The CW has done an impressive job building a snappy show out of one of the goofier heroes of the DC universe.

[Mad Dogs] is perfect escapist fare--by turns funny, frank, and frightening, with terrific, color-saturated cinematography and a central foursome whose long history feels immediately palpable.

The dysfunctional relationship between sensible Kermit and the perennial diva Miss Piggy drives the show, and there is plenty of inside Hollywood humor, but its most delightful subplot is with Fozzie Bear, who is experimenting with inter-species dating.

It's funnier than most of what's on television these days, but it never coalesces into something spectacular.

I've seen both of tomorrow's episodes, as well as next week's, and I loved every minute. But I'm also a geek who read Ray Bradbury and Isaac Asimov growing up.

In that way, he's not unlike the super-competent Michael Westen from "Burn Notice," and "Human Target" has the same fun, retro-chic vibe as that USA series. But because it's on a broadcast network, the show works on a broader scale.

NBC's half-hour slice of small-town life isn't perfect right out of the gate; few shows are. But it's so sure-footed and engaging that it would be a pleasure to see how it turns out. [7 Oct 2000, p.43]

What's there is fascinating. More than perhaps anyone writing for TV, Carter understands the tactical value of withholding information; he gives us just enough to pique our interest and then pulls back, promising to deliver more when the time is right. The first installment of Harsh Realm promises plenty. [8 Oct 1999, p.71]

You get out what you put into it--even in the episodes that are weaker, I was rarely bored--and it's a consistent scripted oasis in a sea of shows where people take lie detector tests on camera.

Life Unexpected turns out to be a warm, sweet, fun family dramedy. The three leads are very likable, the stakes just high enough for the show to not seem inconsequential

For one night, this is the best House, and its leading man, have been in a long time.

All this should seem precious and dumb, but it doesn't, thanks to the cast's deadpan intelligence and some sharp, self-aware writing (the characters' names often refer to characters in fiction by J.D. Salinger ). Best of all, Travis fails to wrap everything up in a neat, happy way; the second episode, which is much better than the first, essentially starts all over again, picking up on the time-travel mayhem Travis wreaked a week earlier. [27 Sept 2002, p.59]

Horne and Page have sweet chemistry, but what makes the show work is the cast of eccentrics that Corden and Jones have created around them.

The challenges--including a head-to-head competition where pairs of chefs are sent into various New York neighborhoods and told to cook the local cuisine--seem appropriately Big Apple-centric without being silly.

The jokes are tight, and Anderson, whipsawing between smooth playa and high-pitched dismay, is a very likeable lead. There is is a feel-good resolution, although not quite as sappy (and sappily effective) as those on "Modern Family."

It is slow, and it requires work and careful observation, but when it achieves its breakthroughs, the effects can be as extraordinary and dynamic as any other drama on television.

A welcome surprise - an unabashed melodrama that doesn't wink at the audience but doesn't take itself too seriously, either. Every choice it makes, from pacing to photography to music, seems just about right, and the casting is inspired. (I appreciate that it filled its lead roles with two young men who are somewhat credible on the court.) [23 Sept 2003, p.43]

The series tells hard, funny truths about marriage and parenting that often escape notice in other stories - truths which suggest that writer-creator-producer Marc Cherry and his collaborators have actually taken the time to understand the people they're satirizing. [2 Oct 2004]

The Lost season three finale was no fluke. The show has got its mojo back, and then some.

It's an absurdist comedy about criminal behavior and suburban life that gently mocks its targets while taking its characters and their emotions seriously. [9 Jan 1999, p.23]

Whether Tara is herself or someone else (including a new alter), "Tara" works as both a character drama and an absurdist family comedy because the characters are so well-drawn, and because what happened before isn't forgotten as the show moves forward.

There are enough intriguing, albeit deliberately unfinished, ideas in there to make it worth a look for any fan not only of "Galactica," but the kind of thoughtful science fiction it represented.

I have no interest in fashion, little inherent fondness for soap operas, and I'm absolutely not the gender this show is targeting. And based on the two episodes I've seen, I'm going to be watching "Ugly Betty" every week. It's that much fun.

The show's aura of jungle mysticism is so overblown it's hilarious. I love how the castaways have to kill rats for food and make fire with sticks, but the tribal council meetings take place on a lavish, obviously prefab jungle village set that looks like the Ewok treehouse city in "Return of the Jedi." (The million-dollar grand prize is sitting over in one corner of the set - a pile of cash in an open treasure chest. Very Scrooge McDuck.)...Asinine stuff - and intensely addictive. [2 June 2000, p.37]

Chiklis always sells his end of it, and when he has a great actor opposite him, you don't really notice how puzzling the story arcs would get.

