The show is likable, in a channel-surfing way: So-So Rosie. [31 Oct 2011, p.36]

The animated duo have returned, as dumb--and hilarious--as ever. [31 Oct 2011, p.36]

The talent is good, and on the long road to announcing a top 16, the show expertly milking every drop of pathos. [24 Oct 2011, p.39]

The show offers genuine scares, but lines like "I already cried wolf once--you think they're gonna believe me?" cast a hokey spell. [31 Oct 2011, p.35]

The cast would do well to have more fun, but the layered storytelling has it charms. [31 Oct 2011, p.35]

The show's many subplots are handled clumsily, but these two [Grammer & Nielsen] are too good to pass up. 25 Oct 2011, p.48]

A wiry, tired jitteriness has crept in. [24 Oct 2011, p.48]

Done without any of the smart silliness that made Drew Barrymore's 2000 movie reboot so much fun, the show is just vixen nostalgia. [17 Oct 2011, p.42]

Allen and Travis, who are both better than you r average comic actor, seem aware that they're trapped in a particular cookie-cutter sitcom hell, forced to laugh their way through stale gags about kids while other new TV comedies explore family life with clever, contemporary touches. [17 Oct 2011, p.39]

It might be unwatchable if Dern, who's excellent, didn't allow Amy's laughable obtuseness to be pierced by glimmers of empathy and acceptance. [ 17 Oct 2011, p.40]

Beautifully filmed, George Harrison: Living in the Material World is especially good on the singer-guitarist's post-Beatles life as he sought enlightenment in Eastern religions. [10 Oct 2011, p.40]

Boardwalk is still solid, but it's sacrificed some of its nervy power. [10 Oct 2011, p.40]

Her mind has repressed the clues [to her sister's murder]. Clever paradox, but as a result the show is an unsatisfying mix of razor-sharp thinking and befogged gloom. [10 Oct 2011, p.44]

It's funny and moves blindingly fast, barely giving you time to blink or gulp--Dark Shadows for the PlayStation age. [10 Oct 2011, p.39]

Prohibition is a merry, bullet-sprayed study of the era's rampant criminality. [10 Oct 2011, p.40]

[A] taut, ingenious spy series. [10 Oct 2011, p.44]

Up All Night is adorable without being cute. [3 Oct 2011, p.41]

[Bello's] sour, tough intelligence is right on the money. [3 Oct 2011, p.45]

Even with Steven Spielberg listed among the executive producers, this distant world doesn't inspire much awe. [3 Oct 2011, p.45]

The show is fueled with so much soap-operatic hot air that it takes off. [26 Sep 2011, p.54]

VanCamp goes about her business with a purse-lipped Jodie Foster earnestness that makes her hard to root for. But Stowe coos, scowls, flirts and thunders. She roils Revenge. [26 sep 2011, p.56]

Playboy Club makes the mistake of aping Mad Men's Stern social seriousness. [26 Sep 2011, p.54]

In such grossness is greatness. [19 Sep 2011, p.65]

The acting is flat, but the show casts a hokey spell. [19 Sep 2011, p.65]

The girls' chemistry should keep the show breakdown free. [19 Sep 2011, p.59]

[Believing Rachel Zoe is extremely deadpan] makes her company more enjoyable as she goes about her business--developing the label, hiring staff--without much more outward joy than Christopher Walken. [12 Sep 2011, p.47]

Gellar commands every scene. Hers is a true, potent star turn. [12 Sep 2011, p.43]

Big Sexy could have used less glamour and more Mike & Molly star Melissa McCarthy's salt-of-the-earth power. [Sep 2011, p.46]

Battle doesn't have much to offer that's original. [5 Sep 2011, p.44]

The challenges are ludicrous, but the results can be dazzling. [5 Sep 2011, p.44]

Stranger isn't nice--not with the mortar shells she routinely fires from her mouth--but she's one of reality TV's most vivid characters. [29 Aug 2011, p.36]

This portrait of Prince William's courtship of Kate Middleton is better than April's plucky Lifetime movie. [29 Aug 2011, p.36]

The experience is like having the velvet rope lifted, then wishing you could use it to hogtie the charmed circle behind it. [22 Aug 2011, p.48]

The arbitrary leap overseas moves the show that much closer to pure sitcom--an improvement. [22 Aug 2011, p.45]

It's tacky, da--or should we say duh?--but likable. [22 Aug 2011, p.45]

