What to watch this week

Two don't-miss productions from the Brits, a very special CW show and a reality check for journalists.

All times Central.

“Girlfriends” (8 p.m. Monday on the CW) once again proves why it's worthier than all those overhyped CBS sitcoms put together when it uses comedy to make a surprisingly effective social statement. To past episodes on HIV and AIDS, add this one on domestic violence. Maya (Golden Brooks) gets a hunch that her friends (China Shavers and Carl Anthony Payne) are in an abusive relationship, but nobody quite believes her until her husband Darnell (Khalel Kain) sees, or rather hears it for himself. I've always been impressed at how Kansas City native Mara Brock Akil elevates her game when doing “very special” shows like this one; they're the best episodes of “Girlfriends.”

  “Frontline” (9 p.m. Tuesday on PBS) takes a four-week look at the news business through the skeptical gaze of Lowell Bergman, its longtime contributor. This week looks at the thorny issue of journalistic independence through the ultimate test case -- the Scooter Libby trial currently underway -- and the controversial practice of keeping sources private, which in the case of the Libby trial sent reporters Judith Miller and Matt Cooper to jail. Miller, who agreed to speak to “Frontline,” is unrepentant about her role, even if it helped spread a smear about critics of the Bush administration's case for war in Iraq.

    Two outstanding British-American productions debut on Saturday: “Longford” (7 p.m., HBO) stars Jim Broadbent as Frank Packenham, known in the House of Lords as the Earl of Longford, who championed a notorious woman jailed in the 1960s for her role in a string of notorious child murders that made her name as awful in Great Britain as Jeffrey Dahmer's here. Longford was a liberal Catholic who believed so strongly in prisoner rehabilitation that he took up the case of Myra Hindley, played by Samantha Morton, despite enormous public opprobrium that ultimately damaged his career. These are career performances from Broadbent and Morton, who make their odd and mutually destructive relationship seem real. I was especially touched by Broadbent's ability to make a person like Longford seem both saintly and compassionate, yet strangely naïve about the nature of incarcerees like Hindley.

  You may want to catch that at a later date or on demand, however, because “The State Within,” another terrorist-fueled thriller from the creators of “Dirty War” and “Anthrax,” begins on BBC America at 8 p.m. After a suicide bomb in the U.S., the state of Virginia begins rounding up Muslims in a persuasive what-if-it-really-happened dramatization. Lennie James of “Jericho” and Sharon Gless of “Queer as Folk” are in the cast of the three-part miniseries, which continues at 8 p.m. Feb. 18 and concludes 8 p.m. Feb. 24.