Arcane continues its considerable dramatic momentum from the first season.

Knapp’s legitimacy as a journalist and his skepticism lends Investigation Alien an level of legitimacy that few other alien-sighting docuseries have.

Alan Cumming’s Paradise Homes benefits from the cheeky presence of the Scottish actor, transforming a dry topic into a show that’s warm and funny.

Say Nothing is spectacular television, deftly weaving multiple perspectives together in various timelines to give the viewer the full scope of the Troubles. It’s a show that doesn’t pull its punches, be it in terms of the bleakest moral nadirs of that time or in the sharply hilarious gallows humor of West Belfast. Say Nothing is propulsive, nervy, and FX’s latest must-watch masterpiece.

Whether it’s action, intrigue, humor, or heartache, this show nails it all.

We like Clarke’s strong, stoic presence as DCI Ellis in Inspector Ellis, which is why we’re recommending the show. But we hope the series has less-confusing and more-engaging mysteries in the other two episodes.

From the setting to the food that is integral to the plot to the performances of the show’s leads, the series is a feast for the senses.

It’s a well-acted show with some reasonably intricate foreign relations plotting at its core that would have been right at home on network television in the 2000s or 2010s, save for a few f-bombs here and there. Our opinion of the show hasn’t really changed in that regard, though we do think that the plot is now getting so intricate, the show may be nudging itself more towards the “prestige TV’ end of the spectrum.

St. Denis Medical arrives incredibly sure of itself, having learned all the best lessons from its predecessors. The cast has chemistry, the scripts are sharp and smart, and the guest star potential is huge.

Wizards Beyond Waverly Place will give the adults who were fans of the original series the proper nostalgia hit, but it also has more than enough laughs for the kids who are entering this world for the first time.

Meyers remains the least likely you’d expect to see doing stand-up comedy, and yet somehow, he’s also the most proficient of them at doing it right now.

Somebody Somewhere looks like its going to end the way it began, as a funny, emotional, poignant show with characters we love to spend time with.

Groundbreaking it sure is not, but cozy, it most definitely is. The Marlow Murder Club features a charming ensemble of British actors doing what they do best: countryside murder mysteries with low stakes and high quality. Pour a cuppa and get comfy under a blanket because this is peak cozy murder mystery material.

There’s still plenty of shooting and other action in the second season of Lioness, but at least now Sheridan understands that his stellar cast can do a whole lot more than grimace and hold a gun.

Billy Crystal’s lead performance in Before is what is the big attraction to the series, but we also hope that the episodes’ relatively-short runtimes will keep the storytelling focused on Eli finding out why Noah knows about his past.

Tyler Perry’s Beauty In Black is about a subtle as a slap in the face, which is something we’re surprised we didn’t see in the grim, abuse-filled first episode.

There’s no magic bullet in this hour to change your mind about Minhaj. As he even jokes in reference to his foibles: “breaking news: comedians aren’t wizards.” But his thoughts about class and race and how our relationships to boundaries have deep meanings both inside the family home as well as on the global map, those are illusions worth shattering.

Munno’s schtick may be a bit over the top, but the enthusiasm she brings to Italian food and cooking makes The Pasta Queen a fun show to watch.

The first episode of Territory is a bit cluttered with characters and stories, but the sweeping vistas of the Northern Territories, backed by good performances by Torv, Taylor and Dorman make the show very watchable.

Breath Of Fire takes its entire first episode to set up the controversies surrounding the Kundalini Yoga movement and its two best-known leaders, but even after slogging through that first episode, we still want to learn more.

There are some funny jokes, but the series feels like it belongs in 2005.

Poppa’s House works because both Wayans Sr. and Jr. lean into what makes each of them funny, and are great together. The more standard sitcommy parts will get better the longer the show stays on the air.

It’s Florida, Man. is quirky, fun and sometimes scary, which pretty much reflects the state where its stories take place.

Fire Country might be taking a bit of a soapier turn, but the fire rescue scenes are still well done, and the now-well-established cast work well together.

We were not super impressed with the creepiness or scares in Passenger, but we did like Wunmi Mosaku’s performance, and that may be enough to make this show tolerable.

Hysteria! is funny, loves heavy metal, and does up its 1980s setting well. But it’s also having a real good time keeping us on the back foot.

