Beef Puts Steven Yeun and Ali Wong on a Darkly Comic Collision Course

Looking for your next binge-watch, or just need to fill an hour? Welcome to Your Weekly Watch List, our curated collection of the best shows on television. Here’s what to watch from Sunday, April 2 through Saturday, April 8.

As Steven Yeun and Ali Wong navigate their Beef, Brooke Shields: Pretty Baby, Grease: Rise of the Pink Ladies, and Mo’Nique’s Netflix special bring female empowerment to the screen. Plus, Kathryn Hahn leads Hulu’s adaptation of Tiny Beautiful Things, and Gillian Jacobs sticks it to the Nazis in Transatlantic.

Pretty Baby: Brooke Shields

Monday, Hulu

In this two-part documentary about former child star and model Brooke Shields, actress Laura Linney recalls seeing the ubiquitous, sexualized images of the pre-teen during her heyday and thinking, “I hope she’s okay.” But as filmmaker Lana Wilson documents in Pretty Baby, Shields wasn’t okay: The constant pressures of stardom and her image as an underage sex symbol (which developed after roles in Louis Malle’s Pretty Baby and The Blue Lagoon) took a serious toll. The adult Shields has, somehow, escaped the child star curse, and the documentary sees the actress and mother re-evaluate the way young performers are turned into sexual commodities and detail how her experience led her to campaign for change.

Mo’Nique: My Name Is Mo’Nique

Tuesday, Netflix

In 2018, outspoken comic and Oscar winner Mo’Nique famously called out Netflix for low-balling Black female comedians, eventually winning an out-of-court settlement against the streaming giant. Now, Mo’Nique returns with a standup special in which, we’re just speculating, she’ll have some things to say about Netflix, the position of Black women in the entertainment industry, and her longstanding feuds with industry moguls Oprah Winfrey and Tyler Perry. Mo’Nique promises that viewers will come away from My Name Is Mo’Nique knowing “who the f*ck I am,” so be ready for that.

Dave Season 3 Premiere

Wednesday, 10:00 PM ET on FXX

The third season of this semi-autobiographical comedy series about Dave Burd, better known by his rap persona Lil Dicky, sees the unlikely star continue to deconstruct his own success. Critics of the Lil Dicky character have pointed out that Burd’s habit of tailoring his self-aggrandizing hits toward a white bro culture is deeply problematic, and Dave frequently agrees, portraying Burd as an unlikable narcissist all too happy to pander to the middle. It’s a tricky comic balance, as Dave both revels in and mocks Burd’s YouTube celebrity, all while those around him call him out for his boorish nonsense. Season 3 follows Lil Dicky and his crew as they board a big, pink bus for Dave’s first-ever national tour, a storyline that promises more of the juvenile laughs and sly commentary for which the series has become known.

Beef

Thursday, Netflix (Full Season)

Have you ever had a really bad day? Ali Wong and Steven Yeun sure have, as their stressed-out characters turn a near fender-bender into an escalating war of petty vengeance in Netflix’s darkly comic series Beef. Strap yourself in for Wong and Yuen’s road rage to turn into something more akin to a road-apocalypse: Over the course of creator Lee Sung Jin’s 10-episode series, the pair pursues, stalks, vandalizes, and posts the occasional death threat in fury over their inconsequential run-in, with each refusing to just take a few deep breaths, count to 10, and let it go.

Grease: Rise of the Pink Ladies

Thursday, Paramount+

This Grease prequel series promises to show us 1950s Rydell High from the point of view of the Pink Ladies, the satin-jacketed girl gang who held their own against the singing, dancing, John Travolta-led greasers in the 1978 film. However, don’t look for Sandy, Frenchy, Marty, Jan, or Rizzo, as Rise of the Pink Ladies shows how the gang was formed four years before the film, with an all-new crew of diverse Ladies (Marisa Davila, Cheyenne Isabel Wells, Ari Notartomaso, Tricia Fukuhara, and Shanel Bailey) crooning their way through the heartbreaks, sexism, and racism that caused the girls to band together in the first place. With all new songs and a focus on empowerment, Paramount+’s prequel is already better-positioned than the ill-advised Grease 2.

Tiny Beautiful Things

Friday, Hulu (Full Season)

Even before WandaVision viewers discovered it was Agatha all along, fans have known that a little Kathryn Hahn makes everything better. Thankfully, there’s plenty of Hahn to go around in Hulu’s eight-episode series (based on the book by Cheryl Strayed) about a woman who reluctantly takes a job as an advice columnist. As she looks to to her younger self (Sarah Pidgeon) for much-needed wisdom, Hahn’s Clare reflects on the death of her mother, played by the equally excellent Merritt Wever, in case you needed another reason to tune in.

Transatlantic

Friday, Netflix (Full Season)

An American journalist working in Nazi-occupied Vichy France sees the writing on the wall and forms a rag-tag crew of unlikely spies to smuggle out as many Jews as possible in Netflix’s period drama about the real-life Emergency Rescue Committee. Corey Stoll and Gillian Jacobs head up an international cast in this intense tale of espionage, heroism, and sticking it to the Nazis and their spineless collaborators, which is always a good thing.

If You Have...

An Hour

Quantum Leap Season 1 Finale: Monday, 10:00 PM ET on NBC
Schmigadoon! Season 2 premiere: Wednesday, Apple TV+
Abbott Elementary: Wednesday, 9:00 PM ET on ABC

An Evening

Wrestlemania 39 Night 2: Sunday, 8:00 PM ET on Peacock
Saturday Night Live: Molly Shannon/Jonas Brothers: Saturday, 11:30 PM ET on NBC

A Full Day

Hullraisers Season 1: Wednesday, Sundance Now and AMC+

Up Next

Florida Man: Thursday, April 13 on Netflix
The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel Season 5: Friday, April 14 on Amazon
The Last Thing He Told Me: Friday, April 14 on Apple TV+
A Black Lady Sketch Show Season 4 Premiere: Friday, April 14 on HBO

Dennis Perkins is a freelance entertainment writer with bylines at The A.V. Club, Paste, Ultimate Classic Rock, The Portland Press Herald, and elsewhere.