‘Superfan,’ ‘High School Musical’ Gets More Meta, ‘Afterparty’ Gets ‘Basic,’ a Dark ‘Dogs’ Flashback

Series Premiere

9/8c

Who loves ya, baby? Some of music’s biggest stars are about to find out, as five diehard fans battle it out each week in three rounds of competition to prove who knows the most about their favorite celeb. Center stage on opening night: NCIS L.A.’s rapper hero LL Cool J, who gives some one-on-one attention to whoever wins the night. Next week: Shania Twain’s turn.

Season Premiere

Worlds collide in the fourth and final season of the High School Musical brand extension. The East High Wildcats are eager to put on their graduation-year musical, High School Musical 3: Senior Year, when a bombshell drops that original cast members of the OG High School Musical are coming to campus to film a High School Musical 4: The Reunion movie. HSM alums including Corbin Bleu, Monique Coleman and Lucas Grabeel return as themselves, commanding the spotlight to such a degree that the future of East High’s own musical is put in jeopardy.

The mystery comedy takes a step back to explore why Danner (Tiffany Haddish), who’s on the scene in an unofficial capacity, no longer carries a detective’s badge. Her tall tale is cut from the steamy cloth of 1990s-era erotic thrillers like Basic Instinct as Danner falls under the spell of a shady psychiatrist (Michael Ealy) whom she enlists to help her get inside the mind of an unknown arsonist. “My specialty is … passion,” he informs her while working out in his office minus a shirt. His kinks also include a messy food fetish, which somehow only makes him hotter. And despite warnings from her partner Culp (John Early), Danner is in danger of losing her professional objectivity. “This story is crazy,” marvels her new sidekick Aniq (Sam Richardson)—but you’d think he’d be used to that by now.

The FX comedy takes a dark turn into the past when a stranded Bear (D’Pharaoh Woon-A-Tai) has a chance encounter with a savior who offers him a ride home: none other than the mysterious and fabled Deer Lady (Kaniehtiio Horn). “So you’re really real,” Bear marvels. If only he knew how real, because her own road trip has a purpose: to face the demons of her childhood, when she was one of many Indigenous children taken from their families and subjected to cruel torture and abuse at a purportedly religious “training school.” As a more seasoned classmate tells her in extended flashbacks, “No one leaves. Unless you go to the cemetery.”

INSIDE WEDNESDAY TV:

• MasterChef: United Tastes of America (8/7c, Fox): The cooking competition marks its milestone 250^th episode by challenging the remaining home chefs to recreate iconic cakes. Followed by the penultimate episode of Gordon Ramsay’s Food Stars (9/8c), set in Las Vegas, where Wayne Newton is among the guest judges as the final four entrepreneurs stage circus-inspired shows blending cuisine with casino-caliber theatrics.
• LA Fire & Rescue (8/7c, NBC): In the season finale, a rookie firefighter subs in for a shift at Watts’ Station 16, where his dad is captain. Over at Air Ops, a rescue sends responders rappelling into a canyon to save passengers in a car that went off a cliff.
• Temptation Island (9/8c, USA Network): Major relationship drama is brewing for the show’s first-ever engaged couple (though not for long), Hall and Kaitlin. What did they expect? This isn’t Monogamy Island, just saying.
• The Wonder Years (9/8c, ABC): While Dean (Elisha “EJ” Williams) works with his best pal Cory (Amari O’Neil) to build a Soap Box Derby car, his mom Lillian (Saycon Sengbloh) faces a crossroads with Cory’s dad (Allen Maldonado) when budget cuts in their government office force her to re-evaluate her least responsible co-worker.

ON THE STREAM:

• Ladies First: A Story of Women in Hip-Hop (streaming on Netflix): A four-part docuseries, part of the ongoing celebration of hip hop’s 50^th anniversary, focuses on the contributions of women, from pioneers like Queen Latifah and MC Lyte to contemporary stars including Saweetie.
• Strange Planet (streaming on Apple TV+): A whimsical animated series brings Nathan W. Pyle’s graphic novel and social media memes to life, featuring aliens that resemble blue light bulbs with gym socks but who are a lot like us, musing on the absurdities and mysteries of life.
• Moving (streaming on Hulu): From South Korea, and based on a popular webtoon, an action series treads the familiar turf of teens who discover they have superpowers. The twist: An assassin has arrived in Seoul, determined to wipe them out. Launches with seven episodes.