A harmless and mostly fun little sitcom.

The wit can get a little heavyhanded sometimes - yes, it's another series with voiceover narration (can anybody say "Sex and the City"?) - but its heart, and head, are in the right place.

There's perverse fun to be had in watching "3 lbs." Count the groans as you spot yet another trite piece of formula.

The show moves more like a ready-for-prime-time comedy than a kiddie toon. Think "The Simpsons" with soul.

A rare and almost totally unexpected triumph.

It is so ancient - in approach, tone, style and energy - that you can almost see the dust bunnies tumble across the set.

"Galactica" is so beautifully designed, shot, edited and acted that you can practically smell and taste its emotional validity.

"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.

[A] rewardingly seasoned new drama series that's practically indistinguishable from the acclaimed feature film, except that it's better.

A groaner from beginning to end.

"Dexter" knows what it's doing, and savors its skill immensely.

This fall's most satisfying series delight.

"Help Me" is a Gobi Desert of laughs... There's a strong odor of desperation on-screen, as if the competent and seasoned actors here know they're in this for a short ride. Indeed, they are.

It's slow. It's dull. It's listless.

A soul-deep sense of humanity grounds "Heroes."

The good news is that "Brothers & Sisters" isn't even remotely a disaster. The bad news is that it isn't even remotely a success either.

A reasonably competent soap.

Good actors can get away with glib, and Woods is one of the best, persuasive enough to have you spotting freshness in the familiar and wisdom in cliches.

There's enough human drama here to keep us occupied without having the walls fall down, too.

Yes, there have been some valid questions about TV's recent embrace of the serial. (Too many? Will people stay tuned?) "Kidnapped" feels so fresh that viewers won't even care.

To love "Smith" is to love an ice cube. There may be a cold beauty to the craftsmanship of this enterprise, but there's a pinched, frostbitten heart at the center of it as well.

Watch the first few minutes of "The Class" in its CBS sitcom debut tonight, and you may not believe me when I say this, but here goes. I think they might have something here.

There's a wonderful cast here... There's even an intriguing core idea... But the show also feels phony from beginning to end.

It's hilarious, really, and refreshing, and original and - absolutely - an acquired taste.

At least "Men in Trees" doesn't tax your brain. Just your patience, taste and intelligence.

A critic for this paper once declared "The Wire" "the greatest dramatic series ever produced for television" and as the fourth season gets under way Sunday night, there's no reason to quibble with that assessment.

The filmmakers' assurance makes this miniseries play more like bang-up drama than fact-filled documentary. Yet their facts pass informative muster, and emotional validity, too.

A show that is so achingly familiar - in content, tone, stars, everything - that it's actually funny.

"Standoff" does seem to emerge miraculously out of the fumes of '70s TV - a near-perfect reformulation of every bone-weary cliche, every hackneyed piece of cop chatter (Dan Tanna lives!) that last-century TV glorified in.

Viewers are expected to swallow - worse, to savor - simplistic recycling of melodrama plots seen a hundred times before.

"Fashion House" is a bit more coherent, if still ludicrous.

While neither awful nor even particularly bad, there is an earnest silliness to the whole thing.

The filming is urgent! The dialogue is obvious! The actors get choked up! It's as if a film school class put together a thriller following all the rules precisely.

There's warmth and wit there, along with not a little magic.

"Brotherhood" is sharply written... Nevertheless, a heavy air of predictability hangs over "Brotherhood," which has a tendency to confirm viewer expectations instead of challenging them.

A second-rate knockoff of what's not quite a first-rate fabrication itself.

This four-hour gem is exquisite from start to finish, rife with the texture of its place and time, rich with human understanding expressed in everyday articulation and small gestures.

Because so many viewers will have seen this kind of reality show before, their minds may start to wander by the second commercial break.

There's certainly comedy to be found in these basic situations, but not in "Lucky Louie's" confounding approach or stilted presentation.

Yes, "Deadwood" was incomprehensible last season. It is incomprehensible this season. Fans will be delighted.

In its zeal to zing local TV news, "Dog" loses any flavor of authenticity, which is absolutely essential for effective satire.

Forced, frantic and continually preposterous.

It's fabulous in every sense of the word.

"What About Brian"... wants to be "thirtysomething" for twentysomethings, but it is clichesomething.

If Cecil B. DeMille's 1956 film was the Barnum & Bailey Big Tent version of the story of Exodus, this is the snippy little art house version - smarter (perhaps), a lot more accurate (perhaps) and indisputably duller.

A slight, cartoonish, and terribly, terribly obvious dramedy.

The writing is pointed, the direction tight. But what really makes it work is Tori herself, light, bright and vulnerably likable.

Despite the storylines' incessant emotional and psychological delvings, the result is an inert if not annoying muddle among unpleasantly profane people whose prospective salvation isn't worth wading toward.

Viewers will immediately locate the central flaw. If half of the contestants are so rich, then why go to all this trouble for $200,000?

