The International Flavor of Apple TV+, Sophie Turner Is ‘Joan,’ Bela Lugosi Is TCM’s Star of the Month, ‘NOVA’ Explores the Solar System

The Emmy-winning British spy dramedy escalates the suspense in Season 4’s penultimate episode when rogue agent River (Jack Lowden) is taken into custody, trying to convince anyone that his grandfather and former spy master David Cartwright (Jonathan Pryce) is still very much in danger. Turns out River’s also a target, being stalked by the terrifying Terminator-like assassin Patrice (Tom Wozniczka). David, meanwhile, is being protected by River’s disheveled boss Jackson Lamb (the great Gary Oldman), who finally learns the truth behind the secret program that’s causing all the mayhem throughout London.

Series Premiere

Lately, Apple TV+ has been adding to its distinguished library with foreign-language winners (La Maison from France, Women in Blue from Mexico). The latest comes from Germany, a madcap dark comedy-mystery about two frantic parents, Dedo and Carlotta Klatt (Axel Stein and Heike Makatsch), who’ll do anything to find their missing daughter Wanda (Lea Drinda) — including setting up surveillance cameras in their neighborhood’s homes with the help of their hearing-impaired son Ole (Leo Simon). The Klatts’ farcical attempts to spy on their neighbors takes a twist when they discover bizarre secrets about people they thought they knew. But are any of them harboring their daughter? The series launches with two episodes.

Also of note: The Spanish-language drama Midnight Family evokes the heyday of ER in a taut episode set in the aftermath of a major earthquake shaking Mexico City, with the paramedic family rushing into danger to rescue people trapped in a collapsed building. Their father, Ramón (Joaquin Cosío), is still in the hospital, and despite warnings not to overtax his ailing heart, he snaps into action to help the overwhelmed medical staff.

Series Premiere

9/8c

Game of Thrones’ Emmy-nominated Sophie Turner becomes slightly more contemporary in the title role of a melodrama about a woman who stumbles into a life of crime and becomes a renowned jewel thief in the flashy 1980s. The pilot episode introduces Joan Harrington (Turner) as a desperate young mother who escapes a harrowing marriage to a criminal and attempts to reinvent herself, putting her beloved daughter into temporary (she hopes) foster care. Though Joan tries to go straight, circumstances edge her over the line into larceny, when she meets a sympathetic antiques dealer (Fear the Walking Dead’s Frank Dillane) with underworld connections. Preceded by the Season 2 premiere of the soapy Sullivan’s Crossing (8/7c).

Leaning into the Halloween season, TCM christens Hungarian-born horror-movie icon Bela Lugosi its Star of the Month. It only makes sense to kick off the tribute with his best-known role: the sinister vampire Count Dracula in Tod Browning’s atmospheric and influential 1931 movie, which made Lugosi a star (albeit typecast forever after in mostly “B” genre movies). The lineup starts at 8/7c and continues with several of his better films: 1932’s Murders in the Rue Morgue (9:30/8:30c) as a mad doctor, 1932’s Island of Lost Souls (11/10c) as a beastly experimental hybrid in Dr. Moreau’s (Charles Laughton) eerie menagerie; an adversary of rival Boris Karloff in 1934’s The Black Cat (12:15 am/11:15c), and a cameo as a fortune-teller who encounters Lon Chaney Jr. in 1941’s The Wolf Man (1:30 am/12:30c).

Season Premiere

9/8c

The renowned science series looks to the stars and beyond for a five-part series exploring the worlds far beyond our own planet. With cutting-edge scientific imagery and animation, planetary scientists act as a guide to a universe of myriad planets, moons, asteroids and comets. The opening episode, “Storm Worlds,” depicts extreme weather conditions including dust storms, mammoth lightning strikes and monsoons of liquid methane.

INSIDE WEDNESDAY TV:

• The Golden Bachelorette (8/7c, ABC): Among Joan’s romantic escapades with her remaining entourage of 14 suitors: a night out in Las Vegas with a serenade from Wayne Newton, a kickball game with NFL Hall of Famers Andre Reed and Eric Dickerson as advisers, and a horseback ride with one lucky gent.
• Survivor (8/7c, CBS): Familiarity breeds contempt within the tribes as three castaways are sent on a journey to make a fateful decision.
• Chicago Med (8/7c, NBC): Goodwin (S. Epatha Merkerson) faces the unhappy task of laying off staff, while Ripley (Luke Mitchell) frets about being suspended. Followed by Chicago Fire (9/8c), where Damon (Michael Bradway) puts Severide (Taylor Kinney) on the spot after disobeying one of Kidd’s (Miranda Rae Mayo) orders, and Chicago P.D. (10/9c), with the squad reeling from tragedy but rallying to join a manhunt.
• Forged in Fire (9/8c, History Channel): The competition series returns with a two-hour special, where four teams of builders construct siege weapons, with $20,000 at stake and the title of the first Forged in Fire: Instruments of Death champions.
• Secrets of the Dead (10/9c, PBS): The 22nd season opens with “Returning to Babylon,” in which archaeologists seek artifacts from the ancient Assyrian Empire that may have survived the Isis occupation of Mosul in war-torn Iraq.
• The Ark (10/9c, Syfy): The sci-fi adventure wraps its second season with the crew arriving at a destination that appears to be too good to be true. On this show, that’s usually the case.
• Wild West Chronicles (10/9c, INSP): Bat Masterson shares the inspiring story of Chinese immigrant Wong Fong Lee and his perilous trek to Deadwood.
• Destinations of the Damned with Zak Bagans (11/10c, Discovery): Ghost Adventures’ Zak Bagans goes global in a travelogue to allegedly cursed locations, starting with the site of a 1985 Colombian volcanic eruption.

 ON THE STREAM:

• Chef’s Table: Noodles (streaming on Netflix): The savory food series profiles chefs who know their noodles, with cultural roots in Italy, China and Cambodia. The streamer also launches new seasons of Love Is Blind and Unsolved Mysteries.
• Last Days of the Space Age (streaming on Hulu): Chicago Fire alum Jesse Spencer returns to his Australian roots for a domestic drama set in 1979 in a Knots Landing-like cul-de-sac in Perth. The initial conflict involves a strike at a power plant, where he and his wife (Radha Mitchell) are on opposite sides.
• The Simpsons (streaming on Disney+): Having just aired its satirical series finale (not really) to kick off its 36th season, the undying animated hit drops all of Season 35 on Disney+.
• Bad Monkey (streaming on Apple TV+): More monkey business in the comic adventure’s penultimate episode, with Yancy (Vince Vaughn) in a showdown with Nick (Rob Delaney) to save Rosa (Natalie Martinez).