[An] amiable send-up of small-town life.

[A] dreary, derivative sci-fi series. ... Such silliness might be palatable if Alba were more than the sum of her svelte, zippered bodysuits. Instead she pouts throughout, speaking in a Valley Girl drone.

The premiere episode is pitiless—more pitiless than funny, actually—as it introduces the soap-within-the-sitcom's vain, stupid, ruthless young stars.

This new Fugitive has a very good Kimble in Tim Daly.

Achingly real stories of desperate teenage love, emerging sexual identity, athletic pressure and parental confusion.

Actually watching Big Brother five nights a week (total air time: 3½ hours) seems like the entertainment equivalent of enduring gavel-to-gavel convention coverage on C-SPAN.

Sex is showing more creative staying power than I expected.

Arli$$ is like a high draft choice who becomes an established starter but never fulfills his superstar potential.

Can you say "ill-conceived"?

Now that's daring television.

In more ways than one, ER's new competitor is tough to watch. But the effort looks to be worth it.

If all this sounds more painful than funny, you've hit on the show's main problem.

NYPD Blue's trademarks are still in evidence: the layered characterizations; the slangy, pungent dialogue; the black humor that usually makes you laugh in spite of yourself.

Critics justly extolled The Sopranos for its brilliant blend of compelling drama and mordant humor, and the first three episodes of 2000 contain no signs of slippage.

You'll laugh so often that you may not notice the blessed absence of a laugh track.

All this may not make sense on paper—or anywhere else—but creator Steve Hillenburg (schooled in marine biology as well as animation) has made it a continuing comic delight, wildly imaginative yet never too clever for its own good.

It's stylish, clever and unpredictable.

Popular makes valid points about the unfairness of social stratification. But with its gimmicky camera work (whoa, we're on fast-forward) and flights of surrealism (talking frog in bio lab), it tries too hard to be hip.

The new series, though well-acted, may be overcrowded with characters.

Though it seems a product of calculation more than inspiration, Roswell has appeal.

Harsh Realm looks to be capably acted and artfully creepy, but I'm not sure I care to get involved in another dark, paranoid drama from Chris Carter.

Given that there's no earthly reason for Angel besides the sex appeal of David Boreanaz, it looks like a pretty good show.

The main problem is Amy's fluctuating competency level. In the pilot she floundered as if she'd never been inside a courtroom. She starts strong the next time, then yields to feelings of inadequacy before her mother gives her a jolt of tough love. Come on, get a grip on that gavel.

The young actors are natural and convincing, and the high school characters manage to be funny without too much Dawson's Creek glibness.

It's hard to imagine a flimsier enterprise than this new detective series.

The West Wing sure looks like a winner.

Though the characters endure some familiar embarrassments... the honest performances and perceptive writing will have you feeling freshly empathetic.

Don't know if this extremely edgy material will wear well, but I'm up for more Action.

Sex and the City is definitely striking me as funnier this time around.

Basically MAD TV has everything SNL has—the virtues and the defects.

The writers' apparent priority is to place the adults in trite situations with sexual overtones.

Home Movies meanders, but patient viewers will be amused.

Crass Peter's couch-potato tendencies give MacFarlane the pretext for one quick TV spoof after another, and some of them are hilarious. I find these satirical flights far funnier than the frustrated schemes of Stewie Griffin, a sinister baby bent on world domination.

This looks like another clever, irreverent, cutting-edge animated comedy from creator Matt Groening.

Stewart is more likable and less self-satisfied than Kilborn, and the show's satire is smart enough to have real sting.

There are some laughs here... but too often even the eccentricity seems formulaic.

If [Metcalf's] character can develop into more than a foil, it may be worth tuning in to this show for a weekly update.

What I found in the first two shows was a lot of smart, pointed humor aimed at corporate bureaucracy, mendacity and absurdity. I didn't even notice till late in the second episode that the animation itself was something less than eye-popping.

The PJs can be plenty funny when it isn't crude and offensive—and even when it is.

It has intelligence and feeling and brutality. The Sopranos hits all the notes.

Kanakaredes is appealing, but the series is too fond of flaunting its eccentricity (Mom inhabits Syd's dreams), too short on authentic Providence atmosphere (despite some location filming) and too eager to remind us that the title also refers to God's will.

This season the writers have failed to get the most out of some promising situations.

While Hartman's comic mastery is sorely missed, Lovitz has earned his share of laughs with familiar tics and offbeat timing.

Alternating—or rather, wavering—between frightening and funny, the show has yet to establish a clear identity beyond its-status as a post-teenage teammate of The WB's popular Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

The problem with this new series is not the star's performance but the writers' unwillingness to take the character far enough.

Millennium ... has grown more pretentious and less coherent with each new installment.

For this series to work, the main character—and the star's acting skills—must show signs of growth.

Not too original, but the cast makes this King more than a commoner.

We're betting that with experience, this inconsistent show can find a way to win.

Piven is an irresistible force—mercurial, mischievous and impossibly glib.

