Home is at the heart of TV3’s Christmas shows

UNCLE Vincent is berating everyone from the couch, the kids are obsessing over X Factor, granddad Bill is explaining how they should be lucky to get a penny apple, and almost every show on TV seems to be a re-run or a Christmas special.

TV3 may regularly broadcast reality programmes, but the station’s holiday season schedule is the closest bosses have come to mirroring daily home life.

In the station’s yuletide shows — so varied as to include Can’t get home for Christmas; Dublin Airport: Coming Home for Christmas; Michael Bublé at Home for Christmas; and Homeless at Christmas — TV3 is attempting to bring Christmas home to viewers.

We think.

And if the not-so-subtle hint in their titles doesn’t give the desired impression, the mix of box-set comedies, old movies and “stars” bearing more than a passing resemblance to your own relatives come Christmas night is likely to bludgeon the point, well, home.

In the run-up to the arrival of Santa down chimneys across the world, TV3 will be offering a “finals fortnight”, with the conclusions of X Factor, I’m A Celebrity... (apparently), and Bill Cullen’s Apprentice crammed into 14 days of fun.

A preview of 2012’s “hottest series”, Tallafornia, is also on the agenda, in addition to weatherman Martin King’s Ireland’s Christmas Wishes, which will see “250 staff in TV3 come together to make dreams come true for some of Ireland’s most deserving children”.

In keeping with the Christmas motif, Vincent Browne will present his political awards for this year and a St Stephen’s Day special look-back on the past 12 months in his own Scrooge-like way.

Movies and comedy box-sets that could just as easily be found at the foot of the tree — including Public Enemies, The Bourne Identity, The Snapper, Brendan Grace Live and You’ve Been Framed — will also be broadcast, alongside regular American fare such as Family Guy and American Dad.

“Christmas is all about family, the ones you love, good food and drink, and spending quality time in front of the telly,” explained the station’s group director of programming, Ben Frow.

That’s all well and good, but subjecting us to This is Justin Bieber? Really? Haven’t we suffered enough in 2011?