So much of tonight's series pilot feels so glib and rings so false, it's hard to believe this soapy saga comes from the quality-not-quantity production team of Tom Fontana and Julie Martin.

"Teachers" isn't half-bad.

Far and away the best new pilot on NBC this season.

[A] shamelessly derivative cop show set in the shamelessly overexposed city by the bay, with high-school-play-level acting performances which help make the overall effect cornier than a cornfield in Kansas. And yet ... and yet, there's something appealing about ABC's new cop drama.

While "Men" may have the nutritional equivalent of stick gum, there's some genuine charm here along with a surprisingly seasoned and talented cast.

"American Inventor," ... is unspeakably awful, and makes not just a travesty of the type of television that "American Idol" so dramatically popularized, but an unintentional parody of it as well.

Yes, "The Loop's" a winner, although let us be the first to admit that the usual attributes associated with "winning" are probably stretched beyond all recognition in this context.

[The episodes are] smarter than you might expect but not quite as clever as they work at being. Like the family unit it portrays, this dark/lighthearted drama tries to have everything at once and struggles under the far-reaching effort.

Uncompromisingly revelatory.

Some of Mamet's dialogue is certifiably awful and some certifiably brilliant, and the dichotomy is breathtaking.

Most of the cast stammers its way through sentences as if awaiting a lightning strike of inspiration. When it doesn't come, the actors have to say something anyway, and that meandering search for structure is what winds up filling 30 shapeless minutes.

The best thing about "Free Ride" is the lack of pressure to be about something. Trusting its talented cast to embody their own truths, it ambles and weaves, leaving space for the characters, even folks briefly bumped into, to nail a specific attitude or situation.

"Mrs. Harris" unfolds with a basic playfulness that keeps the mood light even as the story becomes dark indeed.

Tonight's "Skating" debut glides onto the air in a weird sort of middle zone, not quite cheesy enough to skewer, yet too much a cheese-product to take seriously.

It all flows from the heart in a way few shows do, unfolding with the ease of being surrounded by people you've known forever already.

"Crumbs" is surprisingly good.

The show seems to have no point, rendering it agony how hard the proceedings work at making one.

It's bland, tired, listless, and if the show isn't having much fun, how can it expect viewers to?

Quinn radiates enough sincerity to make us keep reading this uneven book, just to see how it shapes up.

Dreadful.

This version is a triumph.

A rich character drama and riveting suspenser that makes Fox's "24" seem lackluster.

All this feels dutiful and rote - the CliffsNotes version.

The storms in this production have more personality than the characters who chase, study and prepare for them.

Any doubts the tube can get graphic enough for today's gore-heads disappear almost instantly with tonight's premiere installment.

Like many Lifetime productions, this one is designed to make you stand up and take action on a hot-button issue. Unlike many, it's got the dramatic chops to keep you on your feet applauding.

This is pretty tedious viewing.

Cynical, randy, derivative and as wearily familiar as a cup of cheap joe, "Freddie" is also expertly cast, acted, written and directed.

ABC's little-girl gang of four represents nothing more than cliches.

This isn't "Friends," after all. At its hour length, "Related" asks us to take the Sorelli saga somewhat more seriously. Yet it provides sitcom incidents that can't stand the significance test.

This canned stew is further flavored with too-snappy comebacks, too-slick repartee and too-clever contrivances. Making it bearable are cast members who do somehow manage to seem like people next door.

What is missing here is heart, drama, and - most inexcusably - horror.

Finally, the best new comedy of the 2005-06 TV season is here... What's that, you say? This is a drama and not a comedy? Oh, dear.

We haven't had a good dishy time-waster in awhile. Maybe this is it.

A mini-triumph of style over substance (of which there is almost none).

There is at least one troubling aspect to "Wishes" - an abundance of product placements within the show itself, which begs the question: Does salvation come with a price tag?

Utterly vacuous and incompetent.

The whole project feels salaciously sleazy, unless you're enjoying the proceedings, in which case it's juicily depraved.

The characters are vibrantly well-defined... And the writing is smart, with a light touch.

There is no fear in this show or any of the doom, shame, ignominy or flat-out reprobation that comes with getting one's head handed to one by the Donald.... Without fear, there is no danger and without danger, no drama.

An effective and well-wrought drama, with enough cinematic flair and energy to paper over some of its more obvious faults.

Layering such unnatural proceedings into the family-drama format only intensifies both story angles when you do it right. And Cassidy has, with strong casting, solid structure and a fine feel for what's most frightening.

Congenial.

The pilot serves up flashy ooh-ah instead of anything tangible to wrap our arms around.

Could... become a very pleasant surprise.

Anyone who wants to take a walk on the wild side and lose an appetite in the process, your show has arrived.

If you expect the worst, your expectations will probably be met.

The first hour manages to feel both mechanical and manipulative, without feeling truly exciting or even grounded anyplace.

Too many moments feel false, overblown or contrived.