Watchable the week of Nov. 23, 2020

SHOW OF THE WEEK: The Flight Attendant (Nov. 26, 9 p.m., Crave)

First things first: Cassie Bowden, the character played by Kaley Cuoco in this drama, is a mess. Her response to any type of stress is to guzzle vodka, or whatever other alcohol is handy, and hook up with random men; and since she wakes up shortly into the first episode with a hangover and a dead body in a Bangkok hotel room she’s under a considerable amount of stress.

So no, Cassie isn’t like Penny, the character Cuoco played on “The Big Bang Theory” for 12 seasons. On the other hand, she’s not unlikeable despite the rampant alcoholism and tendency to let people down.

Cassie’s already unsettled life as a flight attendant is further rattled when Alex (Michiel Huisman of “Game of Thrones”), the rich passenger that Cassie spent a booze-soaked night with, is murdered in the bed they share in an expensive Bangkok hotel. Cassie was so drunk she can’t remember more than flashes of the previous evening and has no idea what happened to Alex. Despite her half-assed efforts to clean up the crime scene and leave without being seen, it isn’t long before she’s on the FBI’s radar as a possible suspect.

Cassie develops her own theories about who might have killed Alex — often through imagined conversations with the dead man — and pursues them in ways that are both reckless and dangerous, which is in keeping with her character.

She has a way of pissing off the people who could help her, including co-workers Megan (Rosie Perez) and Shane (Griffin Matthews); lawyer and best friend Annie (Zosia Mamet) and older brother Davey (T.R. Knight), but that doesn’t mean we’re not rooting for her. 

In fact, as we learn more about Cassie’s troubled past, we want to see her face her demons and get her shit together, as well as clear herself of the crime.

It becomes obvious as the show progresses — I got to see four of the eight episodes — that Alex’s death is tied to some sort of criminal organization and that Cassie is in way over her head, although I suspect she’ll manage to bumble and charm her way out of whatever predicaments arise.

This isn’t gritty, ripped-from-the-headlines crime drama by any means; it’s sometimes funny and even silly, but thanks to Cassie — and Cuoco — it’s a ride I’m willing to take.

Black Narcissus (Nov. 23, 8 p.m., FX)

If you knew nothing about the novel and Oscar-winning movie that preceded this miniseries, your first thought might be “A group of nuns opening a school in the Himalayas? What’s so interesting about that?”

Truth be told, I haven’t read the Rumer Godden book or seen more than snippets of the 1947 film, but I found this adaptation rather intriguing.

As in the originals, the setting is a remote palace perched on a cliff in the Himalayas that formerly housed a harem and where a young woman took her own life. Whether it’s actually haunted or just imagined so by unstable Sister Ruth (Aisling Franciosi of “The Fall,” who excels at playing troubled young women) is open to interpretation, but it’s creepy enough.

And then there’s all the sexual tension. Sister Clodagh (former Bond girl Gemma Arterton) is determined to be a woman of God, despite her memories of a past liaison, but she is drawn to Mr. Dean (Alessandro Nivola), the Englishman who helps keep the school running, and he to her. Ruth, meanwhile, becomes obsessed with him and, as you can imagine, that’s unlikely to end well.

Ethnically appropriate actors play the roles of the locals, including caretaker Angu (Nila Aalia), student Kanchi (Dipika Kunwar) and the Young General (Chaneil Kular), the nephew of the nuns’ benefactor, the Old General (Kulvinder Ghir). (In the movie, white actors were made up to play Kanchi and the Old General.)

The series — filmed partly in Nepal — is atmospheric and beautifully shot and it’s only three episodes, which is like half an hour in pandemic viewing time.

Plus, it was the last TV role for Diana Rigg, who plays the nuns’ mother superior back in Darjeeling.

Saved By the Bell (Nov. 26, 8 p.m., W Network, Global)

I’m in the wrong demographic to have watched the original “Saved By the Bell,” the cult high school comedy that aired between 1989 and 1992, so I really can’t tell you if this reboot does the first show justice. It melds old and new by bringing back stars of the original while populating Bayside High School with new students.

The conceit is that Governor Zack (OG star Mark-Paul Gosselaar) has savaged California’s education budget, which means closing underprivileged schools and busing some of those kids to wealthy Bayside.

Zack is still married to Kelly (Tiffani Thiessen) while A.C. Slater (Mario Lopez) is now Bayside’s gym teacher and Jessie Spano (Elizabeth Berkley) is the guidance counsellor. Reliably funny actor John Michael Higgins (“Best in Show”) joins the cast as principal.

Zack and Jessie both have kids at the school: popular, clueless Mac (Mitchell Hoog) and underachieving athlete Jamie (Belmont Cameli), whose equally privileged pal Lexi is transgender (trans actor Josie Totah).

