1) “Coroner” (shown here) debut, 9 p.m. Wednesday, CW. This mini-network keeps importing shows to plug holes. Some are goofy (“Killer Camp,” “Task Master”) or bland (“Fridge Wars”), but this one is surprisingly good. Based on a series of novels, it starts with a life-changing moment for Dr. Jenny Cooper; then we flash forward. She’s the new coroner in Toronto, ready to help solve cases. The first – set in in a youth detention center – is a tough, smart story. Sharply written and acted, “Coroner” is a summer surprise.
2) “Big Brother All-Stars” opener, 8 p.m. Wednesday, Thursday and Sunday, CBS. Here’s the opposite of social-distancing; it packs strangers into a house together. To pull it off, the show says it quarantined each person separately, tested often and will have weekly tests. Supplies will be disinfected; crew members will be wearing masks and working in pods. Julie Chen Moonves is back as host. She’ll introduce the people – all of them from previous seasons — in Wednesday’s two-hour opener.
3) “America’s Got Talent: 15th Anniversary Special,” 8-10 p.m. Tuesday, NBC. This week, TV is noting two shows that transformed its summers. “Big Brother” started 20 years ago; “AGT” is in its 15th season. Others (“Survivor,” “Idol,” “Amazing Race”) moved into the regular season, but these remain summer staples. Now “AGT” looks at some of the people who went viral – Kodi Lee, Shin Lim, Grace Vanderwaal – and at groups, including Zurcaroh and V. Unbeatable, the winner of “AGT: Champions.”
4) Shark-invested changeover, Sunday, cable. Sharks continue to fill the National Geographic Channel all week, but on Sunday they’ll move over to Nat Geo Wild. That’s the same day that Discovery – which created “Shark Week,” 32 years ago – takes over. At 8 p.m., it returns to the site of one of its favorites – the high-leaping “Air Jaws.”At 9 p.m., it claims to have an underwater confrontation between sharks and Mike Tyson. At 10, it heads to New Zealand, the home of 20-foot great whites.
5) “Bob (Hearts) Abishola,” 8:30 p.m. today, CBS; and 10 p.m. today, “POV” (check local listings). Here are opposite views of African immigrants. The first is warm, funny and fictional, with the romance of a white Detroiter and a Nigerian native; in tonight’s rerun, Bob tries Abishola’s church. The second, harder and harsher, was filmed in a tiny Brussels hair salon. We slowly get the six-year story of a woman who went from Cameroon to near-slavery in Lebanon, then to Syria, Turkey and Greece.
6) “Modern Family,” 8 and 8:30 p.m. Tuesday, ABC. Barring a late change – something ABC has done often on Tuesdays – this will rerun the show’s two-part finale. It was a fairly good finish to a terrific, 11-year run. Cam and Mitchell are settling into their new life, with Lily and their newly adopted baby, when Cam suddenly gets a shot at his dream job, Meanwhile, Phil and Claire decide their house is too full; one of the grown children will have to leave. There’s more, with, as usual, warmth and laughter.
7) Sports surge. Fox switches baseball to Thursdays – the night it will have football next month. At 7:15 p.m. ET, regions will get the Astros-Diamondbacks or Cubs-Royals. Other broadcast networks also load up. CBS has golf, with the final PGA rounds fom 4-10 p.m. ET Saturday and 3-9 p.m. Sunday; ABC has basketball, with Spurs-Pelicans at 3 p.m. Sunday. There’s much more on ESPN or TNT; basketball is 6:30 and 9 p.m. ET every weekday, followed by a four-game spurt on Saturday.
8) “Great Performances: In the Heights: Chasing Broadway Dreams.” 9 p.m. Friday, PBS. Lin-Manuel Miranda grew up near Broadway, but hadn’t been to a show there. Then he saw “Into the Woods” on PBS; “it changed my life,” he’s said. He wrote “In the Heights” in college and refined it for almost a decade. He was 28 when it opened on Broadway in 2008, winning four Tonys, including best musical. This film aired a year later, tracing the effort. Later, in 2015, Miranda’s “Hamilton” ruled Broadway.
9) “American Sniper” (2014) or “Richard Jewell” (2019), 8 p.m. Saturday, Syfy or HBO. After mastering fiction, Clint Eastwood suddenly switched, directing five straight films based on true stories. The first (and, maybe, best) was “Sniper,” about a military marksman. Its six Oscar nominations included best actor (Bradley Cooper) and best picture. “Sniper” made $547 million worldwide – topping “Jewell” (about the security guard who found bombs near the 1996 Olympics) by $500 million.
10) “Masterpiece: Endeavour” season-opener, 9-11 p.m. Sunday, PBS. The good news is that this series ia back with three movie-length stories. It’s an “Inspector Morse” prequel, with the young detective solving crimes in Oxford; as usuall it’s beautifully filmed and subtly acted. And the bad? This opener leaps skittishly between several stories and only solves one (not the main one) in its opener. That’s not typical of “Masterpiece” or “Mystery”; neither is adding a supernatural detail that doesn’t quite fit.