Here’s what’s happening in the world of television for Tuesday, January 12. All times are Eastern.
Top pick
This Is Us (NBC, 9 p.m.): NBC’s drama darling loves setting up a mystery, then taking a good long time to offer the solution. (Remember the crockpot?) But the title of tonight’s episode, “Birth Mother,” seems to indicate that the answer to at least one of this season’s unanswered questions is fast approaching. Here’s Caroline Siede on last week’s mid-season premiere, “A Long Road Home:”
Back in the This Is Us season premiere, Randall longed for a year without surprises. And while the show, of course, used that as a springboard to immediately introduce a bunch of new twists, the midseason premiere displays an admirable commitment to not dragging out those mysteries longer than it needs to. In short order, we get official confirmation that teen Kate had an abortion after finding herself pregnant by Marc. And we also learn that Randall’s birth mom Laurel died in 2015, meaning that while there’s still plenty of her story yet to be explored, we’re not in for another long-lost relative reunion.
Cue the exploration. Look for Caroline’s recap, and probably for the single tear that will roll slowly down Sterling K. Brown’s award-winning cheek.
Regular coverage
Wild cards
Time for another wild card lightning round.
Chris Rock Total Blackout: The Tamborine Extended Cut (Netflix, 3:01 a.m.): Rock’s 2018 special gets a “remix” with “never-before-seen jokes, interviews, and BTS footage.”
Two Sentence Horror Stories (The CW, 8 p.m., season-two premiere): The CW’s enjoyable anthology series returns for a second season of horror stories that are not actually just two sentences, honest. Still, if you’re finding that your attention span is a little shorter than usual due to, say, stress, this might be right up your street.
6 Comments
I don’t know why AV Club refuses to cover ZEP.
I don’t even watch This Is Us and even I remember the crockpot.
Has anyone seen that new “Michael Chiklis, Border Ex-Patrolman” thing, and if so is it any good? It obviously doesn’t have to be FX good, but I would like to know if the show contains at least a satisfactory level of angry Chiklising before investing myself.
He’s a morally conflicted anti-hero and 32 year border patrol veteran who hasn’t really picked up any Spanish, so it’s kinda like the Shield if everything were way less well-thought-out and with a weaker grasp on its characters. It’s not offensively terrible enough to put you off if you’ve really missed him, but I couldn’t in good conscience recommend it to non-fans.
Just want to mention that Trickster, based on a book by First Nations author Eden Robinson, premieres on the CW tonight at 9 p.m. after Two Sentence Horror Stories.
If you’re in Canada you can watch all the eps right now on CBC Gem. Worth the time.