GREAT! Action TV Guide: Listings, Schedule & What’s On GREAT! Action Tonight

GREAT! Action is a free-to-air film channel on Freeview 42, built around action films and westerns. It started out as Sony Movies Action on 10 September 2019 and has been renamed twice since, most recently in March 2023. Tonight, Monday 17 August 2026, it’s built around a spy series double before the film: The Unit takes the 6pm slot, Burn Notice runs back to back at 7pm and 8pm, Parker, the 2013 thriller with Jason Statham and Jennifer Lopez, opens from 9pm, and the night closes with a rerun of the 1960s Avengers TV series at 11:30pm, not the 1998 film of the same name.

GREAT! Action Schedule: Monday 17 August 2026 (Full Listings)

Here is the complete GREAT! Action schedule for Monday 17 August 2026, on Freeview 42.

Overnight

Breakfast

Morning

Afternoon

Early evening

Primetime

Late night

What’s on GREAT! Action today

Two vintage spy series open the day back to back: The New Avengers at 12:50am and The Persuaders! at 1:50am, both reruns from the archive. Seattle Superstorm, a 2012 disaster thriller with Esai Morales about a mysterious object that triggers catastrophic weather over the city, follows at 3am. Coast Guard Alaska and two episodes of Air Rescue take the channel to 6am, when six half-hour Teleshopping blocks fill the schedule through to 8:30am.

The daytime turns to a bounty hunter, a true-crime case and a D-Day mission. Wanted: Dead Or Alive, the series that made Steve McQueen a star, opens proper programming at 9:10am with an episode sending Randall after a reclusive fugitive guarded by an Apache bodyguard. Murder Maps follows at 9:50am, tracing the 1940s investigation into con man John George Haigh, better known as the acid bath murderer. Hell in Normandy, Guy Madison’s 1968 war drama about Allied paratroopers sent to knock out Nazi flamethrower bunkers ahead of D-Day, holds the late morning from 10:50am. The Unit takes 1pm, an episode built around a helicopter crash in Siberia, and two episodes of Burn Notice run from 2pm, both repeated later in the evening. Stonados, a 2013 disaster film with Paul Johansson about a storm chaser trying to stop tornadoes hurling boulders across Boston, splits across 4pm and 5:01pm around a short This Week Back Then insert, before The Unit returns for a same-day repeat at 6pm.

GREAT! Action tonight — primetime and the evening schedule

Here’s the GREAT! Action primetime line-up for tonight, Monday 17 August 2026.

The Unit — GREAT! Action, 6pm

The Unit opens the evening with a same-day repeat of the episode shown at 1pm (series 2, episode 8). A helicopter comes down over Siberia, and the hour is about Bob and his interpreter staying alive on the ground long enough for anyone to reach them.

Burn Notice — GREAT! Action, 7pm & 8pm

Michael Westen’s Miami operation gets a double bill from 7pm, with the same two instalments GREAT! Action ran at 2pm and 3pm this afternoon (series 3, episodes 12 and 13). A favour for one of Sam’s old Navy SEAL contacts leads Michael into a barrio to track down a predator, before a pair of acquaintances from his own past turn up needing their mess cleaned up.

Parker — GREAT! Action, 9pm

Parker, the 2013 thriller built from Donald E. Westlake’s novel Flashfire, takes the 9pm slot. Jason Statham plays a professional thief left for dead by his own crew, and Jennifer Lopez is the struggling estate agent who ends up helping him track them down for revenge.

The Avengers — GREAT! Action, 11:30pm

The night closes with a rerun of the 1960s spy series The Avengers, starring Patrick Macnee and Diana Rigg (series 5, episode 18). This is not the 1998 big-screen version with Ralph Fiennes, Uma Thurman and Sean Connery, and it has nothing to do with Marvel’s superhero team of the same name. Steed and Mrs Peel infiltrate a conference after delegates start predicting, and then suffering, their own deaths.

What kind of films are on GREAT! Action

Classic westerns and action icons

The channel advertises itself as the home of John Wayne, Robert Mitchum, Jean-Claude Van Damme and Dolph Lundgren, and for once the marketing is accurate. Westerns from the 1930s to the 1960s take up most of the daylight hours, series as well as films, with Tombstone Territory and The High Chaparral in heavy rotation. After that come the 1980s and ’90s action vehicles, built around a small and very dependable cast list.

