BBC One Christmas 2019

At the very least Gavin and Stacey was 63 minutes long but had an hour slot, so that will have pushed everything else back a good five minutes at least when accounting for idents and trails.

They've repeated it in mainly 30 minute slots since its first airing. I thought the 20 minute slot seemed a little odd as well.

They should probably have scheduled EastEnders at 9:35 and Mrs Brown at 10:35. No need to meet the neater junctions they went with as ITV weren’t matching them anyway.

Unless they did it deliberately of course to generate the big artificial peak that they will lead with tomorrow, but I’m sure that can’t possibly be the case.

The last 3 minutes of EastEnders were cut off on my recording thanks to this, even with the 5 minute overrun programmed in to the timer for this sort of thing.

I have to say it's a huge failing on the BBC's part to include the Gavin & Stacey special within season 3 on iPlayer rather than in a standalone part. It took me a while to find it.

I nearly missed the beginning of Call the Midwife when it started at 1859.

To be fair, I had no idea the show was that old.

Queen Victoria and Charles Dickens were on the set for the very first episode.

I have to say that this Christmas night was very lacklustre on BBC One. Strictly was a nice late afternoon, easy going special and my family enjoyed it, the usual over scoring from the judges and generally nice comments for some of the celebrities who would have got ripped to shreds for their dancing if this was the regular series.

I am not a Call the Midwife fan, so nothing there for me. Gavin and Stacey I never found funny, James Corden's ego just grates - Eastenders was a complete extreme sombre fest, more than usual for Christmas night.

I have to say the only light relief for me was Mrs Brown, a show which I know annoys many, and indeed I used to enjoy the earlier specials of around 2011 to 2014, but now in 2019 it is a show that has milked its success to death, but was a nice end to the night.

Shame ITV waved the white flag of surrender and offered nothing great.

And now we enter the Christmas Limbo - where nearly all the schedules are mixed up, and the next 7 days are a mess filled with films and the odd special along with the usual soap overload.

It was on the front page for me - exceptionally easy to find.

Last night’s Gavin & Stacey pulled in 11.5m (peaking at 12.3m) - the biggest Christmas Day ratings for over a decade.