Denis Leary's superb comedy-drama about New York City firefighters, will end its seven-year run a few days before the 10th anniversary of 9/11. [15 Aug 2011, p.34]

Jake & Vienna's sense of self-importance in this crowd is ludicrous yet also fascinating. They make Heidi Montag and Spencer Pratt look earnest. [15 Aug 2011, p.34]

The poisoned relationship of attorneys Ellen Parsons and Patty Hewes has gone slack. But The supporting cast is superb. [8 Aug 2011, p.40]

The series is unmatched as a portrait of the entertainment industry. [8 Aug 2011, p.39]

Without Bentley;s cruel cunning, the rest of the show has played out predictably. [1 Aug 2011, p.39]

The "nuttiness" is contrived, but Johnny Argent, Roseanne's boyfriend of eight years, is amusingly droll. [1 Aug 2011, p.41]

This is a happy carnival of singers, Magicians, dancers and --this season-0- what appear to be gnomes. On the judges' panel, Howie Mandel has turned out to be a improvement over the thumpingly earnest David Hasselhoff. [25 Jul 2011, p.39]

It's only fun, though, when the would-be mates turn on each other and the bat guano flies: Romancing the Stone morph into The War of the roses. [25 Jul 2011, p.40]

In season 2 this fluffy spy caper about gorgeous CIA operative Annie Walker is starting to deliver on the seductive fun promised by Piper Perabo's sly, flirtatious smile in the opening credits. [25 Jul 2011, p.40]

The Show has evolved into a modern underworld Western--there's nothing else like it. [18 Jul 2011, p.41]

The trivia segments aren't very interesting, but I laughed at every screaming, shrieking exit. [18 Jul 2011, p.38]

The show continues to be soft, captivating fun. [18 Jul 2011, p.36]

The show is a trampoline that sags clear down to the ground, the better to catapult you off into the air. [18 Jul 2011, p.35]

This eighth season finds him spending time in New York City, and the trip rejuvenates him. [18 Jul 2011, p.35]

When The Close comes to a close, we'll lose one of the best TV detectives of the past decade. [11 Jul 2011, p.33]

The show is a bit of a junk heap--Fringe, Mission:Impossible and Death Becomes Her are in the pile--but it's a real adventure. [11 Jul 2011, p.34]

Thorne has the right bristling, combative energy for all this commotion, but the pilot is hard to swallow. [4 Jul 2011, p.38]

Luckily Blood is still buoyed by its weird, Gothic zest and the performers all operate with the same vibe of ripe sexuality and restrained camp. [4 Jul 2011, p.37]

The show is The Odd Couple redefined by psychosis and whimsy. I'm not wagging my tail. [27 Jun 2011, p.46]

The show doesn't have the sinister intelligence of ABC's short-lived Invasion, but it's good family entertainment. [27 Jun 2011, p.45]

The fun comes in watching the uncynical Adams learn to undercut everyone else's cunning. [27 Jun 2011, p.46]

What's surprising and even touching is that Fergie may not be a hot mess, but she's an appealingly human one. [20 Jun 2011, p.47]

In the premiere of this likably preposterous new show, [Chloe] learns that these changes are embedded in her DNA and can be traced back millennia. [20 Jun 2011, p.58]

The show is light, viewer-friendly entertainment, but without the conceptual novelty that gives USA dramas their oomph. [20 Jun 2011, p.48]

Very few reality shows generate real suspense and sadness at the moment of elimination, but this one does. [20 Jun 2011, p.53]

Katie Leclerc is instantly, sunnily appealing as Daphne....Vanessa Marano is fine as the other misplaced kid, except she's a sulker and sort of a drag. [13 Jun 2011, p.48]

The only disappointment is the werewolf makeup, minimal enough that Posey could still blend in at the mall. [13 Jun 2011, p.48]

Collar's odd-couple tension tugs the show in entertaining directions. [13 Jun 2011, p.46]

If you look past them, at their star projects and their own homes and offices, you can see that their tastes are impeccable and inarguable. [13 Jun 2011, p.46]

Like the world cares. [6 Jun 2011, p.46]

It's not a fascinating process. As host and co-judge, Jewel is so glamorously reserved, she's faintly sinister. [6 Jun 2011, p.46]

The show works on its own undemanding terms. [6 Jun 2011, p.45]

The 90-minute premiere sets up what could be a very good--by which I mean crassly turbulent--season 3. [23 May 2011, p.41]

