MONDAY, JUNE 27
2 Broke Girls
The basketball-playing cousin of Oleg (Jonathan Kite) comes to town to play a game again Max’s favorite team and gives her two free tickets, but chaos ensues when the girls interfere with the game and risk ruining their cupcake business in the process (8:30 p.m., CBS).
Mygrations: Predator Alley
In the season finale, only 32 miles (and a plummeting waterfall) remain as the remaining “herd” of hardcore survivalists they try to overcome their hunger, exhaustion and injuries—and avoid or outpace the very real lethal predators in their path—to make it across the finish line (9 p.m., National Geographic Channel).
TUESDAY, JUNE 28
Dead of Summer
In the premiere episode of this new series, seven camp counselors plan for the best summer of their lives, but something evil lurking at the recently reopened, seemingly idyllic Camp Stillwater has other plans in store for them (9 p.m., Freeform).
Zoo
Season two of the hit animals-run-amok drama begins with a special two-hour premiere as danger escalates and beasties continue to mutate, intensifying their attacks in an effort to make the planet inhospitable to humans (9 p.m., CBS).
WEDNESDAY, JUNE 29
The Night Shift
A college coed falls from a balcony, but once she’s in the ER, TC (Eoin Macken) and Paul (Robert Bailey Jr.) find out that her situation is even more complex than the tumble she’s taken (9 p.m., NBC).
The Real O’Neals
Eileen (Martha Plimpton) faces her book club for the first time after her family’s “outing,” but things take a surprising turn when, instead of shunning her, the other ladies begin opening up—way too much—about their own problems (10:30 p.m., ABC).
THURSDAY, JUNE 30
Beach Bites with Katie Lee
You can practically feel the breeze as Lee (Billy Joel’s third wife) goes tropical to sample sopes in Mexico, rum-glazed chicken in St. Barths and drinks from sandy coastal cantinas that will make your mouth water (10 p.m., Food Network).
Sex&Drugs&Rock&Roll
Denis Leary returns to star in the kick-off episode of the second season of this rowdy, critically acclaimed series as the lead singer of a legendarily self-destructive New York rock band called the Heathens, known for living up—or down—to their name in practically every way (10 p.m., FX).
FRIDAY, JULY 1
Moby Dick: Heart of a Whale
How much truth is there to the 19th century stories, of monstrous sperm whales attacking ships, that inspired author Herman Melville’s epic novel Moby Dick? This documentary series seeks answers, including whether some of the actual whale attacks of yore might have been “premeditated” (3 p.m., Smithsonian).
Mysteries at the Museum
A new season of the show examines more treasures and artifacts from museums, galleries, archives and private collections, guided by host and history expert Don Wildman, including a compass belonging to the explorer who inspired the fictional character Indiana Jones (9 p.m., Travel Channel).
SATURDAY, JULY 2
The Eighties
This back-to-back repeat of all seven episodes of sweeping documentary miniseries, co-produced by Tom Hanks, chronicles the milestone events and pop culture of the era that gave us MTV, the AIDS crisis, the Reagan Revolution, “Greed is Good” and “Tear down this wall!” (7 p.m., CNN).
Rio 2
A family of blue macaws is comfortably settled in the city, but the mom fears her kids are becoming more like humans than birds. So a trip to the Amazon is in order in the network premiere of this 2014 family film featuring the voices of Kristin Chenoweth, Jesse Eisenberg, Jamie Foxx and Andy Garcia (8 p.m., FX).
SUNDAY, JULY 3
Secrets of America’s Favorite Places
This new eight-part series, with fascinating fun factoids about some of our nation’s most treasured landmarks, kicks off with the Statue of Liberty. Did you know it wasn’t actually a gift from the French government? That it might have been modeled after a man? That one dedicated fellow spent decades of his life climbing to its top to maintain it? (6 p.m., Discovery Family Channel).
Celebrity Family Feud
Are you ready for some football? Players from the American Football Conference offense (including the New York Jets, Baltimore Ravens and Oakland Raiders) and the National Football Conference defense (the Carolina Panthers, Washington Redskins and Seattle Seahawks) square off (8 p.m., ABC).
READ ALL ABOUT IT
Two days after his 69th birthday and the release of his latest musical masterpiece, Blackstar, David Bowie died of the cancer almost no one knew he had. Rolling Stone columnist and best-selling music writer Rob Sheffield explores the British rock icon’s career, his legacy and his powerful, enduring connection with his fans in the thoughtful and meditative On Bowie (Dey Street).
NEW ON DVD & BLU-RAY
Tina Fey stars as a reporter covering the war in the Middle East in Whiskey Tango Foxtrot (Paramount Home Media), based on real-life reporter Kim Baker’s satirical memoir about combat journalism and her own arc of self-discovery on the beat in Afghanistan. With Margot Robbie, Martin Freeman and Billy Bob Thornton.
What was it like to be a character actor or an extra in the original Star Wars? Elstree 1976 (MVD Entertainment), which takes its name from the studio complex in England used for filming some of each of the films in director George Lucas’ trilogy, shines an affectionate spotlight on this unique fraternity of performers, from minor role players up to towering David Prowse, who “filled out” the suit of Darth Vader and provide the movements—but not the face or voice—of the film’s most iconic villain.
Long before the modern era of digital effects, he made magic on the big screen. The documentary Ray Harryhausen: Special Effects Titan (Arrow Video) showcases the life and work of the legendary the “stop-motion” pioneer whose signature handiwork throughout the 1950s, ’60 and ’70 includes The Beast From 20,000 Fathoms, Clash of the Titans, The Golden Voyage of Sinbad, Jason and the Argonauts and Mysterious Island.
When a preteen girl enters the “kill zone” of a planned drone strike on an African terrorist cell, it triggers an international dispute—and sets up the gritty moral, political and ethical quandaries of director Gavin Hood’s gripping Eye in the Sky (Universal Pictures Home Entertainment), starring Helen Mirren and Aaron Paul (of TV’s Breaking Bad) and also featuring the final on-screen appearance of the late Alan Rickman.
AT THE MOVIES
It’s Jaws all over again, but with a new, nail-biting twist. In The Shallows, Blake Lively plays a surfer on a secluded beach who finds herself stranded alone on a rock in the middle of the feeding ground of a monstrous great white shark, with the tide rising, requiring all of her ingenuity, resourcefulness and fortitude to figure a way off—and out.
Director David (Harry Potter) Yates’ The Legend of Tarzan, the big new remake of the Edgar Rice Burroughs’ saga, stars Alexander Skarsgård as the feral child raised by apes in the African jungle, now acclaimed to life in London but summoned back to the Dark Continent to intervene when a mining operation encroaches on his former home. With Margot Robbie, Samuel L. Jackson and Christoph Waltz.
In The BFG, director Steven Spielberg’s adaptation of a novel by Roald Dahl, a young girl encounters a greatly oversized man, who—despite his intimidating presence—turns out to be a kindhearted soul and an outcast from the other giants who, unlike him, love to eat children.
It’s that time again: the Purge, an annual 12-hour event when all crime, including murder, is legal—an act of violent, bloody catharsis for the citizenry, and callous population control for the government. But in The Purge: Election Year, a senator (Elizabeth Mitchell) is running for U.S. president on the platform of eliminating the Purge, and her head of security (Frank Grillo) is a former police chief who lost his son to the Purge two years ago… Hang on, it’s gonna be a wild night!
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