What to Watch: Week of October 24 - October 30

In addition to our usual list of television recommendations, we've included this week our top choice for the horror movie being aired each night, and there are some good ones, but some of our favorites are shamefully absent from the airwaves (Psycho, The Exorcist, Rosemary's Baby, anyone?!). Oh well, we'll take what we can get. Do your best to get good and scared this week -- Happy-almost-Halloween!
 

Monday Bored to Death - "The Black Clock of Time" (HBO 9PM EST)

• "Crotch open or crotch closed? George gives Jonathan some advice."

HORROR PICK: Halloween (AMC 8PM EST)

• John Carpenter's classic chiller about the escaped masked maniac known as Michael Meyers who returns to his Illinois hometown to continue his bloody rampage. A nineteen year olf Jamie Leigh Curtis stars. And if you're interested in the sequels AMC will be playing them all week, but my heart will always belong to the original.

Tuesday

Sons of Anarchy - "Family Recipe" (FX 10PM EST)

• "An important club vote gets side-tracked when SAMCRO is forced to deal with dangerous external threats against the club."

Onion News Network - "Dead Reporter" (IFC 10PM EST)

• "Goodbye to newsman Brandon Armstrong."

HORROR PICK: The Devil's Mercy (Chiller TV 8PM EST)

• "A couple and their six-year-old son move into an old Connecticut house where the boy soon becomes distraught with thoughts of monsters dwelling in the attic. When their friends and guests abruptly go missing or die mysteriously, it becomes a race against time as the family's lives are in peril."

Wednesday

Modern Family - "Halloween" (ABC 9PM EST)

• "Claire prepares to make the Dunphy house spooky for Halloween; Cameron does not like the holiday because of a traumatic childhood experience; Jay and Manny tease Gloria about her accent." 

Happy Endings - "Spooky Endings" (ABC 9:30PM EST)

• "While Brad and Jane are house-sitting in the suburbs, the rest of the gang attends a warehouse party."

American Horror Story - "Halloween, Part I" (FX 10PM EST)

• "The line between the living and the dead blurs on Halloween. Two of the house's previous residents give the Harmons decorating advice."

HORROR PICK: Bloody Reunion (Sundance 10:35 PM EST)

• "Abandoning recent stylistic trends in Asian horror, Korea's Lim Dae-Woong pays tribute to slasher cinema with a striking exercise in full-blooded mayhem. Told in flashback, BLOODY REUNION follows a gathering of former schoolmates and their ailing, wheelchair-bound teacher Mrs. Park. As the event progresses, it becomes clear that Mrs. Park's enduring influence was seldom positive and justifications for ill will are many. Alas, the students aren't the only ones harboring festering resentment."

Thursday

Community - "Horror Fiction in Seven Steps" (NBC 8PM EST)

• "The GCC gang tells scary stories while Britta discovers that one of her pals might be a psychopathic maniac. "

Parks and Recreation - "Meet'N'Greet" (NBC 8:30PM EST)

• "April and Andy throw a Halloween party while Tom brings his flair to Leslie's campaign."

The Office - "Spooked" (NBC 9PM EST)

• "Erin struggles to pull off the ultimate Halloween party, juggling the expectations of Robert California, Andy and the staff." While I'm less than anxious to watch an episode that focuses heavily on the painfully moronic and uninteresting Erin, The Office's Halloween episodes have pretty much always been fantastic in the past, so maybe it'll balance out...

It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia - "Chardee MacDennis: The Game of Games" (FX 10PM EST)

• This sounds good..."What's The Gang to do on a rainy day but play the most twisted (and self-made) board game ever. Dee and Dennis square off against Mac, Charlie and Frank in this battle of wits, wild cards and wine."

Beavis and Butthead - Pilot (MTV 10PM EST)

• I never thought this day would come. Some of my earliest and most lasting life lessons came from watching Beavis and Butthead, and I credit the duo with making me the person I am today. At last they are back where they belong: on television, molding the minds of young, impressionable Americans, and I for one, couldn't be happier about this. Obviously, a lot has changed since the 90s, so expect the boys to be including Youtube videos, reality TV, and social networking sites in their astute cultural commentary. And let's hope that Beavis doesn't discover Redbull.

