Here’s what’s up in the world of TV for Thursday, December 27. All times are Eastern.
TOP PICK
Happy New Year, Charlie Brown (ABC, 8 p.m.): Ah, the Peanuts gang! Is there any holiday for which you didn’t crank out a special? Yeah, we’re sort of surprised you didn’t do something like Look Out, Charlie Brown! She’s Irish! for St. Patrick’s Day, as it would have been the perfect opportunity to expand the mythology around the Little Red-Haired Girl, but you did do a special for Arbor Day. Arbor Day, for God’s sake! Anyway, we recommend you check this one out, because it’s a touch underrated, and what other New Year’s Day specials are you going to watch? Rudolph’s Shiny New Year? Please!
WHAT ELSE IS ON
The Big Bang Theory (CBS, 8 p.m.): There are a number of strong reruns on tonight, but we’re going to recommend this enjoyable Big Bang Theory, because we know that doing so will make you angry, and our servers are powered by your rage. No, really! You can look it up on the “About The A.V. Club” page!
The Mindy Project (Fox, 8 p.m.): Fox’s attempt to get you interested in its floundering Tuesday night comedy bloc continues with two solid hours of the most scattershot new show of the fall. Maybe you’ll love it, but we’re betting you’ll be more confused by what it’s trying to go for as it finds its voice.
The Real Housewives Of Miami (Bravo, 9 p.m.): Meanwhile, all those Florida housewives get together to shoot the shit about the season just passed in part one of a sure-to-be-interminable reunion special. Actually, we’ve never watched this. A Housewives show set in Miami seems like shooting fish in a barrel.
Rocket City Rednecks (National Geographic, 9 p.m.): Reality TV loves a challenge involving a disabled war veteran, because it lets everybody involved do some good for once. So when a disabled vet comes asking for a boar-hunting vehicle, well, the Rocket City Rednecks are only too happy to oblige.
Friday Night Lights (ESPN Classic, 10 p.m.): If you’ve never seen the series finale of this wonderful series, it’s probably time to get on that. Unless you’ve never seen the rest of the series, in which case, what business do you think you have reading this website? Hm? Go! Go go go! It’s on Netflix! Now!
Wives With Beehives (TLC, 10 p.m.): Continuing its weird run through all of the pilots it apparently rejected this year, TLC takes a look at some women who live their lives inspired by 1950s housewives. If you’d just readjust your masculine expectations of good TV, you’d see this is the best show ever made.
Bound (IFC, 8 p.m.): This snappy little heist film about two former lovers who decide to take the mob for all its worth got the Wachowskis the gig to direct the Matrix films and briefly shocked all of mid-90s America with the idea that somebody could make a genre film prominently featuring lesbians. Gasp!
Good Morning, Vietnam (Sundance, 8 p.m.): We have basically no idea how this film fits into the Sundance Channel’s “indie films” aesthetic, but at least it will almost certainly have Robin Williams shouting the film’s title stuck in your head for the rest of the day. Go ahead. You can imitate him.
The Postman (Reelz, 8 p.m.): Kevin Costner took a surprisingly great David Brin book built around a ridiculous premise—man finds a mailman’s outfit in post-apocalyptic America, then starts delivering the mail—and made it one of the worst, most boring movies of all time. See how much you can get through!
NBA Basketball: Mavericks at Thunder (TNT, 8 p.m.): This is the first time the two teams have met since the Thunder swept the Mavericks in last year’s NBA playoffs, so we’d say the Mavs have vengeance on their minds, if we believed for a second in the sorts of bullshit sports narratives peddled by the TV.
IN CASE YOU MISSED IT
The Hour (Wednesday): The penultimate episode of this short season concludes with one of the more thrilling sequences you’ll see on TV this year. But Todd VanDerWerff—and who cares about that guy anyway?—says you’ll need to get through some bizarre character development on the way there. Boo!