She discusses her problems with a warm directness that makes them sound as if they could be anyone's. The show is less authentic when she learns about recovery from non-celebrities blindsided by tragedy. [16 May 2011, p.48]

Visually, it makes for odd television. Odder still is that the coaches compete too....The good news? The caliber of voices is high--better than American Idol. [16 May 2011, p.43]

This TLC series has hit a cultural nerve, partly because it offers practical, price-cutting tips in an era in which people are jittery about inflation. Also because it's bonkers. [26 May 2011, p.46]

The show is solidly American. [9 May 2011, p.39]

Here we have the spirit and courage of the settlers, only without the time to settle. It's CBS after all, not Conestoga. [9 May 2011, p.39]

The show is sloppy, vulgar fun, even if it's hard to detect much likability under the layers of lacquer. [9 May 2011, p.43]

It takes awhile to adjust to the dissonance, but the muted naturalism of the superb cast draws us in. [9 May 2011, p.40]

This sitcom has the high-tech antics of Chuck and the misfit camaraderie of Community-not bad, but no breakthrough. [2 May 2011, p.38]

Season 3 of Showtime's great Nurse Jackie brings romance to student nurse Zoey. [25 Apr 2011, p.44]

What's amazing is how quickly it all falls into place--the show goes like a shot. [25 Apr 2011, p.43]

Reiser, a precise, nimble comic, doesn't have the gut-level energy to bully life into this contraption. It's stalled. [25 Apr 2011, p.46]

At least Endings has something fresh at it's core....Even better, the well-cast ensemble includes Casey Wilson. [25 Apr 2011, p.44]

The photography is sweepingly gorgeous--this must be the best of all possible planets. [18 Apr 2011, p.46]

Set on the eve of the 1936 abdication crisis, it has melodramatic bustle and tender affection for its characters--of all classes. [18 Apr 2011, p.46]

The hot-potato miniseries dares to be unflattering. [11 Apr 2011, p.45]

It's the usual stupid fun. [11 Apr 2011, p.47]

As lead detective, Mireille Enos is terrific and makes up for the sense that we're revisiting terrain already covered--and reduced to parody--by Twin Peaks. [11 Apr 2011, p.46]

FX's spy parody Archer is funnier, and AMC's short-lived Rubicon was a more sharply realized fantasy of work life in a shadow bureaucracy. This is a botched mission. [4 Apr 2011, p.50]

With the second episode, though, the whole tone improves: Delany's performance seems to have caught some of the coppery warmth of her hair, and we spend more time with a good ensemble. [4 Apr 2011, p.49]

This is an epic portrait of a woman who's monumentally single-minded yet uncomprehending, and watching her rise and fall inspires a sick awe. [4 Apr 2011, p.50]

As Merlin, Joseph Fiennes is more like a trainer-dietitian than mentor, but he's lively. Eva Green, as Morgan, is coldly beautiful and magnificent in Camelot couture. She's enchanting. But I don't see Jamie Campbell Bower's Arthur having the resolve of a king. [28 Mar 2011, p.54]

[A] fascinating reality hit. [28 Mar 2011, p.57]

Reubens is getting a bit old for this, but Pee-wee's innocence, infantilism and camp haven't dated--there's a rebel in the ridiculousness. [21 Mar 2011, p.46]

Both shows [NCIS and NCIS: Los Angeles] have an old-fashioned but relaxing simplicity, with an upbeat emphasis on the value of being a team. It's family entertainment. [21 Mar 2011, p.43]

Not a bad concept, but the casting is out of whack. [21 Mar 2011, p.46]

What really matters on Apprentice, though, are the celebs: This season's B- and (let's face it) C-listers are a good, volatile mix. [14 Mar 2011, p.42]

In its second season, the spy parody remains my favorite animated series, thanks to its retro visual design--this is a cartoon for the age of Mad Men--and the vicious, dead-aim put-downs that make up most of the dialogue. [14 Mar 2011, p.42]

An odd but involving concept--Raging Birds. [14 Mar 2011, p.42]

Her own unhappy childhood haunts her, giving the mommy thread a weird poignancy. [7 Mar 2011, p.38]

If anything, it moves so tentatively through the baffling investigation and trial that Hayden Panettiere seems to play a dozen Amandas: cheerful, furtive, erratic--and at times literally clueless. [28 Feb 2011, p.40]