This week's TV: Lena Dunham's ‘Too Much,' Bono and Sting look back at Live Aid, and more

Boston Globe

21 hours ago

What else clicks this week?
'Such Brave Girls,' season 2
, tonight on Hulu: British comedian and series creator Kat Sadler returns for a second season of the critics' darling. Over a dozen episodes, Sadler stars as Josie, a young woman entering art school at long last while finding love, trapped in a cash-strapped dysfunctional family triangle with her sister Billie (Lizzie Davidson, Sadler's sibling in real life) and disheveled single mother Deb (Louise Brealey). If romance is ever in the air for Josie, Deb and Billie are bound to bug spray it into oblivion.
'Ballard,'
Wednesday at 9 p.m. on Prime Video: From creator and best-selling novelist Michael Connelly comes a female-driven 'Bosch' spinoff showcasing Maggie Q's action talents. Her L.A.P.D. Detective Renee Ballard, like the London sleuths in 'Department Q,' works a new cold case corps opposite Rebecca Field, John Carroll Lynch, and Michael Mosley. Titus Welliver (the onetime titular '
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'
,'
Friday on Paramount+ with Showtime: You can't keep a good serial killer down, even if he apparently ended the primary series killed by his own son. Michael C. Hall rises from the ashes, or awakens from a coma, as Dexter Morgan, with a new chance to kill and kill again. Hall brings his insidious charm to bear in a new city: New York. He wants to find his son Harrison, he wants answers — and he doesn't want to be held accountable for past bad acts. Uma Thurman and Peter Dinklage join the cast, while Jack Alcott returns as Dexter's son.
'The Institute,'
Sunday on MGM+: Actor Martin Freeman's son Joe plays Luke Ellis, a teen genius who awakens one day in a strange institution. Prodigies like himself, all with unique special gifts, surround the teen. If it sounds a bit like Avengers Academy, so be it, but the psychological sci-fi horror sprang from the head of novelist Steven King, who also executive produces. Standouts among the adult cast are Mary-Louise Parker ('Weeds') as the headmistress and British star Ben Barnes, recently of annoying T-Mobile commercials.
'Live Aid: When Rock 'n' Roll Took on the World,'
Sunday at 9 p.m. on CNN: On the 40th anniversary of the charitable star-packed concert to address famine in Ethiopia, CNN looks back to 1985 and the first 16-hour event, which was organized by Bob Geldof. The four-episode docuseries will include concert and backstage footage of Queen, David Bowie, Mick Jagger, Tina Turner, and Led Zeppelin. Interspersed are interviews with performers Bono and Sting, as well as public figures George Bush and Tony Blair. The event climaxed with the famous ensemble performance of 'We Are the World,' a catchy anthem to hope, change, and the end of world hunger.
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Thelma Adams is a cultural critic and the author of the best-selling historical novel 'The Last Woman Standing,' about Josephine Marcus, the Jewish wife of Wyatt Earp.