What to Watch on Friday: New true crime from Dateline and 20/20, a new comedy from Netflix
Dead to Me (Netflix) - This new dark comedy series stars Christina Applegate as Jen, a sardonic widow determined to solve her husband’s hit-and-run murder, and Linda Cardellini as Judy, a free spirit who has also suffered a loss. The women meet in a support group and become friends, and Judy will ultimately try to shield Jen from a shocking secret that could destroy her life. Ed Asner and James Marsden also star.
Dateline NBC (9 p.m., NBC) - In this special 2-hour “Dateline,” Dennis Murphy reports on a Connecticut bank executive who is targeted by a crew of criminals who invade his home and then take him and his mother hostage, ordering him to rob his own bank. If he doesn’t commit the crime, they threaten to blow him up with a bomb strapped to his waist. Investigators think it looks like an inside job, but after a string of similar crimes in Tennessee, they learn the victims were picked based on social media posts. This is the first of three consecutive all-new two-hour “Dateline” episodes airing on Friday nights.
20/20: Seed of Doubt (10 p.m., ABC) - This week’s show tells the story of a Texas woman, conceived with an anonymous sperm donor, who learns that her biological father is not Donor 106, as she had been told, but the fertility doctor who treated her mother.
Into the Dark: All That We Destroy (Hulu) - The eighth installment of “Into the Dark” is about a geneticist who fears that her son may be becoming a serial killer, so she creates a group of clones in an attempt to cure him of his psychopathic tendencies by allowing him to relive the murder of his first victim.
At the Heart of Gold: Inside the USA Gymnastics Scandal (8 p.m., HBO) - This documentary is based on years of research to chronicle the sexual abuse of hundreds of female athletes by Dr. Larry Nassar, the physician for the U.S. women’s Olympic gymnastics team. The documentary has interviews with athletes at the center of the story, as well as coaches, lawyers and journalists, and reveals a dangerous system that prioritized winning over everything else.
Some programming descriptions are provided by networks.