ALSO SEE: NFL Preseason 2018 TV Schedule
All Times Eastern.
Wednesday, Aug. 15
Outback: “Return of the Wet”
PBS, 8pm
Series Finale!
In the final episode, “Return of the Wet,” Australia’s Kimberley region experiences extreme heat, humidity and monsoons from November to April. See how an aquaculture center breeds prized barramundi fish to restock a lake’s population, how scientists study the effects of invasive and poisonous cane toads on freshwater croc populations, and how volunteers help tag shorebirds who are on a stopover during the world’s longest single migration.
Explore the diverse landscapes of Australia's Kimberly region — one of the least populated places on the planet! New #OutbackPBS premieres Wed at 8/7c. pic.twitter.com/dwLHECxeeF
— PBS (@PBS) August 13, 2018
Born This Way
A&E, 8pm
Season Premiere!
The Emmy-winning docuseries returns for Season 4 with four weeks of back-to-back episodes. Each member of this close group of friends is living with Down syndrome and is taking brave new steps toward independence: Rachel and Megan move out of their parents’ homes; John and Steven work toward getting their driver’s licenses; and Elena and Sean have new romances in their lives. But the biggest story of the season is the nuptials of Cristina and Angel. The happy bride shares that she can’t wait for America to view her wedding and says, “I want them to feel happy for me. I found the perfect guy for me.”
Burden of Truth: “Family Ties”
The CW, 8pm
Joanna (Kristin Kreuk) and Billy (Peter Mooney) are convinced that the steel mill is hiding something and confront its owner, Ben Matheson (David Lawrence Brown). Meanwhile, the girls continue to get sicker and start to get shunned by the town.
MasterChef: “Just for the Halibut”
FOX, 8pm
The top 12 chef-testants face their third skills test, where they must demonstrate the proper way to break down a halibut. Those who fail to impress judges Gordon Ramsay, Joe Bastianich and Aarón Sánchez must then use their broken-down fish to create an original dish.
America’s Got Talent: “Live Results 1”
NBC, 8pm
After last night’s thrilling live performances, the acts learn who will move on in the talent competition, and who have been eliminated.
The Real Housewives of Dallas
Bravo, 9pm
Season Premiere!
Season 3 finds returning housewives Cary Deuber, Stephanie Hollman, LeeAnne Locken, Brandi Redmond, D’Andra Simmons and Kameron Westcott back in the saddle for another wild season filled with new beginnings, unlikely friendships, acrimonious accusations and lots of horsing around in the Lone Star State.
Man Fire Food: “Light My Latin Fire”
Cooking Channel, 9pm
Roger Mooking fires up two delicioso Latin-inspired feasts. In St. Augustine, Fla., Roger meets Nick Carrera, a grill maker at Urban Asado, and joins him to roast whole lambs and vegetables on Nick’s asado crosses and grills. In Smyrna, Ga., Roger hangs out with Porch Light Latin Kitchen’s chef Andre Gomez, who cooks up Puerto Rican classics in his backyard when he’s off the clock. The pair roast a whole pig and make unique empanadas.
Gordon Ramsay’s 24 Hours to Hell and Back
FOX, 9pm
Season Finale!
The chef ends his first season of trying to save struggling restaurants in a day.
Wonders of Mexico: “Burning North”
PBS, 9pm
Series Finale!
Journey across northern Mexico to discover a desert rich in life. From prairie dogs fighting snakes, to bats hunting scorpions and tiny owls living in giant cacti, its animals have found clever ways to survive against the odds.
Thursday, Aug. 16
Strange Angel
CBS All Access
Season Finale!
This is one strange — but worthwhile — ride. Jack Reynor, Rupert Friend and Bella Heathcote star in the true story of Jack Parsons, a pioneering 1930s amateur rocketeer who also got involved in Aleister Crowley’s infamous sex cult. With the addition of the finale today, the drama’s entire season will be streaming.
SuperMansion: Summer Vacation Special
Sony Crackle
In this stop-motion animated special, the team heads to Hawaii, where Titanium Rex (Bryan Cranston) runs into vacationing former President Barack Obama (Jay Pharoah); Black Saturn (Tucker Gilmore) and Lex (Jillian Bell) teach Cooch (Heidi Gardner) how to swim; and American Ranger (Keegan-Michael Key) attempts to perform in a USO show while an evil threat brews under the sea.
