BY CLIF GARBODEN

FRIDAY 6

8:00 (44) Nova: Hunt for the Supertwister. We’re promised "jaw-dropping 3-D graphics" with this one, so hang on to your bicuspids. A look at two University of Oklahoma researchers out to predict tornados — one using supercomputer simulations, the other out chasing storms the old fashioned way (with Helen Hunt in the back seat). The "supertwister" referred to is the May 1999 storm that ripped through Oklahoma setting records for power and destruction wherever it went. (Until 9 p.m.)

9:00 (2) Frontline: Al Qaeda’s New Front. A look at burgeoning al-Qaeda terrorist activity in Europe, which has a Muslim population of more than 20 million, most of whom, to be fair, are not terrorists. (Until 10 p.m.)

9:00 (44) American Experience: Victory in the Pacific. To mark the 60th anniversary of the end of World War II, PBS looks at the last year of the war from both the US and the Japanese sides. Included are first-hand accounts of the Tokyo firebombing and the bloody battle of Okinawa, a discussion of the decision to drop atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and an interview with an unsuccessful kamikaze pilot. To be repeated on Saturday at midnight on Channel 44. (Until 11 p.m.)

10:00 (2) Frontline: Israel’s Next War? You never know who’s working on whose behalf here, but the focus of this report is that as Ariel Sharon follows through on his promise to move Israeli settlers out of Palestinian territory, extremists settlers will either start a civil war or provoke violence with Palestinians. And who knows what extremist Palestinians might get up to when provoked. (Until 11 p.m.)

SATURDAY 7

5:00 (10) Horse Racing. Live from Churchill Downs, the 131st running of the Kentucky Derby. The Bellamy Road who won the Wood Memorial can’t lose. Whether he’ll show up is another matter. (Until 6:30 p.m.)

6:00 (44) How To Succeed in Business Without Really Trying (movie). Repeated from last month. A 1967 film from the Broadway show with Robert Morse re-creating the role that won him a Tony. Frank Loesser won a Pulitzer for this musical about a window washer who makes it to the top of the martini-culture corporate ladder. (Until 8:02 p.m.)

7:00 (2) Mystery: Miss Marple: A Murder Is Announced, part one. Repeated from last week. The murder in question is announced in the weekly Chipping Cleghorn newspaper, and Jane Marple (Geraldine McEwan), an avid reader, steps in. (Until 8 p.m.)

7:00 (6) Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (movie). HP2, in which we meet Kenneth Branagh as Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher Gilderoy Lockhart and Jason Isaacs as Lucius Malfoy, father of Harry’s arch-enemy Draco and Harry wonders whether his ability to talk to snakes shouldn’t have landed him in Slytherin. Chris Columbus does a darker, and better, job than he did in HP1. (Until 11 p.m.)

8:02 (44) Fiddler on the Roof (movie). Topol plays Tevye, the beleaguered Jewish milkman from the Ukrainian ghetto, in Norman Jewison’s 1971 adaptation of the relentless Broadway musical. (Until midnight.)

11:00 (2) In the Life: My Fair Ladies. A round of applause for the lesbians and such hosted by Tony winner Cherry Jones. This month’s edition of this gay/lesbian/etc. magazine-format news show features tributes to poet Audre Lorde, tennis star Billie Jean King, and novelist Ann Bannon — among others. (Until midnight.)

SUNDAY 8

3:00 (6) Basketball. More NBA playoff action. (Until 6 p.m.)

3:30 (2) Becoming American: The Chinese Experience: Gold Mountain, Between Two Worlds, and No Turning Back. The early history of the Chinese in America. In the mid 1800s, Chinese men fled war-ravaged China for the gold fields of California looking to get rich quick and return home. But things didn’t, uh, pan out, and many found themselves trapped in America and facing heavy-duty economic and cultural discrimination. (Until 8 p.m.)

4:00 (64) Star Wars Episode 6: Return of the Jedi (movie). By now you know where you stand on this. Those who want to catch up in preparation for the May 19 release of Star Wars 3 will appreciate the opportunity. (Until 7 p.m.)

9:00 (2) Mystery: Miss Marple: A Murder Is Announced, part two. The "announced" murder is followed by a couple of unannounced ones. This is the conclusion. To be repeated tonight at 1 a.m. on Channel 44, and at 4 a.m. on Channels 2 and 44. (Until 10 p.m.)

