“St. Denis” will conjure a smile but it doesn’t elicit belly laughs through three episodes made available for review.

The pilot episode is eerie and surprising at times but it also has that will-any-of-this-get-resolved? vibe hanging over it. There’s also a love-will-heal resolution that’s fairly cheesy as well as a frustrating opaqueness.

The show eventually gets to Billy (Tom Blyth) in his outlaw years, but it’s such a predictable and lackadaisical journey, only the heartiest of Western fans will bother to go along for the entire ride.

The musical moments are fantastic — as is Erivo, who evinces no sign of a British accent — but what comes between the musical numbers is a bit of a slog.

There are few revelations that justify the four-hour running time. ... The fourth hour is the strongest, showing how members of the investigation commission used “bureaucratic jujitsu” to thwart efforts to protect NASA’s image.

Early episodes offer some intriguing conflicts and points of view to consider. But later in the season – HBO Max made the first six of 10 episodes available for review — the show devolves into a less interesting cat-and-mouse game between the atheistic robots and the religious invaders.

Early on “The Undoing” seems like it may cast a spell, too, but that feeling wears off.

“Bel-Air” is a glossy, expensive-looking soap that, like Fox’s “Our Kind of People,” puts the spotlight on uber-wealthy Black families. But “fresh?” Not so much.

“Not Dead Yet” is only mildly amusing, not laugh-out-loud funny.

That lighter touch the writers take with Hailey draws more humor out of Sutherland’s Weir. ... That may not be enough to recommend “Rabbit Hole,” which is largely a generic conspiracy thriller, but it’s at least a differentiator.

The series improves somewhat as it delves into the backstories of its Mexican characters. “Coyote” proves watchable but too derivative.

“Good Sam” offers both medical-case-of-the-week and soapy storylines along with the who-needs-who more back-and-forth between father and daughter. This one’s more middling OK than good.

It’s fine if unremarkable. The series basically takes the plot of the 1987 film and elongates and attempts to deepen it with winks and nods to the movie.

It’s a sobering chronicle of a romance surrounded by death that’s, by virtue of its subject, more affecting than entertaining. It’s also slow-paced, suggesting the story may have been better told as a compact feature film rather than the drawn-out miniseries that has all episodes now streaming on Peacock.

“Monarch” is a decidedly old-school, broadcast network prime-time sudser.

While the family story and conflicts with the neighboring Tillersons — you know they’re bad news because they ride ATVs and the Abbotts ride horses – feels overly familiar, credit series creator/writer Brian Watkins with building to shocks at the end of the first two episodes that leave viewers eager to learn what will happen next.

To succeed in the long-term, “Animal Control” needs to get funnier fast and spend more time on its human characters and less time on animal gags.

Kids can forgive a lot and the sometimes-shaky effects work won’t detract from the story. But adults coming to this “Avatar” might be disappointed. From the performances (occasionally stunted and wooden young actors) to the general gee-whiz tone, “Avatar” is an OK but not amazing adaptation.

Representation matters, so the existence of an almost all-Asian cast on a broadcast network series is a welcome development even as the show’s format and themes feel overly familiar.

While there are some nice small moments – a few Will (Noah Schnapp) scenes indirectly address his sexuality; Max (Sadie Sink) and Lucas (Caleb McLaughlin) have some welcome interactions – it’s all the overheated bombast that feels like filler that disappoints.

It’s an intriguing start to the series but the beats that follow flow predictably from the show’s premise.

Though the performances are uniformly terrific – Ferrell has to walk the highest tightrope, making Marty believable but not too pathetic — “The Shrink Next Door” is Exhibit A in streaming series bloat. There’s not enough story to justify eight episodes.

Bad choices naturally lead to worse outcomes in this anti-hero series that would have been innovative in 2005 but today feels like a dull relic.

Perhaps this third episode bodes well for continued improvement, but in the early going, “Clarice” is meh-see TV. It’s fine but surely there are better TV dramas to pair with fava beans and a nice Chianti.

It’s great to see an action-adventure with a young woman in the lead role as Disney+’s “Renegade Nell” offers. But this series is too violent for its intended audience of kids, teens and families.

Other than unnecessarily elongating the story and filming it in black and white, Netflix’s adaptation does nothing to improve on the Oscar-nominated film that already exists.

“Cruel Intentions” a serviceable soap but nothing more.

The medical case in the premiere is pretty dense and sometimes hard to follow but future episodes are more streamlined. Still, it’s not a show you can multitask through and completely grasp what is going on in the medical cases.