There’s nothing wrong with whipping up some comfort food, of course, but Murder might leave you hungry for something more challenging an hour later.

Their journey should be thrilling, fascinating. It’s a chore. The young leads do the best with what the scripts give them, even as they are forced to run over the same story beats.

This is one overstuffed show.

Possibly the least funny thing on TV. [23 Jul 2003]

Extant plays with genres, mixing sci-fi, conspiracy thriller and scenes from a struggling marriage. It also asks some daring questions about the collision of machine and humanity.

Unlike other period dramas, notably AMC's "Mad Men" and Starz's "Magic City," Vegas doesn't cram the hour with topical references. Here, they're more subtle and jarring.

Call me bored. Encore's adaptation of Herman Melville's Moby Dick, the cable network's first original miniseries, is about as thrilling as a three-hour tour of Boston Harbor while blindfolded on a sweltering summer day.

Give Lost Girl a try. You might be seduced.

This is the best young adult cast for any drama in years, and you’ll even be able to overlook Apa’s horrible dye job.

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

The soul of the show is 30-something daughter Lydia (Heather Paige Kent), who dumps her loutish, lay-about fiance and decides to go to college. Written by waitress-turned-screenwriter Diane Ruggiero and based on her own life. The supporting cast, which includes Paul Sorvino, Kevin Dillon, Debi Mazar and Ellen Burstyn, is a standout. [1 Oct 2000, p.6]

The longer you stick with this nine-episode season, the more the players reveal themselves. It’s a big part of how Britannia,”written and co-created by Jez Butterworth (“Black Mass,” “Edge of Tomorrow”), transcends its genre roots.

The cast mines genuine heartache in the mysterious.

The Pillars of the Earth, a six-part, eight-hour miniseries debuting Friday with a two-hour punch, delivers enough surprises to enthrall any thriller buff.

Safe is one of those series, like HBO’s “Big Little Lies,” that focuses on the lives of the beautiful and the well-to-do. It doesn’t suggest the rich are just like us. It suggests they are even more miserable, and in the case of Safe, probably quite monstrous. That’s a story that translates just about everywhere, apparently.

This show is a bit too easy, given that its source material has become a parody of itself. For those who have grown sick of the Bravo formula squabbling, these antics may be a tonic.

Is the show still funny? Sure. But it now seems about as cutting edge and relevant as "Alf" or "Suddenly Susan."

By the end of the third episode, I was tired of all the sodomy jokes. Wood is an appealing comedic lead, but he's working off scraps. Be charitable and chalk up Gann's appeal to cultural differences.

A loopy, likable new NBC comedy.

Boy is often silly, but this cast is just so likable.

Trust at times seems about as factually accurate as the “B.C.” comic strip, and Boyle’s visual affectations and his over-reliance on split-screens do not always serve the story well. (He directed the first three episodes.) .. Whatever Trust’s hold on the facts, it more than makes up for in its performances.

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.

If the queen of England isn’t enough drama for you, then something is amiss. Victoria gets close to the gold crown and then backs off.

The show's repetitive voice-overs are annoying. But you'll be sucked into this dangerous venture.

In one of the episode introductions, Tatum says he spent 107 hours in the studio dubbing his role, so much time that he ended up hurting his voice. There’s no way to be sure if he’s telling the truth. But if he is, it was time well and weirdly spent.

Arrested Development is back. You’ve earned the insanity.

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

A sometimes intriguing sci-fi show from executive producer Ronald D. Moore about a viral outbreak at a desolate Arctic base. The bug isn’t airborne, but stupidity apparently is.