THE AFFAIR
Showtime, 10:00 p.m. ET
SEASON PREMIERE: For Season 2, The Affair is doubling down. Last season, this drama, which demands that you watch closely in order to note all its subtle shifts in perspective, presented the same love affair and mystery story from twin points of view: Noah (Dominic West), the married author who initiates an illicit affair with a local married waitress, and that waitress, Alison (Ruth Wilson), who sometimes recalls the same events very, or slightly differently, than her lover. This season, those two characters are together, having split up with their respective spouses – but this year, those spouses, Noah’s soon-to-be-ex-wife Helen (Maura Tierney) and Alison’s jealous ex-husband Cole (Joshua Jackson), get their own point-of-view story segments as well. We don’t watch each scene played four times with different attitudes and wardrobes, though: For Season 2, there’s a lot less narrative overlap, but more stories and secrets revealed over all. And Richard Schiff from The West Wing, joining the cast as the lawyer hired to defend Noah on charges of vehicular manslaughter, is a perfect addition to this drama, right from his very first scene.