What to Watch This Week: August 6 to 11

From Netflix exclusives to movies to reality TV, we round up our top 10 shows to watch this week

 

1. Ray Donovan – Sunday, August 6, 8 p.m., TMN1 | Season Premiere

Ray (Liev Schreiber) is primed to tumble even deeper down the rabbit hole in season five, as the Hollywood fixer drama gets darker than ever. Just as our antihero prepares to welcome his father (Jon Voight) back into the family fold, the old man’s criminal ways come back to haunt him, forcing Ray to rethink his decision.

Meanwhile, Susan Sarandon joins the cast as media mogul Samantha Winslow. We’re sure she’ll be going toe-to-toe with Ray at some point, but they start off as allies, after she hires him to take on her own fixers, whom she’s afraid may know too much about her company’s inner workings and could easily turn that knowledge against her.

In other news, the Donovan children also find themselves in various states of discombobulation, Ray’s wife Abby (Paula Malcomson) finally gets started on her dream of opening that bar, and his brothers need his help more than ever when their personal lives fall to complete shambles.

 

2. Life of Kylie – Sunday, August 6, 6 p.m., 9 p.m. & Midnight, E! | Series Premiere

There’s a healthy portion of the TV-owning world that is utterly obsessed with the antics of the Jenner/Kardashians—to the point where following them around with cameras was enough to singlehandedly change the fortunes of an entire basic-cable channel (you’re welcome, E!). And so it is that each and every member of this family seems to get their own spinoff at some point; this week, it’s Kylie’s turn.

The new series (which is once again produced by Ryan Seacrest) is very much in the vein of the other Kardashian efforts in that it takes an intimate look at the young model/reality royal’s life in and out of the spotlight. Actually, Jenner believes her show will be even more intimate than something like Keeping Up With the Kardashians, because she really opens herself up. That’s what she’s been telling the press ahead of this week’s debut, at any rate.

“The viewers will get a look behind the scenes, they see me with makeup and without, at work and in my free time with my closest friends,” she promised GQ Germany. Also on Kylie’s daily docket: tending to her new beauty line, filming other reality shows with her mom, brothers and sisters, and various paid appearances.

All told, Life of Kylie marks yet another job in her already jam-packed schedule, but it sounds as though this whole experience has proven to be a life-enriching one for the soon-to-be 20-year-old. “I can finally show everything, all sides of me and who I really am. For me, it feels like therapy,” she added.

Given what we’ve already seen of her family life, a little therapy is probably a good thing.

 

3. The Bachelorette – Monday, August 7, 8 p.m., City & ABC | Season Finale

Rachel Lindsay may not have found her true love on The Bachelor, but we’re all crossing our fingers that the attorney receives a happier ending this week when her run as Bachelorette comes to a close. And be sure to stay tuned afterwards for all the inside dirt, as dished on the annual “After the Final Rose” special.

 

4. Midnight, Texas – Monday, August 7, 10 p.m., Global & NBC

When some new bloodsuckers descend on Midnight, Manfred and Olivia team up to figure out just what brings them to this sleepy Texas town, while Fiji and Bobo start hatching a defense strategy. Elsewhere, angelic tattoo artist Joe confesses his suspicions about why the veil to hell has opened.

 

5. World of Dance – Tuesday, August 8, 10:01 p.m., CTV & NBC | Season Finale

The freshman season of Jennifer Lopez’s dance battle comes to an end, as each of the last three acts are given two more chances to prove they have $1 million worth of “artistry, precision and athleticism.”

 

6. True Grit – Tuesday, August 8, 5 p.m., AMC

The Coen brothers put their own inimitable spin on the 1968 Charles Portis novel about a broken-down U.S. Marshal (a glorious, barely intelligible Jeff Bridges) who reluctantly agrees to help a headstrong girl (Hailee Steinfeld) locate the scoundrel (Josh Brolin) who gunned down her father.

