‘Lower Decks’ Final Voyages, ‘Ghosts’ Parent Trap, ‘Old Man’ Finale, ‘Georgie’ Under Pressure

Star Trek: Lower Decks

The crew of the U.S.S. Cerritos is seeing double when the Star Trek franchise’s colorful animated comedy spinoff enters its fifth and final season. In the first of two episodes, the Starfleet vessel is sucked into one of those “stupid dimensional rifts” while trying to close space-time potholes, encountering alternate and bizarro versions of themselves. The second episode focuses on Tendi (Noël Wells), who needs to resolve a war among her native Orion factions when all she wants to do is return to her friends on the ship.

Ghosts

“She is a lot,” huffs Hetty (Rebecca Wisocky) about their latest arrival, the judgmental Puritan spirit called Patience (Mary Holland), who’s testing everyone’s patience. The conflict becomes even more acute when Sam’s (Rose McIver) once-distant dad (Breaking Bad’s Dean Norris) visits Woodstone with his girlfriend (Melinda McGraw), a situation that Patience finds so abominable she reacts in a way that alarms everyone, living and dead. In other spectral news, Isaac (Brandon Scott Jones) needs to break more bad news to Nigel (John Hartman), the mopey Redcoat he left at the altar.

The Old Man

The convoluted spy thriller reaches the end of its second season, with “old man” Dan Chase (Jeff Bridges) gasping for breath as Zoe (Amy Brenneman) and one-man hit squad Julian (Gbenga Akinnagbe) pursue their deadly mission while searching for an antidote. Last week’s big reveal, though probably not a surprise to anyone who’s watched TV before, changes the geopolitical situation for everyone, including Chase’s longtime frenemy Harold Harper (John Lithgow) and his devious ex, Marion (Janet McTeer).

Georgie & Mandy’s First Marriage

The shadow of Young Sheldon looms large over the spinoff, with Georgie (Montana Jordan) visiting his late dad and namesake’s grave several times as he succumbs to the stress of work and family, even while scoffing at an anxiety diagnosis as “just some New York nonsense.” It’s no laughing matter when he has to play father figure to his younger sister Missy (Raegan Revord) when she’s suspended from school.

Teacup

The slow-burning sci-fi thriller inspired by Robert R. McCammon’s novel ratchets up the tension when James (Scott Speedman) gets an earful from his tormented young captor, Travis (Jackson Kelly). Then, as the families converge on the farmhouse, they’re consumed with paranoia over which among them might be possessed by the “Assassin” from outer space. Grandma Ellen (Kathy Baker) hasn’t been herself lately, that much is obvious, but has the malevolent force moved on, and how can they fight back?

INSIDE THURSDAY TV:

• 9-1-1 (8/7c, ABC): Halloween is especially frightful for the 118 crew, including an encounter with a Pumpkinhead, and it’s no picnic for Doctor Odyssey (9/8c), either, when the ship experiences a zombie-like outbreak. Followed by Grey’s Anatomy (10/9c), where things get scary for a medical team flying in a helicopter.
• Law & Order (8/7c, NBC): After a pipe bombing in a brownstone, the detectives try to figure out who was the intended victim. Followed by Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (9/8c), where Carisi (Peter Scanavino) can’t stop thinking about his daughters while working a case about a date gone wrong.
• Hell’s Kitchen (8/7c, Fox): Marking its 350th episode (and countless bleeps over the years), Gordon Ramsay’s signature cooking competition challenges the chefs to make burgers with a variety of unusual ingredients.
• This Time Each Year (8/7c, Hallmark Mystery): Alison Sweeney (Hannah Swensen Mysteries) stars with Niall Matter as an estranged married couple who pretend to be together again when her mother visits for the holidays. Hint: This is part of the “Miracles of Christmas” movie series.
• Matlock (9/8c, CBS): Matty (Kathy Bates) is rattled when their latest court case requires calling in “the Meerkat,” Shae (Jane the Virgin’s Yael Grobglas), a jury consultant and human lie detector who can’t help wondering why the elderly new hire is so nervous around her.
• Ancient Bodies: Secrets Revealed (10/9c, National Geographic): Cold cases don’t get much more extreme than this, with archaeology experts poring over well-preserved excavated bodies from eons ago (including human remains found in an Italian glacier) to determine their cause of death.
• Elsbeth (10/9c, CBS): Criminal Minds’ Aisha Tyler directs an episode featuring comedian Rob Riggle as a billionaire whom Elsbeth (Carrie Preston) suspects was behind the seemingly accidental death of a fellow mogul during amateur-astronaut training. Tony winner Christian Borle reprises his character of Chicago lawyer Carter Schmidt from The Good Wife and The Good Fight, who brings his former Windy City colleague some concerning news.
• Found (10/9c, NBC): Lacey (Gabrielle Walsh) returns from her kidnapping to find the team no longer one big happy missing-person-finding family, but duty calls when a 15-year-old asks them to find his missing parents.

 ON THE STREAM:

• The Chicken Sisters (streaming on Hallmark+): Find out which small-town eatery wins the Kitchen Clash competition in the charming comedy’s Season 1 finale.
• Tyler Perry’s Beauty in Black (streaming on Netflix): Perry’s latest steamy Atlanta melodrama sets up conflict between exotic dancer Kimmie (Taylor Polidore Williams) and hair-care scion Mallory (Crystle Stewart), with stalwarts including Debbi Morgan, Richard Lawson and Charles Malik Whitfield in the supporting cast.
• Territory (streaming on Netflix): While waiting for the return of Yellowstone in November, fans might enjoy this Australian import starring Anna Torv (Fringe) and Michael Dorman (Joe Pickett) set at Marianne Station, the Outback’s largest cattle ranch, where a battle for generational succession ensues.
• Canary Black (streaming on Prime Video): Not to be confused with the Black Canary, this spy thriller stars Kate Beckinsale as CIA agent Avery Graves, who flirts with treason when her husband (Homeland’s Rupert Friend) is kidnapped, and she’s ordered by terrorists to steal a file titled Canary Black to save his life.
• The Pasta Queen (streaming on Prime Video): Social-media star Nadia Caterina Munno shares culinary secrets while traveling through her native Italy in a tasty and scenic new series.
• The Midwich Cuckoos: Village of the Damned (streaming on Sundance Now): The chilling sci-fi thriller picks up two months after the blackout that paralyzed the village of Midwich, whose women of childbearing age learn that they’re somehow pregnant. Immaculate? Not quite. The government swoops in to contain the situation, but as one of the women wonders, “How can (pregnancy) be a hostile act?”
• Frasier (streaming on Paramount+): Community’s Yvette Nicole Brown guest-stars as Olivia’s (Toks Olagundoye) overbearing sister, whose visit triggers a farce involving two fake boyfriends and an incognito Nobel laureate at Frasier’s (Kelsey Grammer) indoor tailgate party.