Every year, the already crap Christmas TV is comprehensively ruined by the obnoxious Eastenders. I can't imagine a worse programme to inflict on a family audience on Christmas Day.
By the way, I think Matt Smith will come to be widely recognised as the definitive Dr Who. Not that I find it compulsive viewing now that Karen Gillan is no longer in it.
It is nostalgia that makes us think TV was better in 70s 80s 90s. How could it be better with less choice? Not only was the fact that film premieres were exactly that if you had not seen them at cinema but with no video recorders you had to watch it when it was on or miss it.
We do seem to be missing the one big great comedy though no Only Fools, One Foot In The Grave, Vicar of Dibley and more recently Royle Family. I was hoping that Open All Hours or Vicious would get Xmas Day or that a new Miranda would be on.
You think this is a bad thing? I think more choice and more opportunities to watch programmes/films when you want to can only be a good thing!
Why on earth are people moaning about something that has been IMPROVED compared to the past? With all the options available, if you don't like the xmas tv line-up, you can create your own.
Personally I think the xmas tv this year is good as ever anyway. Some people will always moan it's not like it used to be though, that's just human nature!
I never said anything about it being bad so kindly refrain from ranting at me.
I'm simply pointing out the "cons" to the way it is now.
For example, if you had your favourite meal 3 times a day everyday, it wouldn't be long before the novelty would wear off and you'd begin to get sick of it. That's all my point was. The excitement of seeing a film was because it's airings on TV were the first after the cinema, it was something to really look forward to. Nowdays, you can watch anything you want any number of times so the novelty comes off it slightly.
Just looking for something to watch tonight, hundreds of channels but nothing new that stands out. So many things I have seen before. Up to date on most of my sky plus
Do we just live in a spoiled era now, was there so much to really look forward to in Xmas Radio Times of old where you circled so many programmes that you were going to watch
I think you're right to a degree, we argubly have too many channels these days and access to films in an instant via the Internet and DVD.
However, whilst there's still some good documentries and dramas to be seen - BBC 4 is one of my most watched channels now - tv comedy and entertainment has been on the decline for about 10 years in my view, with only a few gems standing out, such as The IT Crowd. We might have 'quantity' these days but we don't have much 'quality' especially when it comes to comedy and entertainment. The X Factor has dominated Saturday night tv for ten years - it's overkill and no wonder this years final had the lowest ever viewing figures - and the soaps are on too often.
TV - and Christmas TV - has stopped being original, partly down to how spoilt we are and partly down to the BBC's / ITV's lack of effort. It's rather watch 'Death Comes to Pemperly' on Xmas Day than most of what's actually being shown.
It is nostalgia that makes us think TV was better in 70s 80s 90s. How could it be better with less choice? Not only was the fact that film premieres were exactly that if you had not seen them at cinema but with no video recorders you had to watch it when it was on or miss it.
We do seem to be missing the one big great comedy though no Only Fools, One Foot In The Grave, Vicar of Dibley and more recently Royle Family. I was hoping that Open All Hours or Vicious would get Xmas Day or that a new Miranda would be on.
I hoped that about Open All Hours too but alas, both that and original drama 'Death Comes to Pemberly' on are Boxing Day. I used to like Downton Abbey but it's getting a bit long in the tooth now.
Every year, the already crap Christmas TV is comprehensively ruined by the obnoxious Eastenders. I can't imagine a worse programme to inflict on a family audience on Christmas Day.
Coudn't agree more. Lowest common denominator garbage.
It is nostalgia that makes us think TV was better in 70s 80s 90s. How could it be better with less choice? Not only was the fact that film premieres were exactly that if you had not seen them at cinema but with no video recorders you had to watch it when it was on or miss it.
But where is that "choice", now? Yes, there are more channels. But when you look at their schedules you find that almost all of their stuff is repeats. For example, look at Sky's package: Comedy Central has a couple of hours of new material per week. Same can be said for FX. Even Sky's "entertainment" channels show the same programmes 3 or 4 times every week. In an age where PVRs are the norm, that's ridiculous.
Terrestrial TV is just as bad. All the +1's don't add choice, they just add repeats. We're also treated to new channels like "4 seven" which is just repeats of channel 4. And others like Dave and Gold and Watch that are basically museum channels: showing the same old, dusty content on a loop, every few months. The really sad thing is that the quality of new programmes is so low, that these 20, 30 and 40 year old programmes are still better than so much of the contemporary material on the other channels. Which is how the "oldies" channels survive.
