Monday: House
Fox has gone bonkers promoting the heck out of this very special House episode … and we are totally on board! In the creepily titled episode “Locked In” (about the even more creepy Locked-In Syndrome), Mos Def guest stars as a man who is trapped inside his body but can’t move or communicate. Thank goodness there’s a hot, grumpy and brilliant diagnostician at Princeton Plainsboro hospital who got himself banged up in a motorcycle accident and is in the neighboring bed! The entire episode (which you can watch the first two minutes of here) is from the perspective of the patient, so expect lots of confessional moments from Dr. House, and all his little cottages. Also, prepare yourself for lots of icky discussion of the “brain stem” (shudder). [Fox, 8 p.m.]
Tuesday: Invasion of the Body Snatchers
We have always been fond of the term “Pod People” to describe the men we date, but in fact this coinage dates back to the classic 1956 sci-fi horror/flick Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Set in the small fictional town of Santa Mira, Calif., the movie centers on a local doctor (Kevin McCarthy) who starts to see a bunch of patients who think their loved ones are impostors. At first dismissing the phenomenon as mere mass hysteria, with the aid of a friend (King Donovan) he comes to discover that people are actually being replaced by Pod People—which grew from “seeds drifting through space for years” (augh!)—who look just like regular earthlings except for the fact that they have no emotion (sound familiar, ladies?). [TCM, 9:30]
Wednesday: Make Me a Supermodel
We were totally prepared to pass on this reality crack pipe—a weird hybrid of America’s Next Top Model and Project Runway—until those evil geniuses over at weekend programming at Bravo got us sucked in with a marathon. What we’ve learned so far: Male models are just as vain as the ladies but somehow, they seem to be a lot nicer. Maybe because they’re not starving? Maybe because male models don’t really matter? In tonight’s episode, the high-cheekboned lovelies get smutty with one another at a photo shoot and it looks like a tape measure will be used to see who’s hips are too effin’ wide to make it. What would Tyra say? [Bravo, 10 p.m.]
Thursday: Romancing the Stone
Grey’s Anatomy and Private Practice are both repeats tonight, and NBC is doing a monster ER series finale (but, on the plus side, Ernest Borgnine guest-stars!). If you’re watching that, you should record the classic 1984 film Romancing the Stone. Remember this one? Kathleen Turner is a romance novelist who has to fly down to Colombia to rescue her kidnapped sister (Mary Ellen Trainor). Michael Douglas plays our swashbuckling hero Jack T. Colton, who promises to help but really might be after the map. There’s a giant green emerald involved! And Danny DeVito! Trust us, mud slides have never before or since been so incredibly sexy. [WE, 11 p.m.]
Friday: Friday Night Lights
Will everyone please, please, please watch this show already? Of course it airs on Friday night! But if you don’t record it you are certainly missing out: There’s the hotness of Tim Riggins, the awesomeness that is Coach and Tami Taylor’s marriage, and after last week we can’t wait to see what the fallout is from the totally bananas father-slapping-son-around-in-the-Applebee’s-parking-lot. We’re at the penultimate episode before season three ends and the fate of this extraordinary television show hangs in the balance. Let’s go, America! Panthers go to State and we’re rooting for a fourth season! Remember: Clear ears, full hearts, can’t lose. [NBC, 9 p.m.]
