Your weekly guide to TV’s best and worst one-hour shows
No fooling: Your TV card is booked solid Sunday, April 1:
“The Killing” (8 p.m., AMC)
After a couple hours of watching the Season 2 premiere, Mama’s feeling a tad suicidal. Between the gloomy rain, the abject misery of each character and the fact that they’re no closer to cracking the freakin’ case, this show may or may not be a good mystery, but it’s definitely the most depressing series since “Luther.” And is it just Mama who hears Laura’s theme from “Twin Peaks” every time Linden (Mireille Enos) discovers another possible witness/suspect?
“Once Upon a Time” (8 p.m., ABC)
We finally get a peek at the Evil Queen (Lana Parrilla) before she became Evil through her back story — Surprise! She has Mommy issues (Barbara Hershey guest stars as Regina’s mother, Cora) — and we’ll finally find out why she hates Snow White so much.
“Titanoboa: Monster Snake” (8 p.m., Smithsonian Channel)
You know that model of a giant snake that scared the bejezus out of you the other morning in Grand Central? Here’s the special about it, so you can have the bejezus scared out of you in the comfort of your own living room.
“Game of Thrones” (9 p.m., HBO)
The fantasy adventure is as exciting and as brutal as ever, even if it requires a five-page family tree and a Dothraki-English dictionary to figure out who is who again. One minor quibble to HBO (and slight spoiler alert): Not to beat a dead, um, you know, but an equine demise in the first 15 minutes of your hit show miiiight not have been the best idea, considering your recent history with “Luck.”
“Great Expectations” (9 p.m., PBS)
And you thought PBS only aired “Downton Abbey.” If the 2006 “Bleak House” production is any indication — and Gillian Anderson is in this one, too — you won’t want to miss this first half of the miniseries based on another Charles Dickens’ book.
“Mad Men” (10 p.m., AMC)
After all the press for the premiere, can Don (Jon Hamm, who also directs this week’s episode) and the gang sustain the excitement? Since they still haven’t given us a glimpse of harpy Betty (whose portrayer, January Jones, was preggers in real life during production), there’s still plenty of good drama — and maybe an encore of “Zou Bisou Bisou” — left to drink in.
“GCB” (10 p.m., ABC)
That’s it, Mama’s converting: Sheryl Crow performs at the annual church fund-raiser for the Texas ladies who backstab. Mama’s religious functions typically involve Bingo.