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0tics ’corner
SMALLVILLE
Thursday at 8 p.m. on
cw
Rock, meet hard place. In
this episode, the Depart¬
ment of Domestic Secu¬
rity wants Jimmy (Aaron
Ashmore) to help it arrest
Chloe (Allison Mack) —
who's hacked a bunch of
government computers in
search of power surges.
Clark (Tom Welling) asked
her to do it as part of his
effort to save Lana (Kristin
Kreuk) — but the feds
don't care. Lex (Michael
Rosenbaum) offers Jimmy
a way out: He'll help get
Chloe cleared, but Jimmy
will owe him big.
KUNG FU KILLER
Sunday at 10 p.m. on SPIKE
His name is Crane, not Caine, but David Carra
dine's character in this new two-part adventure,
set in 1920s China,-will feel familiar to fans of the
series "Kung Fu." Carradine plays White Crane,
a monk and martial-arts master. When mercenar¬
ies trash his temple and kill his mentor, he goes
to Shanghai to avenge the crime. While there, he
meets a singer (Daryl brother. Hannah) who's searching
for her kidnapped Yes, Hannah sings in
this! Part 2 airs Monday.
(b^stof • • • Period TV Series BY JOHN CROOK
“Hi at 70s Show” fj*’ WA
(Fox, 1998-2006): Like i
“Happy Days,” this iwl 0
hilarious series - which IF I i
launched the careers of I 7 a
Ashton Kutcher and I
TopherGrace- MS ly* jjjjt Itt
revolved around
Wisconsin teenagers,
but “That 70s
Show” made even sawier use of
the pop-culture signposts of its era, including
“Star Wars” and a new appreciation of, um, herbs.
“The Waltons” (CBS, 1972-81): If you remember this family drama
as syrupy and sentimental, your memory is playing tricks on you. True, “The Waltons” had
plenty of heart, but especially in the early seasons, the show beautifully captured the
hardscrabble life of a large Depression-era family in Virginia. Ralph Waites sagging shoulders
and tired eyes and Michael Learned’s flinty strength spoke volumes in their scenes as parents
John and Olivia Walton.
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"9 “Mad Men” (AMC, 2007-present): The
m best of the best, this drama set inside a
■ Madison Avenue ad agency captures its 1960
I milieu so acutely that it’s disorienting at first:
I the clothing, the
casual racism and
sexism, the nonstop
smoking. Once you
embrace and enter this
world, however, “Mad
Men” is all about flawed,
recognizably human
characters grappling with
problems that have no
expiration date.
FORSYTH COUNTY NEWS
HOW I MET YOUR
MOTHER
Monday at 8:30 p.m. on
CBS
There's no crying in base¬
ball, and definitely not at
big New York law firms.
When a tongue-lashing
from his hot-tempered new
boss (guest star Bob Oden
kirk) makes Marshall (Ja¬
son Segei) cry, his friends
have all kinds of advice for
him. He goes with Barney's
(Neil Patrick Harris) idea:
Yell at someone else. But
that doesn't get it out of
his system, and he gives
the boss a ration as well in
'The Chain of Screaming."
OUTSIDER'S INN
Friday at 9 p.m. on CMT
Marcia, Marcia, Marcia! To Baby Boomers, their kids and grandkids,' she'll always
be the oldest Brady girl, but actress Maureen McCormick channels her inner Dick Loudon
("Newhart") in this new semiscripted comedy series, which has her running a bed-and
breakfast inn in the Tennessee mountains. She gets a little help from friends Bobby Brown
and Carnie Wilson, her former rivals on the musical competition series "Gone Country."
HOUSE
Tuesday at 8 p.m. on FOX
Hey, it's Big Love! And Ridiculously Old Fraud! House (Hugh Laurie) eventually winnowed
dawn his field of new fellows to three, but this episode takes us back to the beginning of the
elimination game. Thirty wannabes are put to work on the case of a military pilot (Essence At¬
kins) whose illness may disqualify her from astronaut training. And -House is seeing his ex-fel¬
lows (Jennifer Morrison, Omar Epps, Jesse Spencer) in places where they shouldn't be.
I I
( Vincent
Kortheiser
■r
*
>4 J
“Happy Days” (ABC, 1974-84): This long-running sitcom about
Midwestern family life in the 1950s was a nostalgic valentine to an impossibly
carefree America. “Happy Days’ was nothing close to documentary realism,
but as its breakout character, Fonzie, would say: “Ayyyyyyyyyyyy!”
“Swingtown” (CBS, 2008): That other 70s show, now airing
Fridays on CBS, uses the provocative topic of marital swinging in
the Chicago suburbs as a
starting point for a
fascinating look at the
dawning age of sexual
liberation in America. The
cast, headed by Molly Parker,
Grant Sbpw, Lana Parrilla
and Miriam Shor, is close to
superb, but unless ratings
pick up as the show
completes its first season,
we’ll hear a “Swingtown”
swan song.
CSI: NY
Wednesday at 10 p.m.
on CBS
Just when you thought
it was safe ... . In "Like
Water for Murder," the
CSI team investigates
when a body, partially wash¬
eaten by sharks,
es up on Rockaway
Beach, followed shortly
by the discovery Both of an¬
other body. victims
were real estate agents,
and both had traces of
a certain gourmet choc¬
olate in their stomachs.
But the cause of death
is neither sharks nor
chocolate; there's a se¬
rial killer on the loose.
i™
August 15 - 21, 2008