 

7. Wahlburgers – Wednesday, August 9, 6 p.m. & 6:30 p.m. (repeating at 10:03 p.m. & 10:33 p.m.), A&E | Season Premiere

Much like the restaurant chain it documents, this reality series just keeps on growing as fans clearly can’t get enough of watching siblings Mark, Donnie and Paul Wahlberg, as viewed through the prism of their rapidly expanding hamburger empire. The new season—which will feature the show’s 75th episode—will also include a visit from former N*Sync member Joey Fatone, who seeks out Donnie for some restaurant advice, while Donnie enlists his New Kids on the Block tour-mates Boyz II Men to help taste test wife Jenny McCarthy’s new line of vodka. Meanwhile, Mark teams up with Hasbro to create a one-of-a-kind “Paul Wahl” action figure, and then joins his kids to face off against NFL pro-bowler Travis Kelce in a no-holds-barred game of touch football. In addition, illusionists Penn & Teller add a touch of magic to Mark’s VIP party at the Las Vegas Wahlburgers, and the three brothers team up to throw their mom a can’t-miss birthday bash she’ll never forget.

 

8. Transparent – Friday, August 11, 6 p.m., 6:45 p.m. & 7:30 p.m., Showcase

Currently available to stream on Amazon Prime, Showcase is serving up three episodes each Friday night of this acclaimed, award-winning dramedy about a dysfunctional family that must adjust to the patriarch’s (Jeffrey Tambor) transition from male to female. The new season will arrive on Showcase this fall.

 

9. Naked – Friday, August 11, Netflix

It’s a good time to be Marlon Wayans: not only is the Scary Movie alum starring in a new NBC sitcom this summer—you can’t miss it: it shares its title with his first name—but he’s also headlining a new Netflix movie.

Naked, an adaptation of a Swedish film, stars Wayans as Rob, a guy who’s in love and about to marry but finds himself stuck in a time loop that involves him reliving the same hour over and over again. Yes, the title is relevant: the hour always starts out with him lying naked on the floor of a stuck elevator. And yes, the whole premise does bear some resemblances to another comedy, one tied to a holiday that’s celebrated on February 2… or as Wayans himself put it in an interview with The Insider: “It’s like Groundhog Day at a wedding if Bill Murray was black with an alright face and a really nice butt.”

Plus, it’s got an all-star supporting cast, including Wayans’ old Scary Movie co-star Regina Hall as Rob’s fiancée, 24 alum Dennis Haysbert and The Carmichael Show’s Loretta Devine as her parents, and Scandal’s Scott Foley as her jealous ex.

 

10. Atypical – Friday, August 11, Netflix | Series Premiere

It seems odd to think of autism as Hollywood’s hot new medical condition, but there’s no denying that a number of movies and TV shows have been making a point to focus on characters who are, to use the proper parlance, “on the spectrum.” Netflix’s bid to enter this realm is one which—as is becoming standard practice for the streaming giant—an all-star cast.

United States of Tara alum Keir Gilchrist is Sam, an 18-year-old kid on the autism spectrum who decides (with a notable nudge from his therapist, played by The Good Place’s Amy Okuda) that it’s time for him to start dating. It’s a big adjustment for Sam’s whole family, but no one finds it more jarring than his mother, Elsa (Jennifer Jason Leigh), who suddenly realizes that giving Sam more independence means that she’s losing one of the things that gives her life structure. As a result, things occasionally grow awkward between Elsa and Doug (Michael Rapaport), Sam’s father, particularly after he reminds her that they weren’t much older than Sam when they first started dating. (As you might imagine, that’s about the last thing she wants to hear.)

Created and written by Robia Rashid (who previously worked on How I Met Your Mother) and Oscar-winning producer Seth Gordon (The Goldbergs), Atypical isn’t playing around when it comes to tackling autism, pointedly bringing in a professor of special education from California State University Channel Islands to confirm the accuracy of the portrayal. That’s a wise idea: there’s nothing wrong in engaging with autism, but if you’re going to do it, do it right.