Full GREAT! Action listings for Tuesday 27 October 2026, with times in London local time.

Venom takes the 9pm slot, and Burn Notice holds the line before it

See also: What's on tonight across all channels | Wednesday's TV guide

GREAT! Action has one real event tonight: Venom, the 2018 film with Tom Hardy, Michelle Williams and Riz Ahmed, directed by Ruben Fleischer. It starts at 9pm and is cut into two listings, 56 minutes and then 69 minutes, with a five-minute This Week Back Then wedged between them at 9.56pm. Treat the second half as the same sitting. It is the only film in the evening and the only reason to arrive after eight.

The competition at nine is Blue Lights on BBC One and Gogglebox on E4, so this is the alternative for anyone who wants noise rather than conversation. Venom is on again on 31 October and 1 November, which takes some pressure off tonight.

Before it, Burn Notice fills 7pm and 8pm with two back-to-back episodes. That pair already ran at 2pm and 3pm, so anyone who caught the afternoon has seen the whole block. The series ran for seven series and 111 episodes, with Jeffrey Donovan and Bruce Campbell in the cast, which is why the channel can keep feeding it into the schedule without running out. It is dependable filler, and reliable filler is a fair thing to be at that hour.

The Unit returns at 6pm and again at 11.10pm, a bookend that tells you what the channel thinks of its own late slot.


Also on TV tonight at 9pm

  • BBC One: Blue Lights
  • BBC Two: Surgeons: At the Edge of Life
  • ITV1: New: Unbelievable Moments:…
  • Channel 4: The Great British Bake Off (from 8pm)
  • Channel 5: Ben Fogle: New Lives in the Wild
  • BBC Four: The Normans
  • ITV2: Big Brother
  • ITV3: Vera (from 8pm)
  • ITV4: Junk and Disorderly
  • E4: Gogglebox

Every channel tonight, side by side · Films on TV tonight · Tomorrow’s TV


Frequently asked questions

What’s on GREAT! Action tonight?

On Tuesday 27 October 2026, GREAT! Action shows Burn Notice at 7pm, Burn Notice at 8pm, Venom at 9pm, This Week Back Then at 9.56pm and Venom at 10.01pm.

Is there a film on GREAT! Action tonight?

Yes: Venom (2018) at 9pm and Venom (2018) at 10.01pm.

What’s on GREAT! Action late tonight?

After 11pm, GREAT! Action has The Unit at 11.10pm.

What time does GREAT! Action’s evening start?

The evening schedule starts with The Unit at 6pm.

Spies after midnight, Burn Notice by day, a film at 9pm

GREAT! Action runs on three clocks. After midnight it is a 1960s and 1970s spy and adventure channel, with The Avengers, The New Avengers, The Baron and The Persuaders!. In the afternoon and early evening it is an American action-drama channel, built on Burn Notice and The Unit. At 9pm it becomes a film channel, and that film is the reason most people tune in: film takes 45% of primetime here, against 22% across the whole day.

It is also a schedule with a lot of filler in it. Teleshopping fills the early morning, and short inserts of a few minutes, a news bulletin and a history slot, break into programmes and films throughout the day.

What a GREAT! Action day looks like

The night belongs to the old ITV adventure series. The New Avengers or The Avengers usually starts around midnight, The Baron follows at about 1am, and The Persuaders! comes on not long after; The Persuaders! aired on 27 of the 34 days we tracked, The Baron on 26. A disaster film often fills the small hours, and then real-world rescue programmes take over before dawn: Air Rescue around 5am and Coast Guard Alaska just after.

Teleshopping runs from 6am to 9am on all 34 days. Murder Maps, a crime history series, takes the 9am and 10am hours on about half the days, and a war or western film usually fills late morning. The High Chaparral holds 1pm, the same slot on 20 days.

Then Burn Notice arrives. It is the most-shown drama on the channel, with 100 airings, usually two episodes at 2pm and 3pm. A TV thriller fills 4pm, and The Unit takes 6pm on most weekdays.

