Weekly Previews

1) Halloween’s final burst, today. The long scare-a-thon concludes. Even “Dancing With the Stars” (8 p.m., Disney+) and “Quantum Leap” (10 p.m., NBC) have Halloween themes. There are plenty of nasty films, but you can also go light. Freeform starts at 10:30 a.m., peaking with “Hotel Transylvania” (shown here, 2012) and “Hocus Pocus” (1993), at 7 and 9 p.m. The Paramount Network has “Addams Family” films (1982, 1984) at 8 and 10, then midnight and 2 a.m. Read more…

1) “The Conners” and more, 8-10 p.m. Wednesday, ABC. Ever since its “Roseanne” days, 34 years ago, this has had great Halloween episodes. (A recent one is shown here.) Now Dan wants the house decorated, but everyone is busy; Becky tries to take over. That’s followed at 8:30 by horror-film spoofs on “The Goldbergs.” At 9, someone steals the Halloween candy from “Abbott Elementarty”; at 9:30, Tom may have a Halloween-time stalker on “Home Economics.” Read more…

1) “The Simpsons,” 8 p.m. Sunday, Fox. “Treehouse of Horror,” an annual delight with three offbeat tales, will be Oct. 30. A week earlier, here’s a fresh twist: “Treehouse presents” a half-hour take-off on Stephen King’s “It.” We see Homer join other self-described “high school losers” (shown heere), battling a killer clown; 27 years later, they re-unite to try again. The Homer/Marge romance is flipped, in a tale that’s too gory for some viewers, but great fun for many. Read more…

1) “Masterpiece” mysteries, 8-11 p.m. Sunday, PBS. After a sluggish start last month, this night has three openers. “Miss Scarlet and the Duke” (shown here) is light and bright at 8 p.m., with Eliza on a missing-person case with a twist. “Annika” (10) has a smart story, complicated by Scottish accents. In between, “Magpie Murder” (9) is special – a six-parter juggling two mysteries: Who killed the author? And who is the killer in the missing chapter of his book? Read more…

1) “Alaska Daily” debut, 10 p.m. Thursday, ABC. Two Academy Award-winners link for a promising drama. Hilary Swank (shown here) won Oscars for “Girls Don’t Cry” and “Million Dollar Baby”; Tom McCarthy won for his “Spotlight” script. Now he’s writer-producer and she plays a newspaper reporter, moving to Anchorage to repair her tarnished career. That gets ABC’s best timeslot, behind the season-openers of “Station 19” and “Grey’s Anatomy.” Read more…

1) “So Help Me Todd” debut, 9 p.m. Thursday, CBS. There’s a sweet spot, where fun and crimesolving co-exist. TV lost it for a while, but “Todd” hits it perfectly in its opener … before getting a tad goofy in the next couple weeks. Margaret (Marcia Gay Harden) is a lawyer; Todd (Skylar Astin) is a private eye, with tech skills and no work. (They’re shown here.) He’s also her son; when he works for her, his freeform style collides with her diligence. Good mysteries are peppered with fun. Read more…

1) “Quantum Leap” debu (shown here)t, 10 p.m. today, NBC, rerunning 8 p.m. Saturday. The first day of the official TV season includes a zinger – a quick, slick fantasy show that keeps us involved, even when stretching credibility wildly, Raymond Lee plays a physicist, adapting the same notion used 30 years ago, in the original series. Suddenly, he’s in 1985, in the body of a stranger. He remembers nothing, including his fiancee, who’s there as a hologram others can’t see. Read more…

1) Emmy awards, 8-11 p.m. today, NBC. Kenan Thompson (shown here) hosts, planning to have a big opening number. He’s not much of a monologue guy, but he’ll have lots of other “Saturday Night Live” people (past and present). They include Seth Meyers, Jimmy Kimmel, Amy Poehler, Molly Shannon and Vanessa Bayer. Others range from Will Arnett to Natalie Zea and two people from “Squid Game,” a first-year show that’s up for best drama. Read more…

1) “Monarch,” about 8 p.m. ET Sunday (after football), Fox. Eight days before the season officially starts, here’s the first arrival, Planned for last spring, then delayed, it links music and soap-style drama, just as “Empire” did … but with country music. Trace Adkins and Susan Sarandon play the leaders of a Nashville dynasty (shown here). They have one daughter who looks like a star (Anna Friel) and one who sings like one (Beth Ditto), plus a business-like son. Read more…

1) “America’s National Parks,” 8 and 9 p.m. today through Thursday, then 9 p.m. Friday, National Georaphic. This starts today with opposite worlds — the Everglades and the 277-mile-long Grand Canyon. It ends Friday with the fury and beauty of trhe Hawaii Volcanoes National Park (shown here), where one volcano erupted for 35 years, burying a road under 100 feet of lava,. It’s beautifully filmed, with Garth Brooks as narrator.

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