Your Christmas schedule sounds familiar to me

This year we promised ourselves a smooth Christmas, and the virulence of the omicron has brought us a night in which, waiting for the bustle of

we have ended up seeing ourselves as the lonely Theodore Twombly from

.

What has not been a surprise is that the night's programming has followed the bland and decaffeinated line to which we have become accustomed in recent years and to which we only pay attention because launching onto the platforms is not a way to honor parties like It's due.

TVE once again trusted that

that in 1990 triumphed due to its ability to surprise us by showing us an unpublished face with faces as familiar as they were unknown.

Hence, when, in its first edition, Pedro Piqueras started with

we will be left with the same face as Hugh Grant when his chauffeur in

sings

with a bass baritone voice.

More information

Ramón García: "I'm looking forward to January 7"

The best Christmas television invention worked because of the

of seeing presenters as circumspect as María Escario singing

or Elisenda Roca changing the figures and letters for

But since the genres have faded and even the news programs have their part of the

that their visible faces shake to the sound of Gloria Trevi is just as surprising, and even more so when without the label it is difficult to identify the interpreter and even the program he represents. . Although there are always moments that justify it, like seeing the essential Paloma del Río, to which we say goodbye this year, singing and dancing to the rhythm of

A moment so joyous that it is almost forgiven that before we have seen almost all of the 6,537 employees of the entity sing.

Boris Izaguirre and Ana García Obregón, in 'Telepasión'.

The common thread this year was a plane trip of those that we have done so little lately and had Boris Izaguirre and Ana García Obregón as masters of ceremonies.

Pulling from trade and contagious enthusiasm, they dealt with a loose script that, caught up with some of the

most hackneyed

of

, tried to cover so much that it ended up looking like an infomercial for RTVE.

After

, to which after 31 editions it is urgent a step through the workshop, TVE maintained for another year the formula "they gave me two" that began with Ana Torroja singing all the hits of her career. Having the music of Mecano as content is like playing a game of tute with all the cards of the suit that he paints. The songs of the trio are milestones that transcend generations and the joy with which Ana was received on social networks made it clear that Mecano's legacy does not weigh the controversies: neither the haciendas, nor the “mariconeces”, nor the Aztec pyramids. Sailors, soldiers, singles, married couples and lovers and errands surrendered to their duets with Raphael, Malú or Alaska and their inseparable Mario Vaquerizo. If, as Debussy said, music is the space between the notes, Spanish television programming is the space between one appearance of the couple and another.Yesterday, transversal as they are, they walked through the three chains.

Aitana, another of Torroja's guests, was the second star of the night.

He went from singing

in karaokes to doing it as a duet with Ana at a time that seemed like the cañí, pacata and for all audiences version of

by Madonna and Britney Spears.

Aitana and David Bisbal, in the Christmas Eve special.Manu_Carmona

If TVE did not bother to renew itself, La 2 directly put into the player the same 240-minute TDK tape recorded in 1993 with

by Tony Leblanc, Chiquito or Tip y Coll, his humorous

of each saving party.

As predictable as it is infallible, because can someone get tired of hearing Eugenio's jokes?

Telecinco is the one that has differentiated the most from last year.

He took off the training wheels that the Universo

supposes

and, with Joaquín Prat and Lara Álvarez at the helm, he recovered one of those finery that are zapping meat and in which you find Omar Montes as well as Café Quijano or —and this it was disconcerting — a ventriloquist.

A proposal as surprising as seeing Sofía Cristo in Mediaset without anyone doing a

or crying or grandiloquent confessions.

After

waste of media

with its stunning wardrobe and a performance reminiscent of Valerio Lazarov's wildest times, the Telecinco gala seemed like a well-intentioned but humble school function like the lazy pig's straw house.

Lara Álvarez and Joaquín Prat, presenters of Telecinco's Christmas Eve gala.

Antena 3, which throughout the year has fought Telecinco's audience with strategic movements that would have thrilled General Rommel by fitting cheap Turkish dramons and programs of celebrities doing things into his grid, gave up in advance the

of the Christmas Eve and he subscribed to the refried of the funniest moments of the year and the umpteenth comeback of

olo the

screen reminded us the night it was. It is surprising that Atresmedia is unable to design an original and competitive program for the date, while at home Ibai Llanos, whose omicron also twisted his plans at the last minute, put on a Santa hat, played some games of

and got more than 80,000 viewers to join him on Twitch.

Following his own tradition, Cuatro opted for family movies with

and

It should be remembered that this is the same movie that aired on Christmas Eve 2019 while the world as we knew it began to decompose before our eyes.

We're not blaming Scrat for the slow-motion apocalypse we've experienced since then, but just in case there are doors that it would be best not to reopen.

If in March we are again fighting for the last sack of sourdough and subscribing to the challenge of the 400 squats of Patry Jordán, we already know who to blame.

La Sexta also took the night like any other Friday and did not take away our share of Gloria Serra, facing daily terrors such as false homemade croquettes with the same gravity as Oriana Fallaci from Ayatolá Khomeini.

An image from the documentary 'Crock of Gold: drinking with Shane MacGowan'.

We had to wait until dawn to find the most original and fascinating Christmas proposal. Movistar Estrenos celebrated the birthday of ethyl Shane MacGowan, singer of The Pogues, with the broadcast of

. To enjoy it it does not matter if you are not a fan of the group, or even know who MacGowan is. From the moment the Julian Temple documentary begins, it is impossible to escape the magnetism of a life marked by talent and addiction. An ode to the physical destruction and dental reconstruction of a genius who with

composed an incontestable lay Christmas carol.

It is available at Movistar + and at Filmin.

If the proposals of the generalist televisions have known little, give it to them, it will be the only content of tonight that they will remember next year.

You can follow EL PAÍS TELEVISIÓN on

Sign in to continue reading

Just by having an account you can read this article, it's free

Sign upLogin

Thanks for reading EL PAÍS