What’s on TV this week—Black Mirror is back, Full Monty is now a series, and brace for The Walking Dead: Dead City
Plus, a beloved nature doc, the best Star Trek show in years, an Amy Schumer special, and more
TV Lists The Walking Dead
Welcome to What’s On, our weekly picks of must-watch shows. Here’s what you need to watch from Sunday, June 11, to Thursday, June 15. All times are Eastern. [Note: The weekend edition of What’s On drops on Fridays.]
The biggies
The Full Monty (FX on Hulu, Wednesday, 12:01 a.m.)
The ’90s are back, baby. British film The Full Monty, about a group of unemployed men who became strippers, returns after 25 years in the form of a TV sequel. Robert Carlyle, Mark Addy, Steve Huison, and Paul Barber reprise their roles as they reunite to pay tribute to their adventures and friendships. Lesley Sharp and Talitha Wing co-star. Check out The A.V. Club’s interview with Carlyle about the show.
The Walking Dead: Dead City (AMC+, Thursday, 3:01 a.m.)
No one necessarily asked for this, but it might be entertaining to watch The Walking Dead’s Maggie (Lauren Cohan) team up with her husband’s skull-basher, Negan (Jeffrey Dean Morgan), in a new spin-off, right? Over six episodes, both of them head to an apocalyptic New York City to rescue Maggie’s kidnapped son, facing off against city walkers and new cast members like Gaius Charles and Željko Ivanek.
Black Mirror (Netflix, Thursday, 3:01 a.m.)
As if the world wasn’t in enough decay, a new season of Black Mirror is here to darken the mood even more. Charlie Brooker’s sci-fi anthology returns for five new episodes with a cast that includes Annie Murphy, Salma Hayek, Ben Barnes, Aaron Paul, Zazie Beetz, Myha’la Herrold, Anjana Vasan, Himesh Patel, and Michael Cera. Look for The A.V. Club’s review and additional coverage soon. And until then, revisit our ranking of the previous outings.
Hidden gems
Our Planet II (Netflix, Wednesday, 3:01 a.m.)
Any nature documentary narrated by Sir David Attenborough is like a balm for the soul, and Our Planet is no different. The ambitious British docuseries returns for a long overdue second season with eight new episodes featuring captivating, never-before-seen footage of wildlife in their natural habitats. The season addresses conservation issues for the disparate animals it focuses on, and also includes a behind-the-scenes look at how the camera crew tirelessly captured everything.
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds (Paramount+, Thursday, 3:01 a.m.)
Strange New Worlds, a.k.a. the best new Star Trek show in years, returns for a highly anticipated second season. The series follows Captain Pike (Anson Mount) and his crew of the USS Enterprise as they galavant across the galaxy in the decade before Star Trek: The Original Series. Ethan Peck, Jess Bush, Melissa Navia, Christina Chong, and Rebecca Romjin co-star. Look for The A.V. Club’s interview with Navia soon.
More good stuff
Amy Schumer: Emergency Contact (Netflix, Tuesday, 12:01 a.m.)
Amy Schumer returns for her third Netflix comedy special, Emergency Contact. In her stand-up act, she talks about her mother-in-law’s passing, discovering her “widow’s hump,” and her longtime relationship.
How Do You Measure A Year? (HBO, Wednesday, 9 p.m.)
Directed by Jay Rosenblatt, How Do You Measure A Year? is a coming-of-age documentary about his daughter, Ella. Filmed over 17 years, he documents her growth and development on each birthday by asking her a range of questions.
The Big D (USA, Wednesday, 10 p.m.)
It’s time to add The Big D to a long list of bizarre reality shows, and it’s not for the reason you think. The titular D refers to divorce in this case, and the dating competition sends a group of formerly married folks to Costa Rica for a new chance at romance with other divorcees—and everyone’s ex is along for the ride. The Bachelorette alumni JoJo Fletcher and Jordan Rodgers host.
Can’t miss recaps
The Idol (HBO, Sunday, 9 p.m.)
