MONDAY
While the WGA is back at the negotiating table, locked up in some undisclosed location—e.g. not the Beverly Wilshire—and avoiding the press, the show must go on! (But keep those fingers crossed.) Tonight is the final round of competition in Dancing With the Stars (ABC, 9 PM). Marie Osmond has completely co-opted the fifth season of the reality series, what with her fainting, her father passing away, and her being the oldest woman to ever make it to the finals. (I bet she just loves that stat.) So just give the darn trophy to her and let’s go back to acting like this isn’t one of the most popular shows on television.
For some real competition, Samantha Who? (ABC, 9 PM)—which has been bumped up a half hour to make way for Notes From the Underbelly (ABC, 9:30 PM) making its second season debut—will go to head to head with Two and a Half Men (CBS, 9 PM)—the most popular half hour of comedy on TV, despite not being the least bit funny.
Bonus: a gaggle of hot models—Heidi Klum, Marisa Miller, Adriana Lima—do a bit of DVR hijacking for Victoria’s Secret on How I Met Your Mother (CBS, 8 PM).
TUESDAY
Americans needed another person doing impressions of George Bush and Sean Connery about as much as they needed a Spice Girls reunion. But, we got both! Hallelujah! And one, believe it or not, has been smiled on by the angels—Frank TV (TBS, 11 PM). The sketch comedy show starring Frank Caliendo had an impressive 2.9 million people tune into its debut. Due to the strike, there are only four episodes left! But don’t fret/see-visions-of-the-forthcoming-apocalypse; with numbers like this, he’s not going anywhere.
Do you ever get the feeling that the writers of House (ABC, 9 PM) and Grey’s Anatomy are reading the same medical journals—or issues of People? This season alone, both have used Lyme disease (and the dramatic discovery of a phantom tick), and tonight’s House finds Wilson having to tell a patient that he’s not going to die of a cancer that he had originally diagnosed as terminal. This plotline already played itself out on Grey’s a couple of weeks ago.
ABC tries to score again with another Charlie Brown special: Charlie Brown Christmas (8 PM). It won a Peabody—over 42 years ago.
WEDNESDAY
Thanksgiving is over, which means one thing to retailers and networks, alike: it’s Christmas. And finally, there’s something other than Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer and, well, Charlie Brown Christmas, to show: Shrek the Halls (ABC, 8 PM), an animated half hour featuring characters from the movie. Stay tuned for How the Grinch Stole Christmas (ABC, 8:30 PM). While it’s safe to say ABC’s audience is pediatric, NBC’s will be geriatric. The peacock unloads Christmas in Rockefeller (8 PM), a variety show of sorts staged around the lighting of the famed Christmas tree. Tony Bennett, Celine Dion, and Carrie Underwood, amongst others, perform. Definitely DVR this one, so you can fast forward through the Metamucil commercials.
THURSDAY
It’s the attack of the repeats. The networks have nothing to show at 9 PM. Grey’s Anatomy (ABC 9 PM), CSI (CBS 9 PM), and The Office (NBC 9 PM) are all old. The only thing left to watch? Kathy … Griffin … on … Bravo. I am so afraid of having nothing else to watch, that I had to write that from the fetal position. End the strike, now!
FRIDAY
CBS tries to add a bit of historical importance to the Grammy Awards by showing a best of (CBS, 8 PM). The Hallmark channel premieres A Grandpa for Christmas (9 PM)—aw!—starring Ernest Borgnine—oh, better yet, mom, can I get a Wii? And MyNetworkTV is showing Mulholland Drive (8 PM).
