WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE?

Friendly Rating: Elementary age and up

Safety Rating: Usually very safe, sometimes bad behavior on the part of the ancestors is revealed. And the constant plugging of a certain website sponsor

Quality Rating: Getting better and better

Season Three premieres tonight at 8 p.m. on NBC

I keep liking this show more and more each season. Okay, maybe it’s also because I have a major soft spot for Martin Sheen – whose forebears are featured tonight. But his family, like many families, has an interesting background. Sheen who is well-known for his activism for peace and social justice, wanted to find out if there might have been a genetic component to his activism, and there certainly is. But it’s when he dives even deeper into the Spanish side of his family that he finds a rather amazing coincidence that probably isn’t quite so amazing considering the rather closed and compact nature of societies in that part of Spain.

On the plus side, we only got one plug for that website for genealogists. Please note, there are other free sources you might want to try first before signing up you-know-where.

But this is one of those shows that does encourage you to get off your backside to see what you can discover about your ancestors. I have to say, since last season, I got a little taste of the genealogy, myself, after visiting my grandfather’s grave. It is so much fun! I found a death certificate for my great-grandfather and an obit for him – which did not give the family names I was hoping for. I got some memories out of my dad, which I’ve never gotten before. It’s an addicting hobby and all about your family.

Plus it’s a terrific way to bring history to life. I learned a tremendous amount about the Spanish and Irish Civil Wars that I didn’t know before and it was real in a way that it isn’t usually because you have real people, not just famous ones, that you’re hearing about. So I encourage you to watch this show with your kids, not because there might something questionable, but for the questions it will raise and perhaps spark a family passion.

Al and Marion Mazur, courtesy OWN

LOVE ETC.

Friendly Rating: Elementary and older

Safety Rating: Minor language issues, some smoking and drinking

Quality Rating: Very charming and sweet and often bittersweet

Film airs tonight at 8 p.m. on OWN.

Finding, sharing and experiencing romantic love is one of those things we say makes the world go ’round. So filmmaker Jonathan Tisch set out to explore love and how we experience its different stages by looking at three couples and two single guys.

Al and Marion Mazur have been married almost 50 years. She’s almost 90 and suffering from dementia, but the two are still in love with each other. Ethan is divorced and starting over. Gabriel and Danielle are each other’s first loves, but they will soon graduate from high school. Scott currently has no one to partner with, so he decides to have his kids without a partner. Chitra and Mahendra are engaged and in the process of getting married.

It’s a sweet little film that’s also rather sad in its way. There’s Al and Marion’s story – which is inspiring and sad. Gabriel and Danielle are not going to college together. Ethan starts a relationship that doesn’t go anywhere (although I was not impressed by the woman, myself).

Safety-wise, there are issues with the language, but it’s just a word or two here and there. Since Scott is gay, he has a surrogate bear his children, as described in song by two women friends. The song isn’t entirely discreet (there’s a line about looking at porn in a sterilized room) but isn’t overly descriptive, either.

You may want to ask your children what they think of the couples and what they go through. If you have a teen in the throes of first love, it might be illuminating. Either way, it’s a sweet look at something we’re all very interested in.

Chris Rock talks about his neighborhood, courtesy Showtime

BROOKLYN BOHEME

Friendly Rating:  Older elementary and up

Safety Rating: Foul language across the spectrum, not bleeped

Quality Rating: It’s got a lot going for it

Documentary film airs on Showtime tonight at 8:30 p.m.

It’s not the fastest moving movie in the world, but there are several things I like about Brooklyn Boheme, not the least being that it provides a whole different look at African American culture and history. This being Black History Month, we’re going to be getting a fair amount of that, which has its pluses (namely that we’re seeing it at all) and minuses (why do we only acknowledge the contributions and accomplishments of African Americans during one month of the year and the shortest at that?).

This movie, however, looks at a bunch of upwardly mobile Blacks who landed in this one Brooklyn neighborhood and how that seemed to foster quite the explosion of creativity and commercial success. This was the place where Spike Lee grew up and made his movies. Chris Rock spent part of his childhood here. And in the 1980s and 90s, it was a place that fostered all kinds of African American artists, including the film’s nexus, writer, director and historian Nelson George.

There is plenty of foul language sprinkled throughout, but the key is sprinkled. Whether it’s appropriate is borderline and ultimately up to you to decide.

