BY CLIF GARBODEN

THURSDAY 11

TERROR MATRIX ALERT: September 11 specials could strike at any time on any station today. None will inform you, most are apt to depress you.

7:30 (2) Basic Black: A Conversation with Pedro Noguera. Host Darren Duarte talks with the Harvard education prof about finding and fixing the problems with urban schools. (Until 8 p.m.)

8:00 (2) Frontline: Faith and Doubt at Ground Zero. An old show that re-examines the September 11 terrorist attacks through the prism of individual faith and spiritual groundings. Lots of interviews with survivors and pundits. To be repeated tonight at 1 a.m. (Until 10 p.m.)

9:00 (44) Mystery: The Inspector Lynley Mysteries: Payment in Blood. Repeated from last week. Lynley and Havers (Nathaniel Parker and Sharon Small) play Clue with real dead bodies on a Scottish estate. To be repeated on Friday at 12:30 a.m. on Channel 2. (Until 10:30 p.m.)

3:00 a.m. (2) The American Experience: The Center of the World. Repeated from last week. Burns’s typically uneven film documentary about New York, New York: A Documentary Film, continues with an eighth installment covering the 30-year history and sudden destruction of the World Trade Towers. (Until 6 a.m.)

5:00 a.m. (44) Soundstage. Featuring music from John Hiatt, Dar Williams, and Robinella and the CC String Band. (Until 6 a.m.)

FRIDAY 12

8:00 (10) Dateline with Katie Couric and Dr. Phil. A special devoted to fat Americans and what we should do about them. (Until 10 p.m.)

10:00 (44) Coupling. Another episode of the original Brit version. (Until 10:30 p.m.)

12:30 a.m. (2) Mystery: The Inspector Lynley Mysteries: Payment in Blood. Repeated from Thursday at 9 p.m.

4:00 a.m. (2) Globe Trekker: Great Festivals. Repeated from last week. An anthology of unusual celebrations in remote locales hosted by a full selection of regular Trekkers. To be repeated on Sunday at midnight on Channel 44. (Until 5 a.m.)

5:00 a.m. (2) Soundstage. Repeated from last week. Featuring music from Chris Isaak and Raul Malo. (Until 6 a.m.)

SATURDAY 13

Noon (6) Football. North Carolina State versus Ohio State.

3:30 (6) Football. South Carolina versus Georgia. (Originally scheduled as Notre Dame versus Michigan.)

8:00 (2) Red Files: Secret Files of the KGB, Soviet Sports Wars, Secret Soviet Sports Mission, and Soviet Propaganda Machines. Sounds like a behind-the-scenes look at the USSR’s propaganda initiatives, but the program-guide blurb suggests it’s actually four shows about Western types who spied for the KGB. Either way, it should be almost as revealing as a look at Bush’s propaganda machine would be. To be repeated tonight at 1 a.m. (Until midnight.)

8:00 (6) Football. Penn State versus Nebraska.

Midnight (2) Austin City Limits. Featuring music from Bonnie Raitt and some guest artists. (Until 1 a.m.)

Midnight (44) Soundstage. Repeated from Thursday at 5 a.m.

SUNDAY 14

1:00 (12) Football. The Miami Dolphins versus the New York Jets.

1:00 (64) Football. The San Francisco 49ers versus the St. Louis Rams.

2:30 (5) Ohhh Davey. Now even old cartoon shows have reunions. A tribute to the 1960-’65 series Davey and Goliath. Davey was a kid; Goliath was his self-righteous talking dog. Nothing really Old Testament was involved, but the shows were lessons-for-life/morality tales. Groundbreaking animation — for its day. (Until 3:30 p.m.)

4:00 (6) Basketball. Action from the WNBA championship series.

4:00 (12) Football. The Pats versus the Philadelphia Eagles.

6:35 (44) The Spiral Staircase (movie). A 1946 thriller starring Dorothy McGuire as a mute servant surrounded by murders. (Until 8 p.m.)

