‘Lord of the Rings’ Returns, Netflix’s Bizarre ‘Body,’ a ‘Lowdown’ Road Trip, Veterans Day on TV

The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power

Things are looking grim in Tolkien’s Middle-Earth in the third season of the epic dark fantasy, taking a five-year time jump from the climactic fall of Eregion. The monstrous armies of Sauron (Charlie Vickers) have swept through much of the land, while the Dark Lord seeks the elusive elven rings and their precious secrets. Thankfully, there are still a few outposts where heroic elves, dwarves, men, and occasional wizards — we see you, Gandalf — are gearing up for battle. The season launches with four episodes, with two more on November 18 and the final two on November 25.

The Body

A compellingly twisted crossbreeding of Mean Girls and The Crucible delivers a potent brew of sex, drugs, and blasphemy inside a Catholic school in 2004. The eight-episode series from Quinn Shephard opens on Halloween, when the debauched leaders of St. Mark’s prestigious dance team host a forbidden party in an abandoned convent known as “Devil’s House,” where an initiation rite goes terribly wrong. In this hotbed of adolescent angst and religious repression, the students begin to have mysterious visions, triggering mass hysteria. Can these sorry souls be saved?

The Lowdown

The intrigue deepens in this offbeat crime dramedy, with public defender Ginger (the superb Betty Gilpin) learning more than she expected while being held captive by two rubes, while citizen journalist Lee (a jittery Ethan Hawke) rattles cages to get the truth exposed. The heart of this wonderful episode, however, belongs to an Emmy-worthy Tommy Lee Jones as Lee’s melancholy father “Frog,” spending a memorable day doling out hard-earned wisdom to his adoring granddaughter Francis (Ryan Kiera Armstrong), and then embarking with his estranged son on a bittersweet road trip. The pretext is to unearth memories from Frog’s storage unit deep inside Oklahoma, but the excursion gives the men a chance to come to poignant terms with their emotionally fraught history. Not to be missed.

Forged by War: The Navy SEALs

The centerpiece of History Channel’s Veterans Day commemoration is a two-hour special tracing the evolution of the U.S. Navy SEALs into an elite unit, using archival footage, first-hand testimony, and dramatic recreations, culled from two seasons of the docuseries Navy SEALs: America’s Secret Warriors. Among the missions revisited: the rescue of Capt. Richard Phillips from Somali pirates and the operation that led to Osama bin Laden’s death in Pakistan. Followed by Mission to Honor: A 250th Salute to American Veterans (10/9c), a tribute to military men and women through the individual stories of five veterans who served in conflicts from World War II, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War, to the Iraq War and Afghanistan.

Available to stream on Prime Video, the documentary Where We Once Stood, produced and narrated by Gary Sinise, follows Vietnam War veterans from the Army, Marine, Navy, and Air Force branches as they return to the country for the first time, confronting their memories while finding healing through fellowship on the journey.

Nostalgia channel MeTV presents its annual three-hour special, MeTV Remembers the M*A*S*H Finale (7/6c), with new interviews alongside an uncut showing of the series finale, which in 1983 drew a record audience of over 105 million viewers. Many may choose to mark the holiday by watching classic war movies. The Movies! channel devotes the entire day (starting at 6 am/5c) and evening to the genre, including Oscar winners The Best Years of Our Lives (9:05 am/8:05c), The Longest Day (12:50 pm/11:50c), and The Bridge on the River Kwai (8/7c). The latter is also part of Turner Classic Movies‘ evening lineup, airing at 11/10c after a screening of In Harm’s Way (8/7c), with the Oscar-winning The Deer Hunter airing overnight (2 am/1c).

Stick

Rhea Seehorn, coming off multiple award wins for Apple TV‘s Pluribus, joins the sports comedy as Amanda, the daughter of the coach who told the young golfing hopeful Pryce Cahill (Owen Wilson) nearly 40 years ago, “You owe it to yourself to be great.” Pryce is swinging for greatness again, trying for a comeback at 55 with the U.S. Open in his sights. Looking for inspiration from his mentor, Pryce travels to Missouri with former rival Clark Ross (Timothy Olyphant) and caddie Mitts (Marc Maron), where Amanda provides a necessary reality check. Elsewhere, Pryce’s own protégé Santi (Peter Dager) makes his pro debut, with a powerful super-agent (Billy Zane) watching and marketing his every move. Talk about pressure.

INSIDE WEDNESDAY TV:

• Scrubs (8/7c, ABC): J.D. (Zach Braff) wants to know why the ER has suddenly become The Pitt-level swamped.
• Survivor (8/7c, CBS): The castaways need to rely on their partners when tree mail orders them to pair up in teams of two. Followed by The Amazing Race (9:30/8:30), which sets a course for Laos.
• Chicago Med (8/7c, NBC): Dr. Lenox (Sarah Ramos) is back in the Emergency Department after her three-month leave. Followed by the probies’ last day at Firehouse 51 on Chicago Fire (9/8c) and a kidnapping in Chinatown testing a new style of community policing on Chicago P.D. (10/9c).
• Nature (8/7c, PBS): In HumanLike: The Chimps of Fongoli, experts observe a group of chimpanzees in Senegal whose remarkable behaviors, including hunting with spears and digging wells, could provide clues to our evolutionary past.
• Abbott Elementary (8:30/7:30c, ABC): Ava (Janelle James) reluctantly turns to Janine (Quinta Brunson) for a dose of her “toxic positivity” to boost Abbott’s step team’s morale on the day of the regionals.
• NOVA: Evolution (9/8c, PBS): The series concludes with a study of the evolution of the horse to illustrate how species across the planet developed the power of movement.
• Celebrity Wheel of Fortune (9/8c, ABC): New Girl alums Jake Johnson, Lamorne Morris, and Hannah Simone spin the wheel to play for charity. Followed by a new episode of Shark Tank (10/9c).
• Monsters Inside Me (10/9c, Discovery Channel): The series about invasive human parasites returns for a ninth season with a woman who discovers live worms in her eye. (I’ll probably be covering my own.)

ON THE STREAM:

• Tyler Perry’s The Gospel of Christmas (streaming on Netflix): Kirk Franklin is the music producer of Tyler Perry‘s heartfelt holiday fable of a faith-challenged pastor (Durrell “Tank” Babbs) whose wife (Fantasia Barrino Taylor) helps lift his spirits as he revives a failing New York City church. Among those raising their voices: gospel greats the Clark Sisters, Pastor Shirley Caesar, and CeCe Winans.
• Avedon (streaming on Netflix): Director Ron Howard presents a biographical profile of the late fashion and portrait photographer (1923-2004) whose work, according to The New York Times, “helped define America’s image of style, beauty and culture for the last half-century.”
• Rivals (streaming on Hulu): The media war of 1987 rages on as the soapy drama’s second season resumes with three episodes and ruthless TV exec Tony (David Tennant) reeling from personal tragedy.
• Chris Harrison’s The Vow (streaming on Fox Nation): The former Bachelor host returns to the TV-dating scene with a faith-based approach to the journey of 30-year-old bachelor Jace Cates, seeking compatibility, commitment, and marriage to one of 10 women.