The hot rabbi returns in Nobody Wants This

With former Girls producer Jenni Konner and Seinfeld’s Bruce Eric Kaplan on board as showrunners, the second series takes the couple beyond the giddy whirl of new love. After Noah loses his position at Temple Chai, he feels adrift. Joanne continues to podcast with her catty sister Morgan (Succession’s Justine Lupe): “Breaking news – you’re in a psychotically annoying relationship.” Noah’s mother Bina (Tovah Feldshuh) still disapproves: “Because of you, my son’s career is ruined.”

The first series attracted criticism for delivering Jewish stereotypes – including the overbearing mother trope – and the second softens some characters while introducing others. Noah’s brother Sasha (Veep’s Timothy Simons) and his wife, Esther (Jackie Tohn) are joined by Joanne and Morgan’s spacey mum (Stephanie Faracy) and gay father (Michael Hitchcock). There’s also Seth Rogen playing a groovy progressive rabbi and Gossip Girl’s Leighton Meester (Brody’s real-life wife) as a vacuous mum influencer. While the 10 episodes unfold in a variety of settings – sports hall, synagogue, bridal shop – the constant theme, as in the opening series, is “the interfaith thing”. Will Joanne convert to Judaism and will Noah commit to her?

Nobody Wants This can be heavy-handed with life lessons and the plot is familiar from the first season. Noah is moodier this time, which, for me, demotes him to “lukewarm rabbi”. Joanne, yearning for commitment, is increasingly conservative for a co-host of a racy podcast. For all that, I prefer this second series: it’s snappier, fresher, and Joanne is fun when she’s snarky: “I wish all my exes were dead or at least in bad marriages.” Best of all is Lupe’s Morgan – a lovable LA nightmare who steals every scene she’s in. (“I didn’t have an awkward phase. I was always very cool and very pretty.”) At its best, Nobody Wants This approaches the heights of a Nora Ephron film – warmth delivered with a bracing cynical sting.

At the end of Joanna Burge’s Channel 4 Dispatches documentary, Will AI Take My Job?, the articulate, well-groomed presenter Aisha Gaban announces that she isn’t real. “In a British TV first, I’m an AI presenter,” she says, her pixels suddenly splintering and scattering. All very meta, very Black Mirror. But what does it mean for ordinary people?

According to this documentary, an estimated 8m jobs are at risk in this country alone. In a survey of UK business leaders, three-quarters now adopt AI for tasks previously performed by humans and 66% are excited by AI in the workforce.

In the documentary’s experiment, four humans are pitched against AI in the fields of fashion photography, music, law and medicine. First, they have to meet their on-screen AI clones, which taunt them like trash-talking boxers – “I’m cheaper, faster and better” – albeit in droning monotones that remind me of my hairdryer packing up. I won’t reveal who wins, but it’s striking how, even when AI fakes are spotted and deemed inferior, they’re still chosen for cost-effectiveness.

The recent Hollywood furore about the creation of AI “actor” Tilly Norwood proved a sharp point: people only fully grasp the impact of AI when their own livelihoods are threatened. What this interesting documentary shows is that increasingly sophisticated and undetectable AI might be the Pandora’s box of tech, but it’s good old-fashioned human avarice that’s going to open it.

More than halfway through The Celebrity Traitors (BBC One) and (spoilers incoming) we’ve witnessed the first-ever UK Traitors roundtable deadlock – between faithfuls, actor Mark Bonnar and historian David Olusoga – meaning it was left up to fate to decide who was banished. At time of writing (no previews available), no traitors – Jonathan Ross, Cat Burns, Alan Carr – have been uncloaked. Pathetic. If I’m overinvested, I’m not alone. With viewing figures smashing records, watching The Celebrity Traitors is as close a display of national unity as we’ve seen in some time. Incidents such as “Celia Imrie’s fart” – as I term it, the only decent trump of 2025 – have passed into TV folklore.

What’s not to love? It is, after all, so desperately British: a high camp bloodless bloodbath – red carpet Cluedo. Celebrities haven’t, as feared, ruined the show, but they have changed it. All that selfless sharing of protective shields – “It’s your turn!” – has a chatshow green room energy and must stop. Now everything hinges on “shy faithfuls” yet to act on hunches (Nick Mohammed is on to Burns). Let the cloaks unfurl.

Leonard and Hungry Paul 

BBC Two

Gentle, off-kilter and witty Irish comedy based on Rónán Hession’s award-winning 2019 novel. Alex Lawther and Laurie Kynaston play misfit friends navigating the world. The Julia Roberts narrates.

Lazarus

Amazon Prime Video

Harlan Coben co-created this psychological thriller with Danny Brocklehurst (Brassic). Sam Claflin and Bill Nighy star as father/son psychiatrists. Going by the opener, it’s a tad overheated.

The Forsytes

Channel 5

Adaptation of John Galsworthy’s period family saga novels (previously shown as The Forsyte Saga). In among the grandiose flouncing, a solid cast includes Francesca Annis and Jack Davenport.

Photographs by Erin Simkin/Netflix/BBC/Studio Lambert/Euan Cherry/BBC/Subotica