Malkovich’s detective lacks his spirit. ... This detective is subdued, almost meek. He is an imposter.

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.

Your appreciation will rise and fall on your enjoyment of seeing Boston and its people portrayed as profoundly racist and corrupt.

Alas, most of the other characters are so weakly sketched, they don't make a ripple.

Netflix’s sequel series Fuller House is a triumph of canny calculation over creativity. The extended 40-minute premiere is the best fan-service of any reboot ever.

[Host John Cena is] smart and he’s funny when he goes off-script. He gives American Grit its shot at glory.

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.

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

Limitless may give you an immediate high, but side effects may include listlessness, dangerous plot holes and a sinking feeling you’ve wasted an hour of your life.

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

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

Showtime’s The Chi floats like a worthy successor to “The Wire” and then descends into the sort of bathos of a Tyler Perry production.

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.

Reba's smile can warm almost anything. But it's not worth sitting through this recycled sitcom for it.

Living Biblically is made in such a way that it won’t offend most anyone. It also won’t make many laugh. That’s splitting the difference in all the wrong ways. The show is exhausting.

The Czech Republic location shoots convincingly suggest medieval France, but the episodes run an unwieldy 75 minutes long. Capaldi is terrific and commands the screen as if he’s on an HBO series while everyone else is in a cartoon.

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

When it comes to Sun Records, the hook is there, but it can’t sustain the beat.

Williamson has crafted a pilot tense and frightening. But in the subsequent three episodes, The Following deteriorates into a serialized version of CBS' "Criminal Minds." ... After four episodes, this viewer was weary of seeing women terrorized.

Scream Queens is just too dumb to be fun.

Shots Fired’s biggest sin is its lack of urgency. For a story this topical, Shots seems constructed like a LEGO model--one scene is pressed onto another.

The fallout, partly because of the size of the sprawling cast, partly because of the tonal shifts, sometimes within the same scene, can be jarring. Orange nails the dramatic moments. It’s the comedy that ranges from banter to slapstick and back that feels out of place, especially as the rioting wears on.

The Last Ship is a naval recruitment ad for the apocalypse, and these waters look shallow. Careful before sticking your toe in.

Tacoma FD needs more than a spark to get going. It needs a tanker full of gasoline and a convenient bolt of lightning.

It's also clear that, with the show now starting its fifth season, the contestants have actually bothered to watch previous installments and have strategized. It may keep them in the game longer, but it makes for more predictable TV.

You'd have more fun watching somebody put up drywall.

Although 'Dad' also was created by [Family Guy's Seth] MacFarlane and has even more outlandish characters - a gay alien, a randy German goldfish - it feels like the more conventional (read: less funny) sitcom. [1 May 2005]

There probably hasn’t been so much talk about sex crammed into one hour since MTV’s “Loveline.” Much of it cannot be repeated here. Instead of being titillating, it’s tedious, the equivalent of three cold showers.

The show flexes its political correctness so hard, it forgets the most important part of TV drama is showing, not telling. That changes, for a few moments next week, when Ashley and Kristen are arrested and suffer far different ordeals from a booking officer. It’s a welcome rarity, and proof Ball can craft compelling drama, when he chooses to. Most of the characters on Here and Now self-medicate. You might feel the same urge after spending some time with this fractured family.

The challenges are right out of “Survivor” and MTV’s much missed “Road Rules”--so much so that loyal fans will be able to scream out the season, if not the episode. Some of the game rules seem arbitrary, even for the genre.

Ultimately, Fleming will leave you neither shaken nor stirred.

Like "Lost," the show is burdened with flashbacks and divides its time between the present and the prison 50 years earlier.

The alleged comedy follows this blended family's attempts to get along. The laugh track works harder than anyone here.

The innuendos would make a seventh-grader giggle. ... Mullally’s Karen remains one of network TV’s greatest comic creations, even when she’s saddled with such lines as “Hasta la homos!” Hayes’ shtick has not aged well. Messing seems to be reading her lines in the pilot. It’s not all bad. The theme song has been given a kick.

The weird, creepy comedy about the world of a struggling copy writer from her dog’s perspective. ... Three episodes of this show and I was fantasizing about dropping this flea bag off at a shelter and speeding away. Oh, some of the bipeds here are endearing, when they get their moments.

