‘Nobody’s Love Story, Jeff Hiller Vamps, David Tennant Does ‘Time,’ Lava & Plagues in ‘9-1-1’ World

Nobody Wants This

The “hot rabbi” Noah (Adam Brody) and his slow-to-convert soulmate Joanne (Kristen Bell), a sex podcaster, are one of TV’s cutest couples, but their rocky road towards a happily ever after continues to hit speed bumps in the third season of the Emmy-nominated sitcom. (All 10 episodes available for bingeing.) They’re now living together in an enviable L.A. home, which means there’s no escape from each other’s idiosyncrasies: her messiness, his insistence on a top sheet. She’s taking classes (with Sarah Silverman as her rabbi instructor) in the process of converting to Judaism — Andrew Rannells plays a particularly snarky classmate — while Noah sets his sights on regaining the senior rabbi job he gave up for Joanne. Elsewhere, his brother Sasha (Timothy Simons) uneasily adjusts to single life, but how long before he realizes the chemistry he has with Joanne’s even flightier sister, Morgan (Justine Lupe)?

Eternally Yours

Supreme scene stealer Jeff Hiller (Widow’s Bay), an Emmy winner for HBO‘s much-missed Somebody Somewhere, is a welcome addition to the supernatural sitcom, guest-starring as the imperious Aldrict, a vampire guest at the Seattle coven’s initiation party for fledgling vamp Max (Jaren Lewison). One person who’s not thrilled to see him: Liz (Allegra Edwards), who recognizes Aldrict as a fellow undead traveler who knows the real story about how housemate Jesse (Parker Young) was inducted into the coven way back in 1876 Colorado.

Time

The versatile David Tennant, whose TV career ranges from Doctor Who and Broadchurch to the more recent Good Omens and Rivals, stars in the third season of the exceedingly grim British prison-drama anthology as Officer Bobby Bailey, who unsmilingly oversees the chaos at a Young Offender Institution. Bobby is less than welcoming to the new prison chaplain Marie-Louise (Happy Valley‘s Siobhan Finneran, the connecting link between all three seasons), whose compassion he sees as weakness. Marie-Louise feels she’s lost her faith, while Bobby has lost his bearings in his personal life. Neither are prepared for the fallout from a violent incident on their watch. Louis McCartney, a Tony nominee for Broadway’s Stranger Things: The First Shadow, is a standout among the inmates as the guilt-ridden James, who acts out rather than forgive himself for his role in a family tragedy. The three-part series airs weekly.

9-1-1

Ryan Murphy‘s first-responder melodramas aren’t afraid to go big. Take the mothership, which is coping with an active volcano under the streets of L.A., sending lava spewing down iconic boulevards, while Det. Athena Grant (Angela Bassett) is trapped underground in a collapsed tunnel. Over on 9-1-1: Nashville (9/8c), a fiendish criminal is visiting plagues inspired by the Bible upon Music City, moving on from murder hornets and gushers of blood to boils, with newly arrived Det. Rogue Kelly (Ryan Phillippe) leading the investigation and clashing with Capt. Don Hart (Chris O’Donnell).

Cupertino

While our heroes in the David-vs-Goliath law firm reel from the realization that their new client Bo (Rob McClure) is actually a sentient AI computer, wishing to sue its makers to reinstate guardrails (how timely), they first need to figure out how to stay in business. Which means taking on a test case brought to them by their would-be financier Natalia (Busy Philipps), and it’s a doozy, involving a chatbot that may have led a boy to commit murder. Twist: the chatbot was created by the company owned by Natalia’s billionaire ex (Fisher Stevens), who takes the stand. And complicating things further: the rival law firm hires Michael’s (Mike Colter) ex, Nichole (the fabulous Hamilton and The Good Wife alum Renée Elise Goldsberry), as the alluring opposing counsel to throw him off his game.

INSIDE THURSDAY TV:

• Pardon the Interruption — 25^th Anniversary Special (5 pm/ET, ESPN): Hosts Tony Kornheiser and Michael Wilbon celebrate a quarter-century of verbal sports-talk sparring with a retrospective special, followed by the regular daily edition.
• Georgie & Mandy’s First Marriage (8/7c, CBS): My, how they grow. And parents Georgie (Montana Jordan) and Mandy (Emily Osment) aren’t quite ready for little CeeCee to be starting preschool already.
• The Traitors (8/7c, NBC): Paranoia among the players reaches a peak while a new mission gives one contestant the chance to acquire a game-changing power.
• Hudson & Rex (8/7c, UPtv): The canine-and-cop team smells something fishy when a fisherman’s body washes up.
• Studio C (8:30 pm/ET, BYUtv): Comedian Pete Holmes guests on the Season 23 premiere of the sketch comedy.
• Elsbeth (9/8c, CBS): The wonderful Tony winner Christine Ebersole (Bob Hearts Abishola) visits as Lydia, Elsbeth’s (Carrie Preston) mother, while her daughter becomes suspicious of the influencer sister (Girls‘ Jemima Kirke) of a murdered pop star.
• War (9/8c, HBO): The divorce case heats up during arbitration, and Nick (James McArdle) appears to choke when going head-to-sepulchral-head with his ruthless adversary and former co-worker St. John (the formidable Pip Torrens).
• Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (9/8c, NBC): The unit clashes with federal investigators while trying to take down a dark-web network targeting young children. Followed by Law & Order (10/9c), where the murder of a newspaper editor leads to a thicket of ethical journalistic quandaries.
• After the First 48 (9/8c, A&E): The true-crime series, revisiting cases first shown on The First 48, returns for a 13th season, followed by the Season 2 premiere of Killer Investigations (10/9c).
• Grey’s Anatomy (10/9c, ABC): Bailey’s (Chandra Wilson) graduate studies are disrupted when she and the exiled Blue (Harry Shum Jr.) deal with a fraternity hazing gone wrong.
• The Graham Norton Show (11/10c, BBC America): This week’s eclectic guest list includes Ellen DeGeneres, Colin Farrell, Quentin Tarantino, and The Five-Star Weekend‘s Gemma Chan.
• Swipe Right on the Devil (streaming on Hulu): A three-part true-crime docuseries explores the disappearance and murder in 2017 of 24-year-old Sydney Loofe in rural Wilber, Nebraska. Her Tinder date led her into the twisted circle of a man who allegedly was recruiting a coven of witches with murder as an initiation rite.