Tonight

The special two-hour Star Wars episode of Deal Or No Deal airs at 8 PM. According to the official Star Wars blog, it features models dressed in the famous Leia slave-girl outfit from Return Of The Jedi, plus Carrie Fisher herself in the audience. Chewbacca and R2D2 are there to provide moral support to the two Star Wars fans competing for money. Oh, and Darth Vader takes place of the "villainous banker." (Why is the banker villanous? Is this some kind of Bear Sterns reference?)

Tonight's Letterman features Gwyneth Paltrow promoting Iron Man. Expect pithy quotes about how her Pepper Potts is a new type of comic-book-movie heroine. And tomorrow night, Robert Downie Jr. is on Letterman promoting possibly the same movie.

And early Tuesday morning, TMC has Aeon Flux at 1 AM and Encore has the original Robocop at 2:30 AM.

Tuesday

On the History Channel at 9 PM, The Universe gives major spoilers, with an episode that reveals "the future of the universe." Who lives? (Nobody.) Who dies? (Everybody.) Here's the blurb:

The Universe as we know it is condemned to death. Space, matter and even time will one day cease to exist and there's nothing we can do about it. Harsh realities are revealed about the future of our Universe; it may collapse and burn or it might be gripped by a galactic ice age. Either of these scenarios might be a long way off. However, our Universe could suddenly be destroyed by a "random quantum fluctuation", a bubble of destruction that can obliterate the entire cosmos in the blink of an eye. No matter how it ends, life in our Universe is doomed.

And on Wednesday morning at 2:00 AM, BET is showing Hood Rat, about a swarm of super-intelligent mutant rats that go around killing people in a housing project. It's sort of a remake of Willard, except that instead of training them, I think Isaiah Washington's character just sort of befriends them and they turn out to be super-rats. Ice-T is the comic relief in this film. And it features a scene where rats "come out of a toilet to devour a crackhead's anus." This either just got on your must-see, or your must-avoid list, depending on your taste in bizarre horror films.

Wednesday

This has nothing to do with science fiction, except tangentially, but the worst pain from last winter's writers' strike is yet to come. The proof comes in the form of a new reality TV series which premieres tonight on The CW, called Farmer Wants A Wife. It's about a farmer. Who wants a wife. Suddenly Flash Gordon is sounding really great right now.

Speaking of which, Sci Fi is showing another Flash Gordon marathon all day, allowing you to experience the greatness of croptops, hairgel, hawk people and castrating amazons if you missed it the first time.

Also, the History Channel brings us yet another new UFO Hunters at 10 PM, about a UFO sighting at a U.S. military base.

Thursday

Tonight's Smallville is the 150th episode, and it's directed by star Tom Welling. Clark visits an alternate reality, where Buffy never came to Sunnydale Clark never came to Smallville. In this alternate reality, as in all right-thinking universes, Lex is president of the United States. Here's a pretty great scene from the episode, which airs at 8 on The CW (sorry about the sound quality):

And then there's a new Lost at 10 PM on ABC. Jack's doing poorly, and hovers on the brink of nasty death. Meanwhile, Sawyer, Claire, Aaron and Miles try to make their way to the beach, but something goes horribly wrong. We featured two clips from the episode on Friday.

At 7 PM, Sci Fi is re-running Warbirds, its TV movie about pterodactyls in World War II.

You face an impossible choice on Friday morning at 3:00 am: AMC is showing the original Species, while Sci Fi is showing Decoys 2: Alien Seduction. I would advise watching (or taping) Decoys 2 instead of Species. Sure, Species features the super-hot Natasha Henstridge as a human-alien hybrid who's desperate to find someone to reproduce with. But Decoys 2 features a whole squad of alien women who transform themselves into college boys' naughtiest fantasies so they can seduce them and implant their alien eggs inside them. It's like Species mashed up with Alien mashed up with a weird teen sex comedy. We featured a clip from it a while back.

