Seven Days of Television: May 5 to May 11
A select viewing guide to the next seven days of television
MONDAY MAY 5 24: Live Another Day (Fox, 8 p.m.) Look out, old Jack is back. Kiefer Sutherland resumes his portrayal of the indestructible spy-hero in this five-hour TV event. The storyline picks up several years from where the original series left off, with Jack in exile from the U.S. and living a fugitive existence in downtown London. Everything changes when an evil terrorist cell threatens to rock the world with a devastating attack – and guess who’s the only person of stopping them? Also back is Mary Lynn Rajskub as the precocious computer hacker Chloe.
TUESDAY MAY 6 Wild Things with Dominic Monaghan (OLN, 9 p.m.) Nothing says adorable more than two hobbits reuniting. Series host Dominic Monaghan welcomes his former Lord of the Rings co-star Billy Boyd as guest star in tonight’s new episode of this nifty nature series. The two ex-hobbits revisit New Zealand to wander through several LOTR filming locations and search for the Giant Wetapung – one of the largest and heaviest insects on the planet. The results are simply precious.
WEDNESDAY MAY 7 Secretly Pregnant (TLC, 8 p.m.) The reality pool just never seems to run dry for TLC. Now in its second season, this popular reality series profiles expectant women forced to keep their pregnancy quiet for a variety of reasons. Tonight, meet Charity, who already has five kids and is currently pregnant with her sixth but can’t afford to tell her parents the news. Also meet Natasha, a young woman who is terrified that her boyfriend will leave her if he learns of her delicate condition. Don’t judge, just watch. Two more episodes follow.
THURSDAY MAY 8 Hell’s Kitchen (Fox, Citytv, 8 p.m.) Oh, Gordon Ramsay, you lovable brute. Still going strong in U.S. ratings, the Brit chef’s search for America’s next culinary superstar is forever predictable but rarely boring. In tonight’s new outing, Ramsay tasks the remaining chefs from the red and blue teams to take the “adaptability challenge,” in which the amateurs must create a dazzling entrée with four hidden ingredients. Celebrity chef Michael Cimarusti makes a guest appearance.
FRIDAY MAY 9 Unforgettable (CBS, CTV Two, 8 p.m.) One of the best shows you’re probably not watching grinds to a second-season close tonight and will likely not resurface next year. For newcomers, the premise casts the lovely Poppy Montgomery as Carrie, an intense young New York cop with the remarkable ability to remember people, places and things to a remarkable degree. All of which comes in handy in tonight’s season-ender in which she attends her high-school reunion and one of her former classmates is murdered. Get ready for all those high-school memories to come flooding back.
SATURDAY MAY 10 Stella Dallas (TCM, 8 p.m.) How on earth did Barbara Stanwyck never receive an Oscar? The versatile actress is painfully believable in this 1937 tearjerker casting her as the uncultured factory girl Stella, who weds the Ivy Leaguer Stephen (John Boles) even though she knows the marriage is doomed. Once hubby splits for New York, Stella’s sole source of joy becomes her daughter Laurel (Anne Shirley), for whom she desperately wants a better life. Get out the hankies for the closing scene as Stella watches her own daughter’s high-society wedding from a respectable distance.
SUNDAY MAY 11 Rosemary’s Baby (NBC, 9 p.m.) Owing more to the original novel by Ira Levin than the 1968 movie, this four-hour adaptation is highly-recommended viewing. Airing this Sunday and next, the story casts Carole Bouquet and Patrick J. Adams as Margaux and Guy, an attractive American newlywed couple who move into a Paris apartment building with a dubious past. When Margaux gets pregnant, she’s suddenly having horrible dreams and fears that both her husband and new neighbours are plotting evil behind her back. The devil, you say.