Happy’s Place is a throwback sitcom that relies on character humor instead of broad gags, and that’s always something that we will root for.

Despite the fact that the huge cast and massive number of storylines made us dizzy, Rivals is deliciously and unapologetically trashy, and we have to give the show credit for that.

Despite the “howcatechem” aspect of Elsbeth being less than satisfying, Preston is so good as the title character we will put up with unsatisfying cases just to watch Elsbeth do her thing.

Georgie & Mandy’s First Marriage has a leg up on most of Lorre’s sitcoms because it starts with characters we already know and care about. Because of that, Lorre and company can delve into the more emotional parts of their relationships and let the funny come when it comes. There were a few funny moments during the first two episodes, but we hope those laughs come more often as the show becomes more established.

Even if you’ve never seen an episode of Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, you’ll get a lot out of seeing Bloom speak openly about grief while keeping it harmonious.

Manuel Garcia-Rulfo thrives in the courtroom scenes that pepper Lincoln Lawyer. .... Lincoln Lawyer is also at its best when its centerpiece attorney is in reaction mode to the moves being made by the people in his personal and professional lives, which increasingly overlap.

Like most modern game shows, Are You Smarter Than A Celebrity would be better if either the episodes were shorter or more than one contestant was brought on per episode. If that were the case, we can forgive the relative uselessness of the celebrities as a trade-off for the entertainment factor they bring. And Travis Kelce definitely has a Michael Strahan-esque future in media, given how much fun he is as host.

In the second season of Shrinking, Lawrence’s patented “found family” vibe is in place, with different segments of the excellent cast mixing and matching easily in storylines that feel earned and unforced.

Coleman delivers her lines in such a stiff manner, you wonder if Jolie is really upset or just annoyed. In general, though, the show is inoffensive fare that you can watch with your teens and tweens.

Tracker‘s appeal [lies] mostly in Justin Hartley’s empathetic performance, a carryover from his This Is Us days. Otherwise, it’s a fairly standard procedural whose weekly cases are rarely compelling.

NCIS: Origins is a solid NCIS prequel that promises some backstory for Gibbs while introducing us to how the agency operated when even other government agencies had no idea it existed.

Calamy’s performance as the delusional Chris makes The Confidante a very intriguing series. We just hope that the Bataclan attack is more of a factor in the show than just being the launching point for Chris’ lies.

The first episode of Starting 5 is titled “Meet the Hoopers”, and it’s clearly focused on introductions, but the notion that introductions are necessary is pretty silly, given the star caliber we’re talking about here.

Hey, this thing is creepy. Teacup thrusts us into the everyday life of a family who must navigate their own internal problems as the world around them becomes increasingly unsettling. And weird! And probably morebloody!

Tomb Raider: The Legend of Lara Croft has action, mystery, and a sincere emotional core that combine to form a fleshed-out world and story that will pique your interest. With plenty of compelling plotlines, questions, and characters set up in the first episode, we look forward to continuing on with them to see where this exciting adventure will lead.

Outer Banks season four is charging ahead with a solid new adventure while leaning into the cast of characters these actors have honed and developed over the past four years. The chemistry between all of these personalities feels real, and there’s a creaky, spooky vibe surrounding their new mission that adds to the fun.

As the first spinoff from Citadel, Citadel: Diana carries over and adds to that show’s world-building, establishes its own international flavor, and maintains an urgency driven by Diana’s double agent intentions.

Season 2 is bringing just as much drama, humor, and self-referential winking to the camera [as Season 1], and that’s all reason enough for all of us to STREAM IT.

“Look how much fun I’m having,” Wong says at one point. We can tell. And her joy at finding love again, or even at just rediscovering dating now that she has some newfound power in the dynamic, makes it fun for us to go along for the ride with her.

The chemistry between Bernal and Luna is at the heart of La Máquina, and we hope that the show’s producers lean on that for the rest of the season.

We like the cast of The Inheritance enough to keep watching, but it feels that the show is too distracted by lots of side stories to really concentrate on the mystery at its center.

There are parts of Last Days Of The Space Age that we liked, but the storytelling is too much of a shambling mess to keep our interest.

Citizen Nation is the antidote to every show you’ve seen about teens lately. These teens don’t care about internet fame; they care about restoring dialogue to the discourse in this country, and it’ll be fun to see them all getting ready for and competing in We The People.

