenna Coleman) and Ajay (Amesh Edireweera) flee Bangkok for Nepal, where they scour the iconic hippie streets for victims in the fourth episode of this eight part series.

After Charles loses the group’s money in a card game, tension rises in the gang until Marie-Andrée overcomes her crisis of conscience to deliver Charles his next prey. The group flees on a frenzied trip around Asia, leaving destruction in their wake.

In March 1976, Nadine (Mathilde Warnier) helps Herman (Billy Howle) and Angela (Ellie Bamber) to accumulate evidence by taking undercover photos of the suspects and their private apartment. Will this be enough to convince Janthasin (Sahajak Boonthanakit) to raid Kanit House? And how safe is Nadine?

The Serpent, BBC One, 9pm

The battle of the clay continues in the second episode of the brand-new series of The Great Pottery Throw Down, hosted by Siobhán McSweeney.

12 of Britain’s best home potters compete to become champion. This episode is all about bricks and mortar as the 11 remaining potters slab-build a 3D building. And in a Pottery Throw Down first, judge Rich Miller tasks the potters to handmake bricks, as he and fellow judge Keith Brymer Jones decide who will be named potter of the week and who will be leaving the pottery.

The Great Pottery Throw Down, Channel 4, 7.45pm

Just over 30 years since the very first episode of Fresh Prince aired, Sky Comedy is having a Bell Air reunion with the good Fresh Prince himself.

This one-off documentary is bringing the Banks family back together to look back through the family album at the best of times shared together, if not always conventional.

The premise of the show, originally airing on NBC stateside, saw Will Smith as a street-smart teenager from West Philadelphia. While playing street basketball, Will misses a shot and the ball hits a group of gang members, causing a confrontation that frightens his mother, who sends him to live with his wealthy aunt and uncle in the opulent neighbourhood of Bel Air, Los Angeles.

Will’s working-class background ends up clashing in various humorous ways with the upper-class world of the Banks family – Will’s uncle Phil and aunt Vivian and their children, Will’s cousins: spoiled Hilary, entitled Carlton, and impressionable Ashley.

Join Will Smith and his former co-stars for a funny and heartfelt night full of music and dancing in
celebration of the show that ran for six seasons and 148 episodes.

The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air Reunion, Sky Comedy, 9pm