TUESDAY
JANUARY 1
2019

BIANCULLI’S BEST BETS

 

IFC, 12:00 a.m. ET

Happy New Year!!! Beginning exactly at midnight ET – Holy Happy New Year, Batman! – IFC presents a marathon of the entire first season of ABC’s mod, mad, improbably entertaining Batman series, starring Adam West as the Caped Crusader and Burt Ward as his sidekick Robin, the boy wonder.  The action begins with “Hi Diddle Riddle” and “Smack in the Middle,” the episodes introducing Frank Gorshin as the Riddler – with Jill St. John as, if my memory is correct, the only character to meet a fatal end in the entire Batman series. Burgess Meredith as The Penguin shows up next, at 1:06 a.m. ET in “Fine Feathered Finks” and “The Penguin’s a Jinx,” and Cesar Romero as The Joker is another early addition, at 2:12 a.m. ET with “The Joker Is Wild” and “Batman is Riled.” But it wasn’t until late in that first season, after actors portrayed such minor villains as Zelda the Great, The Mad Hatter and False-Face, that Julie Newmar came on to steal the show as Catwoman (pictured). You can see her, and you should, at 9:51 a.m. ET Tuesday morning, in “The Purr-Fect Crime” and “Better Luck Next Time.”

 
  
 
 

Netflix, 3:00 a.m. ET

SEASON PREMIERE: For the third and final season of this charming adaptation of Daniel Handler’s series of Lemony Snicket books, this Netflix series adapts the final books in the canon: The Slippery Slope, The Grim Grotto, and the two perfectly titled adventures, The Penultimate Peril and The End. Patrick Warburton continues as the author’s alter ego, playing Lemony Snicket as a sort of kid-lit Rod Serling (see above). And Neil Patrick Harris, as the recurring and chameleonic villain of the piece, is as much fun as everything else. And everything else includes the dazzling direction by Barry Sonnenfeld, so that’s really saying something.

 
  
 
 

Fox, 9:00 p.m. ET

MIDSEASON PREMIERE: Back for the second half of its second season, The Gifted begins with some members of the Mutant Underground in custody, and others seeking to survive by forming new alliances. Meanwhile, the Strucker’s teenage daughter Lauren (Natalie Alyn Lynd) is getting noticably more powerful, unpredictable – and out of control. Did I mention she was a teenager?

 
  
 
 

BBC America, 9:00 p.m. ET

SPECIAL PREMIERE: This is the first between-seasons special starring Jodie Whittaker , as the Doctor, and it promises to be a time-travel romp through Earth’s history, with a very persistent foe on his, or her, trail.

 
  
 
 
 
 
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David Bianculli

Founder / Editor

David Bianculli has been a TV critic since 1975, including a 14-year stint at the New York Daily News, and sees no reason to stop now. Currently, he's TV critic for NPR's Fresh Air with Terry Gross, and is an occasional substitute host for that show. He's also an author and teaches TV and film history at New Jersey's Rowan University. His 2009 Dangerously Funny: The Uncensored Story of 'The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour', has been purchased for film rights. His latest, The Platinum Age of Television: From I Love Lucy to the Walking Dead, How TV Became Terrific, is an effusive guidebook that plots the path from the 1950s’ Golden Age to today’s era of quality TV.