Here's everything you'll be watching on TV this Christmas
Along with mince pies for breakfast, pouring an obscene amount of gravy on your plate and beating your competitive nephew at charades (it’s all in the name of fun), Christmas TV is another of those magnificent things we can look forward to in December.
The festive season is one of the best times of the year for TV, when the airwaves are packed with the best family friendly entertainment everyone – from under 10s to over nineties – can sit down and enjoy together. A tough ask, these days!
So look forward to settling in on the sofa with family and friends, a newly opened box of Quality Street atop your lap (does anything beat the sound of cracking the lid open for the first time?) and diving into one of these festive shows…
BBC ONE
Gavin & Stacey Christmas special 2024
James Corden and Ruth Jones have put their heads together for one last hurrah as Smithy and Nessa, having penned a final Christmas special of their iconic show Gavin & Stacey for 2024.
The news was announced in May, when James took to Instagram to share a photo of him and Ruth with a script, along with the caption: "Some news… It’s official!!! We have finished writing the last ever episode of Gavin and Stacey. See you on Christmas Day, BBC One. Love Ruth and James.”
It follows the last Christmas special in 2019, which aired ten years after the previous series ended. The 2019 special left us on the edge of our seats with the mother of all cliff hangers: Nessa proposing to Smithy in the street. Did he say yes? Did they get married? Plot details for the 2024 Christmas special are under strict wraps, of course, but on behalf of the nation we sincerely hope we finally get an answer!
Official cast details haven’t been confirmed, but we can probably safely assume the main cast will return: Mathew Horne as Gavin Shipman, Joanna Page as Stacey Shipman, James Corden as Neil ‘Smithy’ Smith, Ruth Jones as Vanessa Shanessa ‘Nessa’ Jenkins, Larry Lamb as Mick Shipman, Alison Steadman as Pam Shipman, Rob Brydon as Bryn West and Melanie Walters as Gwen West.
Watch Gavin and Stacey: The Finale on Christmas Day on BBC One and BBC iPlayer.
Call The Midwife Christmas special 2024
The Call The Midwife Christmas special is one of the most looked forward to events in the festive TV calendar. Excitingly, this year's festive offering marks a series first, as it's the first time the Christmas special is being split across two 60-minute episodes, instead of the usual 90-minute format.
Plot details are always kept under close wraps, but there’s plenty to whet our appetite on the Call The Midwife official Instagram page, having shared photos of cast members on set filming the special episode. There have been no official photos released of Helen George as her character Trixie in the Christmas special, but we do know she hasn’t officially left the show, so it’s anyone’s guess as to whether she’ll return from New York City to make a surprise appearance.
In April, it was confirmed that 2024’s festive special would be set in Christmas 1969, making it the last episode to be set in the sixties, as 2025’s season 14 will then take place in 1970.
There’s also been a picture released of Miss Higgins (Georgie Glen) surrounded by dozens of Brussels sprouts, but no explanation as to why there are quite so many! We’ll have to tune in to find out.
Watch the Call The Midwife Christmas special this Christmas on BBC One and BBC iPlayer.
Doctor Who Christmas special 2024
Ncuti Gatwa returns as the fifteenth doctor in this year’s Christmas special, which also excitingly stars Bridgerton’s Nicola Coughlan in a guest role.
Written by former Doctor Who showrunner Stephan Moffat, the festive episode is called Joy To The World, and a sneak peek was revealed at San Diego Comic-Con this summer, in which we see Nicola’s character Joy meet the Time Lord for the first time.
Speaking about the 2024 Christmas special, showrunner Russell T Davies said in July: “Now the Doctor voyages forward, and guess what always happens to the Doctor every so often - Christmas! Here comes Christmas.
“I can't give away much more but work has begun on it already, and it's mad, it's one of the maddest Christmas specials you'll ever see. It's epic, it goes to so many different places. And it's a great story of who the Doctor is when he's alone.
Watch Doctor Who: Joy To The World this Christmas on BBC One and BBC iPlayer.
Outnumbered Christmas special 2024
After an eight-year hiatus, the Brockmans are back for a festive special.
We don’t know much of the storyline for now, but the BBC has confirmed the episode will “follow the chaos in the downsized home of Pete and Sue Brockman, as they grapple with the challenges of parenting kids who are now adults, with their own lives to lead.”
It sounds like it will be hilarious as ever, and we know that at least one of Sue and Pete’s children have had children of their own. “In a moment of adversity, Sue and Pete gather all their offspring (including one grandchild) to try and celebrate a traditional family Christmas. But fate, neighbours, hyenas and bus replacement services get in their way.” A classic Brockman family Christmas, then?