Deadpool
FX, 7:30pm
Ryan Reynolds stars as darkly funny comic-book character Deadpool in this 2016 action film. Wade Wilson (Reynolds) agrees to rogue experimentation to help cure his cancer. He doesn’t realize that what he signed on for will leave him disfigured and hidden in the shadows. Now, armed with a variety of weapons and his twisted sense of humor, his new alter ego, Deadpool, takes a dark path to find and destroy the man who altered his life forever.
The Gong Show
ABC, 8pm
Celebrity judges Rob Riggle, Ed Helms and Regina Hall are set to praise, critique and gong performers in tonight’s episode. Tonight’s acts include water-bottle ballet, shadow puppetry, a dancer with four legs, and a man who spits and does tricks with table-tennis balls.
NFL Preseason: N.Y. Jets vs. Washington
ESPN, 8pm Live
The N.Y. Jets head to FedExField in Landover, Md., for a Week 2 preseason game against the Washington Redskins.
“The Simpsons” Marathon
FXX, beginning at 8pm
Lisa (voice of Yeardley Smith) gets the spotlight on The Simpsons tonight as FXX airs “Lisa’s Substitute” (1991), “Lisa the Vegetarian” (1995), “The Secret War of Lisa Simpson” (1997), “Make Room for Lisa” (1999) and other episodes centered on the Simpsons’ middle child, a.k.a. “Stupid Lisa, Science Queen.”
Rustic Rehab
HGTV, 8pm
New Series!
Cabins go from crappy to quaint at the hands of investor David Rivera and his designer wife Chenoa in this new renovation series that proves the great outdoors are always better when it’s fab inside, too.
U.S. Gymnastics Championships
NBCSN, 8pm Live
NBCSN and NBC air the U.S. Gymnastics Championships from TD Garden in Boston, with men’s events tonight on NBCSN, women’s events tomorrow on NBCSN (tape-delayed) and men’s events on NBC Saturday.
Match Game
ABC, 9pm
Celebrity panelists for tonight’s episode are Kenan Thompson, Debi Mazar, Thomas Lennon, Sherri Shepherd, Horatio Sanz and Gillian Jacobs.
Trial & Error: Lady, Killer: “A Family Affair/Bad Instincts”
NBC, 9pm
In the first of tonight’s back-to-back episodes, the retrial of Jesse Ray Beaumont (Michael Hitchcock) looms, and the team digs into Lavinia’s (Kristin Chenoweth) past to gain some fresh insight into the case. Then, after Lavinia is eliminated as a suspect, Josh (Nicholas D’Agosto) struggles with his defense for Beaumont.
Braxton Family Values
WE tv, 9pm
Midseason Premiere!
The flamboyant Braxton sisters resume their sixth season of unscripted drama. For starters, “Un-Break My Heart” singer Toni lands a movie role, but will have to postpone her wedding in order to take it. Hey, that’s showbiz, kid.
Nightwatch Nation
A&E, 10pm
New Series!
The hit A&E series Nightwatch returns, but this time, it’s taking viewers beyond the streets of New Orleans and Tampa and going national with police, fire and EMT units across the country as they patrol the streets between the hours of 8pm and 4am. Follow units in New York, Arizona, Texas and Louisiana as they make calls, save lives and keep America safe while it sleeps.
Take Two: “Shadows of the Past”
ABC, 10pm
In the new episode “Shadows of the Past,” Sam (Rachel Bilson) and Eddie (Eddie Cibrian) are shocked to find that the man who had just hired them to find his missing wife is the most recent victim of a serial killer.
Alone: “Cold War”
History, 10pm
Season Finale!
The final remaining participants face the onslaught of Mongolia’s brutal winter. Relentless hunger and savage cold test them like never before, and in the end, only one will walk away with the $500,000 prize.
Friday, Aug. 17
Disenchantment
Netflix
New Series!
Matt Groening and Josh Weinstein (The Simpsons, Futurama) are executive producers of this adult animated comedy fantasy series, which launches its first season with 10 episodes. It takes place in the crumbling medieval kingdom of Dreamland and follows the misadventures of hard-drinking Princess Bean (voiced by Broad City’s Abbi Jacobson), her feisty elf companion Elfo (Nat Faxon) and her personal demon Luci (Eric Andre). The voice cast also includes frequent Groening collaborators John DiMaggio, Billy West, Maurice LaMarche and Tress MacNeille.
To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before
Netflix
Original Film!