Friday

At 7 PM, NickToons is premiering a 90-minute "TV movie" of Speed Racer: The Next Generation. It's basically the first three episodes of this cartoon series mashed up together. The movie is also getting a DVD release on Tuesday, May 6. In this new series, the son of Speed Racer studies to become a race-car champion and rebuilds the Mach-5. Racer X is the new Speed Racer's brother, and his uncle is the school's headmaster. Oh, and Chim Chim is a robot monkey. The TV movie is written by Justin Gray and Jimmy Palmiotti, who wrote the fluffy but fun Heroes For Hire comic among others. Here's a clip:

At 8 PM, Sci Fi has two episodes of Doctor Who's kid-friendly spin-off The Sarah Jane Adventures. She polishes off those evil nuns, and then squares off with an alien army that's recruiting teenage humans through a sort of laser-tag arcade. The second episode features my favorite Sarah Jane scene of all time, where she builds a weird energy-detector machine out of bits and pieces, wearing a badass welding mask. You go, Sarah Jane!

And then at 9, there's easily the best episode so far of the current Doctor Who season — the Doctor visits Pompeii right on the eve of its destruction by a volcano. His new companion Donna asks some tricky questions about where the Doctor draws the line on interfering with history, and the Doctor has to struggle with his answers a bit. Here's our recap, including a clip from the episode.

And at 10, there's another new Battlestar Galactica. "A possible truce with rebel Cylons leads Starbuck to put her trust in an old enemy." It looks like Starbuck and Leoben are reunited, and it feels so fine. Here's the trailer:

Sci Fi is showing episodes of Stargate SG-1 all day, in case you need to catch up.

Saturday

There are two episodes of Spectacular Spider-Man at 9:30, including one new episode at 10 AM: "Reaction" introduces Doctor Octopus to the cartoon universe, and also brings back the Green Goblin.

And also at 10 AM, the Cartoon Network has a new Ben 10: Alien Force. Ben and Gwen start to trust Kevin 11 — but then he steals the Rustbucket and tries to trade it for alien technology.

And then at 10:30 AM, the Cartoon Network has a new Transformers: Animated, called "Mission Accomplished." (Is this some kind of subtle dig at George Bush?) Here's the episode description: "Convinced there are no Decepticons left on Earth, the Elite Guard prepares to take Optimus Prime and his crew back to Cybertron — unaware of the increasing Decepticon activity taking place under their very noses." They're not called Decepticons for nothing.

And at 1 PM, The CW has Virus, featuring Jamie Lee Curtis and one of the Baldwins versus an alien disease.

Sunday

At 2 PM, TNT is showing The Tuxedo, which isn't in the top 100 Jackie Chan movies but does have a few great scenes, most notably the "pants-only mode" scene, when Jackie is only wearing the super-suit's pants — so only his legs are super-agile. It's not a bad thing to watch on a slow Sunday afternoon. Oh, and then there's this bit, where Jackie Chan knocks out James Brown and has to take his place, complete with a moment of weird ass-fetishism.

Sci Fi is showing horror movies all day, starting with Children Of The Corn at the churchgoing hour of 9 AM, and ending up with Final Destination 2 at 9 PM. I don't think any of those films are actually science fiction.

Oh, and at 8 PM, FX has the sort of scifi-ish Mr. And Mrs. Smith, while Spike is re-running Star Wars Episode III: Revenge Of The Sith. If you flip back and forth, you could mash them up into one totally awesome movie called Mr. And Mrs. Sith.

Tonight is pretty empty, now that Sarah Connor, Kyle XY, Heroes and Chuck are all gone until fall. However, CBS has a new episode of nerd-com The Big Bang Theory at 8 PM. And Fox has a new New Amsterdam at 9 PM. Our immortal-ish detective investigates the death of a homeless man, and remembers joining a 12-step program in 1964.

Tuesday has the final episode of Jericho on CBS at 10, with things building to a (slightly contrived) climax. Jake and Hawkins make their way to Cheyenne to try and avert another nuclear holocaust. This show has grown from a slightly clunky soap opera to an irresistible thriller with a very science-fictional critique of a future corporate-dominated dystopia. Even if you haven't watched every episode lately, you should still catch the action-movie conclusion, which should be pretty easy to follow. Here's the first few minutes, to get you started. (Sorry about the streakiness and jerkiness, they were in the source video.)

