TV highlights
SUNDAY 9 p.m. on SHOW Billions
Julianna Margulies (“The Good Wife”) and Corey Stoll (“House of Cards”) join the cast as this critically acclaimed drama starts season five. Margulies guest stars as Ivy League sociology professor and bestselling author Catherine Brant, while Stoll plays Mike Prince, a social-impact pioneer who poses a big threat to Bobby “Axe” Axelrod’s (Damian Lewis) power. Elsewhere, Axe and Chuck Rhoades (Paul Giamatti) reignite their vicious rivalry, and Chuck feuds with a formidable district attorney.
MONDAY 9 p.m. on KDKA All Rise
Making a virtue of necessity, this new episode explores how the shelter-in-place rules relating to the COVID-19 crisis affect the criminal justice system. As the episode opens, Judge Benner (Marg Helgenberger) authorizes a “virtual” bench trial presided over by Judge Lola Carmichael (Simone Missick). The other characters including the defendant, lawyers and prosecutors argue their case via such video chat apps as FaceTime, WebEx and Zoom, while also trying to navigate their personal lives in quarantine.
TUESDAY 8:30 p.m. on WTAE Bless This Mess
A violent storm strike in Bucksnort makes several of the locals even more aware of their already fraught personal situations in the season two finale, “Tornado Season: Part Two.” Things between Beau and Mike (David Koechner, Dax Shepard) remain tense over which egg business will land a contract with Dolores’ (guest star Celia Watson) restaurant, and a mixup in pregnancy tests has Rio (Lake Bell), Kay (Lennon Parham) and Jacob’s (JT Neal) girlfriend all wondering whether the stork is on the way.
WEDNESDAY 10 p.m. on BET Ruthless
Originally created for BET’s streaming service BET&, this spinoff of Tyler Perry’s political drama “The Oval” sounds so over the top, it might make “Dynasty” look straitlaced. Melissa L. Williams heads the cast as Ruth Truesdale, a fanatical woman who kidnaps her young daughter, Callie (LondonRose Sellars), to join her in an insane sex-crazed cult known as the Rakudishis. Matt Cedeno, Lenny Thomas, Yvonne Senat Jones and David Alan Madrick co-star in the new “guilty pleasure” on which Perry is writer, director and executive producer.
THURSDAY 9 p.m. on MTV Families of the Mafia
In “Part VI,” a shocking and devastating loss turns everyone’s world upside down, while Karen and Karina are faced with a painful and seemingly impossible decision about whether they should leave Staten Island. Elsewhere, a nervous CP reunites with his father when he is finally is released from prison.
FRIDAY 9 p.m. on WQED In This Together: A PBS American Portrait Story
This new half-hour special provides insight into how Americans are adapting to the extraordinary demands of the coronavirus pandemic via self-shot video as well as photos and text. Participants share how the COVID-19 outbreak is affecting their own lives, their communities and their concept of what it means to live in our country during this challenging time.
SATURDAY 6 p.m. on OXYGEN Accident, Suicide or Murder
This docuseries — which delves into suspicious deaths that at least initially were presumed to be accidents, suicides or murders — opens sea- son two with an hour devoted to the case of Ellen Greenberg, found dead in her locked apartment, her body marked by 20 stab wounds. There are no signs of an intruder or a struggle, so detectives begin digging into the victim’s mental-health history for clues to the cause of death. Ultimately, her parents launch their own investigation.