Tune In: Sunday brings bowls for NFL, puppies and toilets

The Steelers and the Green Bay Packers meet in Super Bowl XLV (5 p.m., Fox). That’s 45 to the rest of us. Much has been made of the fact that this game will be played in Arlington, Texas, at the new home of the Dallas Cowboys, a team tormented by both the Packers and Steelers over the years.

The game can be enjoyed as football, as a carnival of commercials and as a ratings superlative. Many of the most watched events in TV history have been Super Bowl games. And this season, the ratings for NFL events have been among the few bright spots for network television. Hanging over this event is the prospect of negotiations between the players and management and the vague fear that next season could be delayed or not happen at all. But for one last evening, football is king in a mid-winter classic that has become a kind of corporate Mardi Gras, and in its own way, a harbinger of warmer days to come, or at least spring-training baseball games.

A special episode of “Glee” (about 9:30 p.m., Fox) airs directly after the post-game festivities. Appropriate to the night, the show involves an attempt to bring football and glee club cliques closer together.

Networks have long showcased their most promising series right after the big game in the hopes of turning a hit into a blockbuster. But I can’t help feeling that “Glee” has already reached its potential market and that creatively, the series may to have peaked. A dead giveaway that a show, particularly a comedy, has run out of ideas is when it resorts to famous guest stars and stunt casting. You knew it was time to hang crepe for “Will & Grace” when Cher showed up. Gwyneth Paltrow on “Glee” gave me a similar feeling.

• If the big game is on, then “Puppy Bowl VII” (2 p.m., Animal Planet) is at hand. Or at paw, if you will. In a “Puppy Bowl” first and in an attempt to cram even more cuteness into a “stadium” of clumsy puppies, the “stands” will be filled with baby chicks and chicken cheerleaders. Television at its finest.

DIY uses the occasion to air 17 hours of home-renovation projects centered around the bathroom with its annual “Toilet Bowl” (6 a.m., DIY). May the best grouter win.

• PBS commemorates President Ronald Reagan’s 100th birthday with “Nancy Reagan: The Role of a Lifetime” (9 p.m., PBS, check local listings), a profile of the woman who some have argued may be one of the most influential first ladies in the history of the presidency. Judy Woodruff interviews Nancy Reagan, who discusses their courtship and her role advising Reagan as both California’s governor and as president.

Today’s highlights

• “Masterpiece” (8 p.m., PBS, check local listings) repeats “The Unseen Alistair Cooke,” a profile of the journalist and longtime “Masterpiece Theatre” host.

• Anti-Polygamy rallies cloud Bill’s inaugural plans on “Big Love” (8 p.m., HBO).

• Sean’s eyes wander on “Episodes” (8:30 p.m., Showtime).

• The mayor’s speech seems to put the police director on the spot on “Brick City” (9 p.m., Sundance).