Also on Tuesday, the History Channel has two repeats of The Universe at 8 and 9, dealing with unexplained mysteries and the rings of Saturn. And USA has K-PAX at 2 PM. Is Kevin Spacey an alien or a mental patient? Can't he be both? And Encore has Alien 3 at 3:05.

Wednesday sees a new Futureweapons on the Discovery Channel at 8 PM. This is actually the second episode to deal with Israel, and this time around we get to know the embattled country's missile shield, known as "Iron Fist." (But there's no weapon system called "Power Man," for some reason.)

And then at 10 PM, there's a new UFO Hunters on the History Channel, dealing with "UFO Vortexes." Similar to last week's focus on UFO Gateways, this is all about areas of the planet that seem to lend themselves to mysterious activity... like the Bermuda Triangle. And an astrophysicist suggests interdimensional travel using these vortexes (vortices?) may be "entirely possible" under Einstein's Theory of Relativity. It's pure science!

And the Sci Fi Channel has Sean Connery's classic Meteor at 3:00 AM Thursday morning.

Thursday's Smallville sees Clark finally learning how to fly, in preparation for his battle with Brainiac. And there's some kind of key thingy that leads to all sorts of Kryptonian secrets, and the wrong people have it. Here's the trailer:

Also, if you missed the acclaimed TV movie Rock Monster on the Sci Fi Channel this past weekend, you have another chance to catch it this Thursday at 9 PM. It's about a student, visiting Eastern Europe, who pulls a sword out of a stone — and then the stone goes on a murderous rampage. And yes, you're not alone in making a silly B-52s song out of the title. But if you'd rather stick with something you already know is good, FX is showing X2: X-Men United starting at 8 PM.

FX has the 2002 remake of Solaris, with George Clooney, at 10 AM. Ditch work and join the select club of people who appreciate the Soderbergh revamp.

Friday, two new half-hour specials about Battlestar Galactica are airing on the Sci FI Channel at 10 PM. Battlestar Galactica: Revealed is a clip show that retells the first few seasons of the show. And Battlestar Galactica: The Phenomenon is a fluffy look at how much celebrities like Seth Green and Joss Whedon adore the show. If you can't wait until Friday, both shows appear to be on Youtube and various other video sites in their entirety already. Here's a chunk of celebrity BSG love:

Also, Encore has the wetter of Kevin Costner's two post-apocalyptic loner movies, Waterworld, at 2:30.

Saturday morning, the CW has the penultimate episode of Legion of Super Heroes at 9:30 AM, followed by Spectacular Spider-Man at 10. LSH's episode is part 1 of "Dark Victory," featuring Imperiex (who I think was a Superman villain in the comics.) Part 2 airs next week. Meanwhile, Spider-Man meets Flint Marko, who becomes the Sandman, probably with worse special effects and better pacing than Spider-Man 3. And then at 10:30, there's a new Transformers: Animated. The Decepticons begin their invasion of Earth, and Optimus Prime worries that he's not a great leader. Aww.

And then at 9 PM, BBC America has a new (to Americans) Torchwood. It's the absolutely horrible one about the evil circus performers who get trapped inside an old movie from the 1920s. I don't know how to convince you to stay away from this one. This isn't just random Torchwood bashing — this episode is like three weird old Roger Corman movies mashed up, with the Torchwood stars heads randomly stuck on some of the characters. Actually, when I describe it that way, it sounds kind of great. But sadly, it tries a bit too hard to be serious, and ends up being awful and boring. I feel like I have a holy duty to keep you from watching this episode.

Luckily, there are many other options around that time. IFC is showing Austin Powers twice in one evening, at 5:30 and 10:45. Sci Fi is showing the first two Resident Evil movies back-to-back. TBS has Jackie Chan's vastly underrated Tuxedo at 8, followed by Spider-Man at 10. (Okay, The Tuxedo isn't that great. But it's got a few great bits, including the weird James Brown sequence.)

Sunday, Comedy Central is re-running the Futurama movie "Bender's Big Score," if you were too cheap to buy the DVD. That's at 7 PM. And Disney Toon has a random episode of Superman: The Animated Series at 10:30. That's all I can come up with, unless you think there's some kind of brain-eating virus involved in all those women desiring Brett on Rock of Love.