The stars of the original award-winning comedy will return for the special, including Hugh Dennis as dad Pete, Claire Skinner as mum Sue, Tyger Drew-Honey as eldest son Jake, Daniel Roche as the middle child Ben, and Ramona Marquez as the daughter, Karen.
Watch the Outnumbered Christmas special this Christmas on BBC One and BBC iPlayer.
Wallace and Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl
Everyone’s favourite inventor and his dog make a very welcome return to our TV screens this Christmas, in their first full length feature film in 19 years since BAFTA and Academy Award-winning The Curse of the Were-Rabbit.
Featuring the return of the iconic supervillain Feathers McGraw (a manipulative and calculating penguin), the 70-minute feature film by the multi-award-winning studio Aardman sees “Gromit’s growing concern as Wallace becomes over-dependent on his inventions - which proves justified when Wallace invents a ‘smart gnome’ that seems to develop an evil mind of its own.”
Watch Wallace and Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl this Christmas on BBC One and BBC iPlayer, and on Netflix from 3 January.
Tiddler
For the 12th year running, the BBC takes another of Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler’s popular children’s books and adapts it into a half-hour animated special, with a stellar voice cast to boot.
“Tiddler is the story of a small grey fish with a big imagination who gets lost in the deep wide ocean, until he’s saved by his own storytelling,” write the BBC. The cast is led by Ted Lasso’s Hannah Waddingham as the narrator, Lolly Adefope (Ghosts, Saltburn) as Miss Skate, Jayde Adams (Alma’s Not Normal) as Plaice and other characters, plus Rob Brydon (Gavin and Stacey) returns for his twelfth Donaldson adaptation in the multiple voice roles of Fisherman, Whale, Starfish and Anchovy.
“Every day Tiddler tells a different story to his teacher and his friend Johnny Dory about why he’s late for school,” reads the BBC press release. “His stories stretch from riding on seahorses or swimming around a shipwreck to being captured by a squid! His stories are so great that word of mouth helps them travel through the ocean and so, when Tiddler gets lost, he realises they may help him find a way home.”
Read more about everything we know about Tiddler, and watch it this Christmas on BBC One and BBC iPlayer.
Death in Paradise Christmas special 2024
Following Ralf Little’s departure from the show in March this year, 2024’s feature-length Christmas special of the twisty murder mystery series will be viewers’ first look at his replacement, Don Gilet, who plays the show’s new lead detective, Detective Inspector Mervin Wilson.
Not much is known about the new character yet, except that he arrives on the idyllic island of Saint Marie from London and isn’t overly pleased with his new surroundings.
We’ll have to wait to tune in this Christmas for all to be revealed, but we can be sure that, as ever, the much-loved show will offer “the perfect cocktail of sun-soaked escapism, shimmering seas and clear blue skies.”
Watch the Death in Paradise Christmas special this Christmas on BBC One and BBC iPlayer.
Beyond Paradise Christmas special 2024
Just as loved as Death in Paradise’s spin-off series, Beyond Paradise, and fans can look forward to an exciting Christmas special this year.
As one of the BBC’s (and the UK’s) most popular dramas – 7.5 million people tuned into the first episode of series two earlier this year – the 2024 Christmas special will be just as anticipated as the news that the series is returning for a series 3 in 2025.
No plot details have been revealed yet, but with series two culminating in Humphrey and Martha very nearly tying the knot, and welcoming foster child Ryan into their home, we hope to catch up more in this heartwarming story. Meanwhile, we can rest assured that the Shipton Abbott police team are being kept busy as ever – but what mysterious cases will they have to crack at Christmas, we wonder?
Watch the Beyond Paradise Christmas special this Christmas on BBC One and BBC iPlayer.
SKY/NOW
Bad Tidings
Lee Mack (The 1% Club) and comedian-turned-Strictly Come Dancing contestant Chris McCausland (The Wonders Of The World I Can’t See) star in this hilarious Sky Original festive comedy drama about two feuding neighbours.
A press release reveals that Bad Tidings revolves around “grumpy home-security expert Neil (Mack) and his neighbour Scott (McCausland), who insists on keeping his Christmas lights illuminated all-year-round. And mixing up their bins, criticising Neil’s ‘project’ car and generally winding him up. Basically, Scott’s a git. He’s also blind and all the other neighbours think he’s great.”
When their tit-for-tat argument culminates in Neil triggering a street-wide power-cut on Christmas Eve, Neil and Scott are left to guard the street. “But the local crime family decide to rob every house on the street in a single night, and the pair must set aside their differences to defeat them.”
Sounds like comedy gold to us.
Watch Bad Tidings this Christmas on Sky Max and NOW.
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