Watchable the week of Sept. 21, 2020

SHOW OF THE WEEK: Fargo (Sept. 27, 10 p.m., FX)

“You play the hand you’re dealt,” says the “Rabbi” (Ben Whishaw), one of the vivid ensemble of characters in the fourth season of Noah Hawley’s “Fargo.” Here, the hand is a gorgeously shot tale of two crime syndicates fighting for control of the underworld in Kansas City, Missouri, in 1950.

This season is unlikely to appease critics who found Season 3 too diffuse in the way it spread its characters around, but there’s a lot to be said for these characters and the actors who play them.

Chris Rock anchors the cast as Loy Cannon, boss of a Black criminal gang trying to maintain an uneasy peace with the local Mafia, led by Josto Fadda (Jason Schwartzman). Loy is well aware of what white America thinks of him and determined to snatch his share of riches in spite of it. “I will do whatever it takes to win,” he says.

The Italians see themselves as higher up the food chain because of the colour of their skin, but Josto is fighting on two fronts: against Loy’s gang and against his own brother, Gaetano (Italian actor Salvatore Esposito), who’s fresh off the boat from Second World War-ravaged Italy and thirsty for blood.

Other characters weave in and out of the main plot, including twisted nurse Oraetta Mayflower (Jessie Buckley, turning her Irish brogue into a credible Minnesota accent); brainy teenager Ethelrida Pearl Smutney (E’myri Crutchfield), who has a white father (Andrew Bird) and a Black mother (Anji White); Zelmare (Karen Aldridge) and Swanee (Kelsey Asbille), a pair of lesbian, ex-con outlaws; Mormon U.S. Marshal “Deafy” Wickware (Timothy Olyphant) and twitchy detective Odis Weff (Jack Huston).

So yes, there’s a lot to take in and some of the story threads seem less relevant to the main plot than others. 

In part, it’s a story about the hollowness of the so-called American dream and about who gets to pursue it. It’s also about power and family and loyalty and the illusion of control. You can do your best to exercise control, as Loy and Josto do, but you can’t dictate what hands you get dealt.

Filthy Rich (Sept. 21, 9 p.m. CTV)

If you’re looking for nuanced character development and plot lines with gravitas, don’t look here. If you’re looking for a soap opera that mixes sex, greed and religion, and boasts a formidable leading lady, you’re in the right place.

This dramedy created by Tate Taylor, who wrote the screenplay for “The Help,” is primarily a vehicle for Kim Cattrall to strut her stuff as Margaret Monreaux, the matriarch of a, yes, filthy rich family of televangelists. Things start to go to hell, if you’ll pardon the expression, when the plane carrying her husband, Eugene (Gerald McRaney), crashes while he’s being entertained by a couple of prostitutes, no less, and his will reveals the existence of three illegitimate children.

That sets the scene for a battle of wills between Margaret and one of those kids, Ginger Sweet (Melia Kreiling, “Tyrant”), who runs a porn website and is determined to squeeze as much as she can from Margaret and her multi-billion-dollar empire.

There are plenty of side plots involving Margaret’s disgruntled children (Corey Cott and Aubrey Dollar), stepsons Antonio (Benjamin Levy Aguilar) and Jason (Mark L. Young), the slick but slimy Reverend Paul (Aaron Lazar) and a group of shady investors who want a stake in Margaret’s newest moneymaking venture, a shopping club that peddles Christian values along with the soap and toilet paper.

Utopia (Sept. 25, Amazon)

It’s hard at times to tell the heroes and villains apart in “Utopia,” a remake of a dark British thriller of the same name. 

There’s plenty of killing in the eight-part series, not to mention a little torture, and it’s not just the obvious bad guys snuffing out lives. Luckily, the viewers have several proxies to guide them through the mayhem, a group of comic book nerds who get swept into a conspiracy involving a deadly virus and a plot to save the world.

It starts with the discovery of an unpublished graphic novel called “Utopia,” the sequel to a cult comic called “Dystopia,” which appeared to predict the existence of several real-world viruses.

Utopia obsessives Becky (Ashleigh LaThrop), Ian (Dan Byrd), Samantha (Jessica Rothe), Wilson Wilson (Desmin Borges) and Grant (Javon Walton) travel to a Comic-Con-like convention in Cleveland aiming to get their hands on the book, only to discover that it’s also being sought by a very dangerous and ruthless group of people.

The nerds team up with real-life comic book character Jessica Hyde (Sasha Lane) to unravel the clues contained in Utopia’s pages and try to puzzle out what dangers the villain known as Mr. Rabbit has in store for the world.

Occasionally, diving into the Utopia mythology can feel a bit like going down a rabbit hole, but the series is fast-paced, the twists are compelling and the pieces eventually click into place.

It was created by Gillian Flynn, known for novels-turned-screenplays like “Gone Girl” and “Sharp Objects.” And Dennis Kelly, who created the original “Utopia,” is a writer and executive producer on this one.

John Cusack is the name star, in his first regular role in a TV series, playing scientist Dr. Kevin Christie. Rainn Wilson (“The Office”) also stars as virologist Dr. Michael Stearns.

“Utopia” has a definite dystopian bent along with a misanthropic heroine in Jessica Hyde, but its humanity manages to break through, sometimes in places you’d least expect it.

Odds and Ends

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a Jane Austen fan in possession of a BritBox subscription must be in want of a remastered version of “Pride and Prejudice.” If you’re a fan of that novel, Austen’s best in my opinion, then I’m preaching to the choir with my bastardization of one of her most famous lines. I’m also a massive fan of the 1995 BBC adaptation of the book, which made international stars of Colin Firth and Jennifer Ehle as quintessential Austen couple Fitzwilliam Darcy and Elizabeth Bennet. The digitally restored version of the miniseries debuts on BritBox Sept. 25 in honour of the 25th anniversary.
BritBox also has a remastered version of “Agatha Christie’s Partners in Crime” debuting Sept. 22.

Jann Arden is back for the second season of her sitcom “Jann” (Sept. 21, 8 p.m., CTV). If you loved the TV version of Jann in all her narcissism and self-deprecation in Season 1, then you’ll be down with Season 2. You can read my Toronto Star interview with Jann here.

HBO has “Agents of Chaos” (Sept. 23, 9 p.m.), a new two-part documentary by Oscar winner Alex Gibney (“Going Clear”) about Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. election and ongoing efforts to disrupt democracy, surely a vital topic with a new presidential election coming up.

Staying with the political theme, Crave has the Showtime two-parter “The Comey Rule” (Sept. 27, 9 p.m.), based on the book “A Higher Loyalty” by former FBI director James Comey. The series dramatizes Comey’s take on the election of Donald Trump (played by Brendan Gleeson), the role that Russia played in that election and the events leading up to Comey’s firing by Trump, with Comey played by well known Trump critic Jeff Daniels.

If you like true crime documentaries, “A Wilderness of Error” is worth checking out (Sept. 25, 8 p.m., FX). Produced by Jason Blum and Marc Smerling (“The Jinx”) and written by acclaimed documentary maker Errol Morris (“Fog of War”), it involves the shocking 1970 murder in Fort Bragg, N.C., of a pregnant woman and two little girls, allegedly by their husband and father, army doctor Jeffrey MacDonald, who continues to maintain his innocence.

Finally, Apple TV Plus has “Tehran” (Sept. 25), an espionage thriller about a Mossad agent who goes deep undercover on a dangerous mission in the Iranian capital. It stars Israeli actress Niv Sultan and was co-created by Moshe Zonder, known for the Netflix series “Fauda.”