But what I liked most about the film is that it isn’t about slavery or civil rights. In no way do I want to suggest that we forget about those realities. However, there is a whole lot more to African American culture and history than those two events and this movie celebrates that. It’s about time, too. Now, if we could get a good look at the Harlem Rennaissance airing in, say, May, we’d be making more progress.

Courtesy PBS

NOVA: ICE AGE DEATH TRAP

Friendly Rating: All ages

Safety Rating: Mostly safe, although sensitive young ones might be bothered by how they think the mastodons were killed

Quality Rating: Very good.

Series episode airs tonight on PBS, check your local listings for time

This is one of those shows I watch with a certain fondness and nostalgia. When I was a kid, I loved this kind of show. It set me off dreaming about becoming an archaeologist or paleontologist, until I was told how tedious and exacting work on a dig was.

And whether or not your kids decide to go into paleontology or not, shows like this can help them try on different dreams. In this particular episode of PBS’ science series NOVA, construction workers digging out a basin that had been a lake bed, lo, these many eons ago, discover all these bones.

Turns out the bones belonged to a bunch of prehistoric creatures, but mostly mastodons. So the scientists come in and pull out as many bones as they can find before the construction of a new dam begins. They have six weeks and find some pretty amazing stuff.

Now, it does get sad when they come up with a pretty strong hypothesis about why so many bones were found in this one place – and the scientists do talk about the fact that these were living creatures who appear to have suffered a pretty nasty death. But then they are off checking out another anomaly in the pile, and while it sure looks like it may have been human beings, things don’t quite date from the right time.

Anyway, it’s a fascinating and relatively fast moving hour. And let us know if your kids found it interesting.

Keegan-Michael Key and Jordan Peele

KEY & PEELE

Friendly Rating: Teens, boys especially

Safety Rating: Language, bleeped and not, drug jokes, prison jokes, two jokes about someone getting knifed, some might find it offensive

Quality Rating: Dang, it’s funny

New sketch comedy series premieres tonight at 10:30 p.m. on Comedy Central.

This is kind of a tough one because Key & Peele is not for younger viewers. But it is a classic example of just how much you can get away with if you’re funny. It’s not shock humor for the sake of being shocking. It’s just funny with a genuinely mature edge. That might make it okay for your older teens, although you’ll definitely want to watch it with them or anyone younger in the household.

This is a sketch comedy show featuring comics Keegan-Michael Key and Jordan Peele, and a lot of the comedy comes from the fact that they are bi-racial, with Black fathers and White mothers. They poke fun at pretty much everyone and everything, although a lot of their humor is informed (and pokes fun at) their Black culture.

In an early sketch, for example, Key is talking on the phone with a very White attitude about getting tickets for a classical music concert until Peele comes along, talking on his phone. The two start sounding increasingly Black, until Peele wanders away, expressing fear about the Brotha next to him.

You’ve got Peele impersonating rapper L’il Wayne in jail rapping about how bad he is, only he’s getting his backside kicked. And Peele’s impersonation of President Obama is freaking scary because he sounds so much like the president.

There bitch word is used liberally, and that’s not bleeped, but other words are. L’il Wayne is stabbed repeatedly, as is a cooking show contestant who is stabbed by Key doing a Gordon Ramsey take off that is beyond silly.

In short, most of the foul language comes in places where it’s reasonable to expect it, such as two husbands whose wives always seem to hear them calling them bitches. Or Wayne rapping in prison. Or Obama’s “anger translator.” It’s not about the shock as it is being funny – and that’s why these guys can get away with it. Just be sure the little ones are in bed.

I, personally, am in a The Wizard of Oz mood. What are you reading?

Tony Bennett and Lady Gaga

GREAT PERFORMANCES: TONY BENNETT: DUETS II

This is a programming note since I was not able to review the show.

Quick note here about this one. Just wanted to make sure that it got at least some play since it is pretty cool that all the stars your kids are into, such as Lady Gaga, are singing with a guy old enough to be my grandfather. Seriously, Bennett is 85 and still performing like nobody’s business – and PBS brought him to us live. If I had half his energy now…

I have seen the duet he did with Lady Gaga, singing The Lady is a Tramp – which is delightful. Gaga, whatever her issues with hypersexualization, is still a darned good musician, and I have to give her props. But there’s a whole series of these, including Bennett’s work with the late Amy Winehouse, Michael Buble, Queen Latifah (who may be a little old school for your kids) and a host of others who’ve been around the block a few more times.

It’s on PBS tonight. Check your local listings for times.

