A holiday weekend is the perfect time for the broadcast premiere of Ron Howard’s lively “The Beatles: Eight Day a Week — The Touring Years” (PBS, 8 p.m., check local listings), which considers the band’s power as a live group, and how quitting touring helped inspire new studio creativity. Plus there’s a lot of great songs along the way.
Previously on Hulu, it has surviving Beatles Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr talk about playing live, and quotes are dug up from George Harrison and John Lennon. And the sound for the music has been greatly enhanced. Hope they don’t interrupt to troll for station donations.
It’s paired with a documentary about one of their most celebrated albums, which marked its 50th anniversary this year, “Sgt. Pepper’s Musical Revolution” (PBS< 10:30 p.m., check local listings).
Alabama isn’t just a place for divisive politics; it’s primarily a place of football and its biggest annual event is the game between the two biggest college teams in the state. The annual Iron Bowl pits Alabama vs. Auburn (CBS, 3:30 p.m.) with the winner becoming the SEC West champion.
Prime time college football on network TV tonight has Notre Dame at Stanford (ABC, 8 p.m.) and Washington State at Washington (Fox, 8 p.m.) (and there are a lot more games listed below).
Hallmark’s “The Christmas Train” (Hallmark, 8 p.m.) has bigger star power than usual, with Dermot Mulroney, Kimberly Williams-Paisley, Danny Glover and Joan Cusak. In it, a journalist travels cross country by train to get home by Christmas. And there may be romance involved.
“Wrapped Up in Christmas” (Lifetime, 8 p.m.), from 2015, stars Tatyana Ali, Jasmine Guy and Brendan Fehr star a humbug store manager closing stores falls in love with the hired Santa.
Keyshia Cole, Tank, Macy Gray and Loni Love compete on a “Lip Sync Battle: Soul Train Special” (BET, 8 p.m.).
On “48 Hours” (CBS, 10 p.m.), Erin Moriarty tracks down an accused killer in Brazil.
Christmas specials include two different episodes of “Robbie the Reindeer” (CBS, 8 and 8:30 p.m.) and “The Story of Santa Claus” (CBS, 9 p.m.).
“Killer Women with Piers Morgan” (Investigation Discovery, 10 p.m.) visits with a woman who conspired to murder her ex-boyfriend when she was 15.
“Dr. Jeff: Rocky Mountain Vet” (Animal Planet, 9 p.m.) goes to Romania to help their out of control street dog problem.
The latest remake of an old movie story, “Kong: Skull Island” (HBO, 8 p.m.) with Tom Hiddleston, Samuel L. Jackson, Brie Larson, John C. Reilly and John Goodman, gets its premium cable debut. Also tonight, Robert De Niro stars in “The Comedian” (Starz, 8 p.m.) about a down and out comic who has to do community service for attacking a heckler, but meets somebody. Leslie Mann, Danny DeVito, Harvey Keitel and Cloris Leachman round out the cast in the film directed by Taylor Hackford.
“Welcome to Sweetie Pie’s” (OWN, 9 p.m.) returns for its eighth season amid some rocky family relationships.
A couple can’t coincide their Rottweiler and cat on “Cat vs. Dog” (Animal Planet, 10 p.m.).
Single ladies book a “Get Your Sexy Back” weekend at “Checked Inn” (OWN, 10 p.m.).
“Charles MansonWhat Happened” (Reelz, 10 p.m.) gets a timely replay.
“Ghost Adventures” (Travel, 9 p.m.) goes to the Titanic Museum in Branson, Mo.
New details on “Secrets of the Underground” (Science, 10 p.m.) suggest the city of Atlantis could have been in the Americas.
“Cake Boss” (TLC, 8 p.m.) makes a cake for an Italian soccer team, and then at 10, one for the Year of the Monkey.
Henry Fonda is the focus on Turner Classic Movies with “The Lady Eve” (8 p.m.), “Spencer’s Mountain” (10 p.m.), “The Best Man” (12:15 a.m.). Later comes two with Michael Parks, “Wild Seed” (2:15 a.m.) and “Bus Riley’s Back in Town” (4 a.m.).
College football begins at noon with games that include Georgia at Georgia Tech (ABC), Ohio State at Michigan (Fox), Kansas at Oklahoma State (ESPNU), Florida State at Florida (ESPN), Indiana at Purdue (ESPN2), UConn at Cincinnati (ESPNews) and Tulane at SMU (CBS Sports).
Games at 3:30 p.m. include Alabama at Auburn (CBS), Wisconsin at Minnesota (ABC), Boise at Fresno State (CBS Sports), Iowa State at Kansas State (ESPN2) and North Carolina at N.C. State (ESPNU).
Then comes West Virginia at Oklahoma (ESPN, 3:45 p.m.), Michigan State at Rutgers (Fox, 4 p.m.), Northwestern at Illinois (Fox Sports 1, 4 p.m.), Temple at Tulsa (ESPNews, 4 p.m.), Oregon State at Oregon (ESPN2, 7 p.m.), Clemson at South Carolina (ESPN, 7:30 p.m.), UTSA at Louisiana Tech (ESPNU, 7:30 p.m.), BYU at Hawaii (CBS Sports, 9 p.m.), Colorado at Utah (Fox Sports 1, 10 p.m.) and Utah State at Air Force (ESPN2, 10:15 p.m.).
Men’s college basketball includes Boston College at Providence (Fox Sports 1, 8 p.m.).
There’s some women’s figure skating (NBC, 4 p.m.; NBC Sports, 9 p.m.).
Lauryn Hill performs on an “Austin City Limits” (PBS, 11 p.m.) from last year.
The “Saturday Night Live” (NBC, 11:30 p.m.) with Gal Gadot and Sam Smith is rerun.