Getting ‘Goosebumps’ Again, New Kids on the ‘Silo’ Block, Making Friends With Animals, Dexter’s Date with Destiny

R.L. Stine’s influential franchise of young-adult spookfests returns for an eight-episode season, starring Friends’ David Schwimmer as a botanist who returns to the Brooklyn neighborhood where his older brother and three pals disappeared some 30 years ago. His teenage twins (Sam McCarthy and Jayden Bartels), visiting for the summer, form their own friend group and start snooping around the old fort where the vanishing occurred, while the flora and fauna in their dad’s basement lab take on a life of their own. The series borrows from Stine’s popular books, including familiar beats from “Stay Out of the Basement,” “The Girl Who Cried Monster,” “Welcome to Camp Nightmare” and more.

Who are those young warriors in the seemingly abandoned Silo 17 who attacked Juliette (Rebecca Ferguson) last week? And what have they done with Solo (Steve Zahn)? Those questions will be revealed, with more insights into Silo 18’s mythology courtesy of Lukas (Avi Nash), in the penultimate episode of the sci-fi thriller’s second season. (Silo has already been renewed for a third and fourth season.)

One person’s beast is another person’s bestie — that’s the takeaway from a charming nature series that depicts the close connections between humans and often unorthodox animals. Airing back-to-back episodes on Fridays (streaming the next day on Disney+ and Hulu), with six vignettes in each hour filmed all over the world, the series opens with accounts of people forming close bonds with a chicken, a mother octopus and a jumping spider.

The latest child kidnapping hits close to home for the Miami Police Department, but for young forensics rookie Dexter (Patrick Gibson) in the origin-story prequel, he’s only got eyes for a crime scene that suggests the pattern of an evolving serial killer. (The rule: three murders and it’s official that a serial killer is at work.) Dex should know: He’s planning to take down his own third mark, the gloating home-invasion murderer who fell through the legal cracks after his dad Harry’s (Christian Slater) botched courtroom testimony. Dexter’s technique is getting better, but there are always complications — though nothing’s more unnerving than watching him try to act normal while on a double date with his rebel sister, Deb (Molly Brown). The episode premieres Sunday night on Showtime.

“Do you see what I’m talking about with the crazy?” implores provocateur comedian Bill Maher to a rapt Chicago audience in his 13th stand-up special for HBO. With his signature series Real Time with Bill Maher a week away from launching its 23rd season, Maher regales the crowd with satirical riffs on political extremism on both sides of the spectrum as well as parenting, dating and the third rail of religion. Love or hate him (or both), Maher has a lot to get off his chest.

INSIDE FRIDAY TV:

• Cotton Bowl (7:30 pm, ESPN): Find out who makes it to the college football championship game later this month when the second semifinal plays out on the field of AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas, with No. 8 Ohio State facing No. 5 Texas.
• Happy’s Place (8/7c, NBC): The Conners’ Emma Kenney guest-stars as Bobbie’s (Reba McEntire) daughter Gracie, back home on military leave from Qatar and about to meet the aunt, Isabella (Belissa Escobedo), she never knew existed. While Bobbie frets over the introduction, the rest of the tavern competes to give Gracie the best homemade gift.
• RuPaul’s Drag Race (8/7, MTV): Rapper Doechii is the guest judge as the second half of Season 17’s cast introduces themselves by strutting their stuff in a talent show.
• True Crime Watch: ABC’s 20/20 (9/8c) reports on the 2015 disappearance in Florida of Michael Shaver, whose wife Laurie claimed he’d abandoned the family — a story that held up for three years until his body was found under a concrete patio in their backyard. On Dateline NBC (9/8c), Josh Mankiewicz reveals details about the 2014 murder of Rob Limon, the subject of the Dateline podcast “Deadly Mirage.”

ON THE STREAM:

• The Agency (streaming on Paramount+ With Showtime): Martian’s (Michael Fassbender) plan to recruit his lover Samia (Jodie Turner-Smith) as an informant doesn’t go so well, now that she’s aware of his true CIA colors.
• Look Into My Eyes (streaming on Max): An acclaimed 2024 documentary, about a group of New York City psychics conducting deeply personal readings, makes its streaming debut.
• Get Away (streaming on Shudder): A horror film laced with whimsy evokes Midsommar when Nick Frost (also the screenwriter), Aisling Bea, and their family vacation on a Swedish island that’s preparing for a mysterious annual festival while a serial killer is at work.