Cross Returns, Love Is Blind, Winter Olympics, Beauty Origin Story

Aldis Hodge brings a formidable glower to his embodiment of the well-named Alex Cross, the intense D.C. detective and forensic psychologist from James Patterson’s best-sellers. In the crime drama’s second season, he and FBI agent Kayla Craig (Alona Tal) track vengeful killers who’ve targeted Jeffrey Epstein-style moguls with a history of sex trafficking. Their latest target: Lance Durand (Scream‘s Matthew Lillard), an agriculture-tech billionaire and philanthropist who denies a close association with the rich pervs but panics when he receives a grisly warning. Cross also stays busy doing damage control with his ex-lover, Elle (Samantha Walkes), who’s still close to his kids, and with his partner and childhood bestie John Sampson (Isaiah Mustafa), who is slow to forgive when a decades-old family secret is revealed. Launches with three episodes.

The “social experiment” reaches its 10th season, with a new group of singles entering the pods, now in Ohio, making sight-unseen emotional connections that they hope will continue once they actually lay eyes on each other. (It’s like the blind auditions on The Voice with a wedding on the line.) Vanessa and Nick Lachey are back as hosts, guiding these couples from an unorthodox first meeting through their impending unions. The first six episodes drop today, with the finale scheduled for March 4.

Coverage of the first full Wednesday of competition in Milan and Cortina starts in the early morning with livestreaming on Peacock and live coverage of Nordic combined men’s normal hill ski jump, women’s snowboard halfpipe qualifying, men’s Super G skiing, and women’s moguls on USA Network. NBC‘s afternoon coverage includes women’s moguls skiing finals, men’s 1000m speedskating, free dance figure skating, and qualifying rounds for men’s snowboard halfpipe. (For details, go to nbcolympics.com/schedule.) NBC’s Primetime in Milan recap of the day’s events begins at 8/7c.

“You are a caveman playing with fire now, and fire burns,” warns Ray (Rob Yang), the scientist who developed the miracle anti-aging drug that has transformed the ruthless tech billionaire Byron Forst (Ashton Kutcher) into a libidinous beast, reckless of consequences. But we already know there are consequences in this gruesome body-horror thriller, which takes us into the lab where vials of the top-secret treatment provide too good a temptation for a nerdy employee (Eddie Kaye Thomas) to pass up. And thus the legend of Patient Zero is born.

Emmy winner Jeff Daniels guests on the poignant dramedy as Jimmy’s (Jason Segel) emotionally aloof dad, Randy, who’s not surprised to learn that his neurotic son is stuck in neutral when it comes to restarting his love life. Elsewhere, “D-Day” — as in “delivery day” — is looming for Brian (Michael Urie), Charlie (Devin Kawaoka), and their surrogate Ava (Claudia Sulewski), with Liz (Christa Miller) taking charge. One hitch: Ava hasn’t signed the adoption papers yet.

INSIDE WEDNESDAY TV:

• The Masked Singer (8/7c, Fox): Christina Perri performs when the show celebrates Valentine’s Day with a Twilight-themed episode.
• Nature (8/7c, PBS): The “Parenthood” series explores freshwater animal families, including a frog dad who carries tadpoles on his back while climbing trees in the Amazon. Followed by Nova (9/8c), which explores “Mammal Origins” from Earth’s earliest days.

ON THE STREAM:

• Riot Women (streaming on BritBox): The women make their first recording in a professional studio in the season finale. Thankfully, these proudly punk princesses of a certain age will continue making noise in a second season.
• The Scream Murder: A True Teen Horror Story (streaming on Hulu): A three-part true-crime docuseries revisits the 2006 stabbing murder of Idaho high-schooler Cassie Stoddart, whose killers were classmates claiming to have been inspired by the meta slasher movie Scream.
• Origin: The Story of the Basketball African League (streaming on the ESPN App): A four-part docuseries depicts the formation of the pan-African pro basketball league founded in 2019.