Arriving now
The Wonder Years (ABC, Wednesday, 9 p.m., season three premiere)
Ending soon
Awkwafina Is Nora From Queens (Comedy Central, Wednesday, 10 p.m., season three finale)
23 Comments
Oh wow, I forgot about The Wonder Years. Guess it’s not a great sign they were pushed to the summer season.
Amy Schumer’s third Netflix special is on Hulu? Weird.
Are you guys not recapping It’s Always Sunny anymore?
Not until they can figure out how to format it as a slideshow.
I guess not? Sucks, last week’s episodes were some of their best work in years.
Agreed. I was surprised how much the episodes felt like classic Sunny!
Fuck, I’m such a huge fan and didn’t even know it was back. The downside of not dealing with commercials anymore, I guess.
Yeah, that massively pisses me off. This site is what first introduced me to Sunny, way back in season 5 or something. I’ll be especially annoyed if something as shitty as yet another Walking Dead spinoff gets coverage instead.
It’s like they’re purposefully trying to alienate their readers. This site isn’t even a shell of its former self. It’s a shell of a shell of a shell. I think I only come here out of habit and to commiserate with other lost souls.
Ditto. My very long time account could only be accessed by signing into kinja by signing into twitter, but that stopped working months ago, so I had to create this account because I can’t access my 15 year old account any longer.
Are they recapping anything anymore?
I can’t get over how bad that walking dead title is. Not repeating a word seems like basic shit. Also Lower Decks > Strange New Worlds. The best live action Star Trek show in years, maybe ever. At least it’s the first live action show to have a great first season. Oddly Discovery came closest before this, but then blew the ending.
Yeah, Strange New Worlds has the more “traditional” episodic structure of the original and TNG and just “feels” more Star Trek than anything that’s come since TNG ended.
Unabashed Walking Dead fan, so I’ll definitely watch this. The Iggy & the Stooges “Gimme Danger” in the trailer was a perfect choice 🙂
Not the Walking Dead fan I once was, but I watched it til the bitter end, and I’m doing the same with Fear, but Fear has become so insanely freeking stupid, that I’m kinda just watching to see just how stupid it can get.Dove’s pissed because of what Madison did to her mom, but nobody in the room, including Madison, bothers to mention that she only did it cause Shrike forced her to do it.Nobody points out to the prefects that Shrike deliberately had Finch bit cause she needed somebody that June would do anything to save, and now he’s probably going to die. That’s just so fucking evil. You think the prefects wouldn’t turn against Shrike if they knew? You’d think Morgan/Grace would’ve reminded Mo how much Morgan regretted not ending his son when they knew Grace was going to die.Alisha cut off her arm immediately after she got bit. That’s why she didn’t die from it. We’ve seen that many times before. She was obviously sick from ordinary infection, and then radiation. Radiation didn’t save her, it killed her.
And why does Shrike have that weird accent? What’s up with that?
Stopped watching Fear the Walking Dead after maybe season 3? Just didn’t keep up with it and then never went back.
See I really enjoyed TWD, then kind of fell off, but watched the entire series on Netflix, and IMO it greatly benefits the show if you binge the whole thing straight through.
And then there’s just the overall stupidity of Shrike and bro’s plan to keep kids from losing their parents by taking away their parents. That’s a baby’s plan for babies.Also the stupidity of Shrike and Bro getting their father killed.I’m starting to think Shrike and bro are kinda stupid.
Padre’s not a person. It’s an idea.A really really stupid idea.And to clear that yard, they could just stand outside that chain link fence and start poking zombies in the head. You’d have some mopping up to do, but that’s how you’d start.
There’s actually a reason not to do it that way!If you just pop them as they come up to the fence the bodies start piling up. The fresh walkers start climbing up the pile and then pouring over the top across the whole width.What you need is a cattle chute.
Yeah, but you could kill a lot of them before you came close to that happening.Thing is, they wrangled them in there, which seems harder than wrangling them out. Hell, just open the gate and wait for most of them to wander away. Or draw them into the swamp.
The cattle chute’s a good idea. I was thinking about that too.
What is The Full Monty demographic? Wistful horny geriatrics?
Star Trek: SNW has the best “look” of any show I’ve ever watched. Something about the total combination of saturated color, low brightness, and contrast just makes it so visually rich. Great stories too.