The thing is, there are only so many people in the UK. So there is a limited number of people who could possibly be watching advertisements at any given time. That puts an upper limit on the income of TV channels and therefore the amount of new material they can afford (Same for the Beeb, just substitute licence income for advertising income). All we have now is that instead of 4 or 5 channels getting all those eyeballs and therefore being the outlets for new content, it's spread across 30 or 40 channels. Same size cake: just thinner slices. So the "choice" aspect is a myth. The amount of original content - and therefore the ability to choose between programmes - is determined by the size of the TV audience, not by the number of channels.
Just looking for something to watch tonight, hundreds of channels but nothing new that stands out. So many things I have seen before. Up to date on most of my sky plus
Do we just live in a spoiled era now, was there so much to really look forward to in Xmas Radio Times of old where you circled so many programmes that you were going to watch
Its because today all they care about is putting on the same crap like they do all year round. When I was 7 the tv schedueling was completely different.
In an ideal world the soaps would be banished from Christmas Day, but as they get relatively big ratings and are cheap to make in a cut throat market, they get shown on Christmas Day. However, I am glad this year Doctor Who is shown at a better time and Mrs Brown has replaced the clapped out and unfunny Royle Family. Last year was poor, but there are four really good shows I want to watch on the big day.
In an ideal world the soaps would be banished from Christmas Day, but as they get relatively big ratings and are cheap to make in a cut throat market, they get shown on Christmas Day. However, I am glad this year Doctor Who is shown at a better time and Mrs Brown has replaced the clapped out and unfunny Royle Family. Last year was poor, but there are four really good shows I want to watch on the big day.
Could you let us know what the four shows are - I have only found three and one is a Morecambe and Wise compilation on BBC2.
Another Christmas Day viewing tradition will not be far off coming to an end I suspect.
The Queen's Christmas message at 3pm.
The replacement already lined up. The King's Christmas message. When we see Charles delivering it instead, that is going to make a lot of people a lot more nostalgic still.
Every year we get a couple of these threads.
Go on someone root around and dig out a Chrimbo TV schedule from times gone by, see if it lives up to the memories.
As an aside, rememeber the Circus shows that used to be on, damn sure I remember there being Gerry Cottles on one channel and Chipperfields on the other, flicked between channels out of boredom.
I remember the circus being on every bank holiday. Not my cup of tea at all. I know this is about the Xmas schedules but the New Year's Eve schedule has improved out of all recognition. All I remember every year New Year's Eve back in the 60's/70's was Andy Stewart's White Heather Club.
TV today is bland and safe and "top-down" corporate. Obviously it's not going to engage with the general public.
It's bland and safe as a consequence of the slim profits and virtually zero margin for error in the cut-throat world of bottom-of-the-barrel TV, or "more choice" as it was sold to us. Since any given TV station makes hardly any money, there being so many of them, they can't afford to take risks: some of which would fail and some would occasionally produce an unexpected pearl. The failures would kill 'em, dead.
So they stick to producing the cheapest TV possible, with the most predictable forumlas as they know that people will watch that. It's better to commission yet another soap, cop show, quiz, cooking or celebrity chat as they already have a good, predictable audience. If a station took a risk and produced something completely new - such as a programme for a male audience, that cost £££ millions - and it failed - because it didn't attract women viewers and therefore the advertisers weren't interested - they'd be utterly screwed.
It's not the TV stations' fault: it's just that you either stay with the herd, or you get eaten.
As for quality? Forget it, with the amount of money TV stations make, it's far too costly and would never get the audience size to make it worth while.
I try and get this over to my kids, when I was a kid in the 60's and 70's Christmas TV was an event, not just for kids but for everyone, there were only three channels and they were usually shut down before midnight, so to have all of the different stuff on at Christmas was great, nowadays with 300 channels on 24 hours a day we have seen all there is to see and Christmas TV is just another day, it's a bit like shopping and the Christmas holiday back then compared to today, back then my mum had never been to a supermarket and did all of the shopping local daily and at Christmas you had to stock up because a lot of places would be shut for a fortnight and a lot of peoples work places would be shut for the same length of time, so the whole holiday period was more of an event in my opinion.
Christmas was more of an 'event' due to the lack of stuff to do, places to go.
Well, you can stick that as far as I'm concerned.
As I said earlier, check those TV schedules from the 'golden age'
We've done this before and as an adult now, I found more stuff I wouldn't be interested in than stuff that would interest me.
Right, I'm off to see if BBC2 has decided to sneak out a late night genre movie season, they did Noir years back, but told nobody.
I've got a $hitload of stuff to watch on the computer anyway, too much stuff.
Edit: even as late as 1980 BBC2 was closing down at 11:25 until 3:30.
That would lead to the renting of garments on DS, there's your good old days, look at that girl and the sodding clown for 3 hours.
Christmas was more of an 'event' due to the lack of stuff to do, places to go.
