News & Notes
Over on cable, BIO has The Bee Gees: In Our Own Time special, History has a WWII in HD: The Air War special, ID has the first season finale of Who the (Bleep) Did I Marry?, Science has the second season premiere of Sci-Fi Science: Physics of the Impossible, truTV has the eighth season premiere of Most Shocking and the third season finale of Black Gold, TV Land has the first season finale of Harry Loves Lisa, and USA has the fifth fall season premiere of Psych.
Prime Picks
Undercovers (NBC): New. Samantha and Steven run into some unexpected complications while searching for a bomb. Shaw is wondering how much longer he can go with this before the Blooms figure something is going on.
Criminal Minds (CBS): New. A kidnapped woman’s body is found in an alley and the team attempts to find the unsub before it happens again.
Psych (USA): Fall Premiere. Shawn and Gus are heading back to Vancouver at the request of Despereaux, played by Cary Elwes, just days before he is extradited to the United States. Plays again later. I love this show and this episode shows why. The humor is fantastic, the guest star Elwes is great, and…well, it has a great ending. I also very much enjoyed watching Vancouver, B.C. get a chance to play itself once again. I mean, it spends so much time pretending to be other places. We get six more episodes after tonight over the next few weeks. I’m so happy to have this show back, how about you?
Solid Selections
The Next Iron Chef (Food Network): Repeat. This past Sunday’s episode, “Inspiration,” replays. Plays again later.
MythBusters (Discovery Channel): New. The guys test six smaller myths. Plays again later.
Terriers (FX): New. It’s the day of Hank’s ex’s wedding and he is fighting the urge to drink. While trying to forget about the wedding, Hank stumbles upon something going down regarding the Ocean Beach conspiracy. Runs 61 minutes. Plays twice and again later. I know that I say it every week, but this is another great episode. This is by far the best new show of the fall. Yet, if I had to choose only one thing to watch in this hour, it’d be Psych, but purely on a seniority basis. I have a lot more time invested in the story and characters of that show. But, lots of stuff goes down this week for both Hank and Britt and the ending perfectly sets up next week’s outstanding episode. If you’re not watching this, you are truly missing out on some great TV. For those that dropped the show early on, cause it was too episodic and not serialized enough, well, you should have stuck around. There is barely anything that happens in an episode that isn’t linked to something in a previous episode or will crop back up again in a latter episode.
Other Options
- The Defenders (CBS): New. Two people end up dead at a club shooting and Nick has to show that a local rapper is innocent of anything that happened that night.
- Hollywood Treasure (Syfy): New. “London Calling.” Plays again later.
- Tailgate Warriors With Guy Fieri (Food Network): New. It’s Bears fans vs. Bills fans outside the stadium. Plays again later.
Sports Notes
- ESPN has doubleheader NBA action with the Utah Jazz at the Orlando Magic followed by the Los Angeles Clippers at the San Antonio Spurs.
- ESPN2 has college football action with Miami (Ohio) at Bowling Green.
TV Marathons
Bravo has six episodes of Tabatha’s Salon Takeover and later five episodes of Top ChefL Just Desserts.
Oxygen has 12 episodes of America’s Next Top Model.
Syfy has eight episodes of Moonlight.
USA has 10 episodes of Psych followed by six episodes of NCIS.
As “Undercovers” is your prime pick this evening, I thought I would ask of you your thoughts on it’s cancellation…
Tim, Undercovers has been and continues to be a “Prime Pick” by default, as there isn’t anything else in the hour that’s really worth watching in my opinion. That changes next week with the return of FOX’s Human Target.
I am slightly disappointed in the cancellation, as it looks to be improving a bit each week and the show is supposed to get some actual heft with the introduction of a mythology that has thus far only barely been hinted at in a couple previous episodes.
Sadly, it sounds as if another possibly good show was first ruined by the network wanting mainly standalone episodes in the beginning of its run, which didn’t garner any real critical praise or interest viewers in large enough numbers.
If the upcoming arc that delves into why the Blooms were brought back into the spy world turns out to be good, then my level of disappointment may rise. But, as of now, I can’t say that I’ll really miss it.