What if all the crushes you’ve ever had found out how you felt about them … all at once? In this adaptation of Jenny Han’s popular young-adult novel, Lara Jean’s (Lana Condor) love life goes from imaginary to out-of-control when the love letters for every boy she’s ever had feelings for — five in all — are mysteriously mailed out.
NASCAR Xfinity Series: Food City 300
NBCSN, 7:30pm Live
Elliott Sadler, Cole Custer, Daniel Hemric, Tyler Reddick and Christopher Bell are among the top Xfinity Series drivers looking to survive the hard-nosed, short-track racing at Tennessee’s Bristol Motor Speedway tonight.
WE Day
ABC, 8pm
Young people making a difference are celebrated in this powerful special, culled from the star-studded WE Day California event on April 19. Moment of note: Jennifer Aniston takes the stage to praise two survivors of the Parkland, Fla., high school shootings.
Basketball: BIG3 Playoffs
FOX, 8pm Live
FOX Sports heads to Dallas, Texas, for the playoffs of the BIG3, the premier half-court, 3-on-3 basketball league.
13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi
FX, 8pm
Based on the 2014 book by Mitchell Zuckoff, this 2016 action-thriller follows the true story of the six members of a security team who fought to defend the American diplomatic compound in Benghazi, Libya, after a terrorist attack on Sept. 11, 2012. John Krasinski, Pablo Schreiber and Toby Stephens star.
The Great British Baking Show
PBS, 9pm
Season Finale!
The unaired season from 2012 wraps up with the three remaining bakers being put through their pastry paces in a pair of challenges before finding out which of them is the crème of the crop.
In Search Of: “Time Travel”
History, 10pm
Host Zachary Quinto charts a journey to determine whether time travel is possible. He meets a man who claims to have traveled back in time via a secret government program, and a group of people in Liverpool known as “time slippers.” Later, after getting equipped with new knowledge on the origins of the universe and the dimension of time, Quinto tests his own perception of time with an elaborate skydiving experiment to see if he can slow down time itself.
Great Performances: “Vienna Philharmonic Summer Night Concert 2018”
PBS, 10pm
Enjoy the world-renowned Vienna Philharmonic’s annual open-air concert from Austria’s Imperial Schönbrunn Palace, featuring conductor Valery Gergiev and internationally acclaimed soprano Anna Netrebko as a guest soloist.
Saturday, Aug. 18
Melissa McCarthy Movie Marathon
FX, beginning at 3pm
Melissa McCarthy gets the spotlight on FX today as the network airs three of her movies — Spy (2015), The Heat (2013) and Ghostbusters (2016) — back-to-back.
“Planet Earth: South Pacific” Marathon
BBC America, beginning at 4pm
BBC America presents a marathon of all six episodes of 2009’s Planet Earth: South Pacific nature documentary series tonight. Benedict Cumberbatch narrates.
Major League Baseball
FS1, beginning at 4pm Live
The Baltimore Orioles are at the Cleveland Indians in the first game of FS1’s MLB doubleheader. In the second game, the Milwaukee Brewers visit the St. Louis Cardinals at Busch Stadium.
Cold Justice
Oxygen, 6pm
Back in Texas in the 1990s and 2000s, Kelly Siegler was a tough prosecutor who won convictions in 19 out of 20 death penalty cases. Today, the former ADA is in her fifth season as lead investigator on Cold Justice, a show that tries to wrap up some of the nation’s estimated 200,000 unsolved homicides. So far, she says, she’s worked on “65-plus cases with 37 arrests and 18 convictions, sometimes with no DNA or living eyewitnesses.”
Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series: Bass Pro Shops NRA Night Race
NBCSN, 7:30pm Live
The steeply banked, 0.533-mile short track at Bristol Motor Speedway in Tennessee provides a 500-lap endurance test for Kyle Busch, Kevin Harvick, Joey Logano, Brad Keselowski, Martin Truex Jr., Clint Bowyer and other top Cup Series drivers tonight.
Pearl in Paradise
Hallmark Channel, 9pm
Original Film!
Magazine photographer Alex Anderson (Jill Wagner) and author Colin Page (Kristoffer Polaha) head to Fiji in search of the elusive blue pearl that Colin wrote about in his bestselling novel, Pearl in Paradise. While searching for the precious pearl, the two discover that finding love could be the rarest adventure of all.
Murder Made Me Famous
REELZ Channel, 9pm
New Episodes!
This series continues to explore why certain killers attract the attention of millions and their stories generate so much interest. New hourlong episodes include looks at the infamous Jack the Ripper, ruthless serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer and others.