Krause could be hard to digest as the self-righteous Nate on "Six Feet Under," but he makes a fine, amusingly flustered straight man to the cast of eccentrics that Wright and producer Greg Berlanti have assembled.

Hung has more to offer than just John Thomas jokes. Amidst all the sniggering humor about how Ray has been taught to "do your best with the gifts God gave you" is some smart comedy about the state of 21st century America in general, as well as a superb lead performance from Thomas Jane.

The documentary finally sags a bit in the final hour, albeit inevitably, as Jones and Timlett detail the making of the group’s final film, "Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life," by which point all six men were quite ready to be done with each other for a while, and then as we briefly glimpse them in their post-Python lives.

Smith's work in "The Eleventh Hour" showed us exactly what Moffat saw in that audition...."Eleventh Hour" is also a great build-up for Karen Gillan's immensely likable Amy Pond, who has by far the most interesting, emotionally resonant backstory of the modern companions.

Though I enjoyed NBC’s pilot for Community a little bit more, "Modern Family" has as assured and entertaining a start as you could hope for.

There's definitely a joy to this series, no matter how dire things get for its characters.

Those three performances are so good that they lift up everyone around them, whether it's Combs (best whenever he has Rashad or McDonald to spar with) or John Stamos, surprisingly subtle in what could be a thankless role as the white man who doesn't want the Youngers moving into his neighborhood.

While at times it feels like a bleak HerskoZwick drama--"Fortysomething Going on Fiftysomething"--the stories are leavened with humor, and the chemistry between the leads, and their fine performances.

I've seen the pilot episode at least four times already, in whole or in parts, and I laugh just as hard at the jokes now as I did the first time.

The first two ABC episodes of Scrubs, premiering back-to-back tomorrow night, more closely resemble the series in its marvelous early seasons, and suggest that Braff's victory lap will be a memorable one.

The drama is one of the season's best because it makes you care even when you know something big is coming -- and because it finds pleasant little surprises along the way.

The most stylistically innovative comedy to hit American television since HBO's great, barely seen "The Larry Sanders Show" ... It's also the most squirm-inducing look at everyday deceit that I've seen outside of an Albert Brooks or Woody Allen movie. [14 Oct 2000]

Though it rushes a bit through its final episode, Torchwood: Children of Earth is big in a way that very little of TV aspires to anymore. Until we see what kind of late charge "Mad Men" will have when it returns in mid-August, this is the most exciting television of the summer.

Nix and company had a very thing going last season, and they've found a way to change the show a little without screwing it up.

Because the comedy is so strong, the cast is so likable, and everyone involved so obviously has a passion for making the show as entertaining as it can be, there's a sense of joy around "Chuck" that's infectious.

The hour offers up office intrigue, romantic complications and a classic Don Draper pitch, not to mention the usual brilliant acting from all involved.

The fifth and final season may be the most overtly farcical, but only because things in this slightly fictionalized Baltimore have become, if you can imagine, worse than ever.

There are shows on television that are smarter than Chuck, deeper, more ambitious, whatever. At the moment, I can't think of one that's more fun.

The only real sin of "Joan" so far is the presence of Joe Mantegna as Joan's police chief father. Mantegna, as always, is great, but his presence in what should be a small role apparently freaked out someone at CBS. So Hall tries to give him more to do by devoting a good chunk of each episode to unrelated crime stories - very mediocre ones, at that. [26 Sept 2003, p.57]

Felicity is very clearly targeted at the Clearasil set that worships at the altar of the WB's "Dawson's Creek," but if the show can maintain the charm and poignancy of the pilot, adults may also want to pay homage to television's newest star. [29 Sept 1998, p.47]

Party Down may not reinvent Starz the way "Mad Men" did for AMC, but it's a very funny series that any cable channel would be lucky to have.

I've seen five Archer episodes--and laughed frequently and loudly at all five.

Twists and rule tweaks will only carry a reality show so far by the time you're into the sixth season. The format itself has to be durable, and the casting has to be sharp--both of which seem to be the case in the early going.

Hart is a delight as Sabrina. She's warm, charming, always plays Sabrina as a vulnerable teen first, and a superpowerful witch second. The writing is very squarely aimed at younger viewers, but an occasional joke slips in just for the grown-ups. [27 Sept 1996, p.67]

The premiere doesn't necessarily have the sort of mythical, spine-tingling moments that the first season provided from time to time, but the acting remains strong (particularly by Chandler and Britton, the First Couple of primetime) and it feels like an episode of Friday Night Lights in a way that very little of season two did.

