Kevin Winter/Getty Images for TAS Rights Management
Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour
Finally, the worldwide legion of Swifties won’t have to leave their home to dance along with the blockbuster concert that conquered the globe and, in movie form, became the top-selling concert film ever, grossing more than $260 million. As is Taylor Swift’s fashion, with the movie arriving on streaming, there’s a bonus: four additional acoustic songs plus the song “cardigan,” making this most likely one of the longest concert films ever, not that fans will ever want it to end. Now it won’t have to.
ABC/Anne Marie Fox
Grey’s Anatomy
Disney’s decision to move the Taylor Swift movie from its originally scheduled Friday date to Thursday puts it directly in competition with another of Disney’s most important assets (via its ABC network): the Season 20 launch of Shonda Rhimes’ never-ending hospital saga. It’s a very busy episode, with the doctors of Grey Sloan Memorial rallying to save one of their own, Teddy Altman (Kim Raver), from a life-threatening infection, while the new-ish batch of interns frets about being fired over their recent actions. Though Nick (Scott Speedman) warns them not to practice medicine while he’s otherwise occupied, do they listen? Of course not, which puts kinda-couple Simone (Alexis Floyd) and Lucas (Niko Terho) in a jam when they’re trapped in an ambulance by a self-driving car gone haywire. In other words, business as usual.
Disney/Chris Willard
9-1-1
This is a big night for ABC, which brings Ryan Murphy’s hit first-responder drama to the network after Fox dropped it. The promos suggest peril at sea for delayed honeymooners Athena (Angela Bassett) and Bobby (Peter Krause) aboard a cruise ship, but the storm is still only brewing in the season opener, where the vacationing policewoman suspects foul play among the passengers, though Bobby thinks it’s just a ploy to keep them from having to spend time alone. Back at Station 118, Chimney (Kenneth Choi) works out his own anxieties about his marriage ever growing stale, and Eddie (Ryan Guzman) discovers underlying issues with son Christopher’s (Gavin McHugh) views on romance. Most memorable call of the week: a couple whose hot-tub tryst makes them inseparable.
Disney/James Clark
Station 19
Rounding out ABC’s Thursday lineup is the beginning of the final season of the Grey’s Anatomy firehouse spinoff, a transitional episode that finds Andy (Jaina Lee Ortiz) stepping up as Captain while holding vigil over a grievously injured Jack (Grey Damon), who’s recuperating from brain surgery conducted by Grey’s surgeon Amelia Shepherd (Caterina Scorsone). Still, duty calls, and Vic (Barrett Doss) risks her neck trying to talk down a potential chemical bomber.
Vince Valitutti/Peacock
Apples Never Fall
Author Liane Moriarty (Big Little Lies) provides another sensational hook in this seven-part adaptation (all available for binge-watching) of her melodrama about a family whose secrets keep spilling out like the proverbial apples after matriarch Joy Delaney (a terrific Annette Bening) abruptly disappears while riding her bike through sunny West Palm Beach. Her husband Stan (an equally fine Sam Neill), a restless retiree who with Joy ran a family tennis academy for years, comes under suspicion. But the grown kids think a stranger named Savannah (Georgia Flood), who insinuated herself into the Delaney’s empty-nest household, may somehow be responsible. (See the full review.)
Emily V Aragones/Netflix
Girls5eva
And here’s the show Peacock let get away. Thankfully, Netflix stepped up to produce a third season of the hilarious musical comedy about a ’90s girl group mounting a comeback, this season on a “Returnity” world tour. Or so they dream. The nonsense resumes in Fort Worth, Texas, where the girls—ambitious Wickie (the fabulous Renée Elise Goldsberry), exhausted and pregnant Dawn (Sara Bareilles), daffy Summer (Busy Phillips) and voraciously woman-hungry Gloria (Paula Pell, a scream)—are pandering to the locals with a “Tap Into Your Fort Worth” anthem. The road beckons, but it’s going to be a rocky one, littered with Marriott Divorced Dad Suitelets. Thankfully, we’d follow these wacky ladies anywhere.
Max
The Girls on the Bus
Take a road trip with a more political bent in this frothy drama about women reporters seeking scoops and other forms of career and personal fulfillment while on a fictional campaign trail. Inspired by co-creator Amy Chozick’s own professional experience, dramatized by Julie Plec (The Vampire Diaries) and showrunner Rina Mimoun (Everwood), the series sometimes feels like Ally McBeal aping the gonzo spirit of Hunter S. Thompson. That legendary writer haunts the dreams of Sadie McCarthy (Supergirl’s Melissa Benoist), who’s seeking redemption alongside veteran journalist Grace (the wonderful Carla Gugino), conservative Black TV reporter Kimberlyn (Christina Elmore) and, most amusingly, influencer Lola (Natasha Behnam), who’s learning the rules she’s all too eager to break.
Michael Courtney/CBS
So Help Me Todd
This comedic caper has raised its game in its second season, and this laugh-out-loud episode, directed by Robin Givens, is a terrific example. While Todd (Skylar Astin), “Portland’s best detective-to-be,” lies in the hospital following an emergency appendectomy, he believes he witnesses a murder plot. But no one will listen: not his snarky doctor sister (Madeline Wise) nor his lawyer mom Margaret (Marcia Gay Harden), who’s preoccupied trying to win the business of two cranky rich sisters. Lucky, then, that a legendary local private eye (Dean Winters, aka Allstate’s “Mayhem”) becomes his roommate. Soon, everyone’s involved in the hunt for a murderous femme fatale.
INSIDE THURSDAY TV:
- Law & Order (8/7c, NBC): There’s a new DA in Manhattan, as Tony Goldwyn takes over from the formidable Sam Waterston as Jack McCoy’s appointed replacement, Nicholas Baxter. He leans on prosecutors Price (Hugh Dancy) and Maroun (Odelya Halevi) to get a win in his new office’s first case, involving the murder of a Wall Street investor.
- Ghosts (8:30/7:30c, CBS): There’s a new ghost in residence: Carol (The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel’s Caroline Aaron), the unfaithful wife of scoutmaster Pete (Richie Moriarty), who creates a fake girlfriend in an attempt at payback. While the spirits adjust to the new dynamic, Jay (Utkarsh Ambudkar) hopes to convince a skeptical Isaac (Brandon Scott Jones) to loan him the money to keep his restaurant plans afloat after an investor backs out.
- Son of a Critch (9/8c, The CW): Young Mark (Benjamin Evan Ainsworth) is caught in a Valentine’s Day triangle when he gets multiple valentines.
- True Crime Story: Smugshot (10/9c, SundanceTV, streaming on Sundance Now and AMC+): A six-episode true-crime series profiles criminals whose sense of entitlement is their undoing, starting with married Orange County lawyers who took their crusade against the PTA president too far.
ON THE STREAM:
- Barbie and Stacie to the Rescue (streaming on Netflix): Not to be confused with the big-screen blockbuster, an hour-long animated family special puts middle sister Stacie on the spot as she rallies to help Barbie and Skipper during a hot air balloon festival.
- Frida (streaming on Prime Video): An artful documentary uses Frida Kahlo’s own words and images to animate and illuminate her eventful life story.
- Invincible (streaming on Prime Video): The coming-of-age animated adventure returns for the second half of its second season, with 18-year-old superhero Mark Grayson (voiced by Beef’s Steven Yeun) struggling with a complicated family legacy that could decide the fate of Earth.
- Justice, USA (streaming on Max): An immersive six-part docuseries (two episodes weekly) goes inside the jails and courtrooms of Nashville’s criminal justice system.