The League - "Ol' Smoke Crotch" (FX 10:30PM EST)

• "Kevin struggles with getting older. Ruxin is so desperate to get rid of his au pair that he gets Rafi's help. Taco finds a market for Kevin and Jenny's wedding cocktail napkins. And Pete learns a new sexual position, and regrets it."

HORROR PICK: Teeth (IFC 11PM EST)

• "A teen (Jess Weixler) learns that she is a living example of the vagina dentata myth after a sexual encounter with a classmate takes a grisly turn." 

Friday

Chuck - "Chuck Vs. The Zoom" (NBC 8PM EST)

• "Chuck, Sarah, Casey and an Intersect-enabled Morgan start their own spy firm. Mark Hamill and Craig Kilborn guest star."

Fringe - "Novation" (FOX 9PM EST)

• "In the aftermath of recent shocking events, things really escalate when the translucent shapeshifters return. As the threat and circumstances intensify, a former Massive Dynamic scientist Malcolm Truss (guest star Arye Gross) enters the fold. Meanwhile, Nina Sharp pays Walter a visit in the lab."

HORROR PICKS: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre (IFC 9PM EST)

• Okay, while it's admittedly not even close to being in the same league as Tobe Hooper's 1974 original, this remake did have some pretty gore-tastic moments: "In 1973, teenagers (Jessica Biel, Jonathan Tucker) taking a road trip wander into a farmhouse belonging to a family of cannibals." Both movies inspired in part by the necrophiliac activites and art and crafts of Ed Gein.

-AND-

30 Days of Night (FX 10:30PM EST)

• These vampires are waaaay cooler than any of the one's you'll find in Twilight: "After an Alaskan town is plunged into darkness for a month, it is attacked by a bloodthirsty gang of vampires."

Saturday

Bedlam - "Committed" (BBCA 9PM EST)

• "When Mark receives phone calls in the dead of night, he thinks a woman may have a vendetta against him, but Jed knows the truth is darker. Meanwhile, Ryan finds a photo of Jed's mother and begins to unravel the mystery of Jed's birth. Kate suspects Warren might be hiding a dreadful secret, as Jed faces his toughest test yet, to save Mark from a gruesome fate."

HORROR PICK: The Shining (IFC 8PM and 11PM EST)

• "A writer (Jack Nicholson) goes mad while serving as caretaker with his wife (Shelley Duvall) and clairvoyant son (Danny Lloyd) at a snowbound Colorado hotel."

Sunday 

Allen Gregory - Pilot (FOX 8:30PM EST)

• After watching the trailers for this series back in early spring I have been super-stoked for this addition to FOX's Sunday night animated comedy line-up. Allen Gregory "tells the story of one of the most pretentious 7-year-olds of our time...Although Allen Gregory (voice done by Jonah Hill) has allegedly already composed operas, written novels and dated Chloe Sevigny, he's about to embark on his greatest challenge yet: leaving the safety of his father's homeschooling and attending elementary school with children his own age." Finally, Jonah Hill will be doing something other than being Jonah Hill.

The Walking Dead - "Save the Last One" (AMC 9PM EST)

• "The group await Shane's return, unaware that he's trapped in a school surrounded by zombies; Daryl and Andrea scour the woods for a missing person. "

Dexter - "The Angel of Death" (SHO 9PM EST)

• "Dexter receives spiritual guidance from his new friend, Brother Sam, while his search for the Doomsday Killers leads him in a new direction. Later, Quinn and Batista visit Prof. Gellar's former university; and Debra is required to undergo post-shooting therapy." 

Boardwalk Empire - "The Age of Reason" (HBO 9PM EST)

• "Bad news from Harry Daugherty in Washington, D.C., could make things tough for Nucky, who assembles quite a crowd to organize a liquor delivery in Philadelphia. Meanwhile, Jimmy talks business with Leander Whitlock but turns to Manny Horvitz to get results; Margaret prepares her son for his first confession; and Van Alden struggles to maintain his composure as a fallen colleague's condition deteriorates."  

HORROR PICK: Hostel (IFC 9PM EST) 

• "Backpackers (Jay Hernandez, Derek Richardson) find that their decision to stay at a Slovakian hostel is a gruesome mistake."