TV This Week: August 18 - 24: ‘Life of Pi’ on HBO

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This week’s TV Movies

SUNDAY

Find out “Whodunnit?” on this interactive murder-mystery/reality competition’s season finale. Hopefully, it’s not the butler. 9 p.m. ABC

A sweet old biddy disappears from a moving train, and foul play is of course suspected, in a sexy and stylish new adaptation of the classic thriller “The Lady Vanishes” on “Masterpiece Mystery!” 9 p.m. KOCE

Meals on wheels: The latest running of “The Great Food Truck Race” gets underway in San Francisco. 9 p.m. Food

Time for one last bite when “True Blood,” the vampiric drama starring Stephen Moyer and Anna Paquin, concludes its sixth season. 9 p.m. HBO

Got Gotti? The nefarious exploits of the “Teflon Don,” the 1980s-era head of the Gambino crime family, are revisited on a new “Inside the American Mob.” 10 p.m. National Geographic

MONDAY

The follow-up special “40-Year-Old Child: A New Case” reexamines the heartbreaking medical mystery of a young girl whose body seemingly refuses to grow. 10 p.m. TLC

“POV” presents “The Law in These Parts,” a new documentary detailing the legal and ethical issues stemming from Israel’s decades-long occupation of the Palestinian territories. 10 p.m. KOCE

Meet the dorks — sorry, “scribes” — who help keep “New Girl’s” Jessica Day (Zoey Deschanel) so gosh-darn “adorkable” on a new episode of the Jim Rash-hosted docu-series “The Writers’ Room.” 10 p.m. Sundance

TUESDAY

They came, they saw, they conquered at the 1999 Women’s World Cup … and captured the hearts and minds of a new generation of fans in the process. Soccer greats Mia Hamm, Brandi Chastain and their storied squad are saluted on a new “Nine for IX.” 5 p.m. ESPN; 10 p.m. ESPN2

Journalist and author Rageh Omaar confers with historians, theologians and others across the Middle East and elsewhere to profile Islam’s 7th-century prophet and founder in the three-part special “The Life of Muhammad.” 8, 9 and 10 p.m. KOCE

WEDNESDAY

A rogue’s gallery of reality TV stars, including “Survivor’s” Russell Hantz, Omarosa from “The Apprentice” and “Teen Mom’s” Farrah Abraham, is on display on a new edition of “Count It Down.” 8 p.m. TVGN

Like “Mr. Mom” quadrupled, the unscripted series “Modern Dads” follows the domestic misadventures of four stay-at-home patres familias. Which is indeed the plural of “pater familias,” although we had to look it up because our Latin is lousy. 10:30 p.m. A&E

THURSDAY

Catch an encore of “Sharknado,” the super-cheesy creature feature that created a social-media tsunami, followed by the new TV movie “Ghost Shark” — which better not be just a shark wearing a sheet with some eyeholes cut out. 7 and 9 p.m. Syfy

“Kid Rock: Live from Buffalo Chip” finds the rap-rocker turned country-rock crooner performing at the annual Sturgis Motorcycle Rally in South Dakota as part of CMT’s “Bike Week.” 8 p.m. CMT

Those who faced near-certain death but lived to tell the tale do so in the special “I Survived a Serial Killer.” 9 p.m. E!

FRIDAY

They had a dream: Five decades on, Rep. John Lewis, Harry Belafonte and other civil rights-era luminaries recall sharing the stage with the Rev. Martin Luther King “We Were There: The March on Washington — An Oral History.” 7 and 10 p.m. CNN

Have racquets, will travel: The ascension of the Williams sisters to the top of the tennis world is charted in 2012’s “Venus and Serena.” 9 and 11 p.m. Showtime

Efforts to restore the historic Mission San Antonio de Padu, one of the original California missions founded by Father Junipero Serra back in the 18th century, are detailed in “An Island in Time.” 10:30 p.m. KOCE

Old married couple: Turner Classic Movies’ salute to Elizabeth Taylor includes the actress opposite sometime spouse Richard Burton in the 1966 adaptation of Edward Albee’s play “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” 9 p.m. TCM

SATURDAY

It’s grrreat! Ang Lee’s visually ravishing 2012 adaptation of Yann Martel’s novel “Life of Pi” tells the tale of a Bengal tiger and a teen adrift in a lifeboat on a seemingly endless ocean beneath an equally endless sky. With Suraj Sharma and Irrfan Khan. 8 p.m. HBO

Two love-struck teens (Haley Lu Richardson, Jack Falahee) attempt to “Escape From Polygamy” in this new made-for-cable thriller. “In Plain Sight’s” Mary McCormack and “Lost’s” William Mapother also star. 8 p.m. Lifetime

Like an “Ocean’s Eleven” for the teen-and-tween set, the made-for-cable caper “Swindle” boasts a batch of some of Nickelodeon’s most popular young stars including Ariana Grande and Jennette McCurdy. 8 p.m. Nickelodeon

“Hot in Cleveland’s” Wendie Malick makes like “The Fugitive” and goes on the lam after being accused of a murder she did not commit in the TV movie “After All These Years.” Andrea Martin and Gregory Harrison also star. 9 p.m. Hallmark