There’s enough we liked about the first two episodes of The Franchise to recommend it, but we wonder how far the show’s accomplished producers can push the “crazy production of a high-budget film” theme without making things either absurd or annoying.

Mariska Hargitay’s Olivia Benson is one of TV’s most beloved characters and as long as she’s there, the show is worth watching. But, boy, they couldn’t have come up with a more generic season premiere if they tried.

While not quite as intense as its first season, the second season of Suspect is still very watchable because of the well-paced half-hour episodes and a cast that can handle its tell-don’t-show storytelling.

Gremlins: The Wild Batch continues the pre-movie mythology of the Mogwai with good voice acting, fun action sequences and expressive animation.

Heartstopper continues to revel in the small moments in relationships as well as the big ones, and seeing all of this romantic stability onscreen makes us feel good, which is the show’s objective.

Where’s Wanda? is engaging and funny, but effectively shows how two parents wanted to be active in the search for their missing daughter.

Mr. McMahon isn’t the whole story, and it’s not reasonable to expect it to be given the financial conflict of interest between Netflix and WWE. It’s still a fascinating story, though, and there’s a lot to be taken from Mr. McMahon, even if you take it with a grain of salt on the side. (Or perhaps in the eyes.)

The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon continues to work because it puts one of the franchise’s best characters in an unfamiliar situation. But now that his partner in zombie-killing is on the way to his side, that should make things even better.

Social Studies doesn’t tell you anything you haven’t already heard about teens and social media. But the sheer volume of what Greenfield shows teens being up to will scare any parent more than any blood-and-guts show Ryan Murphy can come up with.

9-1-1 is what it has always been, which is a show with great actors put in insane rescue situations. At this point, for it to be anything different would be strange.

Doctor Odyssey is a pretty dumb, inessential watch, but an entertaining one, mostly due to the performances of the main cast and guest stars.

We’re not sure how much more juice there is left to squeeze from the lemon that is Ashley and Gordon’s odd relationship, but Colin From Accounts tries its best to do just that, while expanding what we know about the world around them.

Even though we don’t completely buy the chemistry between Kristen Bell and Adam Brody, Nobody Wants This is funny enough, and the supporting characters robust enough, to keep us watching to see if Bell and Brody’s characters mesh a little better.

Whether it’s a good murder mystery is still up in the air after the first two episodes. But damn if Nash-Betts doesn’t completely command our attention during her copious screen time.

Midnight Family comes off as a bit soapy at times, but we get to see an aspect of how the medical field works in a place like Mexico City, along with a bunch of rescues that might be thrilling, tragic, silly or all three.

Murder In A Small Town is both a murder mystery series and a romance series. Can the two mesh? So far, it has, mainly thanks to the chemistry between Sutherland and Kreuk.

We enjoyed Penelope because Megan Stott’s performance is a clinic in solo acting, and we appreciate the story’s fantasy aspects. But those nagging questions that pop into our heads while watching it just don’t go away.

DeGeneres still has the chops as a shrewd observational comedian, but can she effectively chop away at her own mystique? Yes and no. .... While she gets sizable laughs making fun of men for getting away with making ridiculous public scenes by playing air guitar or imagining their golf swings, DeGeneres gets far less mileage with more shallow thoughts about somehow not knowing what it means to be in charge.

Your enjoyment of this series depends as much upon how well you know and follow the Whitehalls (as it does upon your enjoyment of reality TV projects in general). If you’ve loved watching the exploits of Jack and his dad in the past, or already love binging lite reality, then you’re obviously going to want to STREAM IT. But if you haven’t experienced Jack Whitehall and his dad before now, this might not be the best first introduction to them.

Zachary Quinto is a big reason why Brilliant Minds works in its first episode. But for it to continue to work, the rest of the characters need to be developed, and Quinto’s character needs to have his flaws explored in more depth.

Because of Bates, Matlock is certainly entertaining to watch. But would the show be equally entertaining if she wasn’t there? We’re not sure.

While Rescue: HI-Surf isn’t the deepest drama we’ve seen, the rescue scenes combined with Wells’ knowledge of how to build characters around the action give us confidence that the series has potential.

Twilight of the Gods happily gets lusty and bloodsoaked as it explores the tenets and characters of Norse mythology, with a strong sense of adventure to go with its weaving of fact, fable, and director Zack Snyder’s signature style.

