BREAKING BAD

(AMC, Sunday, March 8, 10 p.m.)

If you missed Bryan Cranston’s surprising Emmy-winning best actor turn last season, your shot at redemption begins Sunday.

But after screening the first two episodes of the sophomore campaign of Breaking Bad — the story picks up where the initial seven left off because the first season lost two episodes to the writers’ strike — Cranston’s Walt White may be losing his.

For those who missed AMC’s first class, here’s a cheat sheet on White’s periodic table. A mild-mannered everyman, White’s a high-school chemistry teacher struggling to make ends meet for his pregnant wife Skyler (Anna Gunn) and Walt Jr. (R.J. Mitte), a teenager with cerebral palsy. The father’s midlife crisis hits new depths upon discovering he has inoperable lung cancer, news of which he tried to hide from Skyler. But his life begins to “break bad,” after he realizes from brother-in-law and DEA agent Hank (Dean Norris) the kind of money available from drugs.

You see, Walt’s knowledge in the lab makes him a top crystal meth chef, and he teams with former student Jesse “Cap’n Cook” Pinkman (Aaron Paul) in the trade as a means to fund his family’s financial future.

The series seems darker and more violent, with less humor and little of the conflicted humanity that White initially exhibited.

The first 15 minutes are especially riveting, with the scenes featuring lunatic drug-snorting kingpin Tuco (Raymond Cruz) and his still-not-fully-clued-in wife equally unsettling.

But unless Skyler’s going to approve of Walt’s new line, it’s hard to see the story not burning out quickly, like those who engage in the drug at its center.

— Mike Reynolds

RELATIVE STRANGER

(Hallmark Channel, Saturday, March 14, 9 p.m.)

Hallmark Channel has assembled a strong cast of familiar TV actors and acclaimed director Charles Burnett for its original movie Relative Stranger. Yet for all the star-wattage and noble intentions, the pic ultimately comes up short — tugging lightly on heartstrings rather than delivering an emotional wallop.

ER’s Eriq La Salle is Walter Clemons, a former football star and recovering alcoholic who returns to the wife (another former ER castmember, Michael Michele) and two kids that he abandoned six years earlier. The cast also includes award-winner Cicely Tyson as the family matriarch and Third Watch’s Michael Beach as the brother who has cared for Walter’s family — and fallen in love with his wife — in Walter’s absence.

There’s a powerful theme here — the hurt that parents can pass on to their children — but it’s undercut by the routine script and predictable theatrics.

Still, for the most part, the cast does not disappoint; and there’s no denying that Relative Stranger has lots of heart — even if it’s all over its sleeve.

— George Vernadakis