The 6pm to 10.30pm evening is fixed until 9pm. The Unit at 6pm, two more episodes of Burn Notice from 7pm, and then the film. The 9pm slot carried a film on nearly every night in the window: Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, Rambo, Rambo: Last Blood, The Predator, Salt, Punisher: War Zone, Priest and High Plains Drifter all took it. A short history slot at 9.56pm interrupts it on almost every night. The Unit returns at 10.55pm, and the spy series begin again around midnight.

Weekends drop the American series altogether. Crime drama falls from 15% of weekday airtime to nothing, film rises from 18% to 32%, and the afternoons become war-film double and triple bills.

Popular shows on GREAT! Action

Burn Notice is an American drama that began on USA Network in 2007 and ran to seven seasons and 111 episodes, starring Jeffrey Donovan, Gabrielle Anwar, Bruce Campbell and Sharon Gless. It is the channel’s weekday engine, four episodes on a typical day.

The Unit is a CBS action series from 2006, four seasons and 69 episodes, starring Dennis Haysbert, Regina Taylor, Scott Foley and Robert Patrick. It runs at 6pm and again late at night.

The Persuaders! is a 1971 ITV crime-comedy adventure starring Tony Curtis and Roger Moore, one series of 24 episodes, so it comes round again quickly at this rate.

The New Avengers is the 1976 ITV spy series with Patrick Macnee, Gareth Hunt and Joanna Lumley, two series and 26 episodes. The original The Avengers shares the late-night slot.

The High Chaparral is an NBC western from 1967, four seasons and 98 episodes, with Leif Erickson and Cameron Mitchell. It is the 1pm regular.

The films split into two piles. The evening and weekend pile is westerns, war films and big action: Randolph Scott is the most frequent star, in six films including Comanche Station and Ten Wanted Men, with Audie Murphy, John Wayne and Lee Marvin in three each. Steven Seagal appears in six, including Beyond the Law. The overnight pile is disaster films: Collision Course, Asteroid: Final Impact, Super Eruption, Stonados, Seattle Superstorm and NYC: Tornado Terror, with Tibor Takács and Jason Bourque each directing two of them.

How to watch GREAT! Action

GREAT! Action is on Freeview channel 42, Sky 318 (317 on Sky Glass) and Virgin Media 426. On Freely it is channel 33, which needs an aerial. It is not on Freesat. GREAT! Action+1, an hour later, is on Sky 319. It also streams free on Great! Player, which is Freeview channel 63 on connected TVs. Watching any channel live needs a TV Licence.

GREAT! Action and its sister channels

GREAT! Action has four siblings. GREAT! TV is the gentle one, with The Waltons and MAS*H. GREAT! Movies is a crime channel built on Murder, She Wrote and made-for-TV mysteries. GREAT! Romance runs romantic TV films, and Christmas ones in the late autumn and winter. GREAT! Mystery, which we do not cover separately, completes the set.

The nearest channel outside the family is Legend. Comanche Station and Ride in the Whirlwind aired on both in the same five weeks, both lean on Steven Seagal, and Legend also puts an action film on at 9pm, after Babylon 5 and Walker, Texas Ranger.

Who it’s for

GREAT! Action is for someone who wants a big, loud film at 9pm and is happy to sit through Burn Notice to get there. It is good for fans of 1960s and 1970s British adventure television, who will find it after midnight every night, and for anyone who likes a war film on a weekend afternoon. It is not for viewers who want a film without interruption: the short inserts break into most of them.

What channel is GREAT! Action on Freeview?

GREAT! Action is on Freeview channel 42. It is also on Freely 33, Sky 318 and Virgin Media 426.

Does GREAT! Action show a film every night?

Nearly every night, at 9pm, usually an action, war or western film.

What’s on GREAT! Action most evenings?

On weekdays, The Unit at 6pm, Burn Notice from 7pm and a film at 9pm. At weekends films run through most of the day.

Can I watch GREAT! Action online?

Yes, free on Great! Player.