8:00 (2) Evening at Pops: John Williams Show. Williams, the once neglectful and unpopular Pops conductor, returns to Boston to promote his soundtrack compositions. To be repeated tonight at 3 a.m. (Until 9 p.m.)

8:00 (6) Great Women of TV Comedy. Will & Grace’s Megan Mullally hosts this Museum of TV & Radio recap of TV funny women from Lucille Ball to Lily Tomlin to Marlo Thomas to Ellen DeGeneres to Mary Tyler Moore, etc. (Until 9:30 p.m.)

8:00 (44) Woman of the Year (movie). It’s Kathy Hepburn night on ’GBX. Here we get her co-starring with Spencer Tracy (for the first time) in the overplayed 1942 spat fest. She’s a political expert; he’s a sports writer. But love wins out. (Until 9:45 p.m.)

9:00 (2) Mystery: The Inspector Lynley Mysteries: For the Sake of Elena. Lynley and Havers (Nathaniel Parker and Sharon Small) solve the case of a woman murdered near Cambridge University. To be repeated tonight at midnight, and on Channel 44 at 1 and 4 a.m., and on Thursday on Channel 44 at 9 p.m., and on Channel 2 at 3 a.m. (Until 10:30 p.m.)

9:00 (12) Out of Sight (movie). Jennifer Lopez plays Elmore Leonard fed Karen Sisco on the trail of gentleman bank-heist king George Clooney in this 1998 Steven Soderbergh cop flick. (Until 11:30 p.m.)

9:30 (10) Conan O’Brien 10th Anniversary Special. Has it been that long? Highlights from 10 years of Conan shows — with lots of unscheduled guests and a reunion with one-time second banana Andy Richter. (Until 11 p.m.)

9:45 (44) Pat and Mike (movie). Hepburn with Tracy again, this time in the 1952 Ruth Gordon/Garson Kanin tale of a female golfer and her sportswriting fan. (Until 11:30 p.m.)

11:30 (44) Katharine Hepburn: They Called Me Kathy. The late KH herself recalls her life and career. (Until midnight.)

MONDAY 15

8:00 (2) Antiques Roadshow: Cleveland, part one. The new season starts off on the shores of Lake Erie and the Cuyahoga. (Until 9 p.m.)

8:00 (44) Globe Trekker: Cuba and Haiti. Trekker Ian Wright rumbas through Havana, puffs up at a cigar factory, and checks out the Bay of Pigs. Then he moves over to Haiti in time for the voodoo fest. To be repeated tonight at 3 a.m. on Channel 2. (Until 9 p.m.)

9:00 (2) The American Experience: Truman, part one. Jason Robards narrates this repeat (and revealing) bio of Harry S Truman. To be repeated tonight at 1:30 a.m. (Until 11:30 p.m.)

9:00 (6) Football. The Dallas Cowboys versus the New York Giants.

9:00 (44) Classic American Cars of Cuba. Cuba lacks an auto industry of its own, and so the US’s long-running trade embargo has resulted in one in eight cars on the road being pre-1960s American guzzlers. It’s like a classic-car-show museum, and a tribute to both the Detroit engineers who built to last and the Cuban mechanics who’ve kept the wheels turning for almost half a century. To be repeated tonight at 4 a.m. on Channel 2. (Until 9:45 p.m.)

TUESDAY 16

7:30 (2) La Plaza: Behind " The Blue Diner. " A documentary look at local filmmakers Natatcha Estébanez and Jan Egleson and the making of their award-winning film, which airs on Wednesday at 9 p.m. (Until 8 p.m.)

8:00 (2) Nova: Hitler’s Lost Sub. In 1991, someone discovered a WW2 Nazi U-boat on the ocean floor off the Jersey shore. An investigation into how it got there, when, and why nobody ever mentioned it. To be repeated tonight at midnight. (Until 9 p.m.)

