As good as Hawke is here, Johnson just might be better. A winner.

There's growth and evolution in the third season, but not too much and based on a glance at the first four episodes, just enough.

The central argument in Zimny’s loving, but unflinching documentary “Elvis Presley: The Searcher” is that his openness and inquisitive nature is what made him the King.

As indictments go, Going Clear is relentless and effective. But fair and balanced? That's another question--or maybe that's an issue.

Smart new cop show that takes time to build, but will reward patience.

Superior zombie series that takes a little too long to get around to what it's really about — us.

The best new drama of the season, the only one of the 44 new shows that could join "Law & Order," "Homicide," "NYPD Blue," "Murder One" in the pantheon of quality shows. [11 Oct 1996]

It was last year, and remains so this year--one of TV's very best.

Baffling, dull Barry is a bore, and so is the series named for him.

For a show forever detonating bombs, it's surprising how sweet and frothy Tara feels. Just a half-hour long, it doesn't waste a second, pulling a gun within the first few and no punches ever.

Like all love affairs, this one needs the time to develop and gets it.

Breaking Bad is extraordinary, and if the rest of the season matches Sunday, an Emmy nomination for best drama seems certain.

Sharper, smarter, more richly layered, detailed (and acted), Girls has improved upon its first season.

Party Down took awhile to jell, but it has hit its stride as one of TV's most finely observed comedies.

Leaving Neverland has justifiably drawn criticism for being one-sided. It notes Robson’s lawsuit only briefly and never mentions that Safechuck filed a suit of his own. Those are flaws, but the stories of these two men are too compelling to ignore. A riveting story of childhood sexual abuse and its devastating effects on survivors and families.

They've eliminated violence, or tamped it down, to get back to a kinder, gentler, "Murder, She Wrote" era — one abetted with a savage wit, and hard stop to each episode. Nice to be back there again. ... As always, Lyonne is great and her new show a winner.

In the third season, the song remains the same. Biblical themes of fathers and sons, fathers and daughters, honor and dishonor, Cain and Abel are all baked under that pitiless California sun. Brace yourselves.

Who is the real Issa? Neither... or more likely both. That’s the series, and also the wellspring of the humor, which tends to be fleeting, subtle or, in a few instances, flat-out funny.

This is TV's best comedy. And there's nothing in the first two episodes that would suggest otherwise.

The test for the picture, then, comes in whether it's possible to emerge from it with any new insight into the man himself and into why his work resonates as much as it does. And the filmmakers find plenty of material on both fronts.

Ok so Better Off Ted can be oxygen-deprived. This is still one of the funniest shows on TV, and the cast sparkles with vets like Harington, Barrett and de Rossi...Anders and Slavin, too.

While "No Direction Home" can't turn the American Mastery trick of telling us what makes a cultural titan tick, it probably gets deeper inside the Dylan mystery than any such portrait is likely to. [26 Sep 2005, p.B17]

[Producer John] Maggio has discovered the unfamiliar in something some of us thought was already familiar, and by doing so, does help dispel embedded stereotypes while enriching an already rich heritage.

In the three episodes Comedy Central offered for review, most of the sketches work, some don't. But the best of the lot is next week.... just might be that breakout season.

Judge has a keen eye for the absurdities of human behavior and speech, but he's not the kind of guy to waste that on subtle inside jokes or wordplay. He's not someone to waste it on farce, either: Silicon Valley also happens to be sly and smart.

Miller's series offers a chance to understand Martin Scorsese's movies in a new way. What a gift.

One of TV's bleakest shows is also one of TV's best comedies. What a marvel.

Beautiful and often moving.

Will this be a good season? Undoubtedly, yes, and blood will be spilled. But if this opener is any indication, there's not enough fake blood in Hollywood to sate the fifth.

Hard to watch, brilliantly told.

A lesser known, and unloved Shakespeare play (which, incidentally, had other co-authors) comes to life Sunday, but the better plays air over the next couple weeks.

The end begins--evocatively, dramatically.

Anyone who enters this fantastic and beautifully realized play-scape--which remains ever so slightly ghoulish--will stick around. This is a winner.

Falco, Eve Best (Ellie O'Hara) and Anna Deavere Smith (Gloria Akalitus) are flawless, and... very amusing.

If the first two episodes are indicative of the kind of inspired lunacy these guys will produce over the next 20 weeks, the Kids may well be the successors to Monty Python, SNL and SCTV. [21 July 1989, p.5]

The documentary cannily employs Goldberg's enthusiasm and some clever animations over Moms' audio routines to keep this lost legend's influence in the forefront.

