From the gridiron action of Super Bowl LVIII to Jon Stewart’s return to The Daily Show, we round up our top 10 shows to watch this week

1. The Super Bowl Soulful Celebration 25th Anniversary – Saturday, February 10, CBS

Since its humble origins as a pre-game gospel brunch, the Super Bowl Soulful Celebration has grown to become an annual concert spectacular. This year, hosts Cedric the Entertainer and Tichina Arnold welcome an array of musical performers, including Earth, Wind & Fire, Kirk Franklin, Mary Mary, Robin Thicke and many more. “It’s a privilege to collaborate with the NFL for 25 years and counting, creating an event that celebrates the powerful intersection of football, music and inspiration,” says Melanie Few, who founded the event back in 1999.

2. Super Bowl LVIII – Sunday, February 11, CTV, TSN1 & CBS

The squads have been set for football’s ultimate clash, and it all feels very Hollywood — both in terms of the action on the field and the star power in the bleachers. 

First off, the matchup between the Kansas City Chiefs and the San Francisco 49ers features a quarterback matchup between living legend Patrick Mahomes and perpetual underdog Brock Purdy, who was picked dead last in the 2022 entry draft (earning the nickname “Mr. Irrelevant”). Beyond that, Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce is, perhaps you’ve heard, dating Taylor Swift — leading to rampant debate about whether or not the biggest pop star on the planet will be able to pull herself away from the latest stop on her current “Eras” tour in Tokyo to attend the game.

Finally, there’s the always-fascinating pageantry of the halftime show, which this year is anchored by R&B icon Usher.

3. Stupid Pet Tricks – Monday, February 12, CTV Comedy | Series Premiere

One of David Letterman’s signature Late Night/Late Show bits is back with its very own spinoff series, in which a parade of pets performs the most ridiculous — and occasionally impressive — tricks, on a studio stage in front of a live audience. In addition to the talented animals, the show also promises comedy bits, games and surprise celebrity guests, with one pet winning the “Stupidest Trick of the Week” honours. 

Produced by Letterman’s Worldwide Pants, Stupid Pet Tricks is hosted by comedian extraordinaire Sarah Silverman. “The rule in show business is, ‘Never work with animals or children’ but I choose to work with David Letterman anyway,” Silverman quipped in a statement. 

“David Letterman is an entertainment legend who changed the face of broadcast history with three simple words: ‘Stupid Pet Tricks,’ ” added Brad Weitz (manager of TBS, TNT and truTV, the outlets airing the show in the U.S.). “Not just anyone could carry on that legacy, except the wickedly brilliant Sarah Silverman. I have no doubt that her brand of comedy will bring heart and raw humour in a way that will capture the original heritage of ‘Stupid Pet Tricks’ and provide hilarious moments for a new generation yearning to seek truth and laugh till they cry.”

4. The Daily Show – Tuesday, February 13, Paramount+

Canadian comedy aficionados lost one of their primary sources of info-tainment a few months ago, when The Daily Show was dropped by CTV. But now, you can find the edgy cable-news satire on streamer Paramount+ — with a very familiar face back behind the desk. 

Indeed, The Daily Show redefined late night under the steadfast, tongue-in-cheek leadership of Jon Stewart. While he wasn’t TDS’s first host (that honour belongs to Craig Kilborn), Stewart is the man who, starting in 1999, turned the series from a niche, basic-cable oddity into a pop-cultural juggernaut. Upon his departure in 2015, the torch was passed to Trevor Noah, who kept the laughs and the incisive commentary coming until 2022, before following Stewart out the door. Since then, U.S. network Comedy Central has been cycling through an array of guest hosts — and just recently it was announced that producers would not, in fact, be anointing a new full-timer anytime soon. 

However, we now know that Stewart himself is returning part-time as of this Tuesday, set to anchor TDS one day per week throughout the 2024 U.S. presidential election season. (The rest of the week will be helmed by a rotation of the show’s existing “correspondents.”) Stewart, who recently saw his Apple TV+ political series The Problem With Jon Stewart cancelled after two seasons, will also be resuming his old post as executive producer. Said network CEO Chris McCarthy: “Jon Stewart is the voice of our generation, and we are honoured to have him return to Comedy Central’s The Daily Show to help us all make sense of the insanity and division roiling the country as we enter the election season. In our age of staggering hypocrisy and performative politics, Jon is the perfect person to puncture the empty rhetoric and provide much-needed clarity with his brilliant wit.”

