Tom Hardy’s Poaching Wars

Unlike ‘Caroline Quentin’s Dung Beetle Adventure’ and the like, this two-parter is more than a celebrity-fronted jolly to warmer climes and exotic fauna. To his credit, Hardy – even if he does get to mess around with some elephants – is here using his rapidly expanding profile to investigate the losing battle against rhino and elephant poaching in Africa.

He meets private anti-poaching militias, gamekeepers and journalists, who paint the same grim picture: well-meant but haphazardly directed efforts to counteract the ivory and rhino horn trades are largely locally funded and policed, even as their proceeds are used to bankroll global crime and even terrorism. Solutions are, perhaps unsurprisingly, thin on the ground, but Hardy asks sensible questions and gets honest answers, however unpalatable they may be.