9:00 (12) Elvis, part one. A CBS mini-series with Jonathan Rhys Meyers as the King, as Randy Quaid as "Colonel" Tom Parker, Camryn Manheim as Gladys Presley, Rose McGowan as Ann-Margret, Robert Patrick as Vernon Presley, and Antonia Bernath as Priscilla Presley. Hey, everybody loved Jamie Foxx. To be concluded on Wednesday at 8 p.m. (Until 11 p.m.)

9:00 (44) Independent Lens: Imelda. A revealing film from Ramona Diaz in which former Philippines first lady Imelda Marcos explains, in her own words, how she scrambled from poverty to become the Marie Antoinette figure of the 20th century. As her husband drove her country farther into the ground, Imelda became an international symbol of imperious waste and amassed enormous personal wealth, much of which she spent on shoes. (Until 10:30 p.m.)

10:30 (44) The American Experience: Daughter from Danang. Filmmakers Gail Dolgin and Vicente Franco made this oft-aired Sundance winner about an Vietnamese-American woman whose reunion with her birth mother back in Danang is sad and disturbing. For Mai Thi Hiep, one of thousands of children rescued from Vietnam by Operation Babylift in 1975, it was meant to be a sentimental journey. Her birth mother saw it as an economic opportunity. (Until midnight.)

MONDAY 9

8:00 (2) Antiques Roadshow: Wild Things. An anthology show devoted to animal-themed antiques — everything from $5000 stuffed animals to Dr. Seuss artifacts. To be repeated tonight at 2:30 and 4 a.m., and at 1 and 3 a.m. on Channel 44. (Until 9 p.m.)

8:00 (44) Mystery: The Inspector Lynley Mysteries II: For the Sake of Elena. There’s no shortage of academics and intellectuals with sordid pasts to tap as suspects when a libertine jogger is murdered near Cambridge University, but when a second runner goes down, Inspector Thomas Lynley and Sergeant Barbara Havers (Nathaniel Parker and Sharon Small) are forced to consider more conventional suspects. To be repeated on Wednesday at 1 a.m. on Channel 2.(Until 9:26 p.m.)

9:00 (2) The Carter Family: Will the Circle Be Unbroken? Long before June hooked up with Johnny, there were Sara, A.P., and Maybelle Carter, the country trio whose hard-luck sound serenaded people through the Depression. Old photos, recordings, and performance footage combine to profile these legends from Poor Valley, Virginia. Robert Duvall narrates. To be repeated tonight at 2 and 4 a.m. on Channel 44, and at 5 a.m., back on Channel 2. (Until 10 p.m.)

9:26 (44) Mystery: The Inspector Lynley Mysteries II: Missing Joseph. A single-mom parishioner poisons the vicar. Typical bad English cooking, accident, or murder? Lynley and Havers inspect the quiet little murder shire and uncover a frothy pit of scandal. To be repeated on Wednesday at 2 a.m. on Channel 2. (Until 11 p.m.)

TUESDAY 10

7:30 (2) La Plaza: Conversations with Ilan Stavans: Antonia Hernández. Hernández, president and CEO of the California Community Foundation, discusses the Latino community’s evolving needs and Latino civil rights. (Until 8 p.m.)

8:00 (2) Nova: Secrets of the Crocodile Caves. We get the impression that the crocodiles are the secret. And on the other side of the caves (should you make it through) is a forest that evolved in isolation, surrounded by 1000-foot rock walls. This particular bit of remoteness is in Madagascar. To be repeated tonight at 1 a.m. on Channel 44, and at 4 a.m. on Channels 2 and 44. (Until 9 p.m.)

8:00 (44) Globe Trekker: Pacific Northwest. Seldom-seen Trekker Sami Sabiti does Washington and Oregon, starting in Seattle for some coffee on the thin veneer of good taste, an assault on the Space Needle, and a visit to the Jimi Hendrix Experience. From there, it’s as west as he can go for a salmon barbecue among the Native Americans of La Push, then south to a Loggers Play Day, Native American bareback riding, Portland, and a climb up Mount St. Helens. (Until 9 p.m.)

9:00 (2) Frontline: The New Asylums. As if our prisons didn’t have enough problems, roughly 500,000 current inmates are officially mentally ill — a wide-ranging set of conditions that prison administrators, staff, and systems are not trained to handle. (Until 10 p.m.)