Well, you can stick that as far as I'm concerned.
As I said earlier, check those TV schedules from the 'golden age' We've done this before and as an adult now, I found more stuff I wouldn't be interested in than stuff that would interest me.
Right, I'm off to see if BBC2 has decided to sneak out a late night genre movie season, they did Noir years back, but told nobody.
I've got a $hitload of stuff to watch on the computer anyway, too much stuff.
You have to look at it as if you were an adult back then not now, because perceptions are different it's hard to see it that way I admit and you are right that there was less to do and places to go, people wern't as mobile then, my parents never had a car and only got a phone in 1984 but i still maintain that for people from familys like mine back then (fairly poor in monetary terms) Christmas TV was a big part of the holiday period.
You have to look at it as if you were an adult back then not now, because perceptions are different it's hard to see it that way I admit and you are right that there was less to do and places to go, people wern't as mobile then, my parents never had a car and only got a phone in 1984 but i still maintain that for people from familys like mine back then (fairly poor in monetary terms) Christmas TV was a big part of the holiday period.
Yeah and my mother had a catchphrase that she used a lot all year round 'what's this rubbish?'
The old saying 'You'll get what you're given and like it' comes to mind.
I'm really looking forward to Christmas television, especially Doctor Who on Christmas day.:cool: It's lovely sitting down with friends and/or family to watch a bit of Christmas telly!
I find myself just as excited about Christmas television as I always have done even as a child. But then again, I love Christmas!:D
Three things are must see for me this Crimbo, DW, DA and Still Open all Hours. Nothing else I want to watch and I dare to say the rest of the output on all channels is mush.
Maybe I'm being nostalgic but tv at Crimbo was better in my schooldays, I remember the Morcambe and Wise BBC shows first hand from 1975 till the left for Thames, Mike Yarwood and the Some Mothers specials and they still make me laugh, even the movies were big and fresh where now everything movie orientated has been viewed to death on Skye. Back then it felt special.
Every year we get a couple of these threads.
Go on someone root around and dig out a Chrimbo TV schedule from times gone by, see if it lives up to the memories.
As an aside, rememeber the Circus shows that used to be on, damn sure I remember there being Gerry Cottles on one channel and Chipperfields on the other, flicked between channels out of boredom.
Are you sure you did not remember the circus on both channels from Only Fools?
This christmas is really one of the poorest in recent years and really shows the lack of BBC comedy that all we have on the big day is a new MBB, Xmas Eve is the same Tuesday night schedule we have had for the last 6 weeks apart from a Not Going Out special which whilst I like would in previous years be tucked away on the the 21st or 28th and not on one of the big nights. BBC really should of got a christmas special of Miranda or given Peter Kay's new comedy a start during Christmas to give it the best possible start.
Comments
By the way, I think Matt Smith will come to be widely recognised as the definitive Dr Who. Not that I find it compulsive viewing now that Karen Gillan is no longer in it.
We do seem to be missing the one big great comedy though no Only Fools, One Foot In The Grave, Vicar of Dibley and more recently Royle Family. I was hoping that Open All Hours or Vicious would get Xmas Day or that a new Miranda would be on.
I never said anything about it being bad so kindly refrain from ranting at me.
I'm simply pointing out the "cons" to the way it is now.
For example, if you had your favourite meal 3 times a day everyday, it wouldn't be long before the novelty would wear off and you'd begin to get sick of it. That's all my point was. The excitement of seeing a film was because it's airings on TV were the first after the cinema, it was something to really look forward to. Nowdays, you can watch anything you want any number of times so the novelty comes off it slightly.
Pros and cons, which apply to anything.
I think you're right to a degree, we argubly have too many channels these days and access to films in an instant via the Internet and DVD.
However, whilst there's still some good documentries and dramas to be seen - BBC 4 is one of my most watched channels now - tv comedy and entertainment has been on the decline for about 10 years in my view, with only a few gems standing out, such as The IT Crowd. We might have 'quantity' these days but we don't have much 'quality' especially when it comes to comedy and entertainment. The X Factor has dominated Saturday night tv for ten years - it's overkill and no wonder this years final had the lowest ever viewing figures - and the soaps are on too often.
TV - and Christmas TV - has stopped being original, partly down to how spoilt we are and partly down to the BBC's / ITV's lack of effort. It's rather watch 'Death Comes to Pemperly' on Xmas Day than most of what's actually being shown.
I hoped that about Open All Hours too but alas, both that and original drama 'Death Comes to Pemberly' on are Boxing Day.
Coudn't agree more. Lowest common denominator garbage.