5. Five Blind Dates – Tuesday, February 13, Prime Video

Twenty-something Lia (Shuang Hu) reluctantly receives a prophecy from a fortune teller, who says the fate of her failing Chinese tea shop and her love life are intertwined, and her destiny lies in one of her next five dates. Facing pressure from her family, Lia agrees to be set up with five different suitors. With her best friend Mason (Ilai Swindells) by her side, will Lia find herself (and love), or risk disappointing everyone and losing the business she has put her whole life into?

6. La Brea – Tuesday, February 13, CTV2 & NBC | Series Finale

NBC’s ever-unpredictable sci-fi thriller wraps its abbreviated final season as the survivors stranded in 10,000 B.C. make a risky bid to get back to the present — forcing one or more of them to make the ultimate sacrifice. 

7. Taylor Tomlinson: Have It All – Tuesday, February 13, Netflix

A rising young comic who counts Conan O’Brien among her many fans, Taylor Tomlinson has also just parlayed her standup buzz into a gig replacing James Corden in CBS’s late-late-night slot, as host of After Midnight. 

So, indeed, Have It All is a fitting title for her latest Netflix special. Here, the California native riffs on dating woes, inventive dirty talk and, of course, “dream jobs.” Teasing the special to Forbes as she was honing it on-tour, Tomlinson said: “I wanted this new, current hour to be lighter and sillier — and probably just a little more fun for myself and for the audience. Right now, I like where the hour is at. Quarter-Life Crisis [her previous special] was kind of about not knowing who you were. And then, I think this hour is kind of about knowing who you are — but not knowing why your life isn’t where you thought it’d be.”

8. Far North – Thursday, February 15, AMC+ | Series Premiere

The term “stranger than fiction” is thrown around quite often, but it’s seldom been better applied than to this somehow-fact-based crime drama from Down Under.

My Life Is Murder alum Robyn Malcolm and Boba Fett himself Temuera Morrison star as Heather and Ed, a couple living out their golden years in the remote expanses of New Zealand. Alas, that quiet life gets a whole lot noisier when they cross paths with an Australian gang bumbling their way through a $500-million deal, who end up stranded with a boat full of meth. As circumstances and ineptitude conspire, Ed and Heather manage to not only survive the ordeal, but bring the crooks to justice, leading to the largest drug bust in New Zealand history. 

The six-part series debuts with two episodes on Thursday. Describing Far North in Kiwi outlet The Post, journalist Adam Dudding opined: “It’s a rollicking failed-heist comedy-drama, and some of the dumber-and-dumber plot points are so ridiculous I presumed they’d been added purely for laughs — but when I checked news cuttings, it turns out the more absurd the detail, the more likely it was to be true.”

9. Life & Beth – Friday, February 16, Disney+ | Season Premiere

A true force of nature in the comedy world for the past decade, Amy Schumer has left her indelible mark on standup, sketch and the big screen. In spring 2022, she showed us yet another new dimension, creating and starring in her very first serialized dramedy. Life & Beth casts Schumer as a Manhattan wine saleswoman who, after her big-city life implodes, is reluctantly drawn back to her hometown of Long Island, where she’s compelled to reckon with her various dysfunctions and finally face the ghosts of her past.

Season one earned positive reviews for not only chuckles, but its raw, poignant, honest depiction of a troubled young woman struggling to figure things out. Another highlight for critics was the chemistry between Schumer and Canadian Arrested Development star Michael Cera as John, the local vineyard farmer who, over the course of 10 episodes, mended Beth’s broken heart.

In season two, John and Beth are starting to get serious. But amidst thoughts of marriage, Beth realizes she has more work to do in reckoning with old wounds, and keeping the painful, self-destructive past from repeating itself. 

This year’s guest stars include Girls’ Jemima Kirke, American Crime Story’s Beanie Feldstein, The White Lotus’s Jennifer Coolidge, and SNL legends Colin Quinn and Tim Meadows.

10. This Is Me… Now: A Love Story – Friday, February 16, Prime Video

Said to be unlike anything that viewers have ever seen from her before, Jennifer Lopez (who also co-wrote the project) is at the centre of what’s described as “a narrative-driven cinematic odyssey, steeped in mythological storytelling and personal healing.” Released in conjunction with her first studio album in a decade, This Is Me . . . Now, the film features Lopez inviting viewers to join her on her journey to love, while she also demonstrates the importance of loving oneself. 

“With fantastical costumes, breathtaking choreography and star-studded cameos, this panorama is an introspective retrospective of Jennifer’s resilient heart,” the press release declares. Those cameos, by the way, include the likes of Fat Joe, Trevor Noah, Kim Petras, Post Malone, Keke Palmer, Sofía Vergara, Jenifer Lewis, Jay Shetty, Neil deGrasse Tyson, Sadhguru, Tony Bellissimo, Derek Hough and even Lopez’s husband, Ben Affleck.