Mostly boilerplate teen soap that lacks the (umm) zest of "Sex and the City"--a good thing, in case you're wondering.

This is a thoughtful, dutiful historic drama filled with all the requisite period details and British accents, too. But what's missing here, glaringly so, are passion and sweep .

The performance tends to be monochromatic, and in the end, so is Mildred Pierce. What's especially enjoyable here are the minor performances--especially Pearce as the louche Monty--and the many almost imperceptibly small details, right down to the crockery in a restaurant.

While beautiful to look at--some of this was filmed in Wading River, near Herod Point--Zelda can also feel like that TV biopic we’ve all seen before: The one that trudges dutifully along without adding much depth or subtlety in the process.

Bridgeton is too dull, its denizens likewise. The mystery will eventually be settled, some people will get eaten along the way, our heroes will save the day, the fog will disperse, the sun will come out. Ten episodes sure seems like a long road to get there.

Garcia is a major-league cutie and sunny on-screen presence without being cloying. But enough with the filthy-rich-kid dramedies!

Sure, it's a glossy, well-produced infomercial filled with powerful live performances, but it feels designed to make us want to buy more Beyoncé stuff.

Competent spinoff, but the formula tends to wear like a straitjacket on Whitaker.

Daredevil” isn’t only mindlessly violent, but mindless, too. The cast is terrific, production values superlative and direction first-rate.... But is there a functioning brain, or at least a higher purpose, maybe a deeper one? Like Matt’s own search for meaning, good luck finding answers.

The time allotted isn't long enough to truly convey the touchstones a sci-fi devotee might demand. But with so much skated through, it's plenty to confuse a newbie.

Falco is very good, always is, but her show has gotten tired.

The show they're in is amiable enough, but the premise is awfully thin and the pilot doesn't hint at much of anything beyond that.

Important television, but also wildly, maddeningly uneven TV, too.

Thurgood feels more "important" than dramatic. Part of it is Stevens' then-I-did-this structure, more focused on biographical bullet points than the flesh-and-blood human behind them. And part of it is Fishburne, who despite coiled power--his Ike Turner in "What's Love Got to Do With It" was Oscar-nominated--resonates here as a cool character rather than a fiery one.

Either clever idea or one-trick pony, the Son of Zorn pilot can’t entirely decide which it is either.

A not-bad formula gothic that'll rise or fall on the Dekker/Robertson chemistry; I'm betting on the former.

The feel is more documentary than "reality" show, which some viewers will appreciate and others won't.

At first, the pace is slow--make that glacial--but [the] pilot episode (and especially Sunjata) are good-natured enough to make you want to stick around to see if this gels into anything approaching an FX drama (it does not).

Intriguing... but somber and slowww-moving.

A not-unpleasing comedy that takes time and commitment to grow on you. How long? I started to like it three or four episodes in. Seems like an awfully long time, no?

Respectable, incomplete survey (on TV) Thursday night, but future installments look better.

Amusing, dumb, silly--exactly what you'd expect.

Will a cheerfully biased newcomer with a few amusing, well-crafted one-liners be enough to get FX on the boards in late night? To paraphrase Yoda, difficult to say--always in motion is the future--but Rock may want to light a fire under this act sooner than later.

Hilarious implausibility, overheated dialogue and enough soap to do several loads of laundry are part of its appeal.

Like the previous four "AHS" editions, the fifth is a visual feast (which is probably the wrong word here, but you get the idea). Everything--everyone, and not just Gaga--is eroticized, too. Even the shadows are seductive. A shame that it all feels so grim and joyless.

While True Blood remains wildly and bloodily inventive--and will certainly remain a huge HBO hit--there's still an overwhelming sense that deja-vu-all-over-again has set in.

Passable summer thriller with some decent (for TV) action sequences. The plot? You've been there, done that.

The acting is solid all around--just not entirely convincing.