Documentary series going beyond the theatre doors of Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham, where surgeons push medical boundaries to the limits.

Explored through the lenses of the four natural elements – fire, water, air and earth – COOKED is an enlightening and compelling look at the evolution of what food means to us through the history of food preparation and its universal ability to connect us. Highlighting our primal human need to cook, the series urges a return to the kitchen to reclaim our lost traditions and to forge a deeper, more meaningful connection to the ingredients and cooking techniques that we use to nourish ourselves.

Hayley Pearce (the Tea Lady from “The Call Centre” and a typical twentysomething) explores the issues that affect her generation today.

Through the prism of Jeff Goldblum’s always inquisitive and highly entertaining mind, nothing is as it seems. Each episode is centered around something we all love — like sneakers or ice cream — as Jeff pulls the thread on these deceptively familiar objects and unravels a wonderful world of astonishing connections, fascinating science and history, amazing people, and a whole lot of surprising big ideas and insights.

A Vicar’s Life goes behind the scenes of the lives of country vicars at the heart of the rural community in the stunning Herefordshire countryside. From opening fêtes to marrying local couples, vicars are knitted into the fabric of country life, acting as a pillar of support in times of crisis and personal sorrow.

Each episode features stories from across the county giving a closer perspective on rural life, as seen through the eyes of the church. Village fetes, shooting drives, and local issues – all served up with a heavy dose of humour, charity, and inspiring local leadership.

War as never seen before. Soldiers recount their experiences in one of the worst places of Afghanistan through helmet cameras and testimony years after their tour.

Witness the crime busting techniques and forensic science used by the FBI to break the most baffling cases. From crime scene analysis to the most up-to-date laboratories, FBI agents relentlessly comb through mountains of evidence to narrow their search, ultimately prevailing over the perpetrators and bringing them to justice.

Viewers go deep into an Alaskan winter to meet six tough and resilient residents as they try to stay one step ahead of storms and man-eating beasts to make it through to spring. The closest neighbor to Sue Aikens is more than 300 miles away. Eric Salitan subsists solely on what he hunts and forages. Chip and Agnes Hailstone catch fish for currency in bartering for supplies, and Andy and Kate Bassich use their pack of sled dogs for transportation.

A two-night, four-hour primetime television event documenting the fascinating lives of the British royal family, featuring an extraordinary panel of experts and voices. Explore pivotal moments in the crown’s history beginning with a simple question: How exactly did we get here?

In the frontier town of Nome, Alaska, there’s a gold rush on. But you’ve never seen gold mining like this before — here, the precious metal isn’t found in the ground. It’s sitting in the most unlikely of places: the bottom of the frigid, unpredictable Bering Sea. And there are a handful of people willing to risk it all to bring it to the surface.

Ordinary people reveal their terrifying experiences with the paranormal through photographs, audio recordings, video evidence and chilling reenactments.

Vice is a documentary TV-series created and hosted by Shane Smith of Vice magazine. Produced by Bill Maher, it uses CNN journalist Fareed Zakaria as a consultant, and covers topics such as political assassinations, young weapons manufacturers, and child suicide bombers using an immersionist style of documentary filmmaking. It aired on HBO in April 2013. Rolling Stone wrote that the show “feels a little like your buddy from the bar just happened to be wandering through eastern Afghanistan with a camera crew.”