Russell has an unassuming sort of star quality that draws us to her character, and the writing in the pilot is sensitive without being soapy.

The show needs to guard against the cutesies ... and allow both principals to do more than talk about their sex lives.

The redeeming feature here is [Sallly] Wheeler, who makes her free-spirited character genuinely appealing.

The '70s Show has a jarringly '90s slacker sensibility. Still there are some very funny moments.

Whose Line overworks a limited number of ideas (enough with those takeoffs on The Dating Game), and the quality slips when Carey joins in the improv fun at the end of each show.

There is a tiresome similarity to the plots: In almost every episode our plucky heroes are captured by the reigning totalitarian regime only to be rescued by the local resistance group.

Parker is appealing as always, but watching the show is an empty diversion—like scanning a gossip column about people who don't exist.

The opener, which Hanks himself directed, bogs down with tedious "Can we do this?" conferences ... Part 2, however, soars.

Still hit-and-miss in quality.

Nothing too original is happening here.

High-pitched farce is 3rd Rock's stock-in-trade, and sometimes it just wears us out. But we marvel at how skillfully the writers and directors keep the balls in the air as they juggle as many as three situations per episode.

How much hipness can be injected into any program that relies on endless footage of folks falling on their faces, losing their pants and getting knocked silly?

Attractive as well as articulate, all these high schoolers qualify for some sort of advanced placement. They're easy to watch, just a little hard to believe.

The show has a sly self-awareness that effectively disarms those who would accuse it of merely putting a gay gloss on stock hetero situations.

No doubt about it: Jenna Elfman and Thomas Gibson are cute together. ... We will grow tired, though, if the writers don't eventually get beyond the stereotypes or if Dharma and Greg resolve every dispute by having fabulous-—and cute-—sex.

Both intriguing and irritating.

The opener mostly succeeds in maintaining a tone that's more racy-adult than naughty-juvenile. The only element that doesn't mesh is the character of Alley's father.

There are a few misdemeanors: the over-the-top scenes between an agitated cop (Titus Welliver) and his shrewish wife (Jana Marie Hupp); the sneer of Hill Street vet James B. Sikking as an Internal Affairs Bureau lieutenant... and the mix of Brooklynese and police patois that makes some dialogue hard to understand.

[The first episode] is packed with potential. It is fast-paced, funny, touching, romantic and surprising. Please note that we did not add "realistic."

Behar is the true star. She's funny, likable (without sacrificing irreverence) and sensible. She's much too good to be sidelined an average of two days a week.

The two-hour premiere is sort of fun, but the plot is nutty even by sci-fi standards.

You won't escape easily from this drama's grip.

One problem: The "Squigglevision" animation, in which line drawings sort of wiggle around the edges, gives us a headache that may require medical attention.

We can always count on a major-league effort from the key player, Robert Wuhl, who somehow makes us root for his character, the smoke-blowing, ego-stroking sports agent Arliss Michaels. But the show as a whole lacks the consistency of a championship series.

Spade... can deliver an insult with such grace and precision it's like watching Fred Astaire dance with a prop

All in all, this looks like one of the brightest new shows of the season.

Visually... Daria is misconceived.

The main plot lines are immediately involving.

This cop has such a lock on our loyalty that we squirm when she loses face and pray she won't lose heart. Unlike her character, Mirren's performance is without fault.

Peta Wilson, an Australian actress with the harsh blonde hair, snub nose and oversize, depthless blue eyes of your average mass-produced doll, makes a sexy, amusing Nikita.

An old-fashioned sitcom.

As Larry, Shandling raises banality into an art form; he is consistently hilarious whether blissfully watching his own videos or reacting to a bad review.

Party's fresh-faced young stars are still worth watching, but the show's focus on the family's closeness has inevitably weakened as the kids fall in love or move away.

An instant classic.

With its creepy soundtrack, terrifying visuals and ingenious plot twists, Millennium is far and away the best new show of the year.

Clever writing and the delightful Melissa Joan Hart... make this unlikely plot a high schooler's witch fulfillment.

Like most programs involving clairvoyance or time travel, this idea gets tired fast.

Fox... retains his wonderful timing and delivery. ... But the political satire that makes up the rest of the show is toothless, corny, passé.

Bland.

The badinage with his wife plays nice and easy, like Home Improvement, while that with his parents and brother across the street has more of a Seinfeldian silliness.

A pallid imitation of The Larry Sanders Show, the series works best when its real-life guests are funny.

Unlike their self-absorbed counterparts on MTV's The Real World, these kids don't make you root for the sharks. But their unnerving docu-adventures do make you wonder about their parents.

The Real World is an insult to anyone who lives in the real world.

Fun, swanky nonsense.

If Carvey were actually funny and not just dead-on, I guess this would be brilliant.

This hour-long show puts the city's locations to stylish use, and the first episode careens along with slam-bang action, but the whole concept feels-closer to slapdash.

There are a few weak jokes, but in its substance, look (fly fashions), and sound, this could be a real trendsetter.

Mother-daughter tensions dominate the twist-ridden plot.