Bigger, brassier and even more thrilling, Homeland has boosted the stakes.

Burns and Ward pile on so much detail, alongside so much stunning footage, that by watching this whole spread--to borrow that famous and also well-rubbed line -- will be like arriving "where we started and know the place for the first time." Magnificent. Of course.

A brilliant piece of work, also profoundly dispiriting.

Target is pure, utter, ridiculous, over-the-top-into-the-ravine entertainment.

All the performances are outstanding — O'Reilly has played Mothma in various movies and series for two decades — but the ones that'll knock your socks off are by Kyle Soller and Denise Gough.

Watching the first couple of episodes once again I am marveling at how good the show really is. [16 Jan 2000]

A re-energized and immensely entertaining start to the third season.

One of TV's best shows, comedy or drama, because this series often succeeds as both.

A beauty that will mostly make you laugh and, of course, cry.

It's world-building without the world having already been built in countless other movies, TV series and comic novels. Watch and you have the feeling that you are at the outset of a momentous journey. ... Spectacular.

This one is stylish, smartly produced and has a very appealing cast.

Man, is this a good show...Boomtown is so good, it single-handedly restores your faith in broadcast networks. They can compete with the "freedom" of premium cable. All it takes is creative smarts. And NBC's Boomtown has plenty of those. [27 Sept 2002, p.B02]

You can't go wrong with Smith ("That '70s Show") or Lenehan, pros with impeccable comic timing, which leaves relative newcomers Bornheimer and Hayes. Thumbs-up here, too. Worst Week may be the best new comedy on network TV this season.

You too may begin to see what this newcomer appears to be: a raucous, smart, gentle, imaginative and consistently funny comedy that scores early and often.

Yes, Dannemora is hard and cold. The light is muted, the shadows deep, while seven hours of this could easily turn into prison time. But thanks to that cast and Stiller's masterful direction, they don't--not once, not remotely. One of the best series of the year.

From this, you will gain a keen understanding of what lies beneath those endless rows of markers at any military cemetery. This is an honest and often magnificent tribute to the 1st Marine Division.

Like "Mad Men," Wife has an obsessive attention to detail; it's a hurricane of detail, in the visual touches, legal patter and the actors' unspoken flourishes. Nothing seems extraneous or out of place. Also like "Men," this show cares as much about silence as words, or that which isn't said (also a form of eloquence).

Lean, laconic, precise and as carefully word-crafted as any series on TV, there's pretty much nothing here to suggest that the third season won't be as good as the second--or better.

Unlike "Daddy Dearest," it's a warm, compassionate, story about a human problem the baby boomer generation sooner or later will be dealing with: what to do with geriatric TV set as they get on in years. It's not a big busy ensemble sitcom like "Cheers," more a one-man show for Grammer. But it's cozy, involving, socially relevant and marvelously amusing. [16 Sept 1993, p.93]

People are dogs, too. We also have complicated emotional lives, further complicated by our professional ones. We also seek food. We also seek love. We obsess. Nan and Martin’s bond works--and consequently this terrific series works--because it abides by these simple, inalienable truths.

A luminous and fully alive portrait by a first-rate actress.

Excellent actors playing excellent actors--and largely succeeding.

"Black Bird" effectively conveys the complicated reality of undercover work and what it has to say about the human condition. This is a must-see and not just for fans of the prison genre.

Episodes is flawless and hilarious. What a pity it lasts only seven episodes.

It's extraordinarily familiar territory, as well-trod as any moment of pop cultural history. And yet "The Beatles Anthology" still feels as fresh and as relevant as ever today in the way it presents the dizzying whirlwind of this sort of fame from the front lines.

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

The show also feels more nuanced. If season 4 was like a giant exhaled breath, then season 5 is an inhaled one. The story beats are more deliberate. There's also a sharpened sense of building anticipation--or impending doom.

The precision of "Saul's" craftsmanship--writing, direction, acting, and all the way down to craft services, for all I know--makes this the best series on TV. And there really is no contest.

"Unorthodox" is an achievement of searing power and grace, attuned to big, sweeping emotions and small, observational moments in equal measure. ... This is one of the major achievements in the history of Netflix original productions. You cannot miss it.

Smart, taut, engaging and propulsive. The fifth looks terrific.

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.

The first three episodes totally nail it.

Byrne is brilliant and--for the most part--so is this fine and absorbing show.

A densely packed, well-paced gothic horror soap with surprisingly funny twists placed at the worst.

The Detour is ruthlessly adult stuff--surely too frank and out-there for some viewers--but it’s intrinsically honest, convulsively hilarious and oddly endearing.

Justified remains as good as ever--and as tautly written, acted and directed, and deeply, completely pleasurable as the fifth season, and the one before that and... all of the other seasons, too, now that I think of it.

The show is well-conceived, well-written and very funny. [16 Sep 1991]

The first two episodes promise a contemplative sixth as opposed to a shock-and-awe one.

Another brilliant, powerful, moving season of one of TV’s best.

