HD Heads-Up: November 21 – 27

TV2 will compensate for the pre-emption of Arrow and The Flash in the last week of November by screening the network movie premiere of Thor: The Dark World.

Neither superhero series will air in the week starting November 21 because each will be off-air that week in the US.

TV2 is replacing them with The Day I Almost Died (9.30 Wednesday), which it’s promoting as a “brutally graphic and shocking” account of people who survived horrific and bizarre accidents, and the self-explanatory Hoarding: Buried Alive (9.30 Thursday).

The Day I Almost Died has been culled from a Discovery series of the same name and will screen in HD, Hoarding in SD.

Ahead of Hoarding, TV2 will premiere the first of two Highway Patrol specials that catalogues “some of the funniest, craziest and downright dangerous moments from the first five seasons”.

And on Monday at 8.30, it will launch part one of another, two-part road madness special, Caught on Dash Cam.

TV1 is stripping MasterChef Australia 7.30 Wednesday-Saturday from November 25, which, because of its varying length, will push key 8.30 shows to post-9pm.

That week’s 800 Words will screen 9.15 Thursday while launching off the back of MasterChef’s premiere at 9.20 Wednesday will be Martin Clunes: Man and Beast ahead of The Island With Bear Grylls at 10.20. (Unfortunately, Man and Beast will be in SD.)

Also returning, for its third and final season, is Hannibal (TV3, 12.20am Sunday) while ending their runs are Hyundai Country Calendar, Last Tango in Halifax, Grand Designs New Zealand, Step Dave, The Player, American Crime and Funny Girls.

Guesting on The Graham Norton Show (TV3, 8.30 Friday) are Tom Hanks, David Walliams, Peter Capaldi and Duran Duran.

Meanwhile, Thor: The Dark World (8.30 Sunday) isn’t the week’s only network HD movie premiere: TV3 will debut another comic book adaptation, 47 Ronin, on Thursday at 8.30.

Other coming attractions in HD include: Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen (TV2, 7.00 Saturday), Shrek 2 (TV3, 7.00 Saturday), Premonition (TV2, 8.40 Saturday), Out of Time (TV3, 9.00 Saturday),  Extract (TV2, 10.40 Saturday), Brooklyn’s Finest (TV2, 1.30am Sunday), Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps (TV3, 10.30 Sunday) and Piranha (TV2, 11.45 Sunday).