9:00 (44) Alan Alda in Scientific American Frontiers: Cars that Think. All cars think. And if you don’t wash them, they get cranky and think bad things about you and tease you randomly turning the check engine soon light on during bad weather. Alan explains how cars are learning to sense and avoid hazards and even read you lips. "And," the show’s description claims, "they even know when you are distracted." That means that if you’re reckless enough talk on the phone while driving, your car could decide to get you off the road before you cause an accident. (Until 9:30 p.m.)

9:30 (44) Rough Science: Rocket. This is what reality TV was meant to be like when the Brits picked it up. Unfortunately, by the time it got to the States, the only skills required of contestants involved the ability to eat live vermin without vomiting. This is better. A team is dumped on an island or some other remote spot with a primitive tool kit and given three days to complete a task using the materials at hand. Tonight’s challenge is to build three water-powered rockets that can transport raw eggs (unbroken). (Until 10 p.m.)

10:00 (2) Dances of Life. On the Pacific Islands, they may not know the latest steps, but they certainly know the oldest ones — the "dance stories" that portray their origins, histories, migrations, and cultural high points. Whale Rider’s Keisha Castle-Hughes narrates. (Until 11 p.m.)

10:00 (44) Battlefield Britain: The Spanish Armada — 1588. Eccentric British night continues with father/son historians Peter and Dan Snow exploring Philip II of Spain’s by-sea assault on Great Britain (under Elizabeth I) to end that nation’s Protestant menace. What’s neat about the Snows is that they use computer technology to simulate the battles and spend lots of hands-on time exploring battlefields and ancient weaponry. Always great to see two guys enjoy their work. (Until 11 p.m.)

WEDNESDAY 11

8:00 (12) Elvis, part two. The conclusion. (Until 10 p.m.)

8:00 (44) Battlefield Britain: Naseby — 1645. The turning point in the English Civil War, when Cromwell’s New Model Army beat up Charles I and saw to it that England was never again ruled only by a monarchy. Peter and Dan Snow investigate, re-create, and computer-simulate the action.

9:00 (2) American Masters: James Dean — Sense Memories. A profile of the romantic legend snatched from his most significant period on film. Included are rarely seen screen tests and outtakes from East of Eden, Rebel without a Cause, and Giant. To be repeated at 2 and 4 a.m. on Channel 44, and at 5 a.m., back on Channel 2. (Until 10 p.m.)

9:00 (44) National Geographic Specials: Lost Treasure of Afghanistan. It’s not as if the country didn’t need the money, but recent wars have been tough on Afghanistan’s ancestral wealth. Two cases in point: 20,000 gold pieces (the "Bactrian Hoard") that vanished just as the Soviets were invading Afghanistan 30 years ago; and a third 1000-foot Buddha buried near where the Taliban destroyed two others. To be repeated on Thursday at 1 a.m. (Until 10 p.m.)

10:00 (44) Frontline: Memory of the Camps. This will be grim. Footage taken of Nazi concentration camps as Allied troops liberated them, compiled for an unfinished documentary (worked on, in part, by Alfred Hitchcock) and unearthed from the Imperial War Museum archives in 1984. (Until 11 p.m.)

THURSDAY 12

7:30 (2) Basic Black: Unequal Exposure. Bringing money and industry to communities of color has involved bringing in hazardous materials to the extent that, according to a Northeastern University study, such communities are nine times more likely to be exposed to environmentally hazardous facilities than all-white communities are. Guest host Howard Manly takes on the issue with Penn Loh, director of Alternatives for Community and Environment, Daniel Faber, Northeastern associate professor of sociology and anthropology, and Robert Rio, vide-president of environmental policy at Associated Industries of Massachusetts. (Until 8 p.m.)

8:00 (6) Pearl Harbor (movie). Director Michael Bay and producer Jerry Bruckheimer spent $140 million and got Ben Affleck and Josh Hartnett and Kate Beckinsale and Jon Voight and still didn’t come near Saving Private Ryan, never mind From Here to Eternity. From 2001. (Until 11 p.m.)

9:00 (2) Auschwitz: Inside the Nazi State: Surprising Beginnings (March 1940–September 1941) and Orders and Initiatives (September 1941–March 1942). Linda Ellerby narrates this devastating history of the world’s most efficient mass-murder scheme. Part one looks at the Nazis’ need to eliminate enemies of the state — at first mostly Russian POWs, not Jews. Part two chronicles the Nazi command conference at Wannsee at which the generals mapped out the systematic genocide of the Jews and others and designed the gas chambers to do the job. (Until 11 p.m.)