Girls' moment is almost up, but this lovely, gossamer line ["I want to write stories that make people feel less alone than I did, to laugh about the things that are painful in life.”] reminds us why that moment was so special.

Hilarious, as always, and unexpectedly, maybe an instructional guide to the current political landscape.

Not a single minute seems superfluous. This is all-engrossing, and all-informative.

The producers ("Alias" alums Josh Appelbaum and Andre Nemec) have created a Dickensian (with a nod to L. Frank Baum) universe, draped in shadows, pastels and mystery, while aurally wrapped in chestnuts from the Sweet, Five Man Electrical Band and the Ramones. This new series has enormous promise.

Interesting, engaging, worthwhile.

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.

Brownstein and Armisen move so effortlessly between characters, then execute their riffs, tics, styles and voices with such skilled abandon that before long this doesn't seem like satire any longer but a fun house mirror reflection of intensely real people.

Louie very much remains Louie in the best sense.

A beauty finally returns, and the beauty very much remains.

About as good a Community restart as anyone could have possible hoped for.

This show--still TV's best--remains utterly true to itself.

"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.

Brilliant, unsettling, entertaining.

This was the best comedy on TV last season.

It's a great show, the best new series of the year. It's so - dare I say it? - original. It catches you off guard. Basically, it's everything I'm always looking for in drama. It's beautifully written, authentic, without the plastic Los Angeles look. The acting is marvelous. It's funny in a darkly comedic way, involving as a soap opera, and quirky. I never quite know what's going to happen, even though the subject matter is by no means unprecedented for television. [10 Jan 1999, p.D35]

It's hilarious, and sad, and ironic, and rich.

Dark and thrilling, The Affair returns with a huge wallop--and glorious French star Irène Jacob is in the house.

Its tender moments register without feeling forced while the comedy comes in the form of a constant IV drip.

Still TV's best--dive in while the water's warm.

Wallops don't get more walloping than the one that arrives at the end of the premiere of FX's adult cop show The Shield. Won't tell you what it is, and don't you dare read other reviews in case they blab it. This is one of those punch-in-the-stomach moments of TV you'll want to remember being stunned by. Although The Shield looks pretty dang good to that point - or pretty %@$#! good, as its characters would swear - the show suddenly becomes flat-out brilliant. [12 Mar 2002, p.B27]

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.

An addictive show, with great cast, excellent writing.

Battlestar Galactica is a worthy successor to Sci Fi's late and much lamented "Farscape." That's about as high as our praise gets. [9 Jan 2005, p.11]

The fourth season was great. The fifth at least needs to match it, and the evidence so far establishes that it will.

Watch this, and you'll be tuning in next week.

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.

One of the flat-out funniest half-hours of television in the English-speaking world.

The first season was initially hagiography masking as a high-end TV series, but the second season is Vanity Fair, full of characters, life, humor, passion and buttered scones. Morgan not only has a series to match his 2006 Oscar-winning movie, “The Queen,” but finally one to exceed it. The Crown--the second season, anyway--is magnificent.

The most fantastic program I've seen in my 18 years as a TV critic. [21 Jan 1988]

The Shield (this season and every season) is an intoxicating head-gamer of a show that grabs you by the throat.

Best series of the year so far. Easily.

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.

Riveting, important and lots of fun.

A work of TV art. ... It's a major, major series - a masterpiece, with great characters. The writing is textured, deep, rich. [26 Apr 1988]

Disgusting--but in a good way.

Better, richer, more compelling than season one.

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

They know how to nail situations/characters, while snappy edits cull fluff, leaving only comic gold.

The end begins--evocatively, dramatically.

While a deeply moving tribute to those we have lately come to call "heroes," this proves they've been heroes all along. (It was filmed before the pandemic.) A can't-miss beauty.

The Affair might be an exercise in literary gamesmanship if the acting and writing weren't so strong, or the setting so evocative.... Engrossing.

Pure joy and the tribute Nichols finally deserves.

This still very much feels like a journey worth taking if only because--in the process--Hamm deftly continues to locate some heroic facet in TV's reigning anti-hero.

Douglass comes to life, or those words vividly do.

The TV breakout Glover fans have been waiting for, also unlike anything else on TV.

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.

Funny, melancholy, flawless.

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

A stunning, brilliant, terrifying launch to TV's best series.

Manhunt isn't out to settle scores, but explain the laborious process of intelligence gathering. No one here is looking for a citation, but understanding, and that's what "Manhunt" does best, as well as--yes--connect some dots.

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

I've seen four episodes; they're all good.

CSI is not looking for a facsimile, so fans can rest assured that Fishburne will evolve into a unique and valued lead on his own.

A beautiful, moving film, and Oprah (as usual) brings it.

Terrific start to the 6th.

Showtime lets them take their time to spin serpentine story lines, gradually pulling us deep into one very sticky, scary web of intrigue.

Initial indications are good--the second season of Broad City may even exceed the first.

Not a dull or wasted moment, and Lane may have just turned in the one of the best performances of her career.

"NYC" celebrates the human spirit, not just an institution. ... A beauty.