Q. Can you tell us whether Merlin will return for a third season? We’ve watched for it on Syfy but still haven’t seen it. Also, when will Southland be on next?

Southland resumes on TNT Tuesday. Syfy has already aired three seasons of Merlin, with the third coming to DVD next week. The fourth season began Friday.Q. The last new episode of Terra Nova that aired in December was advertised as the season finale. Does this mean that we won’t be seeing any new episodes again until next fall? If so, why such a short season?

I cannot even assure you there will be a second season, since Fox has not made that decision (although two producers told the Hollywood Reporter they are guardedly optimistic about a pickup).

The first season consisted of 13 episodes, which was Fox’s plan from the beginning, since the post-January part of its season tends to get crowded by the return of American Idol. That’s also close to the cable model of many dramas, which will do relatively short seasons to control costs and free up their cast members for other projects.Q. I have a question about an old movie but I’m not sure of the title. This movie was about a military officer working in England during WWII and somehow the Germans were able to capture him and render him unconscious for a period of time and place him in a “mock” U.S. Army base because they were trying to find the details of D-Day ahead of time. The thing that tipped him off was a paper cut on his finger that he knew had only happened a week ago. I think it was called The Paper Cut but I can’t find any reference to it anywhere.

The movie you remember is called 36 Hours, from 1964. James Garner starred, along with Eva Marie Saint and Rod Taylor. It was based on a Roald Dahl short story, Beware of the Dog, which also inspired the 1989 TV movie Breaking Point, starring Corbin Bernsen. The Garner film is on DVD; the Bernsen version was released on VHS. Q. I saw The Destructors, a British film written by Graham Greene, on television in the late 1970s. It was about a group of boys in postwar London on a bomb site, where they destroy the only surviving house. Is it available?

Most likely you saw an installment of Shades of Greene, a series of adaptations of short stories by Greene, one of which was The Destructors. Unfortunately, I do not know of an authorized release of the series or of that episode. Q. There was a revival in 1988 of the Mission: Impossible TV series. What is the cast doing now?

Mission: Impossible (now a successful film franchise starring Tom Cruise) originally aired on CBS from 1966 to 1973. ABC gave it another try in 1988-90, with Peter Graves returning from the first series’ cast, along with Bob Johnson as the voice giving the missions. Another connection to the first series was Phil Morris, the son of the first Mission’s Greg Morris, playing the son of Morris’ character. The cast also included Thaao Penghlis, Antony Hamilton, Terry Markwell (for the first season) and Jane Badler (for the second). You may remember Badler from the original version of V; she also appeared on ABC’s recent revival.

Graves died in 2010. Hamilton died in 1995. Johnson died in 1993. Markwell continued to act for about a decade after Mission, but the Internet Movie Database lists no credits for her after 1997. Penghlis spent many years in daytime, including on Days of Our Lives, and — judging from the photos on his website — mixes acting and travel. Phil Morris has acted and done voice work in numerous series, and became a TV legend as lawyer Jackie Chiles on Seinfeld.