8:00 (44) Soundstage. Featuring music from Trace Adkins and Travis Tritt. To be repeated tonight at 3 a.m. on Channel 2. (Until 9 p.m.)

9:00 (64) The O.C. The season finale of this intricate interpersonal drama about life in the Old Country finds our hero, a would-be national-bowling-championship-team contender named Falngmn, reunited at last with his sweetheart, Singredd, who was born Ludmilla to Magdute the Fortune Teller and Onufrius the Lion Tamer, both once members of the renowned Radzyminsky Brothers, Borczak & Basinski Circus act called the Flying Dyfnicks and Fluffy. Years before, Onufrius, hoping to avoid upsetting his wife, Floral (who was also a fellow Flying Dyfnick), abandoned Singredd/Ludmilla in Falngmn’s remote but goat-rich village of Coraopolis. Tonight, Onufrius confesses everything and is set upon savagely by Floral and her sister, Doral (the fourth Flying Dyfnick). Magdute rushes to defend her one-time lover. In the confusion, a lantern is overturned and the circus grounds catch fire. Falngmn and Singredd/Ludmilla escape with Fluffy, the one-eyed basset-hound and former Flying Dyfnick mascot, to the capital city of Dolnth, where Singredd/Ludmilla finds work as a servant in the house of the kindly Lord Bozidar, who agrees to sponsor Falngmn as he climbs the ladder of the Old Country Olympic Bowling Team, and they all live happily ever after except Floral, Doral, Onufrius, and Magdute, who are all blinded in the fire and forced to live out their lives in poverty in the Ghetto of Plangth. Enough of this nonsense. (Until 10 p.m.)

9:00 (44) P.O.V.: Soldados: Chicanos in Vietnam and The Sixth Section. Two films focusing on Latino-American issues. Charley Trujillo & Sonya Rhee’s Soldados recalls the hardships of Mexican-Americans who fought in ’Nam. Alex Rivera’s The Sixth Section looks at immigrant Mexicans trying to make it work in upstate New York. To be repeated tonight at 4 a.m. on Channel 2. (Until 10 p.m.)

WEDNESDAY 17

9:00 (2) The Blue Diner. A film by local filmmakers Natatcha Estébanez and Jan Egleson about a Puerto Rican family in Boston. Daughter Elena forgets how to speak Spanish. Her boyfriend’s paintings wind up at the MFA. And there’s some rancor and confusion over a visa. Better seen than described from the info we were given. To be repeated tonight at 1 and 4 a.m. on Channel 44. (Until 11 p.m.)

9:50 (44) The Hunt for the Battleship Hood. In 1941, the British navy was out to get the German battleship Bismarck, which was sinking a lot of Allied merchant ships. The giant British battleship Hood engaged the Bismarck and was sunk (in less than two minutes) when a shell exploded in the ship’s magazine. Not long after, the Brits got their revenge and sank the Bismarck. This show dives beneath the North Atlantic to examine the remains of that WW2 drama. (Until 11 p.m.)

THURSDAY 18

7:30 (2) Basic Black: Boston 2004 Inc. The Democrats are coming! The Democrats are coming! Next year, the Hub will be immobilized by wishy-washy pols who lack the guts to thwart the Bush coup. A round-table discussion. (Until 8 p.m.)

8:00 (6) Threat Matrix. How long after September 11 will it be cool to exploit terrorism for commercial drama? Until about now. Each morning, we’re told by the show’s PR engine, the president starts his day by reading the title document, which we presume alerts him as to which race, religion, nationality, or minority is ripe for targeting by the Undersecretary of Fearmongering. Yeah, right, like Bush actually knows what’s going on. Sounds as if this show itself were more right-wing fearmongering. The season premiere. (Until 9 p.m.)

5:00 a.m. (44) Soundstage. Featuring music from Wilco and Sonic Youth. Good morning. (Until 6 a.m.)