There’s no meanness between the rich kids and the newbies despite the socio-economic chasm that separates them (smart and ambitious Daisy, for instance, played by Haskiri Velazquez, can’t take advantage of the school apps because she’s still using an old-school brick of a cellphone). It doesn’t take long (I saw just one episode) for the imports to make their mark: Daisy in student government, Aisha (Alycia Pascual-Pena) on the football field and Devante (Dexter Darden) in tryouts for the school musical.

I found the humour goofy and mildly amusing. Whether the reboot succeeds will, I imagine, depend on whether it entertains the original series’ fans.

Black Beauty (Nov. 27, Disney Plus)

Disney has been expertly manipulating emotions with anthropomorphic animals at least as far back as “Dumbo” in 1941 and “Bambi” in 1942, a tradition upheld by this live-action “Black Beauty” remake.

Like the original 1877 Anna Sewell novel, the film tells the story from the horse’s point of view.

Beauty is now a wild mustang rounded up in present-day America and taken in by a horse sanctuary, where she remains proudly and stubbornly untameable despite the kindness of manager John Manly (Iain Glen of “Game of Thrones”). That is, until John’s orphaned niece Jo arrives (Mackenzie Foy, switching the gender from the 1971 and 1994 film versions) and bonds with the horse.

If you know the book or movie versions you know that the horse’s pleasant existence is upended and it trods a perilous path back to comfort and ease. So it is with this Beauty, a female given voice by Kate Winslet.

After Beauty spends a summer under Jo’s watchful eye leased out to a cartoonishly horrible rich woman (Claire Forlani) and her spoiled daughter (Fern Deacon), the sanctuary is closed and Beauty is sold. She passes from one owner to the next, some kind, some cruel, while Jo vows never to stop looking for her. 

This is a Disney movie, so luckily the horse isn’t subjected to any really dire physical abuse. As for the emotional toll, well, keep a tissue or a hankie handy. Is there a happy ending for Jo and Black Beauty? Do you even have to ask?

Documentary Corner

The doc that’s bound to grab the most attention this week is “Shawn Mendes: In Wonder” (Nov. 23, Netflix), which is timed to the release of his album “Wonder” on Dec. 4. The 22-year-old Pickering-born superstar comes across as relatively humble and grounded despite his massive fame as the doc, directed by Grant Singer, follows him to dates on last year’s 105-show tour — including his triumphal Toronto show — and into the recording studio. On the human side, we see Mendes hanging out with family, childhood friends and girlfriend Camila Cabello. 

CBC has the timely “The COVID Cruise” (Nov. 27, 9 p.m., “The Nature of Things” and CBC Gem) about how COVID-19 tore through the Diamond Princess cruise ship at the start of the pandemic, directed by Mike Downie (yes, Gord’s brother) and written by David Wells. The dry, air-conditioned atmosphere aboard ship was perfect for the virus and although non-symptomatic passengers were quarantined in their cabins it didn’t stop the spread. All passengers were eventually evacuated after 705 infections and 14 deaths. Yet more than 100 cruise ships embarked after the Diamond Princess outbreak, leading to predictable infections and deaths.

TVO has “Running Wild: The Cats of Cornwall” (Nov. 24, 9 p.m.) by Aaron Hancox. It turns out the Ontario city is the stray cat capital of Canada, which is bad for the cats, not to mention the bird and small animal populations. The doc follows the two local women behind Cattrap, which traps, spays and neuters feral cats, and the Tiny But Mighty Kitten Rescue, as well as other concerned citizens who feed the cats. It’s stressful, never-ending work, which gets a boost when the city council eventually passes a cat control bylaw.

Finally, PBS has “Saving Notre Dame” (Nov. 25, 9 p.m. on “Nova”), which I didn’t get to prescreen but which is about the restoration of Paris’s famed Notre Dame Cathedral after last April’s devastating fire.

Odds and Ends

Crave has the HBO Max movie comedy “Superintelligence” (Nov. 26), starring Melissa McCarthy as an ordinary woman whose TV, phone and microwave start talking back to her, and whose life is taken over by the world’s first superintelligence (James Corden). Bobby Cannavale (“Homecoming,” “Boardwalk Empire”) also stars.

CBC Gem has “Noughts and Crosses” (Nov. 27), a young adult love story starring Masali Baduza and Jack Rowan (“Peaky Blinders”) set in an alternate reality in which Africa has colonized Europe.

Global TV has the “SNL Thanksgiving Special” (Nov. 27, 8 p.m.), featuring a selection of Thanksgiving-themed sketches from the comedy show’s 46 seasons.

BritBox has both seasons of the 1960s sketch comedy “Do Not Adjust Your Set,” starring Monty Pythoners Eric Idle, Michael Palin and Terry Jones, and more.