Daily Best Bets

Best-bets for July 15: stars of basketball and baking

1) WNBA all-star game, 8:30 p.m. ET, ABC. The top women’s basketball players collide in prime time, with A’ja Wilson and Breanna Stewart as captains. They were the top vote-getters, with Brittney Griner (shown here) finishing third. It’s the ninth all-star selection for Griner, who is 32 and 6-foot-9. Bouncing back quickly from nine months in Russian prison, she’s been almost matching her 2021 season, when she averaged 20.5 points and 9.5 rebounds. Read more…

Best-bets for July 14: Canadian chaos, American reality

1) “Moonshine,” 9 p.m., CW. In last week’s opener, life imploded for Lidia (Jennifer Finnigan). A busy Manhattan architect, she returned home to Nova Scotia with her two teens, for her aunt’s memorial service. She promptly learned that she’d inherited 43 percent of her family’s crumbling resort … and that her husband is cheating, Now she’s decided to stay in this chaotic place (shown here), as secrets and suspicions persist. She tries to make changes, starting with the “Goat Roast.” Read more…

Best-bets for July 13: bye, “Blacklist”; hi, vampires

1) “The Blacklist” series finale, 8 and 9 p.m., NBC. For a decade, this has given us richly tangled stories centered on an enigmatic character. Using the assumed name “Red” Redington, he’s a master criminal who tips an FBI task force; James Spader (shown here) has had two Golden Globe best-actor nominations, playing someone a half-step ahead of life. Now we may learn his identity and the secrets he’s holding. Read more…

Best-bets for July 12: sports champs and food stars

1) ESPY awards, 8-11 p.m., ABC. It’s time to honor the best in sports. For top male athlete, baseball’s Aaron Judge faces football’s Patrick Mahomes, basketball’s Nikola Jokic and soccer’s Lionel Messi. For women, skiier Mikaela Shiffrin (shown here) has her third nomination, facing A’ja Wilson (basketball), Sophia Smith (soccer) and Iga Swiatek (tennis). There’s much more … but, reportedly, no host or script, due to the writers’ strike. Read more…

Best-bets for July 11: It’s an all-star night (literally)

1) Baseball All-Star Game, 8 p.m. ET, Fox. The American League arrives with an eight-game winning streak – and the overall home run leaders for this year (Shohei Ohtani, shown here) and last (Aaron Judge). The National League includes Luis Arraex, who has been hitting close to .400. Also in the National starting line-up are three Braves and three Dodgers; the American line-up has four Rangers and two Angels, including Mike Trout, in his 11th All-Star Game. Read more…

Best-bets for July 10: weird humor and teen trauma

1) “Miracle Workers” season-openers, 10 and 10:30 p.m., TBS, rerunning at 11. This arrives in spurts – a 15-month delay after the second season, a 22-month one after the third. Still, it’s worth the wait – fresh, funny and weird. The first three seasons took Daniel Radcliffe and Geraldine Viswanathan to Heaven (literally), a medieval village and a wagon train. Now they’re post-apocalyptic warriors (shown here), settling into suburbia. The result is erratic, but sometimes hilarious.
Read more…

Best-bets for July 9: American games, British mysteries

1) Game night opener, ABC. Here’s the final piece of ABC’s summer, which has no-rerun blocks from 8-11 p.m. Sundays and Mondays, 8-9:30 p.m. Wednesdays and 8-10 Thursdays. At 8 today, “Prank Panel” makes an overprotective dad think his daughter has the world’s worst boyfriend. At 9, “Celebrity Family Feud” has Gayle King, Sophia Bush Hughes and the “Yellowjackets” (shown here) cast. At 10, “$100,000 Pyramid” includes RuPaul and Loni Love. Read more…

Best-bets for July 8: grim drama, geek fun

1) “Dawn,” 8 p.m. Lifetime, rerunning at 10. The grim tales of V.C. Andrews (the “Flowers in the Attic” author) are big on Lifetime. On consecutive Saturdays, four movies will tell of a sweet teen, encased in wealth and cruelty. Brec Bassinger (shown here with Jesse Metcalfe) is subtly excellent (as she was in “Stargirl”), but many characters are overwritten and/or overacted; Donna Mills is especially inept as a venomous matriarch. Read more…

Best-bets for July 7: Fridays add light dramas, music, more

1) “Family Law” season-opener, 8 p.m., CW. Abby’s life was derailed by alcoholism and a cheating husband. Almost disbarred, she had to work in her dad’s law office, with two half-siblings. Now things are worse: Her half-sister had a break-up and their father (Victor Garber, shown here with Jewel Staite as Abby) is dating an abrasive TV commentator. Also, there’s a strange new court case. Despite flaws (likable characters are scarce), this Canadian show works fairly well as a light drama. Read more…

Best-bets for July 6: Missy, murder, mermaid, more

1) “Young Sheldon,” 8 p.m., CBS. For most of these first six seasons, Missy has been unnoticed and underappreciated. She’s not as smart as one brother (Sheldon) or as troublesome as the other (Georgie), but has ample people skills. With the focus on Mandy’s baby, she anew. Then – at the end of an episode that reran Wednesday – she stole her dad’s truck. Tonight (shown here) she finds her friend Paige (a young genius who’s a college drop-out) and tries a joy ride. Read more…