Laurel’s TV Picks

Best Bets

New Friday Night Lights (NBC, 8pm)
New Monk (USA, 8pm and 11pm)
New Numb3rs (CBS, 9pm)
New Psych (USA, 9pm and midnight)

News & Notes

I’ve had this cold for a whole week now and I’m darn tired of it. If I sound grumpy, blame the cold.

I’m enjoying reading your contest entries. If you aren’t interested in entering the contest, I’d still love to hear your picks for favorite new show of this season (just be sure to tell me in your message that you’re not entering the contest).

Daytime

Psych marathon (USA, 5am - 3pm). Reruns of most of the episodes from earlier this season.

The X-Files marathon (Sci-Fi, 7am - 4pm). Episodes 3-11 from season seven, the episode at 3pm is “Syzygy” from season three. “Millennium” is the episode that airs at 8am, it’s a crossover of sorts with Millennium.

Primetime Grid

Primetime

Turner Classic Movies celebrates director Fred Sears by airing four of his movies: Earth vs. the Flying Saucers (TCM, 7pm - 8:30pm, letterboxed), Rock Around the Clock (TCM, 8:30pm, letterboxed), Cell 2455, Death Row (TCM, 10pm), and The Werewolf (TCM, 11:30pm, letterboxed). You can read all about Fred F. Sears and these movies on the TCM website. Very cool stuff. I could enthuse about these movies, but the folks at TCM have already done so and better than I could.

If you’ve gotta watch a show with “Whisperer” in the title tonight, I recommend Dog Whisperer (National Geographic, 7pm and 10pm).

Melinda tries to figure out what’s behind some hauntings at a school on Ghost Whisperer (CBS, 7pm). Seriously, Dog Whisperer is better.

A lake is transported to Mongo or something like that and Flash needs to do something to prevent more theft of the Earth’s water on a new Flash Gordon (Sci-Fi, 7pm and 10pm). Wouldn’t it have been neat if this show had been a dark and interesting re-imagining of Flash Gordon? But, um, no. It’s just kinda dumb.

The “mob” on 1 vs. 100 (NBC, 7pm) includes Ross Mathews (a.k.a. “Ross the Intern”) from The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, Richard Rubin (of Beauty and the Geek), the Dahm Triplets (of Playboy magazine), and (best of all) Oscar the Grouch (of Sesame Street).

Yet another airing of the first episode of season five of The Wire (HBO, 7pm). The second episode is available now on HBO On Demand and debuts on HBO on Sunday (I’ve seen it, it’s great). If you haven’t seen seasons 1-4 of The Wire, you really shouldn’t jump in to season five because you’d be pretty lost and would be missing out on a lot of cool things. Seasons 1-4 are available on DVD and are definitely worth tracking down.

Rebroadcast of the season finale of Grey’s Anatomy (ABC, 7pm - 8:02pm) which aired last night, in case you missed it. Another fine episode. If you’re a fan of Chandra Wilson as Miranda Bailey (and who isn’t?), you don’t want to miss this one.

Bones (FOX, 7pm) and House (FOX, 8pm) are the two best shows FOX has so they seem to be airing reruns of both a lot. This rerun of Bones is “The Priest in the Churchyard” from last season. A water main bursts in a graveyard and they find a body that shouldn’t be there. Plus Booth is still seeing a shrink (played by Stephen Fry) and he brings Brennan to see him. Lots of good character development in this one as Booth and Brennan bicker more than usual and argue about God and so forth.

The pressure is on Smash to make a verbal commitment to a college on a new Friday Night Lights (NBC, 8pm). And Coach Taylor is a bit stressed about the biggest game of the season, plus dealing with Riggins too.

“Mr. Monk Joins A Cult” in the winter premiere of Monk (USA, 8pm and 11pm; also on Saturday at 6pm). It’s actually a sweeter episode than I expected and I enjoyed it well enough (I’ve had a chance to screen it). There’s a case, Monk joins a cult to try to solve it, and so on.

Carson Kressley helps a mother and her daughter on a new How To Look Good Naked (Lifetime, 8pm and 10pm).

Everything I can find says that the series premiere of George of the Jungle doesn’t air until next Friday, but the schedule shows an episode tonight (Cartoon Network, 8pm and 9:30pm) so that can’t be quite right. I guess this is a sneak preview. It’s a cute new cartoon about a guy named George who lives in the jungle, you know the one– watch out for that tree! I’ve seen an episode of it and I enjoyed it, seems suitable for kids and adults alike (though more for kids). Colorful and goofy.

Josh is kidnapped by a vindictive drug lord on a new Moonlight (CBS, 8pm). DVR Alert: This episode was originally supposed to air a while back (but didn’t) so your DVR may not realize it’s new.

New What Not To Wear (TLC, 8pm and 10pm; also on Saturday at 1pm).

Rerun of House (FOX, 8pm) from season two. Chase faces a disciplinary hearing regarding his involvement in a woman’s death. Stacy (Sela Ward) counsels him. There are flashbacks to how Chase and House and the rest handled the case.

Stacy: “If Chase screwed up so badly, why didn’t you fire him?”
House: “He has great hair.”
Stacy: “What are you hiding?”
House: “I’m gay. Oh, that’s not what you meant. It does explain a lot though. No girlfriend, always with Wilson, obsession with sneakers . . . ”
  from House

Someone really doesn’t want Charlie to do his job to help the FBI with a particualr case, so they try to intimidate him on a new Numb3rs (CBS, 9pm). Chris Bauer makes another appearance on the show; he’s been in many things, but I’ll always think of him as “Frank Sobotka” from The Wire. Last season, someone from The Wire was in just about every episode of Numb3rs, this year they’ve been totally slacking in that regard.

Winter premiere of Psych (USA, 9pm and midnight; also 5pm on Saturday). Gus has a rather large secret which comes out early in this new episode. Gus and Shawn end up working a missing persons case while Lassiter and O’Hara get really competitive at the police station. I’ve seen this episode and it’s another good one from this fun show.

The team salvages a partially damaged Hive ship on a new Stargate Atlantis (Sci-Fi, 9pm and 11pm).

A fugitive heads to the Montecito in the 100th episode of Las Vegas (NBC, 9pm), which means the Montecito also ends up host to bounty hunters and FBI agents. There are other subplots, of course, because there always are.

Brittany Snow (of American Dreams) directs a documentary which stars tennis player Jelena Jankovic on Framed (IFC, 9:30pm and 1:30am). These are short films made in two days where one celeb makes a film about another.

Late Night

Ben Affleck, George Carlin, and Tom Brokaw are scheduled to appear on the season premiere of Real Time with Bill Maher (HBO, 10pm). Maher and guests will answer questions online after the show.

Tracy Morgan, Kat Von D, Dropkick Murphys on The Late Show with David Letterman (CBS, 10:35pm).

Alec Baldwin, Lena Headey, Spoon on The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson (CBS, 11:37pm).

Full list of late night talk show guests from Sue Trowbridge.

Things get kinda violent late on TCM tonight with Death Race 2000 (TCM, 1am) and Rollerball (TCM, 2:30am).