Laurel’s TV Picks

Best Bets

I’m underwhelmed by my choices of new programming tonight. The “recommended reruns” are worth a look if you missed any of them the first time around.

Recommended Reruns

The Big Bang Theory (CBS, 7pm)
Bones (FOX, 7pm)
Gossip Girl (CW, 7pm)
How I Met Your Mother (CBS, 7:30pm)
House (FOX, 8pm)
Two and a Half Men (CBS, 8pm)

News & Notes

So did you check out the premiere of In Plain Sight last night? What did you think? As always, I like to hear from you fine folks.

Daytime

Rerun of “The Woman Who Lost 530 Pounds” episode of Oprah (syndicated, check your local listings). Originally aired back in November 2007.

Primetime Grid

Primetime

Baseball: Yankees at Twins (ESPN, 6pm). Livan Hernandez is pitching for the Twins, some guy named Andy Pettitte is pitching for the Yankees. Followed by Baseball Tonight (ESPN, 9pm or so).

Rerun of the first episode of this season of Bones (FOX, 7pm). A skull smashes into the windshield of a moving car and the team first encounters a certain cannibal.

Rerun of the second ever episode of Gossip Girl (CW, 7pm; also on Sunday at 5pm) which is the one called “The Wild Brunch” and it takes place the day after the events of the first episode. If you weren’t wild about the first couple of episodes of this show (I wasn’t), trust me when I say it does improve as it goes along. It helped a lot once they humanized Blair and Chuck, that’s for sure.

Chuck: (about Dan) “If I knew his name I’d hunt him down and kill him.”
Nate: “What, ’cause you kill people now? You going to strangle him with your scarf?”
Chuck: “Don’t mock the scarf Nathaniel, it’s my signature.”
Nate: “Just saying, death by scarf, not that intimidating.”
  from Gossip Girl

Howard Wolowitz is, um, busy with one of Penny’s friends so she’s asked to fill in for Halo night in this rerun of The Big Bang Theory (CBS, 7pm).

Sheldon: [after being forced to miss some TV] “I’ll watch the last 24 minutes of Doctor Who, although at this point it’s more like Doctor Why Bother.”
  from The Big Bang Theory

Two new episodes of Little People, Big World (TLC, 7pm and 10pm, 7:30pm and 10:30pm).

Cappie’s pledges break in their fake ID cards, Casey questions her choices for the future as she prepares for a test on a new Greek (ABC Family, 7pm; also Tuesday at 11pm and next Monday at 6pm).

Barney seduces Marshall’s law professor (played by guest star Jane Seymour) and Lily takes a job at Ted’s office where she tries to teach Ted’s boss (played by guest star Bryan Cranston) a lesson in this rerun of How I Met Your Mother (CBS, 7:30pm) from last season.

Ted [after Lily takes his bosses baseball away]: “Give him his ball back right now! People are gonna get fired!”
Lily: “No, they’re not! It’s just a tantrum, Ted. I saw this in kindergarten all the time.”
Ted: “This isn’t kindergarten. Mr. Druthers is an adult, and he wants his ball back!”
  from How I Met Your Mother

“The Big Chill: Swanson’s and Stouffer’s” on a new episode of Heavyweights (Food Network, 7:30pm and 2:30am).

Extreme Marksmen (History Channel, 8pm – 10pm, midnight – 2am).

Rerun of the first episode of House (FOX, 8pm) for this past season, which was titled “Alone” in part because House had lost his team at the end of the previous season. Cuddy pressures House to hire a new team, he tries to diagnose a woman who survived the collapse of an office building and a janitor helps him out. There’s also some hilarity involving a missing guitar. Kay Lenz is among the guest stars.

Dr. Cuddy: “Where did you come from?”
House: “Apes, if you believe the Democrats.”
  from House

Charlie should be focused on his new relationship with Linda (played by Ming-Na) but instead he can’t get Rose out of his mind in this rerun of Two and a Half Men (CBS, 8pm). Melanie Lynskey (of Drive) returns for this episode as Rose. Jane Lynch also guest stars as Charlie’s therapist.

Alan: “Berta, have you seen Charlie?”
Berta: “He’s not in his bed?”
Alan: “No.”
Berta: “Passed out on the bathroom floor?”
Alan: “No.”
Berta: “Rubbing oil on the volleyball girls?”
Jake: “No.”
Berta: “Well, that just leaves the bars, hospitals, and jails. I’ll go get the Yellow Pages.”
  from Two and a Half Men

“Wind Farm Technician” is the dirty job du jour on Dirty Jobs (Discovery, 8pm and 11pm). Rerun of an earlier episode (“Steel Mill Worker”) at 7pm and 11pm.

Jon Kelley hosts the season premiere of The Mole (ABC, 9pm). The 12 players meet for the first time in Los Angeles, Chile. Their first mission has them jumping over a waterfall, I guess. I suppose you could say that this reality-competition show is a little like The Amazing Race, except there’s a saboteur among the competitors and part of the game is figuring out who that is. The person who knows the least about The Mole by the end of each episode is eliminated. This show first debuted in 2001 and the first two seasons were hosted by Anderson Cooper and were somewhat entertaining; seasons three and four were celebrity editions hosted by Ahmad Rashad which weren’t any good. We haven’t had a season of this show since 2004, but now it’s back.

New Verminators (Discovery, 9pm and 1am).

A missile is launched into a courthouse in this rerun of CSI: Miami (CBS, 9pm). I hate it when that happens.

Late Night

Scott McClellan on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart (Comedy Central, 10pm and midnight).

Jon Paskowitz on The Colbert Report (Comedy Central, 10:30pm and 12:30am).

Indianapolis 500 winner Scott Dixon, Adam Sandler, Donna Summer on The Late Show with David Letterman (CBS, 10:35pm).

William Shatner, Chelsea Handler, Newton Faulkner on The Tonight Show (NBC, 10:35pm).

Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Matt Costa on The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson (CBS, 11:37pm).

Seann William Scott, Tim Meadows, the Raconteurs on Late Night with Conan O’Brien (NBC, 11:37pm).

Matthew Fox (of Lost), Kristi Yamaguchi, Pussycat Dolls on a rerun of Jimmy Kimmel Live (ABC, check your local listings).

Maronzio Vance, Jenny McCarthy, Does It Offend You Yeah? on a rerun of Last Call with Carson Daly (NBC, check your local listings).