Week's TV highlights: The Shadow Line and Shaun Micallef in Who Do You Think You Are?

THE week's TV reveals secrets for Shaun Micallef, a struggle for Claire Dunphy, shocks for Karl Pilkington, and intrigue in The Shadow Line.

modern family

DIANNE Butler reviews your weekly evening television.

Wednesday, March 21
Jersey Shore
MTV, 8.30pm
Rating: 2.5 Stars

GTL. They need GTL again. "I cannot get a haircut out here, I can't go tanning out here. And the gym sucks. I'm going to Jersey," Pauly D says.

And, indeed, when the self-styled guidos and guidettes of Jersey Shore return to the US from their distressing season in Florence, Danny at the T-shirt stand on the Seaside Heights boardwalk remarks he's never seen them so pale. "I kind of like it."

It doesn't last. After the initial homecoming euphoria (Ronnie's analogy is Italy is boarding school and the US is his mother) which involves full-frontal horizontal hugging between boys and Snooki drinking straight out of the pickle jar ("I never knew how much I missed pickles, and pickle juice"), it's finally time to get on to the GTL. Gym. Tan. Laundry.

There was some interim argy-bargy over room division, which I'm sure will be revisited later in the series. Sammi, whose nickname is Sweetheart, has wound up in a room with Mike. "I can't believe that I'm living in a room with Mike again. Who wants to room with Mike? Nobody." Mike is the guy known as The Situation. That amusing name, hahaha, etc, is clearly masking a personality disorder. They run some clips from previous seasons, and he seems unhinged.

But no sign of physical violence tonight. Only signs of manipulation and threats to expose What Went On In Italy between Snooki and Vinnie. There is also a suspicion something Went On between Snooki and Mike. This is bad because, well, it's Mike, but also because Snooki has a serious boyfriend named Jionni. Mike's friend The Unit is also staying, and he seems very hard to like. But to be fair, so do most of them.

Charles Wooley

Thursday, March 22
Earthflight
Channel 9, 7.30pm
Rating: 3 Stars

IT is a universal dream to fly like a bird. OK. It is not my dream, but carry on Doctor Who. No, wait. The next voice you hear will be Charles Wooley's. Something happened when he crossed the Himalayas and David Tennant got redubbed.

To soar on wings into the heavens blah blah. What are heavens? I feel like muting it, to just look at the birds, which are so lovely you could have them ironically going up your wall. Apart from the pigeons. They let one get eaten by a buzzard. They don't allow anything like that to happen to the attractive birds. No lorikeets or pretty little budgerigars were harmed making this.

Tonight's topic is Asia and Australia, stroke of luck really, because here we are. And incredibly it is also taking place in autumn, and even though it may very well be 30C where you are right now, technically it is autumn.

They should have just used subtitles here. Taking nothing away from Wooley. Or indeed Tennant. Or any narrator. Strange job, in a way. Kind of meaningless.

You can't go round looking at work with that attitude though or where does that leave any of us? Not getting out of bed in the morning is where. But they could just put the name of the bird up - such-and-such crane, bar-headed goose, on their way to India before it is too late - and we can figure out the rest.

Snow, for instance, means the birds have to put their foot down. None of us, I think I can say with confidence, needs Tennant or Wooley to tell us the Himalayas are the highest mountain range on earth.

Just wondering where the camera is though. Strapped to some bird? And is that strictly kosher? I don't really care for shows about animals. You make friends with them and then they die.

The Shadow Line

Friday, March 23
The Shadow Line
ABC1, 9.30pm
Rating: 3 Stars

I might have a good one for you. The Shadow Line.

I think we would have all preferred a better time slot than this but anyway, at least it is getting a run.

Let me set it up for you: two cops, one green, one crusty, are looking at a car, it is sitting out in the dark, isolated, there is a dead guy in the back seat.

He has been shot, it is nice and gory. Contract hit, jaded sergeant says. Junior wants to leap in and do it by the book. Crusty says nuh uh, we're not touching this one, it's got trouble written all over it.

He knows who the dead guy is, it looks like. Cue solemn-faced copper driving to what is now done up as a crime scene.

His name is Jonah Gabriel (Chiwetel Ejiofor), he is an inspector and he has apparently been off work for a while. Shot in the head, it emerges. Residual memory problems. Not entirely Mr Popularity.

He also knows the dead guy. Harvey Wratten. But as we then find out because it is on the news, which is on at the home of Joe (Christopher Eccleston) and Julie, another important pair, he is pretty well known: a convicted drug smuggler who was just pardoned and let out of jail.

And so was his nephew Jay (Rafe Spall from Pete Versus Life) who is having some, um, issues readjusting to life on the outside when he hears about his Uncle Harvey.

And then the story really begins: Figuring out who murdered Harvey.

Why he was pardoned. Which cops are on his payroll. Who is going to turn up dead next. Where his driver is. Where his right-hand- man is. Who is going to run the business now. Just how big a liability is his nephew.

A lot of questions come out of tonight's first episode.

But there is plenty of time yet.

an idiot abroad

Saturday, March 24
An Idiot Abroad,
Channel 10, 9.30pm
Rating: 3 Stars

RICKY Gervais is not letting go of Karl Pilkington's prostate. It appeared to begin in Alaska, this concern, and now that he has worked his way round the world getting through Gervais' and Stephen Merchant's list of things that could kill him, it has developed into something closer to fixation.

And tonight, reunited and seated comfortably back home in front of a television camera, out comes a urologist.

