Time to switch on ‘Lights’
“Friday Night Lights” (8 p.m., NBC) returns to network television for a fourth season, featuring the same top-notch acting and documentary-style melodrama that have made it one of the most highly praised series on television.
Last season’s “Lights” ended with a wedding-reception scene that was among the most beautifully shot and artfully nuanced moments I’ve ever had the pleasure to watch on the small screen.
Season 4 begins with the district rezoned into East and West Dillon High Schools, with coach Taylor (Kyle Chandler) demoted to the down-and-out East Dillon squad, whose locker room is festooned with gang symbols and infested by at least one raccoon.
His wife, Tami (Connie Britton), remains the principal of West Dillon. She deals with the fallout from the new arrangement and faces down the wrath of parents of students reassigned to the “ghetto” school.
On other fronts, Taylor’s former players, Matt (Zach Gilford) and Tim (Taylor Kitsch), adjust to the awkward letdown of watching life go by as underemployed high school graduates when a new football season begins without them.
•The popular and intriguing series “What Would You Do?” (9 p.m., ABC) returns for four episodes over the course of the late spring and summer.
As the title suggests, it combines elements of “Candid Camera” with thought-provoking questions about morality, ethics, privacy, generosity and just plain common sense.
A provocatively dressed and apparently inebriated woman is “helped” by a man at bar who offers to take her home. Will people come to her aid or just mind their own business?
Other folks see a convenience-store clerk pocket lottery winnings. Do they intervene?
In an even more dire scenario, strangers see a woman who appears to be bruised, accompanied by a loud and apparently violent man.
Do strangers get involved in what seems to be a situation of domestic violence? Should they?
Other highlights
A seagoing Australian couple (Sam Neill and Nicole Kidman) encounter a shipwrecked psychopath (Billy Zane) in the 1989 thriller “Dead Calm” (5 and 7:14 p.m., TWC). Yes, it’s on the Weather Channel.
A kidnapping case puts Melinda in peril on “Ghost Whisperer” (8 p.m., CBS).
Ariel becomes unstuck in time on “Medium” (9 p.m., CBS).
Something smells rotten in a Danish restaurant on “Kitchen Nightmares” (9 p.m., Fox, TV-14).
The team needs advice from Earth on “Stargate Universe” (9 p.m., Syfy).
A bully at a festival fills the wards on “Miami Medical” (10 p.m., CBS, TV-14).
Catrina assumes first lady status on “Merlin” (10 p.m., SyFy).
Series notes
Dreamers meet the down-and-out on “Wife Swap” (8 p.m., ABC) … Wrestling on “Friday Night SmackDown!” (8 p.m., MyNetwork) … Martha Kent and Perry White return on “Smallville” (8 p.m., CW, TV-PG).
Late night
Amanda Peet, Nick Griffin and Wale appear on “Late Show with David Letterman” (11:35 p.m., CBS) … Jay Leno welcomes Don Cheadle and Erin Andrews on “The Tonight Show” (11:35 p.m., NBC) … Common appears on “Late Night with Jimmy Fallon” (12:35 a.m., NBC) … Craig Ferguson hosts Kaley Cuoco, Steven Wright and Matt Baetz on “The Late Late Show” (12:37 a.m., CBS).