TONIGHT'S MUST-SEE: "RESCUE ME," 7 P.M., FX

The hour opens with a 15-minute tour-de-force by Denis Leary, who also co-wrote the episode and co-produces the series.

Tommy (Leary), a recovering alcoholic whose recovery is stumbling, is in a bar filled with liquor, money and his visions of people who are dead or missing.
It's a raw episode, superbly done. And after a few detours, it has a cliffhanger ending.

TONIGHT'S MIGHT-SEE: "MENTAL" DEBUT, 9 P.M., FOX

In the tradition of TV doctors, Jack Gallagher makes a strong first impression. He's fresh, original, caring and ... well, naked.
Chris Vance (who played Whistler in the Panamanian episodes of "Prison Break") plays Gallagher, who wants staffers to get out of the sterile clinic. "Real life is loud, messy and full of surprises," he explains; he's a Fox kind of guy.
Annabella Sciorra plays the psychiatric-unit boss, with Jacqueline McKenzie ("The 4400") as a clinic chief. Still, the show's acting style is oddly flat.
The main story jumps to an awfully tidy solutions, but these are characters who mean well. In a summer with few new, scripted hours on the broadcast networks, "Mental" is worth trying.