David Steinberg and Jerry Seinfeld

INSIDE COMEDY

Friendly Rating: Elementary and older

Safety Rating: Some talk of drinking and the odd innuendo – but can’t promise there won’t be language issues

Quality Rating: Interesting, but not interesting enough

Series premieres tonight on Showtime at 11 p.m.

When I was a kid, I loved shows like these, where the comedians I saw on TV sat down and just talked about themselves and their lives. I wanted to find out all about Bill Cosby and Mel Brooks and Don Rickles. Okay, maybe not Rickles so much because I didn’t think he was that funny. And there was part of me that wanted to be a stand-up comedian, as well.

The problem with David Steinberg’s new look at comedy and the comedians who make it is that it’s not that riveting. It’s just two guys chatting and laughing a little. There’s not much here about comedy that I didn’t already know. The one surprise was that it was pretty safe. I saw one innuendo from some of Seinfeld’s concert footage. But otherwise, the worst word I heard was hell. Can’t promise that will continue, however.

That being said, if you’ve got a kid who’s new to this whole thing, it might be just the ticket. You’ll probably have to explain about the Seinfeld show and Don Rickles. Other masters coming up include Mel Brooks, Carl Reiner, Tim Conway and Jonathan Winters. Chris Rock and Sarah Silverman are also coming up. Not all of these are folks you’ll find funny or even appropriate. Others will be very interesting to see.

David Mazouz and Kiefer Sutherland, courtesy Fox

TOUCH

Friendly Rating: Elementary age and up

Safety Rating: Some fist fighting and potential bombing, but may get worse

Quality Rating: Really, really good

Special preview tonight at 9 p.m. after American Idol, series premieres on March 19.

It’s not often that I get really excited about a show, and as I write this, I do so with some decidedly bated breath. I’ve seen terrific pilots go south – and this story of a widower with a son who appears to have autism, but who can see the interconnectedness of the universe in numbers – is a truly terrific pilot.

Created by Tim Kring, who brought us Herois, the pilot starring Keifer Sutherland as Martin Bohm is dynamite. Martin is a former award-winning reporter who’s doing other stuff now (gee, does that sound familiar). Well, Martin is having a tough time of it. His wife died in the World Trade Center on September 11, leaving him and their son Jake (David Mazouz). Jake, who has never said a word, it trying to connect in the only way he can, via numeric patterns.

But these numeric patterns have meaning for a wide swath of humanity all over the world, and in tonight’s episode, a string brought together as only Kring can do. Jake can’t quite see the future, but he can see connections and how they all will land in terms of future events.

So far, the show isn’t nearly as convoluted at Heroes. Better yet, it is extremely positive – the implication being that we can all choose to do something good for each other.

Violence was a decided problem with Heroes, but the worst violence in this show are a couple fist fights and one suicide bombing that doesn’t come off. I truly hope that they can keep this up, with a view to a world that can be made better. I would not be surprised if it goes the way of all thrillers, but in the meantime, I can hope.

Host Wes Moore, courtesy Discovery Network

Tonight is the annual State of the Union address by the President of the United States, 9 p.m. ET, 6 p.m. PT. Yes, this is a carefully orchestrated event designed to make you feel good about our current president (and given that this is an election year, President Obama has his work cut out for him). But it is news that is happening live, which will give you and your kids the opportunity to draw your own conclusions about what was said without the filter of a news agency.

This is even more important because as soon as the president is done, the opposition gets to put its spin on the speech. It would be nice if folks were kind and willing to acknowledge the good on the other side, but I doubt that will happen.

We also have a show premiering on OWN:

BEYOND BELIEF

Friendly Rating: All ages

Safety Rating: Scenes of war violence, some icky surgery scenes

Quality Rating: The intent is good, the execution only so-so

Series premieres on OWN tonight at 10 p.m.

A soldier survives a hit from a rocket, which embeds itself into his abdomen. A surfing dog helps kids with disabilities. All sorts of wondrous and cool things about our world. This is probably the show that everyone clamors for when they scream that all the news on TV is so negative.

The show, hosted by Wes Moore, is pretty interesting. The problem is that it’s mostly re-plays of old ABC News segments. At least two of the featured segments on tonight’s premiere are, including the story of the soldier – and that one dates to 2007.

If that doesn’t bother you (for some reason, it really bothered me), this is an okay show and ultimately rather uplifting.  It’s also fairly family friendly, which is a little on the unusual side, although you may want to watch first to be sure some of the stories aren’t too mature for your family.