La Maison works because it isn’t about what you might think it’s going to be about. Instead of it being about a stereotypical tyrant of a designer, it’ll be interesting to see two unexpected characters take over a fashion house and bring it into the 2020s.

What’s Next? The Future With Bill Gates is informative, and Gates and the producers speak to an impressive array of experts and A-listers. But we wish it had a bit more of a wary eye about its subjects.

The new Frasier isn’t as awful at the beginning of its second season as it was at the beginning of its first. But it’s not great, either. The recommendation is because of all the guest stars that we’re going to see this season and a hope that the first episode of the season won’t be an indicator of what the rest of the season is like.

The Penguin is compelling because of the very different but equally riveting performances of Ferrell and Milioti.

Monsters: The Lyle And Erik Menendez Story takes a pretty familiar story and makes it compelling by shifting the narrative slightly and through some excellent performances.

A Very Royal Scandal takes an event from the very recent past and gives it some fascinating context, aided by good performances from Sheen, Wilson and Scanlan.

We’ll watch Have I Got News For You because of Wood, Ruffin and Black. But the format is certainly can use some improvement.

It’s definitely a much better use of Hahn as Agatha than just continuing the WandaVision format. .... We’re excited to see Hahn, Plaza and the rest of the cast of Agatha All Along take Agatha’s story in whatever direction it goes.

Nöthin’ But a Good Time: The Uncensored Story of ’80s Hair Metal will bring back tons of memories of the music viewers might have listened to in middle or high school back in the 1980s, but the backstage stories will be what hold the interest of people who didn’t grow up with the music.

We knew exactly what was going to happen, given we saw the French pilot. But we were so entertained with Olson as Morgan that the mystery really didn’t matter.

We appreciate the fact that American Sports Story: Aaron Hernandez treats its story with respect and not as a tabloidy story ripe for outrageous dramatic scenes. That and the generally good performances make the first season of this new franchise worth watching.

Ultimately, the show wants us to be as hopeful as Edelman, while also reminding us that sometimes we need safe spaces to simply exist. And we sure need a lot of hope right now.

We almost think at this point that Tulsa King is designed to be ridiculous on purpose, because as eye-rolling as the second-season premiere was, we still want to watch Dwight and his crew get the upper hand on everyone in Tulsa and Brooklyn.

Three Women might have worked better as an anthology, but in its current format, it has too many superfluous elements and not enough actual drama.

Shows like How To Die Alone completely depend on the charm of the star and the cast. And Natasha Rothwell is definitely charming. But she has also built a cast around her that we want to see more of.

Billionaire Island is just getting started setting up its soapy family rivalry story, and there’s enough there in the first episode to make us hope things will get better.

The strong performances of Jeff Bridges and John Lithgow continue to make The Old Man a must-watch, but it definitely has enough confidence in its ensemble to give us stories without either of them in front of the camera.

My Brilliant Friend: Season 4 kicks off with a compelling and dramatic premiere that will immediately have viewers hooked and hungry for more. From the incredible acting to the impactful writing, this Italian series continues to expertly depict the complexity of human relationships over time and seems poised to end on a high with this fourth and final season.

The Chicken Sisters is a pleasant, often amusing show that has a good cast and wraps family drama in a refreshing package.

Wise Guy: David Chase And The Sopranos provides a lot of insight into what made Chase tick and what went into the creation of the landmark series.

Simply put: Universal Basic Guys is a deeply unfunny show. And when it’s not funny, then all of the other problems the show has are amplified.

As long as the episodes of Trigger Point‘s second season continue to show Lana and the rest of the expo squad escape one tense situation after the other — and occasionally fail — the show will continue to be entertaining, even if the overall terrorist plot is just meh.

A well-organized script and some fantastic performances makes the expansive story of Fight Night: The Million Dollar Heist an engaging, fun show to watch.

The only reasons we’re recommending The Perfect Couple are Hewson, Fanning, and our fervent hope that the series continues to be more irreverent than most shows in this annoyingly persistent genre.

Between the old lies and secrets that everyone is keeping and the new ones that have just been revealed, the show redefines “guilty pleasure” as a show where the guilty get pleasured… and pretty much everyone is guilty of something.

Just like Season 1, those personalities are so strong that we love seeing them interact with each other, even if the cases they’re working on aren’t that intriguing.