MTV’s VMAs, ‘Closer Look’ in Prime Time, ‘Slow Horses’ Speeds Up, New Players in Netflix’s ‘Circle’

MTV Video Music Awards

Megan Thee Stallion hosts the splashy music extravaganza from New York’s UBS Arena, with Eminem as the recently announced opening act and Katy Perry taking the stage with a medley of her hits when she accepts the coveted Video Vanguard Award. Taylor Swift, who isn’t scheduled to perform, leads the nominations with 12, with her “Fortnight” partner Post Malone right behind with 11. Swift has 23 previous VMA wins and could overtake Beyoncé’s record of 25 solo-artist wins this year. But the show is really about the performances, which include Chappell Roan, Camila Cabello, GloRilla, Halsey, Lenny Kravitz, LL Cool J, Sabrina Carpenter, Shawn Mendes and more.

Late Night With Seth Meyers

Closer Look Primetime (10/9c): The late-night comics will have much to say about Tuesday night’s presidential debate between Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump. So much so that Seth Meyers is expanding his regular “A Closer Look” segment from his Emmy-nominated Late Night with Seth Meyers into a primetime special, focusing on the highs and lows of the debate. According to NBC, Meyers’ satirical and wide-ranging “A Closer Look” segments have attracted more than 3 billion views over the years.

Slow Horses

With only six episodes per season, adapting Mick Herron’s terrific spy novels, Slow Horses has no time to waste. The plot gallops forward in Season 4’s second episode, with a new angle on what happened when agent River Cartwright (Emmy-nominated Jack Lowden) entered his befuddled ex-spy grandfather’s (Jonathan Pryce) home. Back at spy headquarters, a young agent makes an alarming connection to the recent bombing, and “Second Desk” “Lady Di” Taverner (Kristin Scott Thomas) will do anything in her considerable power to keep it quiet. “You just want to keep your job is all, isn’t it?” says her cowed superior (a very amusing James Callis). “Yes, because I’m bloody good at it,” Di replies. Also good at his job, despite appearances: Slough House boss Jackson Lamb (a resplendently disgusting Gary Oldman), who takes the team’s officious new administrator Moira (Joanna Scanlan) to lunch, in more ways than one.

The Circle

The elaborate social-media strategy game, hosted by Michelle Buteau, returns for a seventh season, rolling out with four episodes a week for three weeks, with a finale scheduled for October 2. New players isolate themselves within an Atlanta apartment building, communicating only through text chats — several using fake “catfishing” identities — in hopes of being rated the top influencer and walking away with $100,000. As The Circle begins, Netflix drops the final two episodes of its grueling survival competition series Outlast, whose contestants could probably use a rest in a cushy apartment, albeit without the social-media interruptions.

INSIDE WEDNESDAY TV:

• America’s Got Talent (8/7c, NBC): Bumped forward a day by the presidential debate like the VMAs, the live semifinals begin, with 12 acts competing at the Pasadena Civic Auditorium for America’s vote, with six moving on to the finals.
• MasterChef: Generations (8/7c, Fox): It’s also semifinal time on a two-hour episode of the Gordon Ramsay cooking competition, but first, the top six chefs take over Ramsay’s Rooftop, a one-night-only pop-up restaurant id downtown L.A.
• Wild West Chronicles (10/9c, INSP): His story was previously told in a Paramount+ limited series, and now it’s Bat Masterson’s (Jack Elliott) turn to spin a tale about Black U.S. Marshal Bass Reeves (Byron Jackson), who in this account vows to pursue his own son, accused of murdering his wife in a jealous fit.
• Bad Monkey (streaming on Apple TV+): Lapsed detective Yancy (Vince Vaughn) finds himself on the wrong side of the law, and it doesn’t help his case when he’s got a severed finger in his pocket.
• Women in Blue (streaming on Apple TV+): A pivotal episode of the engrossing Spanish-language police drama set in 1970s Mexico City sheds light on the psychologically twisted backstory of the Undresser serial killer. But the pioneering female officers have yet to learn how close he is to one of their own.