Festive TV...My Arse!!

Thank god for Caroline Ahern and Craig Cash, the writers of the Royle Family, for sparing my insanity and boredom at what turned out to be the worst festive TV in living memory. Even the BBC, who normally provide practically all the Christmas entertainment and cheer, fell some way short of delivering the goods that Santa manages to do in just one evening.

So, lets start with the bad. Christmas TV is infamous for it's continuous repeats and films that were lost from the archives in the 1950's. Well this year, it took the christmas pudding. The Incredibles, is well....dull. And while in the early stages of Happy Feet, even Ebenezer Scrooge can't not love the baby penguin, it becomes a tad repetitive. And although the Pirates of Carribean is a good film, it is also one of the most overplayed. Especially, the second one Dead Mans Chest, which I saw twice at the cinema but have seen 20 times on the BBC since. Then the fact that the third one, At Worlds End, took up a whole fecking evening of television and meant I did the usual thing and switched to Dave, where they at least admit that they show endless repeats and feel no shame in doing so.

Then there was the Queen's Christmas Speech, where my family sat down to play the annual game of guessing how many times she will mention the Commonwealth (it was 13 by the way). Yet it is amazing how this sweet, old lady is still the staple in the Christmas TV diet.

For a few years now, Channel 4 have been doing an "alternative" Christmas message to rival the Queen, and this year it was the turn of a girl called Katie, a former model who has a badly scarred face after her ex-boyfriend threw acid over her. While the moral sentiments of being grateful for what you have cannot be questioned, 1) It doesn't fit with the festive cheer, and 2) they showed her programme later that night which too...was a fecking repeat.

The TV over the new year has been equally as atrocious. Apart from "The Big Fat Quiz of the Year", which always guarentees a laugh, the choice has been quite simply apalling. There was Generation XXL (Channel 4), a look at a bunch of overweight children and their 'journey' through childhood. What journey is that then? The one involving the McDonalds drive-thru? Spare me.

There have been a few bright spots. ITV's Fattest Man in Britain, starring Timothy Spall and Bobby Ball, was hilarious yet heartwarming in equal measure, but also tackled the issues of obesity and miscarriages with great care.

(Left - Fat vs Fatter. Generation XXL has been a huge MISS, but Fattest Man in Britain was a huge HIT)

Better still, and the best show on this Christmas was the Royle Family. While not quite as good as last years outing, this was still a festive cracker that had good jokes in it! Concentrating on Jim and Barbara's 50th wedding anniversary, their son Anthony presents them with a stash of cash (helpfully chipping in was Dave and Denise with £20). Rows erupt as Jim wants a HD Box set while Babs wants to go abroad for the first time. So they compromise and end in Wales. Alas, there is no chip fryer, so they end up going back home. That very short description cannot do the show justice. Maybe this short clip will.



So, the decades TV bowed out mostly without grace, and lets hope that the 'teenies' (is that what we will call them?) end better than the 'noughties'.