Photograph: Guido Mandozzi/BBC/Monumental
Ghosts Christmas Special
7.45pm, BBC One
The final ever episode of this beloved sitcom begins with a scenario familiar to most new parents. Mike’s mum is staying for a few days to help Alison acclimatise to motherhood. A couple of months later, the couple are wondering if she’ll ever leave. Worse still, she’s sensed something unusual about Button House. A perfectly calibrated blend of humour and heart – you’ll want to have the tissues handy. Phil Harrison
Tabby McTat
2.35pm, BBC One
Julia Donaldson’s moving tale of the busker’s loud cat who becomes separated from his owner is brought to life beautifully in this animated treat. Jodie Whittaker narrates, Rob Brydon and Sopé Dìrísú play Fred and Tabby, and Susan Wokoma is feline love interest Sock. Children will love the story, while parents will wipe away a cremant-fuelled tear at the undercurrent of loss and love. Hannah Verdier
Doctor Who: The Church on Ruby Road
5.55pm, BBC One
The keys to the Tardis have been handed over and now it’s time for the new Doctor, Ncuti Gatwa, to take it for a spin. But first, he’ll need a companion. Enter Ruby Sunday (Millie Gibson) whose world changes when she encounters the Doctor and the mythical Goblin King. It’s the usual immersive sugar rush – but with Russell T Davies back at the helm, the show is more essential than ever. PH
Call the Midwife
8.15pm, BBC One
It’s Christmas 1968, Apollo 8 is orbiting the moon, Mrs Turner is contributing aid parcels to starving children in Biafra and, closer to home, a lonely man (Goodness Gracious Me legend Kulvinder Ghir) needs charity, too. All the while, Call the Midwife remains a masterclass in tonal balance: as earthy as a fresh-cut fir tree and as twinkly as the lights placed upon it. Ellen E Jones
The Piano at Christmas
8.45pm, Channel 4
One of the sweetest series of 2023 receives its first Christmas special. Highlights include surprise celebrities, a Secret Santa and, most movingly, the 13-year-old visually impaired and neurodivergent prodigy Lucy, joined at the piano by the Grammy-winning Gregory Porter. Ali Catterall
Caroline Aherne: The Queen of Comedy
10.25pm, BBC Two
An emotional rollercoaster of a documentary: a reminder of Caroline Aherne’s uncanny comic brilliance and the tragedy of her often difficult life and untimely death. Her career is recalled with the help of contemporaries including Steve Coogan, Henry Normal and Craig Cash – all of whom clearly feel blessed to have crossed her path. Aherne’s personal struggles are touched upon but there are also ample clips from her early standup sets, her bravura performances as Mrs Merton (look out for a memorably tetchy encounter with Bernard Manning) and, of course, The Royle Family, the timeless sitcom she created with Cash. Eventually, this feels more like a celebration of a remarkable life, albeit a bittersweet and by the end very moving one. PH
Film choices
The Super Mario Bros Movie, Sky Cinema Premiere, 9.45am, 4pm
After Barbie, The Super Mario Bros Movie grossed more than any other film globally this year. It isn’t hard to see why: this is a bright, fast, buzzy love letter to a character who hasn’t previously done very well when it comes to films. Like all the Mario games, the film is about a plucky plumber fighting a sort of mutant turtle. Happily, unlike the games, Princess Peach gets more to do than simply sit around waiting to be rescued. Stuart Heritage
The Addams Family 2, 12.55pm, BBC One
The series of animated Addams Family cartoons turned out to be unexpectedly entertaining. Featuring Oscar Isaac and Charlize Theron as pitch-perfect Morticia and Gomez Addams, this is a wild shaggy dog of a road trip story where the family travels America, Wednesday tries to work out if she’s adopted or not and Uncle Fester turns into a squid. Plus Snoop Dogg plays Cousin It, so that’s something. SH
Toy Story 4 (Josh Cooley, 2019) 3.10pm, BBC One
It’s not a sequel anyone needed, but this 2019 culmination of Woody’s story is so perfect it now feels like the obvious move. The jovial cowboy is still owned by Bonnie, along with Buzz and the other regulars, but he’s feeling neglected, especially when she makes a new favourite toy from a spork, named Forky (Tony Hale). But then a family road trip leads to Forky being kidnapped by a malevolent doll, Gabby Gabby (Christina Hendricks), and a reunion with Bo Beep (Annie Potts), who is now the leader of the “lost toys”. Simon Wardell
The Wizard of Oz, 3.10pm, Channel 5
Few films feel as if they were made specifically for being on in the background while you snooze off a Christmas lunch, but The Wizard of Oz – in all its wonderful timeworn familiarity – lives up to the job. Truly intergenerational, this will be the last time this film will be shown at Christmas, before next year’s Wicked adaptation steals its thunder. Embrace it. SH
Sing 2, 4.30pm, ITV1
Garth Jennings’s singing animal film had the potential to run out of steam early on, but the final result was so warm, and so weirdly moving, that a sequel was always inevitable. The formula remains largely unchanged here – lots of cartoon animals singing hits by Elton John, Billie Eilish and System of a Down – except now Bono plays a lion, obviously. SH
Titanic (James Cameron, 1997), 5.15pm, Film4
In that three-hour pause between Christmas dinner and whatever you can be bothered to reheat in the evening, here’s James Cameron with a cinematic amuse-bouche. It’s sweet, but not too sweet, and despite its length it won’t sit too heavily in your brain. Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio are the cherries on top of the sweeping drama as Rose and Jack, the class-defying lovers who meet-cute on the Atlantic liner, until the world’s largest ice cube puts paid to their canoodling. Find your nearest ship’s bow and join in the romance. SW
Home Alone, 5.30pm, Channel 4
For all the wild, life-threatening injury of the final third, there is an argument to be made that Home Alone contains the most perfect moment of any Christmas film. You know the one. Old Man Marley, in a church, fighting all the loss and regret of estrangement to secretly watch his granddaughter sing in a choir. It’s devastating. And then Joe Pesci gets his head set on fire. SH
The Trouble With Angels, 7pm, Talking Pictures TV
When Hayley Mills wanted to break out of the box she found herself in after years of starring in Disney fare, she chose this. The Trouble With Angels is a 1966 comedy about a pair of rebellious schoolgirls trying to avoid trouble at a convent school. Aside from a climax that is literally too preachy, this is a fun little jaunt. SH
Belfast, 1.45am, BBC Two
Kenneth Branagh has a complicated relationship with Belfast. He was born and spent the first 10 years of his life there, before his family moved to Berkshire to avoid the Troubles. Although he lost the accent, as part of a conscious attempt to assimilate, the city never left him. Belfast is Branagh’s love letter to his place of birth: a warm, joyous burst of nostalgia, shot in monochrome, set against a burbling disquiet. SH
