SUNDAY

AUGUST 3

2014

BIANCULLI’S BEST BETS

Cinemax, 8:30 p.m. ET

One of Stanley Kubrick's undisputed masterpieces. This 1971 movie is bold, brilliant, funny, and unforgettable. It’s also violent, disturbing, unsettling and, it bears repeating, unforgettable. Malcolm McDowell stars, as an initially unrepentant thug roaming the desolate urban landscape of a dystopian future London. By the way: The way his young Alex is rigged up to watch things against his will in the mind-numbing Ludovico treatment? That’s how I feel every time I sit down to watch all of the new fall TV pilots…

MASTERPIECE MYSTERY!: "POIROT"

PBS, 9:00 p.m. ET

This is the second and last of the new Christie mysteries that will be shown on PBS, at least for now. (The final three stories in the series will be available starting next week on Acorn TV, and won’t appear on public television until later.) Tonight’s story, starring David Suchet as Hercule Poirot, is Dead Man’s Folly – and one of the interesting things about is that much of it was filmed at the late Christie’s actual estate, which she used as inspiration for her story’s setting in the original 1950s version. Speaking of which: the plot has to do with a “murder mystery party” gone awry, presenting a social role-playing phenomenon that really didn’t catch on for another few decades. Check local listings.

TRUE BLOOD

HBO, 9:00 p.m. ET

In this final-season story line, former Christian-leader vampire hater Sarah Newland (Anna Kamp) has gone underground, dyed her hair darker, and adopted a new religious belief system. But our heroes, undead and otherwise, believe she’s the key not only to the deadly (or undeadly?) vampire virus, but also to its antidote. And in tonight’s episode, they find her, and question her… and, for good measure, chain her.

THE STRAIN

FX, 10:00 p.m. ET

This fourth installment is the final episode that was sent to critics for preview – and it’s the one, in which our heroes finally get their hands on some physical evidence of what they’re up against, that raises The Strain to an even higher level of creepy. So enjoy – I sure did.

MANHATTAN

WGN America, 10:00 p.m. ET

One of the positive aspects of tonight’s second episode is how it veers away from where you presume the show is headed. John Benjamin Hickey, as scientist Frank Winter, was established in last week’s opener as the guy at the Manhattan Project who was on to the best time-saving, and thus life-saving, theory about building a practical atomic bomb. But this week, instead of having that theory embraced and adopted, it’s rejected by the other scientists – and so is Frank, who finds himself so ostracized that even a simple dinner party becomes an ordeal too annoying to endure.

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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.

New From TVWW

BIANCULLI’S BEST BETS

Cinemax, 8:30 p.m. ET

PBS, 9:00 p.m. ET

HBO, 9:00 p.m. ET

FX, 10:00 p.m. ET

WGN America, 10:00 p.m. ET

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