Get Down with ‘Party Down,’ ‘Drag Race’ Clocks 200, Travel with Eugene Levy, ‘Formula 1’ Returns, Prime Video’s Creepy ‘Consultant,’ Salute to Spirituals

Season Premiere

9/8c

Pink bow ties are back in fashion now that Starz has, against the odds, revived the bitingly funny cult comedy about pipe-dreaming caterers in L.A.—after a mere 13 years. Most of the recognizable squad (minus Lizzy Caplan) is back, reassembling at a launch party for former Party Down employee Kyle Bradway (Ryan Hansen), who’s just been cast as a movie superhero. Which doesn’t always sit well with those who’ve long deferred their dreams, including wry observer Henry (Severance’s Adam Scott) and gloomy cynic Roman (Martin Starr). Ken Marino leads the gang as hapless Ron Donald, always his best-intentioned worst enemy, with Megan Mullally and Jane Lynch also on hand. Adding new verve: James Marsden as a movie star welcoming Kyle into the superhero fold and Jennifer Garner as his producer wife, who’s sure she knows Henry from somewhere. (Could it be that “Are we having fun yet?” ad from eons ago?) And look close for Abbott Elementary’s Quinta Brunson as Kyle’s fickle agent.

8/7c

Having won 26 Emmys during its first 14 seasons, the glittery competition marks another milestone with its 200th episode. Ozark Emmy winner Julia Garner is the guest judge as the queens design costumes in honor of the show’s 15-year anniversary, with crystal as the theme of the Crystal Ball. Just try to look away.

Series Premiere

Describing himself as “more the ‘great indoors’ kind of guy,” Schitt’s Creek Emmy winner Eugene Levy travels way outside his comfort zone in an eight-episode travelogue that challenges him to take an ice bath in the Arctic and confront wildlife in the Costa Rican jungle and a South African national park among other adventures. He rides a helicopter in the Utah desert, a gondola in (where else) Venice and observes sumo wrestling in Tokyo. No reason to be reluctant about tagging along for this whimsical journey.

Series Premiere

Also new to Apple TV+: the premiere of Liaison, a taut six-part international thriller (episodes premiere weekly) in French and English, exploring tensions between the two European nations in a post-Brexit world when two Syrian hackers defect, carrying news of impending cyberterrorism attacks. Eva Green (Penny Dreadful) and Westworld’s Vincent Cassel star as a British government worker and French mercenary whose previous acquaintance complicates matters when they find themselves on either side of the conflict.

Gleaming with enigmatic malice, Christoph Waltz mesmerizes as the sinister title character in this seriocomic business satire/thriller. (All eight episodes are available for binge-watching.) He’s Regus Patoff, who swoops into the gaming company CompWare after the shocking death of its leader, taking charge to the bewilderment of employees Elaine (The White Lotus’ Brittany O’Grady) and Craig (Nat Wolff), who become even more concerned when they see how he might have landed this gig. What Patoff’s intent is remains unclear, and as much as they want to fight him, they know their jobs depend on him. Quite the bizarre yet entertaining dilemma.

Season Premiere

“If you’re not performing, you’re out,” says one of the pro drivers during the 2022 FIA Formula 1 World Championship season, captured in behind-the-scenes detail for the influential docuseries, now in its fifth season. If the pressure of the race wasn’t enough, imagine having Drive to Survive’s cameras watching your every move.

9/8c

Great Performances revisits the great performances of opera divas Jessye Norman and Kathleen Battle, who in March of 1990 collaborated at a historic concert of spirituals on the Carnegie Hall stage, designed to honor their African-American heritage. Excerpts of the concert are given context in interviews with Met Opera General Manager Peter Gelb, who produced the concert, and soprano Angel Blue, who was inspired by what she heard to pursue a professional career.

INSIDE FRIDAY TV:

• The Mandalorian (8/7c, ABC, simulcast on Freeform and FX): In advance of next week’s Season 3 premiere on Disney+, the hit Star Wars spinoff that introduced Baby Yoda airs its pilot episode on linear TV in a broadcast premiere. That’s The Last of Usstar Pedro Pascal beneath the Mandalorian’s helmet.
• True Crime Watch: On Dateline NBC (9/8c), Keith Morrison reports on the 2004 murder of college student Jesse Valencia on the University of Missouri campus, with the investigation implicating a local police officer. ABC’s 20/20 (9/8c) revisits the sordid story of former Playboy model Kelsey Turner, sentenced for the 2019 murder of 71-year-old child psychologist Thomas Burchard, who had been bankrolling her lavish lifestyle.
• On Assignment with Richard Engel—Ukraine’s Secret Resistance (10/9c, MSNBC): On the one-year anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, NBC’s chief foreign correspondent Richard Engel profiles three Ukrainian friends from occupied Kherson who spied on Russians as part of an underground resistance movement, one as a cab driver and another as a bartender.

ON THE STREAM:

• Shrinking (streaming on Apple TV+): It may be too soon for the emotionally fragile and still-grieving Jimmy (the excellent Jason Segel) to invite friends to a surprise engagement party for best bud Brian (Michael Urie). As Jimmy begins to spiral, he can’t even turn to his mentor Paul (Harrison Ford), inadvertently high on gummies.
• M3gan (streaming on Peacock): The hit thriller about an AI doll with a mind of its own is now available for streaming, including in an unrated version.
• We Have a Ghost (streaming on Netflix): Stranger Things’ David Harbour stars in a movie comedy as Ernest, the spirit haunting the “house of death” that a family (led by Anthony Mackie) moves into, and when Ernest goes viral, his new housemates try to resolve his past before the CIA intervenes.
• Bruiser (streaming on Hulu): Presented by Onyx Collective, this brooding coming-of-age film from first-time director Miles Warren stars Till’s Jalyn Hall as 14-year-old Darious, caught in a battle of wills between the man who raised him (Shamier Anderson) and a drifter (Travante Rhodes) with a special interest in toughening the young man up.