The biggest rap against Hollywood dramatizations is that they treat history as a series of white-hot personality conflicts when it's really about slowly building waves of collective action. "From the Earth to the Moon" is a rare exception. There are recurring characters and motifs, but none that appear in every episode, and the writers have resisted inventing an audience surrogate to guide us through the maze. [5 Apr 1998]

All in all, Salem's Lot is a serious, elegant piece of work that provides plenty of shocks and creep- out moments without lingering over brutality and gore - which makes it feel less like a contemporary horror picture than a lost treasure from the 1940s or '50s, when filmmakers had to find imaginative ways to suggest what they weren't allowed to show. It's a feast of horror you can sink your teeth into. [19 June 2004, p.9]

Nip/Tuck is the right show at the right time, a pointed, funny attack on the body biz and another winner from the cable channel that brought us "The Shield" and "Lucky." [21 July 2003, p.25]

Now that Sutter and company have finished the long and difficult task of fixing what wasn't working, I want to know everything it has to offer--even if some of those things may give me nightmares.

Chuck starts a step slower, with more exposition in the first two episodes and no larger-than-life character like Satan to smooth over that, but by episode three, it's just as assured and entertaining in its own extremely similar way.

In Plain Sight is a definite for any summer TV To-Watch list; don't cross it off until you've seen at least one.

It's at once a simple, R-rated office comedy about a bunch of people who would have nothing to do with each other if they didn't work together, and a pretty wicked satire of the quest for fame at all costs.

Odd as The Beat may seem on first glance, it's of a piece with the rest of Fontana's work, which aims to shake up TV storytelling by any means necessary. [21 March 2000, p.37]

A show this whimsical needs a few anchors to avoid floating away altogether. Emerson is one, and the hands-off Ned and Chuck romance is the other.

And as the new season begins, it becomes clear that gags are easier to write in abundance than gag lyrics. The non-melodic portions of the show are still a scream.

Son of the Beach is everything you'd expect from a TV comedy executive produced by Howard Stern - and more. It's unbelievably vulgar - and one of the best bits of dopey humor television has featured since "Police Squad!" [13 March 2000, p.15]

Fey's parts of the premiere are terrific, and next week's episode is an even better--and sillier--showcase for her.

Rarely have I smiled as early and as often at a new series as I have at this one, which manage to be gentle and sweet and lighter-than-air without ever departing from the Earth that we know.

With the start of season two, it looks like the expectations might finally meet the reality--or however real a show with aliens and time travel can get.

Because Dexter's victims are always so evil, we're inclined to root for him, but moments like that--or one in where Dexter admits he doesn't really care about saving innocents, just scratching his itch to kill--gives the show more moral complexity than you would expect, and it's the better for that.

The "Seinfeld" plot doesn't kick off until the season's third episode. The first two, meanwhile, are a reminder of what a brilliant show, and a deep cast of characters, Larry has built ever since he said goodbye to Jerry and company.

The Good Wife is confident and polished, and a much better showcase for Margulies than her last legal drama.

The cases-of-the-week here are not groundbreaking but some are a bit wacky (death by maple syrup), and Battle Creek promises at least one grand mystery--if Duhamel's FBI agent is such an ace, what did he do to rate a posting in beleaguered Battle Creek? Agnew is chomping at the bit to find out, and so are we.

Public Morals is engaging enough, with a jazzy pace, assured direction and a number of fine performances.

The procedural element is smartly done, the stakes realistically high, and Atwell's chemistry with Cahill's D.A. compelling.

What makes a marriage work, and what sacrifices are worth its maintenance and upkeep, are plumbed here with surprising dexterity.

It's effective at quickly making us care for these docs and particularly at orchestrating the cases of the week to an emotional (and emotionally manipulative) crescendo.

Despite that all-too-familiar set-up, Heroes Reborn gets off to a promising start, with some fresh, sympathetic characters and a gentle introduction baited with a little mythology from the original to keep those fans on the hook.

The Player has the feel of one of those high-octane action thrillers that Hollywood pumps out--you get caught up in the moment, but the intricacies of the plot dissolve the second you step out of the theater.

The pilot is carried on Kinnear's rascally charm and is heavy on quirk.

Enlisted is not groundbreaking comedy, but it's dependable and heartfelt--and sometimes that's all you need in your foxhole.