When the funniest things about a comedy are the cameos, it’s time to go back to the drawing board. Or in the case of NBC’s new sitcom A.P. Bio, back to the chalkboard.

There's still heat to Rescue Me - it just needs something to stoke the drama. [19 June 2005, p.A03]

Locked up in cliches, tedium and barely believable bipeds. ... As far as extinction events go, Zoo is lame and tame.

It's an appealing premise that quickly bores with bad writing. [28 Nov 2002]

Somehow executive producer Greg Daniels (``The Simpsons,'' ``King of the Hill'') and his cast must win over new fans while not pissing off the old fans. [23 Mar 2005, p.42]

It’s a dank, depressing series made on too little money that could have been vastly improved by cutting the episode order by at least a third. At 13 hours, you’ll feel as if you’re the one being punished for something.

The TV mom has changed - from out-of-touch authority figure to giggling girlfriend. This WB series attempts to depict a thoroughly modern single parent-child relationship. Yet, there's a sense this type of chumminess could only happen on TV. [5 Oct 2000, p.48]

How you view it will depend on what you consider the proper care of collectibles and the corruption of a minor.

The freak-show rounds, a staple of Idol’s early weeks, have been reduced to a couple of montages and the random weirdo.... Of the three judges, Connick is the harshest, a Simon Cowell without the snark or the malice.

The two have so much loathing for themselves, Alone Together can be downright depressing. Just the quality you don’t want from a sitcom. You might end up hating yourself--for wasting your time.

Return of the Mac looks like a pleasant family project, one they can look back on fondly. For the rest of us, it’s just a step up from watching someone else’s home movies.

Anyone hoping for a “Desperate Housewives” vibe (ABC’s last big Sunday hit) will be disappointed. This story unfolds as if it were told by someone overdosing on Ambien.

Patty is important--but she’s not Insatiable’s main dish. Strangely and crucially, her viewpoint often gets lost, ignored or brushed aside, at least in the early episodes. The focus of this dark comedy is Bob Armstrong (Dallas Roberts).

There are some lovely shots of South Boston. Like everything else here, they've been staged.

Usually “24” descends into silliness in its final third act, and by that time, it has built up a reservoir of goodwill so viewers are determined to finish the day. Not so much with this one.

The men are neanderthals, the women are the sitcom cliche peacemakers.

The Shield gives viewers so much Chiklis, it should be called "The Commish 2." The pilot opens with the unlikely scenario of the portly Chiklis chasing down a teenage drug dealer. It only gets worse...There may be rogue cops out there, but do they really announce to their precinct captains that they can't be controlled? It's hard to watch a show that stars such an unlikable character. [12 Mar 2002, p.41]

Allison is one precious snowflake and is about as interesting as last week’s church bulletin. Lynch, meanwhile, plays her interloper with Sue Sylvester snark peppered with the kind of innuendo you’d hear on “2 Broke Girls.”

It's not a Comedy Central spoof, but it skews ridiculously close to one.

Looking: The Movie is pointless and boring.

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

The show obvi­ously wants you to believe their characters are meant for each other, but given that this show seems to be teasing everyone with everyone else, it’s hard to take that seriously--or even be inter­ested.

Throws off a lot of sparks but it never really ignites. [9 March 2002]

Baker exudes a stoic charm. As his demanding father, Dabney Coleman is a disquieting presence. [25 Sept 2001, p.48]

After three episodes, my head is bumping against my joy ceiling--with Happyish.

Two nights might have worked better for this series, but if noises at night make you jump, "Stephen King's Rose Red" will give you a decent dose of the heebie-jeebies. [27 Jan 2002]

Shahs of Sunset, which plays like a cross between "Jersey Shore" with an older cast and "The Real Housewives of Oblivion."

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.

Controversy aside, Life seems to have no meaning beyond giving the 21-year-old a platform for her parenting views and criticism of Los Angeles.

Despite all of TLC's crafty maneuvering, this is a family that likes to laugh with each other. The rest doesn't seem to matter.

Anderson is charming and sells her sweet character. Sasse’s Xavier comes across as an amalgam of Russell Crowe, Jake Gyllenhaal and the sort I’ve always figured to be an urban­ cannibal.

