‘Pam & Tommy,’ Winter Olympics, ‘Torn’ on Disney+, Celebrity Big Brother

Series Premiere

Lily James (Downton Abbey) and Sebastian Stan are sensational as Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee, the Baywatch sex kitten and the volatile rock-star drummer, in an evocative limited series about the furor that ensues when an unhappy carpenter (Seth Rogan at his most nebbish) burglarizes their mansion and finds a sex tape that he markets on a newfangled platform called the Internet. The series recaptures the bygone 1990s—a time of VHS and VCRs, dial-up internet and Tower Records—with pinpoint accuracy, while spinning a genuine love story amid a caper gone sideways. The first three episodes are available for binge-watching, with the remainder of the eight-part series dropping weekly.

The Opening Ceremonies won’t occur until Friday, but the Beijing Winter Games get started early with coverage of curling, men’s alpine skiing (10:00 pm/ET) and women’s ice hockey (11:10 pm/ET). All events stream live on Peacock, NBCOlympics.com and the NBC Sports app and will be available for replay on Peacock’s premium tier. For updated schedule information, go to nbcolympics.com/schedule.

Documentary Premiere

Max Lowe was only 11 when he lost his father Alex, a legendary mountain climber, after an avalanche buried him and cameraman David Bridges in the Tibetan Himalayas in 1999. In an unusually intimate documentary, Max examines his father’s legacy and the impact his death had on his family, after Alex’s widow Jennifer married her husband’s best friend and climbing partner Conrad Anker, who survived the avalanche. All are torn in one way or another when Alex and David’s bodies are found 16 years later and the family travels to the remote region to reclaim them.

8/7c

Rather than sacrificing expensive new episodes of their popular scripted series during the Olympics, CBS revives this timewaster with a new batch of 11 celebrities. Episodes air throughout the week leading to the Feb. 23 finale. See how many of these allegedly famous people you can identify: Cynthia Bailey, Todd Bridges, Todrick Hall, Chris Kattan, Chris Kirkpatrick, Carson Kressley, Teddi Mellencamp, Shanna Moakler, Mirai Nagasu, Miesha Tate and Lamar Odom.

9/8c

The network’s comedy lineup is all new, including a Valentine’s Day-themed episode of the nostalgic 1960s heartwarmer. The romantic complications begin when Dean’s (Elisha “EJ” Williams) plan to ask Keisa (Milan Ray) to the Valentine’s Day Dance is thwarted after another boy gets to her first.

10/9c

The screws tighten in this screwy sci-fi/comedy hybrid when alien-in-human disguise Harry (Alan Tudyk) falls even further under suspicion as the hapless sheriff (Corey Reynolds) and deputy (Elizabeth Bowen) close in on their murder suspect. If only they knew what Harry was up to underground. And how will Harry’s beloved Asta (Sara Tomko) react when shown the survival bunker he’s preparing for the next alien invasion? Best sight gag involves young Max (Judah Prehn), who keeps finding himself in hairy situations as long as he hoards the stolen alien tech.

Inside Wednesday TV:

• The Amazing Race (8/7c, CBS): Next scenic stop: Corsica, France, where the teams go canyoneering through rockslides, waterfalls and rivers. Amazing for sure.
• The Conners (9/8c, ABC): Adventures in education: Mark (Ames McNamara) is back in public school, none too happily, and Darlene (Sara Gilbert) is alarmed when she finds out how he’s making extra money to put away for college. Speaking of college, is Becky (Lecy Goranson) getting too close to one of her professors?
• Arctic Sinkholes (9/8c, PBS, check local listings at pbs.org): Not likely to be a pit stop on The Amazing Race, this NOVA special heads to remote Arctic locations—the Siberian tundra, an Alaskan lake—where thawing permafrost has released large amounts of methane in what scientists see as a “ticking climate time bomb.”
• Eye of the Leopard: Revealed (9/8c, Nat Geo WILD): Big Cat Week continues with some of filmmaker Dereck and Beverly Joubert’s best-known works, including a profile of leopard cub Legadema’s journey to adulthood; and Eternal Enemies: Revealed (10/9c), with remastered footage exposing the conflict between lions and hyenas. Jeremy Irons narrates both films.
• Good Sam (10/9c, CBS): In an atypically serious episode, a gunshot victim in the ER triggers flashbacks to Dr. Griff’s (Jason Isaacs) own shooting injury, providing new glimpses into how Sam (Sophia Bush) and others coped while he was in a coma for six months.
• The Tinder Swindler (streaming on Netflix): Reminiscent of Showtime’s Love Fraud, but on an international scale, this documentary depicts the revenge scheme of women who fell for who they thought was a billionaire playboy but who soaked them for thousands.