The pilot (only the first hour was sent for review) is well made with strong leads and several intriguing hooks. Almost Human is almost there.

It is all very campy and salacious (the young ladies are quite overcome after witnessing a bedding, although the resulting masturbation scene was trimmed from the pilot shown to the press), and historical accuracy takes a backseat to hair product and a driving contemporary soundtrack. But the show seems to be a bit aware of its own absurdity, which is more than one can say for some of the dreck the networks have served up so far this season.

It's shot single-camera, mockumentary style like "Modern Family," but the set-ups aren't as outrageous and the writing, while funny, is not quite as sharp.

The central mystery still reaches to the Highest Levels of American Government, but it's a more intimate story, with fine performances by the three young children who start hearing voices, and more worryingly, taking direction from an unseen force.

Ryan, a Welsh actor little known on these shores, is the best thing about the pilot. Second best are some genuinely creepy special effects and scares, but the plot itself is a muddle.

Yes, this is "The Shield," with more gloss and less shock, and the story starts to strain as Harlee's FBI handler Warren Kole (Robert Stahl) shows an unhealthy interest in his undercover agent and the series worryingly starts to veer into "Enough"/"The Boy Next Door" territory. But the increasingly fraught dance between Harlee and Wozniak is absorbing and even occasionally nail-biting, and certainly reason enough to give Shades a shot.

Billions is a mostly engrossing but occasionally tiresome tale of financial and legal brinkmanship between Bobby "Axe" Axelrod (Damian Lewis), a blue collar kid turned hedge fund manager with a chip the size of the Bronx on his shoulder, and Chuck Rhoades (Paul Giamatti), an ambitious (and silver-spooned) U.S. Attorney known his no-mercy prosecution of financial crimes.

While these standalone plots could descend into sketches, they don't--the writing is sharp and relatable, and the cast, particularly Colin Hanks and Zoe Lister Jones as new parents, bring their standard-fare roles to life.

Younger, with its fizzy sensibility and sexual frankness, is a not-so-veiled attempt to lure younger audiences to the network, but there's a caginess to the humor, poking fun at both the younger generation, whose self-worth seems irrevocably tied to the strength of their Instagram following, and the pop cultural obliviousness of Liza's generation.

This is definitely promise ring material.

The expensive-looking pilot episode, with its frequent use of unusual camera angles to suggest a world gone askew, effectively establishes the sinister vibe, with some genuine scares and plenty of gore. Daniels is particularly magnetic as the older, put-out-to-pasture priest haunted in more ways than one.

On Best New Restaurant, [Tom Colicchio] is less guarded and more engaged with the chefs and restaurateurs, learning how their experience, management style and personalities interplay in the kitchen and in dining room. A delightful surprise of the premiere are those seemingly genuine, not pumped-up-for-the cameras personalities.

The set-ups are disparate enough [from "The Americans"], and Allegiance's twisty allegiances, are promising enough not to dismiss the show out of hand.

Dean's goofy legal maneuverings--we're talking one step up from Mr. Brady's whiplash-busting briefcase toss--may strain the premise eventually, but after last season's wretched record for comedies, a sitcom that consistently amuses is worthy of acquittal.

Watered-down or not, the immigrant/culture clash storylines are the freshest things about Fresh Off the Boat, which is a pastiche of other ABC sitcoms (thankfully, the good ones).

Beals does hard-edged well, her bluntness an effective buffer against the potential treacle of the weekly cases.

As with many a Patterson thriller, the breathless pace and spine-tingling what-ifs make it easy to get caught up despite your well-founded reservations.

The ABC show is more blandly cast and written [thanrench import "The Returned"], but it's still capable on occasion of hitting you in the gut emotionally, if not scrambling your brains.

It's different enough from the original that you may be better off looking at it fresh, as a promising and more straightforward (okay, relatively straightforward) sci-fi adventure series with the requisite shadow conspiracy and, for those in the past, a looming Armageddon.

"Family Guy" consistently falls short of excellence, thanks to its monotonously unvaried structure, which consists of a character describing an outrageous situation, followed by a clip depicting that same situation. [28 Apr 2005]

Lucas' interactions with House are far funnier than any previous pairing of House with a recurring guest star. On the minus side, it's a role so aware of its own quirks that Lucas might wind up being a polarizing figure....As for the returning characters, the mix still isn't right.

A big, colorful, messy, involving, funny explosion of a show. If it's not the best new series of the season, it's definitely the most memorable.