TV Reviews: If Rosie O’Donnell and company were consciously determined to strangle the rebirth of variety shows in the crib, they couldn’t have done a better job of it than this pre-holiday turkey. Bearing an uncanny resemblance to a particularly awful Vegas revue, “Rosie Live” awkwardly trotted out one celebrity after another before culminating with a big number featuring dancers dressed as food. Too sincere to work as kitsch, NBC’s misguided special/series-trial-balloon doubtless tested the loyalty of even O’Donnell’s most ardent fans and had anyone outside that category praying for the commercials.

TV Reviews: Understandably controversial for its look at homegrown terrorism and the pressures that assail British Muslims in a post-Sept. 11 world, "Britz" features an intriguing parallel narrative structure but meanders too slowly through its second act -- finally playing less like a thriller than a heavy-handed political tract.

TV Reviews: The seven-season Shakespearean tragedy that is Vic Mackey reached a fulfilling conclusion in the finale of "The Shield," and, wouldn't you know it, the cop who thought he could outsmart everyone found himself caught in his own deceitful and convoluted web.

TV Reviews: With Stephen Colbert channeling the ghosts of Perry Como and Bing Crosby right down to the bright red sweater, "A Colbert Christmas" is not only a fabulously zany hourlong ad for the "A Colbert Christmas" DVD but also reinforces what a truly remarkable talent its host is.

TV Reviews: Shot partly on location in South Africa, Fox's "24" movie gives Jack Bauer a new continent across which to righteously kick ass, as well as get his own chops busted in creative (read: tortured) ways.

TV Reviews: A self-described "user's guide to how the news gets made," "The IFC Media Project" is a laudably ambitious dissection of broadcast journalism foibles with an undeniable leftward tilt -- an expected angle, given that Michael Moore collaborator Meghan O'Hara is its co-creator.

TV Reviews: Forty-five years after the Kennedy assassination, those tragic events in Dallas remain a source of near-unparalleled fascination -- especially if that's an excuse for the Discovery Channel to bring way-cool forensic investigation techniques to bear on the evidence.

TV Reviews: This time of year, TV entertainment is rampant with fabricated feel-good sentiments and manufactured emotions. In fact, viewers have been so conditioned by holiday TV's moments of serendipitous redemption that on a superficial level, Hallmark Channel's "Accidental Friendship" may disappoint.

TV Reviews: "Sex at teatime!" protests Mary Whitehouse, the British teacher and housewife who launched a one-woman crusade against smut televised by the BBC in the 1960s. As played by Julie Walters, "Filth" is a surprisingly affectionate and sympathetic portrait of a character who easily could have been presented as a priggish scold. Instead, Walters' Whitehouse is in the tradition of cinematic heroines like Erin Brockovich and Norma Rae, taking on an outsized establishment -- even if her cause is wanton profanity and depictions of sex. Given the unending culture wars, it's a timely and utterly timeless tale.

TV Reviews: A sordid story of unbridled materialism and excess, the film is based on the real-life account of two brothers whose quick rise in the financial world was met with particularly gruesome downfalls. Racy by Lifetime standards, the pic is exactly the kind of tawdry, sexy, strange-but-true tale that makes for a juicy TV movie.

TV Reviews: Amid the film noirish turn of the features, this brightly colored, lighthearted series provides a throwback to pre-Dark Knight days, pairing Gotham's favorite son with relatively obscure heroes, thus mirroring "The Brave and the Bold" comics. More youthful and comedic than such animated efforts as "Justice League," it's primarily for kids, but still good fun.

TV Reviews: In "Estate of Panic," Sci Fi's stab at "House on Haunted Hill" meets "Fear Factor," simple-minded players endure a parade of silly stunts and contests, but this cheeky hour is mostly an ordeal for viewers.

TV Reviews: Staged much like a play, "God on Trial" uses an unconfirmed story -- that doomed Jewish prisoners at Auschwitz put God on trial for abandoning them -- as the jumping-off point for a thoughtful if perhaps unavoidably claustrophobic rumination on religion.

TV Reviews: One newspaper dubbed Chris Lilley "Australia's answer to Ricky Gervais" -- a comparison that, alas, is funnier than almost anything in this mockumentary fished up from Down Under.

TV Reviews: One newspaper dubbed Chris Lilley "Australia's answer to Ricky Gervais" -- a comparison that, alas, is funnier than almost anything in this mockumentary fished up from Down Under.

TV Reviews: Staged much like a play, "God on Trial" uses an unconfirmed story -- that doomed Jewish prisoners at Auschwitz put God on trial for abandoning them -- as the jumping-off point for a thoughtful if perhaps unavoidably claustrophobic rumination on religion.

TV Reviews: Comcast's low-profile Style network has a likable if unlikely new mascot: Ruby Gettinger, a 480-pound resident of Savannah, Ga., who has decided it's time to do something about her morbid obesity.

TV Reviews: Animal Planet is eager to expand its brand into an edgier orbit, and "Whale Wars" certainly fits the bill.

TV Reviews: Reminiscent of the old "TGIF" comedies, "True Jackson, VP" is a slight premise built around a beguiling young talent -- the one-girl charm-offensive known as Keke Palmer.

TV Reviews: What's this, an MSNBC documentary that doesn't focus on pedophiles or prisoners? Granted, the cable news channel doesn't deviate far from the salacious with this 30th anniversary look at Jonestown, the event that forever put the expression "drinking the Kool-Aid" into the national lexicon. NBC News was intimately involved in the story -- two of its journalists died in Guyana, before the Rev. Jim Jones and more than 900 followers engaged in a mass murder-suicide -- and the relatively new MSNBC Films documentary initiative credibly illustrates Jones' madness in appropriately unsettling detail.