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A select viewing guide to the next seven days of television

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MONDAY OCTOBER 21 Canada’s Worst Driver (Discovery, 10 p.m.) From coast to coast, Canada still has some of the worst drivers on the planet. Back tonight for a ninth season, this wildly popular unscripted series puts a new spin on its successful formula: Instead of introducing viewers to a brand-new crop of terrible motorists, it brings back nine of the worst drivers from previous seasons, all toward the hopeful cause of improving their road skills. My personal favourite: Sly from Red Deer, Alberta, who still insists on eating food and drinking soda while behind the wheel. Andrew Younghusband hosts.

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TUESDAY OCTOBER 22 The African-Americans: Many Rivers to Cross (PBS, 8 p.m.) Now this is public broadcasting at its best. Booked for a six-week run, the ambitious documentary series is hosted by Harvard scholar and social critic Henry Louis Gates, who capably rewinds 500 years of African-American history. Tonight’s opener focuses on the arrival of the very first African slaves at Jamestown, Virginia, and deconstructs the transatlantic slave trade that eventually connected three continents. Watch and learn.

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WEDNESDAY OCTOBER 23 World’s Strongest Toddler (TLC, 8 p.m.) Game one of the World Series kicks off tonight but wouldn’t you really rather watch a program about a freakishly strong three-year-old? First broadcast in 2009, this strange hour profiles a kid named Liam Hoekstra, who is stricken with an extremely rare medical condition known as myostatin-related muscle hypertrophy, resulting in his having 40 per cent more muscle mass than your average three-year-old. While Liam isn’t freakishly large for his age, he is plenty strong and eats constantly. Followed on TLC, fittingly enough, by 40-Year-Old Child: A New Case (9 p.m.) and My 40-Year-Old Child (10 p.m.)

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THURSDAY OCTOBER 24 Beyond Scared Straight (A&E, 10 p.m.) Whoever said the A&E network was subtle? Now in its fifth season, this series was created by filmmaker Arnold Shapiro, best known for his seminal 1978 documentary Scared Straight!, which followed a handful of cocky juvenile delinquents on a visit to a New Jersey prison. The same format carries over to this show, except on a weekly basis. Mostly, the show is about teaching the upstarts a lesson, as in tonight’s new episode, in which a young punk is taken to Queen Anne’s County Prison in Maryland and begins mouthing off to a hardened inmate–who promptly throws a chair at his head.

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FRIDAY OCTOBER 25 Dracula (NBC, Global, 10 p.m.) Does the original bloodsucker have enough bite for today’s demanding TV viewer? The Irish actor Jonathan Rhys Meyers, formerly of The Tudors, assumes the Dracula role in this slick remake of Bram Stoker’s story. Set in the late 19 th century, the story involves Dracula posing as an American businessman named Alexander Greyson, who arrives in London in search of business contacts and fresh blood. Of course he’s immediately smitten by the winsome young beauty Mina (Jessica de Gouw), which does not rest well with her fiancée Jonathan (Oliver Jackson-Cohen).

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SATURDAY OCTOBER 26 Jack and Jill (Showcase, 10 p.m.) Sometimes you just want to watch a big dumb comedy on Saturday night. So here you go: This 2011 comedy was co-written by Adam Sandler, who naturally takes the lead role of Jack, a successful ad man with a lovely wife (Katie Holmes), two great kids and a beautiful L.A. beach home. Jack’s bliss is shortlived, however, when he learns his identical twin sister Jill–also played by Sandler, obviously–is coming to stay with him for Thanksgiving. Watch it for the amusing guest turn by Al Pacino, playing Al Pacino, of course.

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SUNDAY OCTOBER 27 The Governor’s Wife (A&E, 10 p.m.) Here’s a new reality show bound to garner viewers and headlines. The format follows former Louisiana governor Edwin Edwards, aged 85, who shocked his constituents and pretty much everyone else a few years ago when he married a woman named Trina, who was 51 years his junior. Apparently the pair became pen pals while Edwin while serving an eight-year stretch for bribery and extortion, and got hitched when he was released. In this setup, the ex-governor’s kids, including one in her mid-sixties, fume over the arrangement while Trina constantly fusses over the old guy. And no, the show isn’t sponsored by the makers of Viagra.

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