While it isn't as tacky as the MTV hit, it does wallow in uncomfortable moments in therapy and exposes people at their most vulnerable. These couples should have checked their love handles in private.

For a topic that sounds as dry as a fund prospectus, the acting and pacing is exceptional.

Becoming Chaz never really gets under its subject's skin.

You just have to wade through a landfill of lame camp and gratuitous weirdness to get to the pop center of Gaga's HBO show.

Why Not? With Shania Twain rings of a last-ditch effort to avoid counseling.

As The Voice made loud and clear, there's not enough talent to go around.

It's wonderful HBO is willing to subsidize so many artists, but Treme feels more like a tax write-off than an actual series.

Additional time would have made Verite more convincing. At 90 minutes, it runs short, especially as the family copes with its newfound notoriety

Those who love the books will probably geek out on the series. The rest of us may have a harder time sitting through Game of Thrones.

The Paul Reiser Show is stale and dated.

When Happy Endings is funny, it's need-to-pause-the-DVR-because-I'm-laughing-so-hard funny. And viewers should easily be able to commit to that.

There were moments during the first two episodes in which I wondered if the series was doddering along like a blindfolded Miss Marple. Have faith. Each episode swings in unexpected directions.

The show runs rampant with rapid-fire dialogue and sly pop-culture references. The cast is strong.

This is no CBS crime procedural, and viewers deserve the chance to delve into this smart mystery for themselves.

If you can accept you're watching the Kennedy saga through the prism of the "Fringe" universe, what you will find is an absorbing, addictive drama, with some authentic performances.

Unfortunately, Iron's not in every scene, and the 100-minute premiere, after a promising opening, becomes bogged down in political intrigue as his rivals scheme to remove the new pope.

This is "King Arthur Begins." Fiennes seems determined to play the Joker. Whether this interpretation of the sorcerer will cast a spell over viewers is uncertain.

Delany can be both captivating and infuriating as the know-it-all medical examiner, but she always holds the screen.

When Jackie snaps over one patient's plight, she could be speaking for impatient viewers: "People gotta stop trying to save people who don't want to be saved." Same goes for TV characters stuck in the same shtick.

The most endearing, functional dysfunctional family in all of TV gets off to multiple good starts in the new season of Showtime's The United States of Tara.

While the miniseries is more faithful to the 1941 James M. Cain novel of the same name, Todd Haynes' adaptation (he co-wrote the teleplay, directed and acted as one of the executive producers on this five-part bloated whale) is so draining, it might make you anemic.

Not even a return to Sin City - the site of the most notorious, debauched entry in the franchise - can jump-start any excitement into this, the 25th season of the unscripted series.

Serenity arrives in surprising ways. Whether Mike makes it in this arena or not, Taking on Tyson suggests he's already won his toughest battle.

For a show that starts out with so much energy, Breakout Kings quickly settles into a procedural rut.

It's an extended "Law & Order" that never settles on a verdict.

The mix of humor and horror is unparalleled, and the bonds of friendship between these supernatural denizens feel authentic.

The ladies are so desperate to be noticed, they recycle bits from other shows.

The story reflects how badly these procedurals have degraded over the years, forced to come up with increasingly more over-the-top motives for murder. If cookie-cutter cruelty is your nightcap, this show will send you well off to sleep.

Mad doesn't stray far from "Mother's" formula

As a man struggling to find where he misplaced his heart, Perry makes angst seem easy. His sense of timing isn't rusty. The sitcom has a few clouds: Alonzo needs an edge and the show should make Jorge Garcia's ("Lost") facilities manager a permanent regular. But Mr. Sunshine could be midseason's brightest ray of mirth.

Traffic Light is the kind of sitcom that revs from zero to zero with laughter.

Every character has a voice-over, info dumps for back story that are either irksome or unnecessary.

Face Off hews so much to the Runway formula, it practically falls over and busts a lip, but at least the pacing is fast.

At 60 minutes, these episodes will test even loyal fans, although some viewers will discover a new respect for Melissa, who displays patience not unlike Job in her trials. Still, Joan is her mother. Everyone else can skip the guilt trip.

Starz's Spartacus - Gods of the Arena is endlessly creative when it comes to all things stabby. It seems to have a bottomless bucket of fake blood in its production budget.

One problem with the show is intrinsic to its premise. Though mediation is valuable in the real world, it doesn't lead itself to interesting stories in a medium that chugs on conflict, victims and victors.

The more [Vance (David Walton) is] allowed to cut loose, the closer Perfect edges to real humor.