The back story here, if you missed the Alaska episode, is that Pilkington apparently dodged the prostate examination when he had his medical, ages ago, before he set off on his trip. This is clearly a public service announcement, masked with coarse humour, so I guess good on them. "Which finger is it?" is the first thing Pilkington wants to know once he is in the obviously not very private exam room with Frank the urologist.

He has a range of questions, to do with gloves, angle, etc, but Frank's right there with him. At the end of it Pilkington gets up off the table: "Now, you are a doctor are you?"

We do see quite a few clips from earlier episodes, which will annoy you if you bothered to watch the whole series, but will not if you didn't. What you will like here is the three of them in the one room.

Some of this stuff tonight is pretty good. Of course it is, these are professional comics. And ones who are funny. Or not Pilkington, he isn't. Not a professional comic.

So. Things Karl didn't hate: When the hippopotamus walked into the house. "My dad didn't let the cat in the lounge," he says, astounded. "That, and the volcano were the highlights of the whole thing." The volcano because he said it made him realise the world was alive.

modern family

Sunday, March 25
Modern Family
Channel 10, 7.30pm
Rating: 3 Stars

CLAIRE Dunphy's running for local council? When did this happen? And is it really a wise idea? Not according to the latest polling, which indicates voters - some voters - find her "angry" and "unlikeable." An unscientific poll, Phil says. "Honey, you're not unlikeable, you just seem unlikeable." Supportive husband.

Claire's due to debate her opponent tonight, the incumbent, somebody called councilman Duane Bailey. Who is also an award-winning dog breeder of some self-confessed renown, as Jay finds when he turns up to watch Claire (Julie Bowen) with Stella, his pug.

Jay's having some issues with Stella, and he blames Gloria. It's a big episode, and not just because the debate is scheduled to be shown on public access television. Alex points out that a small audience tends to watch public access television, to help assuage her mother's performance anxiety, which was brought on in the first place by a heated practice debate at home between Claire and Phil, standing in as Duane Bailey, in front of hairbrush microphones and a disgruntled audience of heckling offspring.

But, well, as things turn out, public-access television draws more viewers than any could've foreseen. Phil can take a lot of the credit. If credit is the word. "It was phenomenal television," Mitchell, well impressed, tells Claire later when they're at a wedding.
 
I don't know whose wedding, but Mitchell and Cameron's daughter Lily is flower girl. You should see her dress. Hideous. Everything that comes down the aisle tonight is a nightmare. You wouldn't think, when you see what Lily's got on, that anything could take attention away from her outfit. But she's discovered swearing. At age I'm not sure. Would she be three? I can never tell.

revenge

Monday, March 26
Revenge
Channel 7, 8.30pm
Rating: 3 Stars

HAPPY anniversary to the Graysons. Twenty-five years. A tremendous achievement. The secret to their long marriage? Conrad and Victoria do not mention this in the sit-down they do with the reporter from the New York Times Style section tonight, but I think infidelity is a big part of it.

They are only having a very small dinner to celebrate, because they hate each other, but it is still not small enough for Victoria. For someone they all call the Queen of the Hamptons, she does not seem to get her own way very often. Or not lately anyway.

Has Frank's leaving had something to do with this? Yes. We should all have a Frank in our life. But it is also Emily. Crazy old Emily. We see a bit of that side of her tonight.

She really is round the bend. And I say that with affection. Or some affection. I really like Nolan best.

You wait until you see his house. We only really see the outside of it, and for one second, but it is sensational.

He has just hired a bodyguard, on account of Frank. Understandable. If he was smart he would have hired Frank. Except Frank's busy on his mission to expose Emily.

He has become quite the zealot. And now he has got the time and the money - he has cashed his severance cheque, Conrad tells Victoria, which we know from the words "Cayman account" means it must be some wad.

Frank also has motivation - his obsessive and unreturned love for Victoria. She has only ever loved one person. Or two, counting herself. Emily's - er Amanda's - father David Clarke.

Meanwhile, what about that Tyler? Nolan's all over him, surely he can't be around much longer.

Shaun Micallef

Tuesday, March 27
Who Do You Think You Are?
SBS One, 7.30pm
Rating: 3 Stars

THERE'D be many reasons why someone wouldn't do Who Do You Think You Are? Shaun Micallef's chief concern, and fair enough, is fear of revealing a history of dull people. Clearly it wasn't enough to stop him going ahead.

And almost immediately a dull Micallef is unearthed: Shaun. Shaun, and his family. I'm not saying this, he is - he's talking about his childhood in Adelaide. Later, he speaks of dull in a comforting, loving way, but that's after he's been through two awful wars on his mother's and father's side.

He knows hardly anything about his background so he's a good topic for this show. Plus he's barely had a conversation with his father, so finding out anything at all will be something. "It's good to have these little chats every 49 years," he remarks after they talk about Malta for a few minutes. Shaun tells us afterwards it's the most he's said to his father, one-on-one, in his life. "Which begs a number of questions," he says. Doesn't it.

Fred, his father, grew up in Malta, and lived there during WWII when it had the daylights bombed out of it. Shaun goes back there, and also to Turkey and the UK - those as part of the search on his mother Judy's side. The trips are war-heavy; some of you will enjoy this episode because of that alone. Two key battles in military history feature here - the Battle of Inkerman, from the Crimean War, and Jutland, from WWI.

Shaun's tremendously relieved when he finds out about the Crimean War involvement. "See now that's not dull, that's interesting. Very interesting."

Yes and no.

There are some nice little bits that come out but it's largely a story for Shaun and his family.