Of all the dumb shows you can watch on a Monday, here’s one more.

It's a drama. ... The Resident turns out to be hilarious in so many ways, but first you must get through the horror.

The writing is so scattered, it’s hard to find anyone, Montague or Capulet, to root for.

Bad Teacher is like a comedy club on a Sunday morning. No fun.

Fox’s creaky re-imagining of the cult classic “Rocky Horror Picture Show” misses the point about what makes the original so beloved.

CBS' new island series Survivor is populated with rats...Most of them walk on two legs. [1 June 2000, p.47]

Basic cable is known for carving out niche audiences, but it's hard to imagine this "Friday Night Lights Shrink" will score with many.

The series is an adaptation of popular Mexican tele­novela “Terminales” and doesn’t do enough to shake off its more sensational roots. A plot swerve at the end of the hour will set off more groans than gasps.

Executive producer Sofia Vergara, better known as Gloria on ABC’s “Modern Family,” and series creator Hannah Shakespeare (“The Raven”) have a lot of ideas, but there isn’t a single surprise in the batch.

Looking might be the most provocative series of 2014. It’s just not original or memorable.

Sunjata is talented and charismatic.... He deserves a show that will cement his status as a leading man. This isn’t it. Tveit buckles under the script shifts, in one scene a dweeb, in the next, a canny agent.

Though the tragic-comedy tone is intriguing if a little askew in the pilot, the bigger problem looming ahead is the show's static formula. [3 Jan 2005]

Bonnie & Clyde? More like Hokum and Bunk.

There are too many instances of people conveniently running into each other. In short, common sense is missing from Justified.

World of Dance has stars, style and spunk. It’s also wildly over­produced and seems a bit out of step.

Unfortunately, it’s not especially funny. It’s one dark, depressing look at a SMILF.

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.

You'll be left tapping your feet all right--wondering impatiently if there's any sparkle under this drudgery.

A spy show mixed with an awkward romantic-comedy. Imagine if “Grey’s Anatomy’s” Shonda Rhimes decided to remake “Get Smart” as a drama and you get a sense of the tones at war here.

The problem with building an action drama around a sniper is that the work by its nature requires people to be several yards away from each other. A climactic gunfight in the season finale goes as far as to show the math--the mental calculations the shooters have to do to make their shot--to juice up the action. It doesn’t work. Shooter excels in one area--grotesque head shots.

This is “The Da Vinci Code” crossed with “Indiana Jones” with dialogue courtesy of a Magic 8 Ball.

Barbershop's tarty makeover - surprising, because three of the films' producers, including star Ice Cube, are behind this - does more than just sex it up for premium cable. The good will has been snipped from the franchise. [11 Aug 2005, p.53]

Sit through TNT’s “The Hero” and 72 Hours and REELZ’s “Race to the Scene” back-to-back, you realize how much the genre lives on the tired bone marrow of “Survivor” and "The Amazing Race."

Biderman’s work here is inexplicably lazy: South Boston natives are haunted or broken; L.A. natives are narcissistic airheads. Voight doesn’t so much chew the scenery as gnaw it.

Russian Dolls reinforces every negative stereotype about Russian women.

The drama is swamped by the saccharine cliches.

The musical numbers are competently staged, even if they often play like filler to underscore character montages. The plots mosey between drama and comedy and never hit their marks.

Jack Ryan excels at pyrotechnics. Walls, trucks and people explode in spectacular arrays of destruction. Its fight choreography gets muddy, especially when Jack is tussling with some terrorist. ... The most charitable thing that can be said about Krasinski’s performance here is that he looks deeply, deeply tired.

APB never settles its own version of its existential dilemma: man or machine? It argues for both. But as this uninspiring drama proves, sometimes when you split the difference, you end up with nothing.

Ransom needs some stirring. Ex-cop Zara Hallam (Nazneen Contractor, “Heroes Reborn”) rounds out the team, and she gets little to do in this hour, a crime one can only hope will be rectified in future episodes.

Don't worry about forming a lasting relationship with Best Friends Forever. It has all the signs of a quick flame-out on the NBC schedule.

It's a bad omen when the show repeats one of its catastrophes next week, just amped to a grislier level. I was bored.