TV Land tries to build on its surprise sitcom hit "Hot in Cleveland" with Retired at 35, a spectacularly unfunny show that reflects a parent's worst nightmare: A grown child moves home for no good reason and shows no sign of budging.

Skins feels raw and gritty. The characters' pain is often palpable. Only the show's target audience will know how true its portrayal of adolescence is, but it should make many parents pay closer attention to what's going on in their teenagers' lives.

Comparisons to the BBC show are unavoidable since the first two episodes are practically a scene-by-scene reshoot of the original's opening. The stars even look like doppelgangers of the English cast.

Bates, who remains a recurring guest on the network's "The Office," brings heart and intelligence to a role that is not nearly so well-defined on the page, proof that casting can elevate any vehicle.

Oh, you'll laugh. But you probably won't remember much of it the next day.

Arnold's Beyond Scared Straight hews to the premise of the original and proves to be just as gripping.

In true "Grey's" fashion, each newbie is challenged with a case that dredges up the personal issues that brought them to this isolated spot, where, according to Ben, it's like practicing medicine in 1952 in a Third World country

You've been three rounds with this story before. Lights Out sets you up for a sucker punch.

Shameless lives up to its title. What's left for the rest of the season? Cannibalism? Macy is a good sport about being dragged around the kitchen like dead weight.

Bob's Burgers arrives cold, with a touch of E. coli. Beware.

NBC's The Cape aspires to be "The Dark Knight" but unfurls more like the campy 1960s "Batman" TV series.

Episodes has funny moments, [but] like "Curb Your Enthusiasm," the satire is an acquired taste and seems to be too inside showbiz to find a mass audience.

Southland's cast remains one of its best selling points.

V is stuck in the past of a 25-year-old show. It needs to shed that skin.

From pariahs to parodies. What a quick ride. The party is almost over for Jersey Shore.

Primeval (which has already been renewed for a fifth season) doesn't ask you to think, just to enjoy the mayhem that follows when a rampaging behemoth is set loose anywhere in the United Kingdom. It's hard to find fault with a formula like that.

Friday Night Lights used high school football as a vehicle to explore plainly and authentically the way in which people live, struggle and thrive in small towns. It just might be the finest scripted series on prime time.

Her tips could be found in the nearest public library. And stretched to an hour, Jobmother seems downright inflationary.

Many of the scenes with the teens seem staged, especially tonight's climax. Still, the Bruces aren't anything like the delusional couples who populate Bravo's "Housewives" shows. This is a functioning family trying to survive a dysfunctional time.

There's something bizarrely addictive about The Hasselhoffs.

The three-week, six-hour miniseries introduces a colorful, international cast of characters who live and breathe to create one moment of perfection under the limelight.

On Veterans Day, Wartorn is a somber reminder of the price that many pay when they serve their country and a wake-up call to the rest of us about the debt we owe them.

With its relentless narration, Gold Rush: Alaska more often plays like anaudible.com download with stunning visuals of Sarah Palin's home state as a backdrop.

Sarah Palin's Alaska turns out to be a tepid travelogue of the former governor's home state's tourist attractions interspersed with homespun homilies and family downtime.

Now this show plays like a cross between any generic CBS crime procedural and the network's "Bones." Human Target needs a course correction.

TBS has concocted a show once considered to be unimaginable: A college comedy so badly written, acted and executed, so deficit in any jokes or diversions that even a stoner wouldn't be able to enjoy it.

The auction segments are fascinating as buyers become locked in bidding wars and props sell for obscene figures. But the series could ultimately hurt Maddelena's business. The means by which he authenticates certain items, at least as presented here, is not convincing.

Of the cast, Winger seems to be the weakest link, brittle and uncertain, but it's too soon in her arc to write her off. The series is like a mystery novel, but the crimes of the heart here are ones the patients unwittingly inflict upon themselves and the lengths they'll go to hide from the truth. Watching Byrne's sullen shrink match wits with Ryan's cool therapist is the best reason to book an appointment with In Treatment.

Wahlberg, a favorite here, needs to avoid David Caruso Syndrome. There's a bit too much posturing with the furrowed brow and hand-on-the-hip that has made a caricature of that "CSI: Miami" star. Moynahan is solid as the assistant district attorney, but her character's lefty politics seem at odds with her occupation and her family.....But Selleck as the bad guy in his own show? It almost makes you want to dial 911.

Unlike "The View," there were no topical references--the show could have been filmed five years ago for all its relevance--unless you count the moment Osbourne turned a vague discussion of divorce law reform into a rant against cyberbullying.

There's an undercurrent of desperation in this spinoff--the belief that a woman is only as good as her face and figure, and that there's always some pretty thing on her way up to take her place. These women know they are disposable. That's the ugly truth lining the sun-kissed streets of Beverly Hills.

