“The Celebrity Apprentice”
Sunday 9pm, NBC
I swore off this show last season after Joan Rivers—who I love—inexplicably won, but goddamned Donald Trump has sucked me back in with this cast. Delightful ’80’s pop star Cyndi Lauper! Baseball star/cautionary tale Darryl Strawberry! Disgraced former governor Rod Blagojevich! Hunkalicious wrestler Bill Goldberg! Surprisingly charming hairband refugee Bret Michaels! And my pick for the win, Sharon Osbourne, talent manager, Ozzfest creator, wife to the Prince of Darkness, and near-constant reality TV presence. The woman has serious business chops, a vicious tongue and absolutely no shame. If that’s not “Apprentice” material, I don’t know what is.
“The Pacific”
Sunday 9pm, HBO
Steve Spielberg, Tom Hanks, and some other guy you don’t care about were responsible for 2001’s “Band of Brothers.” The producers are back for another 10-part World War II mini-series, this one focusing on the battles on the other side of the globe. “The Pacific” tells the intertwined real-life stories of three U.S. Marines as they fought the Japanese at Guadalcanal, Iwo Jima, Okinawa and other battlegrounds, as well as their difficult post-war homecoming. The cast is full of no one you’ve heard of, but many that you might recognize (Jon Seda was Jennifer Lopez’s love interest in Selena; Joseph Mazzello was the kid from the first Jurassic Park). The budget on this thing is massive (reportedly more than $130 million) and it has been in production for years. So expect it to look amazing, and have that trademark Spielberg poignancy.
“America’s Worst Driver”
Sunday 10pm, Travel Channel
In the “You can’t make this up” category we have this new reality competition, in which various shmucks were offered up by friends and families as examples of terrible, terrible driving. Each week four bad drivers will square off in a series of road challenges in the hopes that they’ll be eliminated, because the worst drivers’ cars will be demolished by the show. That is messed up, but amazing. Ultimately the losers from each city will meet up in Los Angeles for one last test, and the bad driver that performs the best wins a new car, while the one who performs the worst is labeled America’s Worst Driver, apparently taking the title from Lucille Bluth. I need to stress: bad drivers will have their cars destroyed. I am firmly behind this concept. So long as it’s not mine.
