What to Watch This Week | February 14–20

It’s Valentine’s Day, so you know what that means: new episodes of The Walking Dead are coming! The second installment of the 11th and final season of America’s favorite zombie show (well, probably behind Netflix’s All of Us Are Dead) premieres Sunday, Feb. 20 on AMC; don’t forget to buy a card.

This week’s What to Watch highlights include the long-awaited return of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, a new mission for Space Force, a relaxing session of Painting with John, and an action-packed NBA All-Star Game. Pile up the Valentine’s chocolate and grab that remote!

Jump to your preferred streaming service

What’s premiering this week

The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel | Prime Video | Comedy, drama

Season 4 premiere, Friday, Feb. 18: Midge’s (Rachel Brosnahan) comedy career rolls into 1960 in the long-delayed fourth season of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel. Prime Video’s immaculately dressed flagship series will be joined this season by guest stars Kelly Bishop, Jason Alexander, and John Waters, and Mrs. Maisel’s standup misadventures look to be her most hysterically humbling yet. Prime Video is dropping two episodes on Feb. 18, followed by six more weekly installments (sorry, binge-ers).

NBA All-Star Game | TNT, TBS | Sports

Coverage begins Sunday, Feb. 20, 8 p.m. EST: The Winter Olympics, the Super Bowl, the Puppy Bowl—had enough sports yet? Didn’t think so. This year’s NBA All-Star Game pits Team (Kevin) Durant against Team LeBron (James), with 24 players drafted from across the NBA (including two from CableTV.com’s hometown team, the Utah Jazz). The 71st edition of the exhibition game will be played in Cleveland, Ohio, at Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse, and marks James’s 18th appearance as an All-Star.

What to watch on Netflix this week

The Cuphead Show! | Netflix | Animation, Comedy

Series premiere, Friday, Feb. 18: When it debuted in 2017, videogame Cuphead was notable for its gorgeous visual style (based on classic 1930s cartoons) and high level of difficulty (it’s not an easy game). The Cuphead Show! solves this conundrum by eliminating the gameplay and just presenting the comic adventures of Cuphead and Mugman—a purely passive experience. All 12 season 1 episodes will be available on Feb. 18, and The Cuphead Show! has already been picked up for seasons 2 and 3.

Space Force | Netflix | Comedy, drama

Season 2 premiere, Friday, Feb. 18: Steve Carell’s Space Force premiered nearly two years ago, back when an actual US Space Force was a hot news item—so, whatever happened to that? The fictional Space Force soldiers on, with General Naird (Carell) and his team now facing the consequences of refusing to take out a Chinese moon base at the end of last season. Shades of reality, the Space Force also has to prove itself to an incoming new administration—given Naird and the crew’s towering incompetence, good luck.

What to watch on HBO Max this week

Painting with John | HBO, HBO Max | Comedy, reality

Season 2 premiere, Friday, Feb. 18: Actor/musician John Lurie’s Painting with John isn’t a how-to show about watercolor techniques, but an intimate, meditative storytelling experience—but if you pick up some brush tricks, cool. Season 1 showcased Lurie’s paradisical home in the Caribbean, but now he insists “We didn’t show you the bad stuff,” like a possessed washing machine and “mean bugs.” Painting with John is weird, for sure, but it’s also an unfiltered love letter to art and life—dig in.

Last Week Tonight with John Oliver | HBO, HBO Max | News, talk

Season 9 premiere, Sunday, Feb. 20: Of all TV’s desk-and-graphics talk dudes, John Oliver is easily the most loudly exasperated—which is fitting for the show. Oliver gets the topical one-liners out of the way early on Last Week Tonight before settling in with his Big Topic, which is usually something systemically horrific in the socio-political realm that you had no idea was even happening . . . but in a funny way. At least Oliver is back with a studio audience and away from the blank Void (R.I.P.).

What to watch on STARZ this week

Power Book IV: Force | STARZ | Drama

New series, now streaming: Force is the third sequel in STARZ’s Power franchise, the high-rated crime drama co-produced by Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson (you might have caught him on the Super Bowl LVI halftime show). This time around, the focus is on Tommy Egan (Joseph Sikora, Ozark) and his new quest to become Chicago’s biggest drug dealer after feeling New York. Power Book IV: Force became STARZ’s most-watched premiere ever last week with 3.3 million viewers, which bodes well for the upcoming Power Book V: Influence.

Home Sweet Hell | STARZ | Comedy, drama

Movie, now streaming: Since it’s Valentine’s Day, you could snuggle up with a boring old rom-com full of sweetness and love—but why not try a pitch-black comedy about marriage and murder instead? Home Sweet Hell (2015) follows put-upon husband Don (Patrick Wilson), a furniture salesman married to ice-cold-but-hyper-organized Mona (Katherine Heigl). When Don has an affair at work, it sets a comic wave of blackmail and murder in motion. Home Sweet Hell sits at 5% on Rotten Tomatoes, but what do they know?

W2W wildcards of the week

Severance | Apple TV+ | Drama, sci-fi

Series premiere, Friday, Feb. 18: Producer/director Ben Stiller offers up an extreme spin on work/life balance in Severance: What if you could have the memory of your personal life wiped clean while at the office, and then have your work life expunged from your brain when you clock out? Repeated daily, what could possibly go wrong? The nine-episode sci-fi thriller stars Adam Scott (Parks and Recreation) and a stacked supporting cast featuring Patricia Arquette, John Turturro, and Christopher Walken.

Texas Chainsaw Massacre | Netflix | Drama, horror

Movie premiere, Friday, Feb. 18: There have been countless sequels and remakes of 1974 horror classic The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, the o.g. slasher flick. But Netflix’s new Texas Chainsaw Massacre (no “The”) is a direct sequel set 50 years later and also features the voice of ’74 narrator John Larroquette—instant cred. When the town of Harlow, Texas moves toward gentrification, Leatherface (Mark Burnham) re-springs into murderous action, the logical reaction to new smoothie shops and yoga studios.