But where is that "choice", now? Yes, there are more channels. But when you look at their schedules you find that almost all of their stuff is repeats. For example, look at Sky's package: Comedy Central has a couple of hours of new material per week. Same can be said for FX. Even Sky's "entertainment" channels show the same programmes 3 or 4 times every week. In an age where PVRs are the norm, that's ridiculous.
Terrestrial TV is just as bad. All the +1's don't add choice, they just add repeats. We're also treated to new channels like "4 seven" which is just repeats of channel 4. And others like Dave and Gold and Watch that are basically museum channels: showing the same old, dusty content on a loop, every few months. The really sad thing is that the quality of new programmes is so low, that these 20, 30 and 40 year old programmes are still better than so much of the contemporary material on the other channels. Which is how the "oldies" channels survive.
The thing is, there are only so many people in the UK. So there is a limited number of people who could possibly be watching advertisements at any given time. That puts an upper limit on the income of TV channels and therefore the amount of new material they can afford (Same for the Beeb, just substitute licence income for advertising income). All we have now is that instead of 4 or 5 channels getting all those eyeballs and therefore being the outlets for new content, it's spread across 30 or 40 channels. Same size cake: just thinner slices.
So the "choice" aspect is a myth. The amount of original content - and therefore the ability to choose between programmes - is determined by the size of the TV audience, not by the number of channels.
That's not much to do with quality though, and more to do with the vast amount of options available for entertainment nowadays.
Its because today all they care about is putting on the same crap like they do all year round. When I was 7 the tv schedueling was completely different.
Could you let us know what the four shows are - I have only found three and one is a Morecambe and Wise compilation on BBC2.
TV today is bland and safe and "top-down" corporate. Obviously it's not going to engage with the general public.
The Queen's Christmas message at 3pm.
The replacement already lined up. The King's Christmas message. When we see Charles delivering it instead, that is going to make a lot of people a lot more nostalgic still.
I remember the circus being on every bank holiday. Not my cup of tea at all. I know this is about the Xmas schedules but the New Year's Eve schedule has improved out of all recognition. All I remember every year New Year's Eve back in the 60's/70's was Andy Stewart's White Heather Club.
It's bland and safe as a consequence of the slim profits and virtually zero margin for error in the cut-throat world of bottom-of-the-barrel TV, or "more choice" as it was sold to us. Since any given TV station makes hardly any money, there being so many of them, they can't afford to take risks: some of which would fail and some would occasionally produce an unexpected pearl. The failures would kill 'em, dead.
So they stick to producing the cheapest TV possible, with the most predictable forumlas as they know that people will watch that. It's better to commission yet another soap, cop show, quiz, cooking or celebrity chat as they already have a good, predictable audience. If a station took a risk and produced something completely new - such as a programme for a male audience, that cost £££ millions - and it failed - because it didn't attract women viewers and therefore the advertisers weren't interested - they'd be utterly screwed.
It's not the TV stations' fault: it's just that you either stay with the herd, or you get eaten.
As for quality? Forget it, with the amount of money TV stations make, it's far too costly and would never get the audience size to make it worth while.
Oh yes. As far as I'm concerned in regards to television, the 25th is Capaldi Day.
Well, you can stick that as far as I'm concerned.
As I said earlier, check those TV schedules from the 'golden age'
We've done this before and as an adult now, I found more stuff I wouldn't be interested in than stuff that would interest me.
Right, I'm off to see if BBC2 has decided to sneak out a late night genre movie season, they did Noir years back, but told nobody.
I've got a $hitload of stuff to watch on the computer anyway, too much stuff.
Edit: even as late as 1980 BBC2 was closing down at 11:25 until 3:30.
That would lead to the renting of garments on DS, there's your good old days, look at that girl and the sodding clown for 3 hours.
You have to look at it as if you were an adult back then not now, because perceptions are different it's hard to see it that way I admit and you are right that there was less to do and places to go, people wern't as mobile then, my parents never had a car and only got a phone in 1984 but i still maintain that for people from familys like mine back then (fairly poor in monetary terms) Christmas TV was a big part of the holiday period.
Yeah and my mother had a catchphrase that she used a lot all year round 'what's this rubbish?'
The old saying 'You'll get what you're given and like it' comes to mind.
Hey ho, we do this every Christmas...
Three things are must see for me this Crimbo, DW, DA and Still Open all Hours. Nothing else I want to watch and I dare to say the rest of the output on all channels is mush.
Maybe I'm being nostalgic but tv at Crimbo was better in my schooldays, I remember the Morcambe and Wise BBC shows first hand from 1975 till the left for Thames, Mike Yarwood and the Some Mothers specials and they still make me laugh, even the movies were big and fresh where now everything movie orientated has been viewed to death on Skye. Back then it felt special.
Are you sure you did not remember the circus on both channels from Only Fools?