The Doctor Who Christmas Special on BBC One, Christmas Day
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TV Choice: Festive look at Top Gear, Doctor Who and more (part 1)
December 22, 2010
Our square-eyed reporters, Hugh Fort and Mike Pyle pick their favourite festive shows.
The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe
BBC One, Thursday, 3.50pm
The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian
BBC One, Christmas Eve, 5.15pm
Whether you like these films depends on whether you like the books.
I found CS Lewis’ classic series mind-numbingly boring as a child and so this film didn’t grip me when I saw it last year.
The story sees a load of posh children with floppy side partings become embroiled in a war between good and evil in a magical land hidden in the back of their wardrobe.
There’s a lot of talking animals, none more so than Aslan the lion, leader of the goodies.
One of the children, the greedy Edmund, is tricked into joining the baddies, led by the evil white witch.
The film looks great, the animals are really well done, but there’s distinct religious connotations in the plot and if that isn’t your bag, you could well find it annoying.
Still, your nippers will love the talking animals. HF
The Snowman
Channel 4, Christmas Eve, 1.20pm
This is a classic that’s on every Christmas that everyone knows and loves – except me.
It is unusual for a cartoon in that the ending is sad. I won’t reveal it, but it’s the best bit.
Raymond Briggs’ Christmas classic features the song We’re Walking In The Air, sung by a very young Aled Jones, and focuses on a little boy who goes on a magical journey when his snowman comes to life. HF
The Muppet Christmas Carol
Channel 4, Christmas Day, 8.50am
The little darlings will have already been up for several hours by this time so, after they’ve opened and broken their new presents, plonk them in front of this and have a well-earned cup of tea.
This is Charles Dickens’ famous tale of Ebenezer Scrooge – with a Muppet twist.
Scrooge is played by Michael Caine, in his best role since Jaws: The Revenge – maybe.
Kermit and Miss Piggy are the Cratchits and naturally Gonzo as Dickens himself.
An accurate depiction of the story (as it can be with talking pigs and frogs) and some typical Muppet songs, this’ll keep ‘em quiet for ages. Well, until it ends at 10.30am. HF
Madagascar
Christmas Day, BBC One, 12.25pm
More talking animals here in a super-fun, cute, animation featuring the voices of Ross from Friends and Ali G.
The plot follows the story of a zebra and a lion who live the life of Riley in a zoo.
Ignoring the fact that one normally eats the other, life is cushty until the zebra decides he wants to go back to the wild, presumably because he misses the prospect of potential lion attacks.
They escape and end up on Madagascar, where they meet a range of unique characters, because the little African island has more unique species than anywhere else in the world.
Ross (real name David Schwimmer) voices a nervous giraffe and Ali G (Sacha Baron Cohen) is the mental king of the lemurs.
Strangely, it’s being shown at the same time most people will be tucking in to their turkey, possibly even as they think “I can really understand why we only eat this once a year”. HF
Top of the Pops Christmas Special
BBC One, Christmas Day, 2pm
The fight for the prestigious Christmas number one spot has been spoilt a bit with the emergence of The X Factor and the winner of that pretty much guaranteeing the top spot.
Well, that changed last year when an internet campaign meant the unlikely song of Killing in the Name Of by Rage Against the Machine pipped poor little Joe McElderry to the to number one. Sadly, it’s business as usual this year as Matt Cardle won by a country mile.
This looks at all the best music this year.
Lots of musicians I’ve never heard of will play their pop ditties before the countdown to the all-important number one.
Top of the Pops 2 is on on Sunday at 1am (it’s repeated from Tuesday), if you’re awake and you like terrible Christmas pap like Cliff Richard then enjoy. HF
Doctor Who
BBC One, Christmas Day, 6pm
This promises to be the highlight of Christmas Day, apart from EastEnders and the Queen’s speech, naturally.
I was sceptical of the last series as I still think of Jon Pertwee fighting giant maggots and the Sea Devils in 70s repeats.
But I was wrong, it was ace.
Matt Smith oozes geek chic as the new Doctor and his chemistry with girl-next-door redhead Amy Pond (Karen Gillan) brought the very sharp scripts and plots to life and made the whole thing thoroughly enjoyable.
This is the Christmas special and sees the Doctor embroiled in an intergalactic take on Dickens’ Christmas Carol story.
First the Muppets and now the Doctor, is the next Star Wars going to feature an alien Bob Cratchitt?
This promises to be an excellent way to pass an hour of Christmas Day.
When you’re full of booze and food and all your relatives have gone sit down and watch this. It’ll be a Christmas cracker (sorry). HF
Top Gear
BBC Two, Sunday, December 26, 8pm
The boys are back and, after a Christmas Day repeat which saw them bomb round America in fast cars, this time they’re pretending to be the three wise men.
The trio will do so in a trio of open top sports cars, each wholly unsuited to the conflict ridden mountains of southern Turkey, the dangerous warzones of Iraq and the searing deserts of Syria. HF
Charlie Brooker’s 2010 Wipe
BBC Two, Boxing Day (Monday, December 27), 10pm
Grouchy writer Charlie Brooker goes through what’s happened over the last year and basically runs it all down.
Freed from the shackles of his Screen Wipe column, Charlie has licence to pour his acerbic wit over everything in news, pop-culture and TV in this hour-long show. Few things escape his attention from the Chilean miners to the general election.
Now that he’s rich and famous, it can be difficult to see why Charlie is still so annoyed all the time but it’s easy to put that to one side because he’s so funny and he mostly says what we’re all thinking. MP
I Am Legend
ITV1, Bank Holiday Tuesday, (December 28), 9pm
At Christmas I think everyone gets to the point where they’ve watched all the festive specials they can take, they’re fed up of schmaltzy family films and repeats just don’t cut the mustard.
If, by Tuesday, you find yourself all Christmas-ed out, why not transport yourself to a world in the not too distant future where the human race has been pretty much wiped out and most of those who remain have been transformed into vampire/zombie-type creatures?
In I Am Legend, Will Smith plays the last human in New York, a scientist who is immune to the virus that has transformed everyone else into blood-thirsty nutters.
It does a passable job of illustrating the isolation he feels helped by a brilliant rendering of New York as it would look if left unattended for years. It’s a desolate wasteland, landmarks like Times Square are excellently depicted as overgrown and decaying.
It’s occasionally clumsy and some of the CGI is ropey enough to give it a B-movie-feel but not in the good-if-it’s-deliberate way like Starship Troopers. But overall it’s good fun and it’s about as festive as a deckchair. MP
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