New-Wave McCarthyism

As we start to gear up for the approaching Nineties revival, Gossip Girl goes back to that designer drug-filled Eighties well tonight to give us a taste of what could be an origin story series. It's not that hard to production design Los Angeles to look pseudo-retro, but the producers did at least one thing right: Nothing reminds us of the Reagan years like Andrew McCarthy in a sweet ride.

Gossip Girl [8 PM, CW]

Brittany Snow guest-stars as young Lily (Kelly Rutherford) during an '80s flashback sequence, complete with guest-brat-packer McCarthy as her father and guest band No Doubt. If the CW picks up the Gossip Girl spin-off for one of its few open spots, Snow and Krysten Ritter would star and Molly Ringwald should start clearing some space in her schedule.

Grandpa, Do You Know Who I Am? with Maria Shriver [7:30 PM, HBO]

In tonight's second installment of The Alzheimer's Project, children and young teenagers discuss what it is like to have a grandparent with Alzheimer's. Maria Shriver, whose father was diagnosed with the disease, provides commentary. At 8 PM another installment explores advancements made in Alzheimer's treatments. From what we have seen, this series covers some of the toughest emotional stuff in life without the maudlin tendencies of network disease specials.

Swine Flu: The Science of Pandemics [10 PM, National Geographic]

Ah, swine flu. It seems like just yesterday that I saw a woman lifting up her face mask to sip her iced caramel macchiato. Depending on your coast, the media-stoked collective disease fear has been replaced by wildfire or Air Force One fly-over scares, but we're not out of the woods yet. NatGeo should be commended for turning around this episode in such short notice, but odds are most of it will be recycled from other pandemic/superflu specials.

Georgia Rule [8 PM, Cinemax]

There is a sub-genre of movies like The Secret Life of Bees or How to Make an American Quilt wherein a group of women of different ages get together to solve some problems. This is supposed to be one of those films, but by the second act of Georgia Rule one realizes that Jane Fonda, Lindsay Lohan, and Felicity Huffman aren't going to get to the bottom of anything and are just going to keep yelling at each other about their various mother-daughter-grandmother issues until the credits roll. There is a plot that involves some devastating revelations about Rachel's (Lohan) stepfather, but the reason to watch this film is to see one legendary and two major actresses toiling mightily over a bunch of lackluster ideas.