The Abraham Lincoln bicentennial on February 12, the birth date of one of America’s most iconic presidents, will be an occasion not only to honor the man who led the country through the Civil War, but also to deepen the investigations into his assassination.

There are already 14,000 books about Abe Lincoln, but it seems that there aren’t enough. The same goes for the documentaries: there are already dozens of films about country’s 16th president, most of them about his tragic assassination, but there’s room for more. In fact, Steven Spielberg is already making a movie about Abe Lincoln and the screenplay is being written by Pulitzer Prize winner Tony Kushner.

Numerous TV stations are preparing to broadcast documentaries or talk shows focusing on Abraham Lincoln’s life, death, contribution to the nation and the world, his legacy, and so on.

For those of you who are interested, the series of Lincoln-related programs will begin tonight with "The Assassination of Abraham Lincoln," an "American Experience" piece produced by PBS filmmaker Barak Goodman. The movie, based on James L. Swanson's 2006 book, "Manhunt: The 12-Day Chase for Lincoln's Killer," focuses on the 12 days before the infamous assassination and creates a complex profile of the assassin: John Wilkes Booth.

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On Monday the History Channel’s “Stealing Lincoln’s Body” focuses a gang from Chicago tried in 1876 to steel the president’s dead body and hold it for a $200,000 ransom.

On Thursday morning, the President’s 200th birthday will be celebrated in a ceremony at the Capitol Rotunda that includes scholars, politicians and others.

On Wednesday, it’s a show that’s worth your attention more than any other Lincoln-linked broadcast. Celebrity Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates hosts "Looking for Lincoln," a show during which the professor will analyze the myth of Lincoln. Gates will be aided in his attempt to put the Lincoln myth in a different light by several eminent historians and former U.S. Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush will also appear emitting air. The main idea behind the show is to make a difference and establish the gap between Lincoln the man and Lincoln the myth.

"My urge to judge Lincoln outside of his times is a strong one," said professor Gates, the director of the W. E. B. Du Bois Institute for African and African American Research at Harvard.

It is not your classic Lincoln documentary or biographic movie. The film focuses on Lincoln, but looks at the legendary figure from more angles. The great emancipator who freed the slaves and saved the Union, yes, but Gates also picks on less savory facts such as the president’s habit of using racial epithets, his questioning of black intelligence and his plans to settle the freed slaves out of the country.

It’s an exploration of Lincoln in all his complexity.

“I made a list of all the Lincolns: the great emancipator, the white supremacist, the warrior, the peacemaker, the gay man, the lover of Ann, the atheist, the saint,” Mr. Gates said.

Happy birthday Abe!