Charlie Cooper’s Myth Country: Winter Solstice
10pm, BBC Three
A festive special with a decidedly pagan twist as This Country star Charlie Cooper embarks on another gentle but earnest investigation of the ancient myths and rituals that underpin Britain’s calendar. Charlie is a little disillusioned with modern attitudes to Christmas, so he explores everything from a barrel-burning festival in Devon to a morris dancing event in Surrey. What he finds is that, just under the surface, our collective attachment to these celebrations remains surprisingly strong. Phil Harrison
Country Music Christmas
9.05pm, BBC Four
With its endless potential for everything to go stilts-up, Christmas lends itself perfectly to a genre marinated in heartbreak. Big country names belt out festive classics, including co-hosts Amy Grant and Trisha Yearwood’s Santa Claus Is Coming to Town in authentic Nashville style. Ali Catterall
The Graham Norton Show
10.40pm, BBC One
It’s not just the individuals sitting on the sofa who matter, but how they interact. Look out for any rivalry between Hollywood heart-throbs Timothée Chalamet (playing Bob Dylan in A Complete Unknown) and Andrew Garfield, promoting his new romantic drama We Live in Time. Plus, Icelandic artist Laufey performs her new single, Christmas Magic. Ellen E Jones
Return to Paradise
8pm, BBC One
Neighbours legend Peter O’Brien (AKA Shane Ramsay) pops into the Australian-set detective show as the suave bad boy of the local lawn bowls scene, then pops out again when his character is shot, seemingly with an inoperable antique weapon. To solve the mystery, Mackenzie (Anna Samson) unpicks a family history loaded with shame. Jack Seale
Only Child
9pm, BBC One
The warm comedy continues, and while trying to organise a surprise 75th birthday party for his dad, Ken, Richard struggles to find many friends who are still alive to attend. Luckily, an old pal makes a reappearance, armed with sweet stories of the past – before Richard gets a potentially life-changing call. Nicole Vassell
The Young Offenders
9.30pm, BBC One
For all that he’s an idiot, Conor always wants what’s best for his mum. So agreeing to mind a gun for a local character named Jack Hammer isn’t his smartest move, particularly in the run-up to Christmas. Lairy but fun, The Young Offenders remains a rough diamond with a heart of gold. PH
Film choices
The Six Triple Eight (Tyler Perry, 2024), Netflix
Perry’s rousing, revisionist second world war drama tells the true story of the 6888th Central Postal Directory Battalion – the only US women’s army corps unit of colour to serve overseas during the conflict. Their job, led by Major Charity Adams (a forthright performance by Kerry Washington), is to sort out 70m pieces of backed-up mail to and from the troops, a poisoned chalice they grasp with weary resolve in the face of racist opposition. A tale of courage and conflict, where the enemy is your own side. Simon Wardell
Citizen Kane (Orson Welles, 1941), 11.05am, BBC Two
Welles’s magnum opus is a formally inventive, still relevant exploration into the damaging effects of power, as personified in wealthy playboy newspaper owner Charles Foster Kane. A reporter prepares an obituary for Kane, and the people he interviews offer differing, sometimes contradictory angles on the man and the myth. Similarities with contemporary media mogul William Randolph Hearst were definitely intentional, but the film’s longevity lies in its very human focus on the impossibility of fully knowing another person’s inner life. SW
The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (David Fincher, 2011), 9pm, Great! Movies
There’s plenty of snow in Fincher’s stylish adaptation of the Steig Larsson novel, but the chills are mostly thriller-related. Daniel Craig is Stockholm-based investigative journalist Mikael, hired by Christopher Plummer’s retired industrialist to investigate his own family, and the unsolved death 40 years earlier of his 16-year-old granddaughter. Mikael makes an odd couple with troubled, goth-adjacent young researcher Lisbeth (Rooney Mara) in a detail-heavy but pacy mystery. SW
The Big Lebowski (Joel and Ethan Coen, 1998), 1.20am, Sky Cinema Favourites
“The Dude abides.” However, in the Coen brothers’ comic masterpiece, the cardie-wearing, white Russian-supping, bowling-obsessed slacker Jeffrey Lebowski (Jeff Bridges in his greatest role) finds his usual stoner ways disrupted by a mistaken-identity mystery worthy of a Raymond Chandler novel. The convoluted plot is, in truth, neither here nor there but the wealth of weird and wonderful characters – from John Goodman’s volatile Vietnam vet to Julianne Moore’s forceful avant garde artist – and surreal situations make for a highly entertaining experience. SW
Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire (Adam Wingard, 2024), Sky Cinema Premiere, 12.35pm, 8pm
Note the change from “v” to “x” in the title – for the fifth film in the Monsterverse franchise, the giant lizard monster is more friend than foe to the big ape and his human handlers. That’s not to say it’s a creature love-in; the duo manage to wreak wanton destruction across many continents and several Unesco world heritage sites, while facing a new threat from an ape species in the Hollow Earth (Kong’s home beneath the planet’s crust) and an ice-breathing Titan. The humans trying to avoid the flying debris include a returning Rebecca Hall as scientist Ilene and Kaylee Hottle as Jia – her deaf adopted daughter, the last survivor of Skull Island and, helpfully, Kong’s best mate. Dan Stevens, seemingly on a path from romantic lead to quirky character actor, provides comic relief as Trapper, a veterinarian with a sideline in simian exoskeletons. SW
