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The BBC has announced that they fully expect up to four people will watch the King's Speech this year, two up on last Christmas.  'It's a fine use of taxpayers' money,' claimed a spokesperson.  The money spent on recording and broadcasting the speech is thought to be less than a sausage finger's worth of a Royal statue, the cost of which has increased dramatically in recent years.


'We will repeat it several times and will naturally fill the news bulletins with the highlights, for the sixty million or so people too disinterested or, frankly, pissed to watch' said the spokesman.


The King's Speech will be broadcast on BBC1, ITV and, for smug bastards with money to waste, on Sky at 3pm if anyone wants a reason to pop down the shed, open another bottle of brown ale or extricate themselves away from building a Millennium Falcon in Lego in front of the telly, especially when they realise seven critical pieces were lost to the Hoover at the ten am emergency vacuum of the living room.


For balance, the BBC has pointed out there is other shit on the other channels.  Or you could just resume the family argument.





06:00 – Pages from Ceefax

An historical collection of low-res articles and holiday offers from before everything went to shite. Press [green] to reveal why your chronic nostalgia is out of control and you need professional help.


07:30 – The Noman

Update of the Raymond Briggs classic brought up-to-date by taking into account the growing effects of global warming. A young boy awakes on Christmas Day to find the contents of the local river in his back garden.


08:00 – BBC Breakfast

Round up of festive news stories plus a cringey interview where Charlie Stayt asks genuine yet naïve questions about a mainstream event or pastime he has never heard of.


09:00 – Greg Wallace kneads some big fat Xmas puddings

Don’t get yer Snickers in a mist dear, the program title is only a joke! Honestly, you can’t say anything these days can you? It’s because I was poor, isn’t it? Oh won’t you look at my p3nis?


11:00 – Annual Shrieking Contest from St Paul’s

Join the latest Aled Jones wanna-a-bes as they trade their souls for five minutes in the limelight in return for a severe beating and sustained bullying programme when they return to school.


12:00 – Only Fools and Horses: The Next Generation

A naively commissioned and classic-ruining rehash that follows Del, Rodders and Albert seeking to reclaim the fortune that they lost after recovering it in the last rehash about them losing the original fortune, with help from Dr Who.


13:30 – The Thrashing of Prince Andrew

No King’s speech this year but be sure to tune in as the disgraced Prince gets a 15 minute head start before His Majesty the King pursues him through the Sandringham estate with hounds and a selection of whipping equipment. Sponsored by Huwawei.


14:30 – The Hobbit 5

A mysterious witch sends Dungo Baggins on a quest for a magic necklace, hidden in a giant’s volcano. Second part of a £10 Million adaptation of the binned notes for the unwritten appendices of Tolkien’s brother’s first draft of an unpublished novella.


17:30 – In the dock of the Pops

Nostalgic look back at some of the greatest festive hits with all suspected or proven abusers digitally removed and replaced with a CGI avatar of MR Blobby.


18:30 – Blackadder’s Christmas Goose-Chase

David Baddiel talks us through the ‘funniest bits’ of last year’s show when Frank Skinner was discussing his ‘most hilarious moments’ from the previous year’s show which featured Ben Elton talking about his favourite bits in Black Adder. Sadly contains no actual Blackadder material, though mercifully the three of them are punched in the face by Rowan Aktinson at the end.


19:30 – Very Strictly Come Dancing

Endurance show where dance contestants see if they can publicly hold their shit together after months of gruelling and belittling punishment at the BBCs dance / prison camp. A phone vote this year will determine who gets six months in solitary.


19:59 – Everybody hates James Corden

Not a program, just a reminder.


20:00 – The Chronicles of Narnia

This cherished BBC classic hasn’t aged as well as you might think. Worse than a Sixth Form play where the performers are drunk but you are not. Special effects provided by pressing on your eyelids too hard for a few minutes.


21:00 – Wallace & Gromit’s Unwanted Christmas Clips

One hour of stitched-together footage that was omitted from the various films because it was crap. Narrated by Sean Pertwee.


22:00 – News at 10

The latest bombings, murder and weather.


22:30 – Jurassic Park IX: Tyrannosaurus-Ex

Do not attempt to watch this without consuming at least three bottles of Baileys and the fairy lights.


00:00 – Shutdown and testcard

Congratulations, you made it through another year and another TV lobotomy. We hope you’re pleased with yourself.






Two novelists hoping to step into John le Carré's boots, have today shredded the pages upon pages of text they laboriously typed, read again to check for typos, then re-wrote again and again to perfect the prose. They now spend their days in the Fox and Hounds, lamenting how each of them had been working on plots that involved the potential of the British government being brought down by foreign countries, only to discover the British government would bring itself down from within.

One of the authors, Joe Sykes, drained the last of his pint of Old and Filthy before telling our reporter with a sigh, 'I was sure I had a winner. Putin would be setting up a honey trap that Johnson would find irresistible. I spent ages doing the research, chatting to high class prostitutes, visited goodness knows how many sex shops to check out the types of bondage gear they flog.


'I searched to see whether a death certificate had actually been issued for George Smiley and nearly got nicked for hanging round the school gates in my quest for a description of the girl at the centre of the honey trap.


'I realised this week how fruitless it all was. There's no way Putin would waste his time trying to destroy the British Prime Minister's career, when the PM is such an idiot he'd do it himself before Putin had found the ideal agent to trap Johnson.'

'Can you lend me a fiver for another pint until my benefits hit the account next week?" he went on to ask our reporter.



First published 12 Dec 2021



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