"Christmas in Rockefeller Center"
Wednesday 8pm, NBC
The big tree will be lit. Roker will host. But what really makes this annual special, well, special this year is that both Celine Dion and Barry Manilow will take the stage to sing holiday tunes and the like. And also probably bring about the end of the world, because when you put musicians with that level of negative cool points together, that must rip a hole in the space-time continuum or something. Also performing, and hopefully pulled into "Manilon"’s cheeseball black hole wake, will be Josh Groban, Ashley Tisdale and Taylor Swift. If only we could substitute Hannah Montana for Carrie Underwood, we’d be all set…
"Tin Man"
Sunday 9pm, SciFi Channel
"Tin Man" is SciFi’s dramatic reimagining of L. Frank Baum’s Wizard of Oz books. This Oz—technically "O.Z.," for "Outer Zone"—is a fantastical but dismal dimension, plunged into darkness by a power-hungry sorceress. You know the basic drill: A bored young Kansas waitress, D.G. (Zooey Deschanel, Almost Famous), gets sent to the O.Z. after getting slammed by a twister. She ends up trying to save the land and is aided by three fellow travelers, but they’re not exactly as you remember. Scarecrow here is Glitch (Alan Cumming), a once-brilliant inventor who’s had half his brain removed by the witch; Tin Man (Neal McDonough, I Know Who Killed Me) is a former cop who spent years trapped inside a metal suit, forced to watch a video loop of his family’s abduction; and the Lion is known as Raw (Raoul Trujillo, Apocalypto), a psychic left emotionally scarred after his "second sight" was stolen from him. Throw in Richard Dreyfuss as the deposed emperor and you’ve got an amazing cast, an inventive reworking of some of the best fantasy source material ever written and, with any luck, a memorable mini-series that could spin into an ongoing show.
"Pictures of Hollis Woods"
Sunday 9pm, CBS
Albemarle’s own Sissy Spacek stars in this adaptation of the novel by Patricia Reilly Giff about a young girl trapped in the foster care system who finds salvation through her artistic gifts and a home with a retired art teacher who encourages her creativity. But when the art teacher (that’d be Spacek) starts to show signs of Alzheimer’s, the social worker (the essential Alfre Woodard) attempts to move Hollis to a new family. She won’t have it, and that’s when the tough decisions for the characters—and the Kleenex for the viewers—come into play. Spacek and Woodard, people. I shouldn’t have to say anything more than that.