While tonight’s debate will certainly drift to who is the more evil — Joe Exotic or America’s latest Bachelor — our recommendations include a network dramedy, a food-based travelogue from a beloved source, and a documentary about mental illness.
NAVANI’S PICK:
The Baker and The Beauty [ABC, 10p]
One day you are just running the family bakery in Miami, leading a very normal life, being a good Cuban-American son, and then BOOM — a break up and a chance encounter uproot your entire existence and propel you into the spotlight. No? Well that’s the story of Daniel Garcia at least, as told by ABC’s newest comedic drama series adapted from the popular Israeli series of the same title. I’m interested in a modern-day fairy tale where the gender roles are reversed. And it stars one of my other fave actresses, Lisa Vidal so I’m all in.
KATHERINE’S PICK:
Good Eats [Food, 9p]
Alton Brown revisits more old recipes from his Good Eats days with the debut of season two. Tonight he examines eggs “from every angle,” which is good, since this is likely your pantry staple, and he looks at “an old pan from a new angle.” He’ll do coffee this season, too! Think of it as comfort viewing-dinner to be followed by Ina Garten’s Instagram as dessert.
JASON’S PICK:
Independent Lens: Bedlam [PBS, 10p]
Tonight’s documentary’s trailer opens on a nurse using the old trope about the definition of insanity (doing same thing, expecting different results) but meta-pointing it at how we treat the mentally ill. That’s the crux of Bedlam — that we’ve lost track of rehabilitation in favor of merely removing the afflicted from society without giving them the, often very available, help they need.
ALSO ON TAP TONIGHT:
- Taking its name from one of Roxette’s four number one hits (any one of which could have fit a dating show), the latest iteration of the premier long-running mating game — The Bachelor: Listen To Your Heart — takes its lead and his many suitors on musical-themed dates. It’s on ABC.
- If you can’t get enough of the Tiger King universe, just wait, there’s more, and in this case it’s the supermarket checkout rag of the online world, TMZ, looking into Joe Exotic and his gang of rogues and rivals. TMZ Investigates: Tiger King — What Really Went Down? is on Fox. Gosh… who to root for here? We’re kidding: obviously, no one (and why would you be rooting in a documentary, anyway).
- The A&E country-fest carries right along, and they continue to make good choices of near-universally liked artists with tonight’s action focusing on tributes to the recently deceased, a gambler and an Okie from Muskogie — it starts with Biography: Kenny Rogers and closing on Merle Haggard: Salute to a Country Legend.
- That short-attention span experiment known as Quibi unveils a bunch of new quick-bite programs — including #FreeRayshawn, The Stranger, Fight Like a GIrl, and Elba vs. Block. Yes, that Elba.
- Seth MacFarlane’s secondary show, American Dad, returns for its 17th season tonight. That can’t be right, and yet it is. Fox {shrug}?!
- Spectrum’s latest exclusive is Paradise Lost — which is either the epic tale of Lucifer’s fall from grace or a Josh Hartnett-led Southern Gothic mystery.