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David Attenborough and the Queen
Branching out ... David Attenborough gets dendrologous with the Queen. Photograph: ITV
Branching out ... David Attenborough gets dendrologous with the Queen. Photograph: ITV

Monday’s best TV: The Queen’s Green Planet; Building Giants

This article is more than 6 years old

Sir David Attenborough teams up with Her Majesty to talk trees, while the geniuses behind Venice’s sea barrier get the respect they deserve

The Queen’s Green Planet

9pm, ITV
Sir David Attenborough teams up with Her Maj to talk trees. A wander around Buckingham Palace’s gardens puts the Queen at ease as the pair enjoy a friendly chat about the Commonwealth Canopy project, as part of which the royal family is planting trees in 53 countries. Princes William and Harry and Angelina Jolie are among the others involved. Also, veteran Labour MP Frank Field, who came up with the plan, talks about how hard it was to get various governments involved over the years. Hannah Verdier

Give It a Year

8pm, ITV
Casting off the shackles of employment for a self-employed existence may attract many would-be entrepreneurs, but the road to riches is riddled with wrecks. Karren Brady meets hopeful business owners ranging from the fastidious to the fantastical, returning to each a year later to discover whether business is booming or bust. Mark Gibbings-Jones

Secret Agent Selection: WW2

9pm, BBC Two
People like SAS: Are You Tough Enough?. They also like Back in Time for Dinner. Let’s mix them! It is episode two of the agreeable period-reality contest and the chaff has been weeded out: the survivors now face the sharp end of the training process for the SOE, Britain’s behind-Nazi-lines crack fighting force. Jack Seale

Building Giants: Venice Sea Wall

9pm, More4
New series offering a corrective to our tendency to take for granted the genius that underpins huge engineering projects. This episode looks at new infrastructure built to protect the old: the sea barrier that will prevent Venice from flooding to an undesirable degree. Andrew Mueller

The Walking Dead

9pm, Fox
Will it be Rick or treat? Season eight of the erratic zombie megahit has dealt tenderly with the death of a core character, while also becoming fitfully fixated on turnips. In tonight’s high-stakes finale, the scattered and knackered good guys try to finally neutralise bellicose biker gang the Saviours. Graeme Virtue

Waco Inferno: The Untold Story

10pm, Channel 5
The story of the 1993 siege of a Texan compound run by the Branch Davidian religious group still has the power to beggar belief. The standoff, which ended in a huge fire, left 75 people dead. This documentary explores David Koresh, the cult’s charismatic leader, and his rise from obscurity. Ben Arnold

Film choice

Aisling Walsh, the director of Maudie, with Sally Hawkins. Photograph: Allstar/Sony Pictures Classics

Maudie (Aisling Walsh, 2016), 3.20am Tuesday, Sky Cinema Premiere
Aisling Walsh’s biopic of Canadian artist Maud Lewis benefits greatly from the chameleon presence of Sally Hawkins. Living a hard life in rural Nova Scotia with prickly fishmonger Everett, Maud crafts her bright pastoral paintings, while her arthritis-afflicted body crunches ever tighter. Paul Howlett

Live sport

Cycling: Tour of the Alps Stage one, from Arco to Folgaria in Italy. 1pm, Eurosport 1
IPL cricket: Kolkata Knight Riders v Delhi Daredevils T20 action from Kolkata. 3pm, Sky Sports Main Event
Premier League football: West Ham United v Stoke City A relegation battle from the London Stadium. 7pm, Sky Sports Main Event

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