WEDNESDAY
JUNE 20
2018

BIANCULLI’S BEST BETS

 

Various Networks, 8:00 a.m. ET

As the Group Stage continues, today we get games from Group A and Group B. Yesterday, Group A leader and tournament host Russia played Group A rival Egypt, notching its second straight outright win (and handing Egypt a second straight outright loss). Today at 11 a.m. ET on the Fox broadcast network, the remaining two teams in Group A, Uruguay and Saudi Arabia, play one another. The rest of today’s games are from Group B: At 8 a.m. ET on Fox Sports 1, Portugal and Morocco, currently at the bottom of their group, play for survival. Then at 2 p.m. ET on Fox, the Group B leaders, Iran and Spain, play (pictured), with Iran the only Group B team to have notched a win thus far.

 
  
 
 

Hulu, 3:00 a.m. ET

How does this happen? A new episode of a TV series, arriving today on Hulu but produced several months ago, is streamed at a time when it seems impossibly, almost amazingly, timely. In tonight’s episode 10 of Season 2 of The Handmaid’s Tale, June (Elisabeth Moss), very pregnant and still in her “Offred” role as an unwilling surrogate mother, finds an opportunity to be reunited with her actual birth daughter, from whom she was wrested cruelly when first captured by the overlords. When she apologizes to her daughter, now assigned to new parents, for everything they’ve endured since being separated, and for not being able to reunite with her sooner, her young daughter asks accusingly, “Why didn’t you try harder?” It’s impossible to watch that scene this week without feeling an even colder, deeper chill. But you should.

 
  
 
 

Paramount, 9:00 p.m. ET

SERIES PREMIERE: Kevin Costner, whose early claim to stardom came when he electrified the 1985 Western movie Silverado with his boundless young energy, returns to the Western – though it’s a modern-day one, with cars as well as horses. In this new TV series, Costner plays a widower who lords over a sprawling Western ranch and his various offspring, a 21st-century Pa Cartwright from Bonanza. It’s one of Paramount’s biggest bids for attention since rebranding itself from the network formerly known as Spike – but whether viewers will find and accept it are two very big, very different questions. For full reviews, see Ed Bark’s Uncle Barky’s Bytes and David Hinckley’s All Along the Watchtower.
 
  
 
 

IFC, 10:00 p.m. ET

SEASON FINALE: Season 2 of Brockmire ends by giving Hank Azaria, as perpetually skidding sports broadcaster Brockmire, a great guest star with whom to play. Appearing tonight, as a pickup “date” even more out of control than Brockmire himself, is Carrie Preston, currently of TNT’s Claws, but most memorably as the wacky, wily Elsbeth on The Good Wife. Tonight on Brockmire, she brandishes attitude, a serious drinking problem – and, when Brockmire least expects it, a handgun.

 
  
 
 
 
 
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David Bianculli

Founder / Editor

David Bianculli has been a TV critic since 1975, including a 14-year stint at the New York Daily News, and sees no reason to stop now. Currently, he's TV critic for NPR's Fresh Air with Terry Gross, and is an occasional substitute host for that show. He's also an author and teaches TV and film history at New Jersey's Rowan University. His 2009 Dangerously Funny: The Uncensored Story of 'The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour', has been purchased for film rights. His latest, The Platinum Age of Television: From I Love Lucy to the Walking Dead, How TV Became Terrific, is an effusive guidebook that plots the path from the 1950s’ Golden Age to today’s era of quality TV.