Fans will be pleased, though they shouldn't be too surprised by the major plot development Sunday--it's obvious by half.

The cast is phenomenal, the writing inventive and genuinely funny, and you could pick just about any character--Andy or Ann, or Ron or Tom (Aziz Ansari) and almost mistake them for the show lead instead of Poehler. But still not quite in the same league as the show that precedes or the one that follows.

A great ensemble cast and characters who grow in complexity, and humanity, episode by episode. If you didn't know them after the second season, you will get to know them well in the third.

Killing Eve can be violent and bloody, sometimes too violent and bloody, but get past that and an intriguing new antihero awaits.

"We Are Lady Parts" captures the spirit of punk rock in a way that's both entertaining and resonant.

A brilliant piece of work, also profoundly dispiriting.

The producers' storytelling bravura grabs your guts from the first tense second and doesn't let go. [29 Oct 2002]

As what you'd expect from the mind of Fred Armisen — quirky, strange, at times off-putting, at other times, engaging, and full of puckish charm.

It’s more urgent and visceral, the blood more copious, the agony more intense. This Roots doesn’t flinch, but you almost certainly will. The cast is first-rate, too. ... But this Roots can’t quite escape the faults of the original. Kunta’s story, the Fiddler’s, and later Chicken George’s, are patterns, and also cycles. They seek dignity, but find only indignity--or abject cruelty--over and over.

This show was always best when handling the little things that aim to capture life, and often do.

It's intriguing, and worthwhile for audiences in search of something genuinely different. Whether that can be sustained over the course of an entire series of television remains an open question.

Bleak and desperate? Possibly (the song [Peggy Lee's haunting cover of the classic Leiber-Stoller song "Is That All There Is?"] is just a sad song). But here's the surprise: Severance makes the opposite case.

Basic yet beautiful, Cosmos appears to be a winner.

It's just as good as I remembered. Even better, if that's possible. [8 Apr 1991]

You see no skepticism in Beyond. No analysis. No thinking. Just a lot of truly scary people yelling at very young kids.

You dive into the deep end of this pool and struggle to make it back to the surface, not because you have to (although in my case I did) but because you can't. That's obviously good, also occasionally frustrating because Homecoming can be parsimonious with information. ... Then, there's Roberts, who is superb (and always is).

In Treatment deftly picks up where it left off--midpoint in the journey of Paul Weston's soul--and reminds us why we took this trip with him in the first place. The new cast is superlative, Bryne is intoxicating, and Ryan is an especially excellent addition. Bon voyage.

Everything is pushed right to the edge, and that it doesn't topple over in a flaming heap is tribute to a pair of brilliant performances--though Damon's is first among equals--and an absorbing production that is morbidly fascinating from start to finish.

A sensitive, nuanced and particularly well-acted dirge.

Halt finally looks like a series going someplace important, and worth viewers going there with it.

They [directors John Dorsey and Andrew Stephan] know how much to say, and show, to viscerally deliver the sights, sounds and even smells, without scaring us away.

Beautifully crafted, occasionally incoherent, often challenging and insistently demanding, but what’s not entirely clear in the early episodes is whether the payoff will be worth all the trouble.

Uniformly excellent - although some additional reporting devoted to the treatment of PTSD would have made this a more complete package.

This beautiful and often moving film resonates even more powerfully with Sandy in our rearview mirror, while Burns' favorite theme--the American character--is drawn here with great clarity.

What worked especially well last season also gets better in the second.

A warm, welcome and even moving return. Best of all, a reflective one.

The result is not just a great comic book transfer but a warmly human cartoon that's goofy, clever and touching. And cool. What else do we need? [8 Nov 2001, p.B35]

A beauty that requires time and patience, but at least strongly hints at a payoff that will reward both.

Don't miss the pilot. It's the best new crime series of the year, whatever you call it, tabloid TV, exciting TV, real TV. [6 Jan 1989]

Every character bursts with life here, in what may be the most fully realized show on TV. [13 Aug 2007]

Sedaris remains, as ever, hilarious, inventive, unbalanced and deeply, joyously, shamelessly twisted. Her new show’s not bad either. ... At Home With Amy Sedaris is each of those [“The Frugal Gourmet,” “Barefoot Contessa,” “Paula’s Home Cooking” and “30 Minute Meals”], on acid.

