Ellen E Jones

Not every Christmas special needs a change of scene. Would I Lie To You? at Christmas was much like any other episode of the show, save for a few snowflake decorations, yet it still felt festive. It's at Christmas that this cosy parlour game comes into its own. Something else that hadn't changed was the gender imbalance. It's not unusual for a panel show, of course, but the fact that WILTY? can muster only one woman out of seven participants is still a shocker.

Judged by any other standard, however, this was a strong line-up. On Lee Mack's team, the lone woman, Countdown's co-presenter Rachel Riley, got in a good yarn about a cake-baking super-fan and David Mitchell's team, featuring actor Ray Winstone and The Last Leg's Josh Widdicombe, was balanced in other ways. "It looks like Ray's on charge for something, Dave is his flustered barrister and Josh is the child they're fighting for custody over," commented host Rob Brydon.

Winstone proved himself a formidable fibber, but the most spurious story of all came from Lee Mack: "I can write so well with my foot that to save time writing Christmas cards I simultaneously write one card with my hand and one card with my foot." Naturally, a demonstration was in order.

In the unlikely event that the Children in Need celebrity single flops, they could always try a celebrities and prostitutes blow-football tournament. It's not in good taste exactly, but voiceover artist and thesp Stephen Toast (Matt Berry) has never cared much about that. Britain's "second best actor acting in high winds" entered one such tournament in aid of homeless ponies last night, and thus began another brilliant series of Toast of London.

How is it that the first series - co-written by Berry and Father Ted's Arthur Mathews, no less - averaged only 300,000 viewers per episode? Exactly how loud does the bombastic and easily infuriated Toast have to shout to get some attention around here?

Like all the best comedy, this sitcom defies explanation, and maybe all humour is subjective anyway, but if you don't find Toast of London's idiosyncratic pronunciations, grotesque sex scenes and Clem Fandango mentions hilarious to the point of hernia, there's simply no hope.

Scotland in a Day, TV review

You've heard the British nations compared to a divorcing couple, but you haven't this pop cultural twist: "The wife's sister's smashed us in the face with a handbag and when that happens, I tell you, it's time to get out of the lift."

Bad Bridesmaid, TV review

There was some amusement to be had in watching the other hens progress from nervous giggles to outright hostility, but the behaviour of Francesca (aka comedian Anna Morris) was never outrageous enough to really entertain.

Boomers: It's entertaining enough, but feels tired

The effort that has gone into Boomers is obvious, and yet a trendy single-camera set-up and a soundtrack of (probably expensively licensed) rock and Motown can't make the script's age-based stereotypes feel any fresher.

Almost Royal review

This first episode of Almost Royal did elicit some chuckles, but it was never as satirical or as audacious [as Sacha Baron Cohen].

It's co-written by Charlie Brooker and Daniel Maier, whose writing credits include Harry Hill's TV Burp, and there's a lot of Burp in both the affectionate spoofing of British television conventions and the relentless onslaught of silliness. The convoluted plots of police procedurals usually require some viewer concentration, but here it's the gags that have you reaching for rewind on the TiVo remote. There are so many of them - visual, verbal, saucy and slapstick - that to watch A Touch of Cloth is to be constantly plagued by the fear that you've missed something brilliant.

Casting John Hannah as DI Jack Frost and Suranne Jones as DC Anne Oldman (pronounced "an old man") is a particular joy, given both of them have often appeared in exactly the kind of series ridiculed here. It wouldn't be half as much fun to have a comedian deliver lines like, "You never get used to the way you get used to it and that takes some getting used to" and keep a straight face.

This season there's also new blood in the shape of Doctor Who's Karen Gillan as... er... Kerry Newblood. It's an opportunity to send up all those clichés pertaining to rookies, of which there are plenty. Not that there's any danger of the writers running out of material. As long as TV's obsession with grisly murders and maverick cops continues, there'll always be a case for DCI Cloth to solve.

Horrible Histories: Frightful First World War Special is not, strictly speaking, last night's TV. It first aired on CBBC at 9am yesterday morning, but it would be remiss of me not to recommend an iPlayer catch up in the strongest possible terms. Nothing can dislodge Blackadder Goes Forth from its place on the informal school syllabus (especially with Michael Gove's enthusiastic endorsement still ringing in teachers' ears), but this would make a very acceptable substitute.

The Horrible Histories team are known for making history palatable for the young 'uns by putting a comical spin on it, but could that approach ever work on this relatively recent human catastrophe?

The sketches included a brilliant Historical MasterChef in which First World War soldier Ernie, impressed the judges with his inventive yet disgusting dishes (Dog'n'Maggot, anyone?). A Charleston-style ditty sung by The Cousins (King George V, Kaiser Wilhelm II and Tsar Nicholas II) and a jaunty commercial for that solution to all trench-based problems - "New World War One Wee Wee" ("And how much does it cost? Why, one pee, of course!" That's a classic seven-year-old's gag, that.)

It was silly, all right, but also appropriately sombre: "But the funny thing about the Somme is... no, I've got nothing, sorry."

The Comedy Vaults review

There were the great sketch shows from the Sixties, Seventies and Eighties that, inexplicably, haven't been repeated since.

The Guess List, TV review

Rob Brydon has a surprisingly rare, but commercially valuable, ability to be both granny-friendly and genuinely funny.