Contemporary action and thrillers

Evenings go harder on star names, usually one bigger studio picture with a leaner independent thriller either side of it. Most had a cinema release before they arrived here.

Anime, rescue documentaries and reality strands

Since around August 2024 the overnight hours have gone to things that are not films at all: Dragon Ball Super, and rescue documentaries such as Coast Guard Alaska and Air Rescue. The evening slots have so far been left alone.

How to watch GREAT! Action

Channel numbers

Here’s where to find GREAT! Action across the main UK television platforms:

Freesat viewers lost it in early February 2024, along with eight other Narrative Entertainment channels, and it has not come back.

Streaming online

GREAT! Action streams free through Great! Player at great-player.com, with no account or sign-in. The app is on Freeview Play, YouView, Amazon Fire TV, and Samsung and LG smart TVs, plus the App Store and Google Play. GREAT! Movies and GREAT! TV sit in the same app, so the whole network is in one place.

GREAT! sister channels

GREAT! Action is one of four channels run by Narrative Entertainment UK Limited under the GREAT! banner.

A fifth channel, GREAT! Movies Christmas, appears seasonally and runs festive films from September to December.

Frequently Asked Questions

What channel is GREAT! Action on Freeview?

GREAT! Action is on channel 42 on Freeview. It’s not currently on Freesat, having been withdrawn from that platform in early February 2024 along with eight other Narrative Entertainment channels. It remains free on Freeview, Sky and Virgin Media.

What channel is GREAT! Action on Sky and Virgin Media?

Channel 323 on Sky, channel 426 on Virgin Media. Both carry the same schedule as Freeview 42 and both are free to watch.

What’s on GREAT! Action tonight?

Monday evening opens with The Unit at 6pm, repeating its own 1pm airing, then Burn Notice doubles up from 7pm with the same two episodes shown earlier in the afternoon. Parker, the 2013 thriller with Jason Statham and Jennifer Lopez, takes the 9pm slot, and the night closes with a rerun of the 1960s Avengers spy series at 11:30pm, starring Patrick Macnee and Diana Rigg rather than the 1998 film cast. See the schedule table above for the rest of the day.

Is GREAT! Action free to watch, and does it carry adverts?

Yes, entirely free on Freeview, Sky and Virgin Media, with no subscription. It carries advertising during films, which is why some titles run in two parts around a short interstitial such as This Week Back Then.

Who owns GREAT! Action?

Narrative Entertainment UK Limited. The channel launched in September 2019 as Sony Movies Action, was rebranded Great! Movies Action in 2021 after Narrative Capital’s acquisition of Sony’s UK channels, and became GREAT! Action in March 2023.

What are the GREAT! sister channels?

GREAT! Movies, GREAT! TV and GREAT! Romance, plus the seasonal GREAT! Movies Christmas. All stream free via Great! Player.

Can I watch GREAT! Action online for free?

Yes, through Great! Player at great-player.com, with apps on Freeview Play, YouView, Amazon Fire TV, and Samsung and LG smart TVs. No account is needed.

Verdict

GREAT! Action costs nothing to watch and needs no sign-up. Monday’s daytime leans on real cases and archive drama rather than films: Wanted: Dead Or Alive sends Steve McQueen’s bounty hunter after a guarded fugitive, Murder Maps digs into the acid bath murders of the 1940s, and Hell in Normandy plays out a D-Day paratrooper mission with Guy Madison. None of it is new, but it is well chosen.

The evening is unusually repeat-heavy even by this channel’s standards. The Unit and both halves of Burn Notice all replay episodes the channel already showed earlier the same day, so anyone who watched the afternoon gets little new before 9pm. Parker changes that: a proper 2013 studio thriller with Jason Statham and Jennifer Lopez, and easily the strongest thing on the schedule tonight. The night then closes out with a rerun of the 1960s Avengers TV series, Patrick Macnee and Diana Rigg rather than Ralph Fiennes and Uma Thurman, so don’t go in expecting the 1998 film.

Related: Film4 TV Guide | Freeview Channel Guide | Films on TV This Week