Executive producer Frank Darabont ("The Shawshank Redemption") is wonderfully skilled at framing shots to achieve maximum horror effect. But the middle stretch tends to bog down. My advice--watch the first 25 minutes (they're really good), then go trick-or-treating.

A beauty with a fully realized world which seems to know where it's going and how to get there.

What works so well on the page becomes inert on the screen. This superb cast, headed by the always fine Spector, fights the inertia but it can't fight the novel.

A powerful testament, and TV's best miniseries since last fall's “Escape at Dannemora.”

The usual C.K. show--fresh, funny, smart, bleak, offensive, entertaining--with one minor demerit, for an overlong finish.

Everything is in place, and everyone, and what's prevented this from turning into a heightened camp version of Wisteria Lane is that now-supersized superteam. ... Still fun, still addictive, still (yup) pretty much the same.

Takes time to get into, but once in, you're in.

Monday night's return of Dallas is a joy and everything fans could ask for--the past, present and future all skillfully bound up in a high-gloss melodrama full of deceit, greed, Velveeta and (surprisingly enough) even love.

They're real people with real problems in an all-too-real world. "As We See It," in other words, is the perfect Katims show. Best TV newcomer of the new year so far.

Fascinating, incomplete, portrait of a man of mystery.

Sunday is a blast. Heads will roll, and roll well. The gore quotient is through the roof. And finally this guarantee--there is one, maybe even two, spots where you will yell out at the screen, "Oh, my God, that just didn't happen." Yes, the new season is that good.

"Men," of course, remains the King of the Emmys, while Empire nailed the equally prestigious Golden Globe for best drama last winter. But Sunday begins to build the case for Empire, and build it convincingly.

The real le Carré unreels here, with savvy updates (re-gendering the book’s male spy boss) strengthening his nail-biting storytelling and ever keen focus on the toxic bureaucracy behind even the most opulent intrigue.

Fascinating primer (that occasionally begs for more details and explanation).

There is an insistent, glowing, pervasive optimism over these 80 minutes that the TV screen can barely contain.

Full of joy, humor, brilliant writing and performances, and a deep unabiding love for what really makes Hollywood great--the women.

It's all sharp and snappy.

It was energetic (de rigeur), secular (usually is), handsomely staged (or scaffolded) and sonic (the louder the better). ... As Christ, John Legend was out-sung by Brandon Victor Dixon (Aaron Burr, “Hamilton”) who was Judas Iscariot, Norm Lewis (Caiaphas), Ben Daniels (Pontius Pilate) and Sara Bareilles (Mary Magdalene). But they out-sing everyone. Not a fair fight.

It does take six full hours to get there, but the journey — her journey — can be an immersive one. ... Terrific. Immersive. Melancholy.

This intelligent, sensitive portrait effectively explores a lost childhood and remarkable mind. It's engrossing to a point, then tiresome.

Sumptuously produced but glacially told, The Crown is the TV equivalent of a long drive through the English countryside. The scenery keeps changing, but remains the same.

Excellent actors playing excellent actors--and largely succeeding.

"The Nine" may well be the best of the crop - smart, clever and especially wise to the ways of this genre - but the challenge remains the same. This is work - admittedly often pleasurable work, but come 10 p.m. next Wednesday, we've got to do it all over again.

The violence and horror of this season are extreme, absent any glimmer of light down that long, Stygian tunnel. .... But that shouldn't detract from the genuine pleasures here either — the acting, the superlative craftsmanship, even the spectacular Canadian Rockies. You could do worse. You will rarely do better.

Equal to season 1, and in some ways (the fashions, humor) superior.

[Showrunner and creator Sam Esmail is] a Kafka in the director’s chair, who sees alienation where everyone else sees a Facebook “like.” It’s as compelling and timely a vision as there is in a primetime series at the moment, and darkness is the price of admission.

What it's really about is the stuff that dreams are made of. As this third season will remind true-blue fans, that stuff can be very funny indeed. ... Hilarious.

Marvel’s Jessica Jones succeeds in all sorts of ways, especially the one that counts most: Ritter just might be the shrewdest casting move of the season, maybe several seasons, because she so fully inhabits the multidimensional Jones.

This handsome, moodily shot movie liberates the play from the confines of the tiny apartment with almost too many scenes on the bus, in a bar and, most chilling, in the back room of a beauty shop where the neighborhood abortionist boils forceps.

There was lots of life left here. If these first couple of episodes are at all representative, there still is. (But still too bad about Peretti's departure.)

Still very high quality, and still a tiny bit dull.