What anchors Better Things is the warmth Sam feels for her family. What makes it works are the tiny human moments.

The second season of FX’s Emmy-winning limited series has a new cast and mystery, and it promises to be even more fun and weirder than the first.

Halt and Catch Fire has always been an acquired taste. The mixture of personal dramas and the tech world doesn’t always go down easily. Some of that continues in the new season, but the new world of the Internet kicks some life into the story.

It has a lovely lyrical wandering quality about it. This year, there are probably more smiles than laughs. The humor is less jokey and more organic (keeping with the food motif). The episodes are more themed than plotted, mostly a series of interconnected vignettes. Characters drop in and out.

The series doesn’t measure up to top-flight Attenborough, who is working on “Planet Earth II,” but it is mostly fascinating as well as, of course, informative.

It doesn’t break any new ground, but unlike most crime procedurals, it’s neither facile nor jokey. Whether in the end Naz is guilty or innocent may not matter. The series ultimately succeeds on its mystery and as a provocative trip through the justice system.

Silicon Valley remains one of the best comedies on television.

It’s still laugh-out-loud funny, the best comedy on TV. One episode will have her monitoring a free election in a former Soviet republic. The irony just drips. And all you can say about Louis-Dreyfus is that six isn’t too many.

Eventually, though, what emerges in the series is a nuanced--if slightly bizarre--portrait of a woman in distress.

The series isn’t striving for reality, although it reflects a dysfunctional one. It’s going straight for laughs, and there are plenty of those. ... It’s Louis-Dreyfus’ presence, though, that makes Veep top-notch.

Odenkirk is flat-out terrific at times, but the show hasn’t kicked into gear for me. On “Bad,” Bryan Cranston’s Walter White was in a desperate situation that unleashed his inner monster and diabolical genius. Meanwhile, the occasionally dense Saul is meandering toward his sugar-rush exile in Omaha.

The Crown succeeds because it gives us this fresh perspective on the world at that time, and in many ways, the events of the royals then are not that far from what’s happening today. This Crown continues to rule.

In many ways, the new season of Jenji Kohan’s Emmy-nominated drama is as impressive as ever, but you may need a scorecard to sort out all the players. Most of the stories are engaging; others seem like simple diversions.

No one is arguing that The Deuce isn’t entertaining, if slightly cliched. But we shouldn’t pretend The Deuce is the truth. It would be easy to praise the series for being unjudgmental and focusing on the human elements. However, there was a lot of pain involved in that world, and the series is too carefully constructed for you to feel it.

While all of this may seem out of the past, there is something naggingly familiar, eerily fascinating and even contemporary about much of The Knick.

It is Balfe, who also received a Globe nomination, whom the series rests on, and she remains a captivating Claire. The actress brings a playfulness and an ethereal presence to the role, which are attributes essential for someone caught between two worlds.compelling drama

As a film, it’s all over the place, but in some ways its crazy-quilt nature suits its subjects and succeeds as a touching portrait of a unique mother and daughter.

In its own way, Wonderland is as visceral in its milieu and sliding-scale morality as HBO's "Oz." [30 March 2000, p.L5]

While the mysteries on Broadchurch are compelling, they can be a bit scattered at times, with some weird detours. Yet the magnetic performances of Tennant and Colman keep the series together; the two acclaimed actors are always able to navigate the show’s odder moments with interesting takes.

You’re the Worst has always been in danger of growing too hip or too stale. So far the series has kept changing enough to avoid that. The early episodes of season four show promise. It seems some reckoning is on the way, but it could also signal the beginning of the end.

Coltrane, Waters and Riseborough are brilliant in this compelling drama.

The brilliant Black Mirror returns Friday for a third season--and its best one yet--on Netflix with six new episodes.

Notaro’s great at deadpan one-liners, which is where most of the humor in the series is generated. Much of the rest of the time, it’s lightly situational.

The thing that The End of the F***ing World smartly does is never let you forget that Jim and Alyssa are like wild animals you think you have tamed, at any moment they might turn on you and bite. Also, kudos to the series for its offbeat selections of songs.

While, at first, the actress may not look like the superhero type, she convincingly gives Jessica a subtle toughness. In a way, the character is the flip side of Supergirl: Jones is a reluctant superhero, a loner who drinks too much and has real human flaws. Yet Ritter gives Jessica a needed likability. The series also boasts a solid supporting cast.

The show manages to be fun and wacky, funny, emotional with something to say.

The eight-part series, based on the popular children’s books by Daniel Handler, is delightfully weird or weirdly delightful, depending. The hourlong show can be both light and unexpectedly dark.

Five Came Back does not cover any new territory but puts together the story in a new focus. It is not simply about the filmmakers but about what they saw--the indelible images of war.