Thursday’s TV highlights

SERIES

Ultimate Factories: The new episode “Coca-Cola” offers an eye-popping view of the machines that fill almost 800 bottles and 1,700 cans per minute with the popular soft drink (7 and 10 p.m. National Geographic).

Destination Truth: The series that attempts to separate sci-fi from sci-fact journeys to Ireland in search of the legendary banshee in an expanded episode (7 p.m. Syfy).

American Idol: The Black Eyed Peas and reigning champ Lee DeWyze perform on the results show (8 p.m. Fox).

Nikita: Nikita (Maggie Q) reluctantly assumes a past alter ego to stop a dangerous new weapon from coming into the U.S. in this new episode of the action drama (9 p.m. KTLA).

30 Rock: In this new episode, Liz (Tina Fey) wants Angie (Sherri Shepherd) to convince Tracy (Tracy Morgan) to move back home (10 p.m. NBC).

Manhunters: Fugitive Task Force: As a new season opens, tough cases await the New York/New Jersey unit of the U.S. Marshals Task Force (10 p.m. A&E).

Blonde vs. Bear: This new series follows Ann Bryant and her team of volunteers as they try to defuse potentially deadly situations of the ursine variety (10 p.m. Animal Planet).

MOVIES

The Fifth Element: Milla Jovovich stars in director Luc Besson’s visually stunning 1997 sci-fi fantasy (8 p.m. Encore), and probes accounts of alien abduction in the 2009 thriller “The Fourth Kind (8:15 p.m. Cinemax).

SPORTS

College basketball: Today’s action at the NCAA tournament includes Princeton vs. Kentucky (11:30 a.m. CBS), Michigan State vs. UCLA (6:15 p.m. TBS) and Gonzaga vs. St. John’s (6:30 p.m. CBS).

Exhibition baseball: The Dodgers host the Arizona Diamondbacks (1:05 p.m. FS Prime).

Hockey: The Kings play the St. Louis Blues (7:30 p.m. FSN).