The popular subcategory of macho documentary-style programming continues with "Tougher in Alaska" (9 p.m., History). Like the History channel's hit "Ice Road Truckers," this series chronicles hard workers using dangerous equipment in the 49th state. Host Geo Beach will introduce viewers to new challenges every week, from gold prospecting (tonight) to salmon fishing (May 15) and logging (May 29).
Tonight's "Tough" looks at several crews as they search for gold in remote regions, some well above the arctic circle. Two men hire a small plane to get to the 20 acres they've staked in gorgeous, if forbidding, wilderness. There they pan and prospect much like the miners who settled Alaska a century ago. Another team invested more than $1 million in a giant mine, where they burrow closer to geologic fault lines using high explosives. One long-time Alaskan has rigged a former military transport vehicle to shake and shift the soil he accumulates after personally strip-mining an entire valley with his other big tractors and Earth-moving gear.
It's not like the environmental impact of gold mining gets short shrift here. It's given no shrift at all.
It's hard to watch "Tougher in Alaska" and not come away with a sense that its creators have some definite ideas about its male audience. The proliferation of big trucks reminded me of the video "Road Construction Ahead," produced some years ago to keep 3-year-old boys pacified and transfixed in front of their televisions.
The host speaks, or rather shouts, very slowly, as if trying to keep the attention of the easily distracted or the hard of hearing. In addition to screaming the word "ain't" often, Beach tailors his commentary to an audience with a severely limited vocabulary. During one ear-splitting sequence, I decided to jot down any words he used that contained more than two syllables. Except for "vehicle," "ambulance" and "Alaska" itself, there were none.
¢ The daughter of two deaf parents expresses some misgivings when both decide to undergo surgery to end 65 years of near silence in the documentary "Hear and Now" (7 p.m., HBO).
¢ With the Olympic games scheduled to open in a matter of months, "Beijing Olympic Stadium" (8 p.m., National Geographic) documents the construction of the 91,000-seat structure. Presented in high definition.
Tonight's other highlights
¢ Billie makes a karmic to-do list of her own on "My Name Is Earl" (7 p.m., NBC).
¢ Conditions at a puppy mill sicken investigators on "Miami Animal Police" (7 p.m., Animal Planet).
¢ A baby shower with an ugly motive on "Ugly Betty" (9 p.m., ABC).
¢ The writers of "Two and a Half Men" have created tonight's crossover episode of "CSI" (8 p.m., CBS) about the death of a sitcom star in Las Vegas.
¢ Jim, Andy and Kevin go golfing in search of clients on "The Office" (8 p.m., NBC).
¢ Nurses demand a policy of romantic transparency on "Grey's Anatomy" (8 p.m., ABC).
¢ Jack doesn't like his new government position on the second-season finale of "30 Rock" (8:30 p.m., NBC).
¢ A truck driver vanishes following a heroic rescue on "Without a Trace" (9 p.m., CBS).
¢ A patient (Aida Turturro, "The Sopranos") demands a follow-up surgery on "ER" (9 p.m., NBC).
¢ Locke makes his way back to Jacob's cabin on "Lost" (9 p.m., ABC).
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