| August 24, 2026 
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A hilarious Gen Z hangout comedy | | From left, Amita Rao, Malik Elassal, Lucy Freyer and Jack Innanen in a scene from Season 2 of the Gen Z comedy “Adults.” Michael Gibson/FX |
Dear Watchers,If you have already lived through your 20s, you may remember that awkward feeling of being a few years removed from the wild nights and chill days of college and yet a few years away from figuring out how you will spend the rest of your life. That age’s woes and wonders are dissected sharply in the very funny FX sitcom “Adults,” now entering its second season and carrying on the tradition of amiable hangout shows like “Friends,” “Happy Endings” and “New Girl.” Created by Ben Kronengold and Rebecca Shaw — formerly writers for “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon” — “Adults” is set in New York City and is one of the rare comedies about young urbanites that considers how broke 20-somethings can afford to live in the city. It is all thanks to Samir (Malik Elassal), a lovable bumbler who lives rent-free in his parents’ house in Queens with his four best friends while his folks are traveling. Those friends include Anton (Owen Thiele), a gay social butterfly who projects effortless cool but is just as much of a screw-up as his pals. Samir’s oldest friend is Billie (Lucy Freyer), who early in Season 1 lost her dream job in broadcasting and is still regrouping. The other roommates are a couple: Issa (Amita Rao), who wants to be seen as making a difference in the world, and Paul Baker (Jack Innanen), a charmer whom everyone always calls by his full name. The first two episodes of the new season of “Adults” will debut on FXX on Thursday. (The whole season will be available the same day on Hulu.) The second episode, “Fake ID,” is a solid piece of cringe comedy, with Billie and Samir awkwardly mentoring the underage people who inherited their phony drivers’ licenses. But the season premiere, “The Scrub,” is “Adults” at its most riotous, packing two farcical plots into a tight 24 minutes. One story line has Billie trying to remove a highly problematic photo of herself from Facebook with the help of Anton, a master of burying old mistakes. (“I got Fox to pull my entire season of ‘MasterChef Junior,’” he claims.) In the other, Issa learns that her sweet, sensitive boyfriend, Paul Baker, still hangs out sometimes with the macho dudes who were his first New York friend group, and she tries to prove that she can bro down too. The humor here is pretty universal, because who hasn’t been young and kind of dumb? But it is also specific to Gen Z, which grew up online and is perhaps prone to excessive self-consciousness. Although these semi-adults are outwardly hip and culturally diverse — “We have almost one of every one!” Issa boasts — they are also paralyzed by the fear of making wrong choices and squandering some of their prime years. That’s the dilemma — and the comedy — of being in your 20s. Also this week | | Joel Edgerton in a scene from Season 2 of the twisty sci-fi thriller “Dark Matter.” Apple TV |
- The PBS series “American Masters” turns its spotlight on a great American poet with the Sasha Waters documentary “Mary Oliver: Saved by the Beauty of the World,” featuring readings from Helena Bonham Carter, Steve Buscemi, Stephen Colbert and Oprah Winfrey. The episode airs on Tuesday at 9 p.m. on PBS (check local listings) and will also be available to stream on PBS Passport.
- Game show fans and trivia buffs have been anxiously awaiting the latest season of “Jeopardy! Masters,” which will see the past “Masters” champs Yogesh Raut and Victoria Groce go up against the “Jeopardy!” stalwarts Andrew He, Long Nguyen, Paolo Pasco and Juveria Zaheer. The tournament begins on ABC at 8 p.m. on Tuesday, and each episode will be available on Hulu the following day.
- The richly realized TV mini-series adaptation of Gabriel García Márquez’s “One Hundred Years of Solitude” comes to an end with a sweeping finale episode, wrapping up the multigenerational saga of the Buendía family and their ill-fated hometown. The ending debuts on Wednesday on Netflix.
- The mind-bending science-fiction series “Dark Matter” is back for Season 2, with Joel Edgerton reprising his role as Jason, a physicist who discovers the existence of alternate universes — and learns that at least one alternate version of himself is up to no good. The first episode arrives on Friday, on Apple TV.
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