Visually, Los Angeles works. One forgets how dark and claustrophobic the New York shows can be. The sets seem more open, and the decor reflects an electric mix of modern styles. But the crimes--ripped from the headlines, naturally--might as well be culled from the funny pages.

Ordinary is super at capturing a middle-class family suffering from self-imposed Kryptonite poisoning

Sister Wives practically twists and breaks its back assuring viewers how gosh-darn normal everything is. Still, there are some cracks in the crackpots.

The show displays all the sophistication you might expect from a social media that limits its statements to 140 characters. Here's a tweet from me: This show is a piece of (bleep).

My Generation is based on a Swedish series, "On God's Highway." Dramatic storytelling seems to have veered off the road and crashed into a tree.

The humor is crude and risque and often at the expense of Indian culture. I could have lived without the defecation jokes. To be fair, the writers don't give America a pass.

Better With You has the foundation to be an engaging comedy. Right now, it's difficult to commit to a long-term relationship

O'Connell glides through the show on his smile. Belushi isn't as bad as one might expect, which, granted, isn't much of a compliment. He reins in the comic buffoonery, and if the scripts get better, he might prove to be up to a dramatic role.

Maybe Abrams just ran out of energy drinks that week. This is a poor caper show that doesn't even deliver half the surprises of TNT's "Leverage."

Tierney and Morrow are both seasoned TV stars, but even they can't make The Whole Truth ring true.

This is a packed episode that sets up the dynamic for a season long rivalry that New Directions will be hard-pressed to overcome.

A serial killer, a state execution, slapstick involving a baby--Fox's new Raising Hope is deliciously demented and easily the funniest new show of fall.

Arnett isn't stretching himself here, but he's still funny as a man who can't comprehend why he can't buy the love of his life. Russell brings a fervor to the role of a woman who has yet to come across a tree she wouldn't want to hug.

Detroit's on-location shooting aids its authenticity, but the show goes awry when it goes for a joke. For example, medical examiner Abbey Ward (Erin Cummings, "Mad Men") carries bruises from her after-hours avocation: roller derby. Detroit 1-8-7 is one of those shows that is going to need some time to finds its destination.

Chase reminds me of "Trauma," NBC's attempt at a Monday drama last year, although the shows couldn't be more dissimilar (the latter was about first responders). They both seem to be placeholders in the prime-time schedule until the network can scrounge up something better.

Underneath the crude humor, there's a sweetness and an honesty to the show. The duo's struggle with weight is believable.

The remake of "Hawaii Five-0" is the best kind of throwback--to the buddy cop films of the 1980s. Think "Lethal Weapon" with a tropical twist.

Lone Star, created and written by Kyle Killen, centers on a con man who lives a double life--with two beautiful women--and is so full of plot holes you could drive a motorcade through it with a parade of elephants behind.

Will The Event turn out to be another "FlashForward" or the next "Lost"? I'm betting cautiously on the latter.

Buscemi is the only big-name actor associated with this cast, and though he seems to be having a great time strutting onscreen, most of the others aren't up to sharing the screen with him.

You've seen this game before, but not played with this level of desperation. There are moments when the boardroom feeding frenzies might cause you to step away from the table. There's something to be said for escapist TV after all.

This show violates so many tenets of storytelling, it deserves to be tossed in the clink. Outlaw is about as entertaining as a legal brief on the case of Wall v. Paint Drying.

Nikita is a breakthrough for teen-happy CW, its riskiest show yet--one aimed at adults. It's one they might enjoy.

The triangle--quadrangle?--becomes more twisted by episode's end. It leads to shocking violence against outsiders that deepens the tragedy and the mythology at the core of the show. "Game on" just might be the two most chilling words uttered this season.

Tom Welling's picked up all the wrong lessons from behind the screen, from premise to character development. Hellcats is poorly paced and its attempts at comedy and drama stumble.

The premise is nonsensical, the characters little more substantial than fog and the central season long mystery is less a whodunit and more a why-bother.

Although the show is reminiscent of the kid-friendly TGIF lineup, some of the jokes are for the PG-13 crowd.

Many of the jokes are non sequitur riffs that turn into endurance tests. The cast seems to be aware of it.

Linney, who also serves as executive producer, is luminous as always. But the first three episodes fall into a predictable pattern of Cathy confronting someone and dropping cryptic comments about her diagnosis.

The Salahis are the attraction here. Judging from the season teaser, the show will spend the entire season building up to the infamous dinner-crashing scene, to which the Bravo cameras appear to had access. Remember, a fame whore needs your attention to survive. Look away now.