The New ‘Doctor Who,’ Family Matters on ‘Blue Bloods,’ ‘Sugar’s Cosmic Twist, A Modern ‘Hamlet’

Season Premiere

The whimsical fantasy series continues to break ground, following the first Female Doctor (Jodie Whittaker) and the first repeat performance by a previous Doctor (David Tennant) with the first Black Doctor, played with giddy charisma and a killer grin by Ncuti Gatwa. Picking up from his Christmas 2023 introduction, the Fifteenth Doctor begins a new series of adventures with his fresh young companion Ruby Sunday (Millie Gibson), a foundling searching for her roots. With Russell T Davies back as showrunner, the first two episodes are brisk and electrifying, starting with a detour on a ship populated by unusually eloquent space babies who live in fear of a monstrous (and perfectly cheesy) bogeyman. More memorably, the duo lands in 1963 London to observe the birth of the Beatles, which has been stalled along with all other forms of music by a demonic diva known as the Maestro (drag superstar Jinkx Monsoon, camping it up like a classic Batman villain). “Without music, the human race goes sour,” the Doctor predicts. Good thing Ruby is a natural at the keyboard, risking it all to bring harmony back to a darkening world.

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Crime hits home for the Reagans when Danny’s (Donnie Wahlberg) son Sean (Andrew Terraciano) is victimized on campus during a string of college robberies. Elsewhere, commissioner and patriarch Frank (Tom Selleck) is outraged to learn that his son Jamie (Will Estes) and grandson Joe Hill (Will Hochman) clashed physically in public. You’d think they’d know to keep their disputes between themselves at Sunday dinner.

And you thought Bogie was out of this world as Sam Spade in The Maltese Falcon. As contemporary L.A. private eye and film noir aficionado John Sugar, Colin Farrell goes a step further—all the way into science fiction—with the latest twist in the genre-busting mystery series. (Spoiler alert) When last we saw the dapper Sugar, he revealed himself to be a humanoid alien, and it just gets stranger from there in the penultimate chapter of the missing-person drama. “We’re members of a group that no one is allowed to know anything about,” is as far as he’s willing to reveal himself to Melanie (Amy Ryan), who as stepmother of the kidnapped Olivia (Sydney Chandler) follows this mysterious gumshoe into danger. When Sugar defies his tribe by continuing to pursue this case, he begins to suspect his time on this planet has made him more human. (Shades of Resident Alien, minus the comedy.)

Special

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Great Performances kicks off its latest “Broadway’s Best” season with a televised version of last summer’s bold Shakespeare in the Park presentation of the iconic Shakespeare drama, with Ato Blankson-Wood (Tony nominated for Slave Play) as the angrily brooding prince. Director Kenny Leon’s modern-dress production is set in a stark world of racial conflict, with John Douglas Thompson his murderous uncle-turned stepfather Claudius and The Equalizer’s Lorraine Toussaint as his conflicted mother, Gertrude.

INSIDE FRIDAY TV:

• BMF (8/7c, Starz): In the Season 3 finale, crime bros Meech (Demetrius Flenory Jr.) and Terry (Da’Vinchi) head back to Atlanta, where they plot to expand their enterprise to St. Louis and beyond with Miami as their hub.
• S.W.A.T. (8/7c, CBS): Hondo (Shemar Moore) faces an existential career crisis when the community he lives to serve accuses him of being “more blue than Black” after his shooting of a young Black man in South L.A. Followed by Fire Country (9/8c), where Station 42 and Three Rock collaborate on putting out a deadly campaign fire.
• Dateline NBC (9/8c, NBC): The murder of an Atlanta DJ’s wife creates suspicion that members of the city’s music community are under attack.
• Mary & George (9/8c, Starz): In the penultimate episode of the lurid historical drama, the court is in disarray following the death of Queen Anne, imperiling the future of King James’ (Tony Curran) favorite, George (Nicholas Galitzine), and his scheming mother, Mary (Julianne Moore).
• The Chi (streaming on Paramount+ with Showtime): The urban drama, already renewed for a seventh season, returns for the conclusion of Season 6, with linear broadcast of new episodes on Sundays on Showtime.
• Franklin (streaming on Apple TV+): After Revolutionary War victory at Yorktown, the delicate negotiations for peace begin, bad timing for Franklin’s (Michael Douglas) latest health setback.