The reason why Queer As Folk largely works is because it’s driven by the characters, not their sexuality.

American Dreams, although set in the supposedly kindler, gentler days of 1963, manages not wrap itself in a “things were so much better then” haze. In so doing, it encourages viewers to think about the issues it tentatively raises, and to make connections between the lives it portrays and the lives we live now.

Not only does Show Me a Hero deal with the same type of intricate institutional power struggles of city government--this time in 1987 in Yonkers, NY, where a battle over the desegregation of low-income housing is waged with newly elected mayor Nick Wasicsko (Oscar Isaac) caught in the crossfire--but it does it with the kind of nuanced, ensemble-driven, character-based stories that made The Wire one of the most acclaimed television series of all time.

The Strain reifies its connections between political and melodramatic themes with the gory action for which the series is best known--the monsters’ neck-piercing six-foot tongues, the silver bullets’ exploding effects--in kitschy evidence during the battle against that takes up the bulk of the storage facility scene.

Nick Doob and Shari Cookson’s decision to use such “found footage” makes their film at once immediate and distressingly distanced, as it offers images both ordinary and specific, families and individuals posing for photos, their faces turned to the camera.

Even in the areas of its strength--the give-and-take between strong-minded friends, the camaraderie of colleagues, and the bonds of a multi-generational family—the show tends to probe lightly the critical issues it consistently raises.

Though it’s unclear in three episodes where such ideas might go in Wayward Pines, the show does provide plenty of unanswered questions to pique our interest.

Ultimately, House of Cards Season Three is a great continuation of a show that remains deliciously dramatic even with a few glaring flaws.

So far, the Disney experiment is working, if not always perfectly. Agent Carter‘s tone seems right and its lead seems perfect, helping the live-action wing of the Marvel franchise to evolve as it spreads across time into our current entertainment and its future.

If you miss Warehouse 13, or liked Friday the 13th: The Series, or Tia Carrere in The Relic Hunter, then The Librarians is worth a visit.

Perhaps as the interplay between the World War II setting and other Marvelverses continues, we’ll see that the creative team learned from Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D,’s early stumbles, so the new show is more mature, and ready to hit the ground with its Enfield No. 4s blazing.

The Flash sports a great cast, visually well-designed sets and effects, and the pace and atmosphere reflect the deft hands of directors and crew. But a superhero show can’t live on those elements alone.

The portrayal of Thomas’ decline is visceral from the first moments to the last, evoking that same second-hand queasiness one experiences watching, say, Leaving Las Vegas, with explicit images of obliterating drunkenness, retching, and emotionless, mechanical sex, as well as the spasmodic gasping for breath coming out of a blackout or descending into an asthma attack. Watching Thomas’ experience is riveting.

Death Comes to Pemberley works so well because the characters are so perfectly realized. Affairs, unwed pregnancies, and murder all abound, but at the heart of the series is the story of a marriage.

A compelling mystery, it maintains a measured pace, inviting viewers’ patience.

While Keating is immediately a compelling character, it is unfortunate that so much of the pilot episode requires the viewer to suspend disbelief, starting with the idea that a top-notch defense attorney would allow a class of newbie law students unfettered access to all documents in a case that she is currently defending.

Everything in the first episode suggests that Forever has a better shot at successfully combining procedural conventions and a high-concept than, say, Intelligence or Almost Human.

Even with selective choices of what reality to include in its fiction, Sleepy Hollow is effective, biting like a vampire, infecting with simultaneous thrill and dread.

Some of the characters aren’t able to achieve the same balance between fantasy and realism as the rest of the show.... Thankfully, Mooney isn’t as central a figure here as Bullock or Gordon, who together are fully capable of carrying the series, even without young Bruce. Logue gives an especially strong performance as Bullock, an exhausted, veteran crime-fighter who remains likable and charismatic even as his various failings seem inevitable.

As fascinating as Madam Secretary can be regarding its global focuses, it’s so far less detailed when it comes to McCord, her family, and her colleagues.

Each of the firefighters here reveals a nuanced, complex mindfulness, a sense that what they do is dangerous, but also rewarding, exciting, important, and, in a word, what they do.

While the designated flawed hero John espouses an essential grasp of the purpose of medicine and the workings of disease (“Despite what you may believe,” he tells Cornelia, “Sickness isn’t a result of poor character, germs don’t examine your bankbook”), he’s also stymied, by his own prejudices as well as money concerns. That these might take him in different directions suggests the series has some sense of the difficulty of medicine then and still.

The series takes some time to put this team together, even in the same area of New York. And while you’re waiting for that plot turn, you’re treated to a series of lurid images, from yucky to jolting.

As before, The Bridge loses its own focus frequently, sliding off into multiple storylines that follow pairs of characters, some less interesting than others, some downright distracting. But for all the time that feels misspent on Charlotte and her idiot boyfriend Ray (Brian Van Holt) or the self-deluding addict reporter Frye (Matthew Lillard) and his long-suffering partner Adriana (Emily Rios), The Bridge offers brief moments that resonate and sometimes, even chill.

Based on co-creator Tom Perrotta’s 2011 book, The Leftovers imagines a range of responses (and too often, responses accompanied by anxiety-making piano or violin trills).

The Escape Artist is unusually willing not to let the audience off the hook, and instead, to help us understand that the pursuit of substantive justice may prove as dangerous as the crimes it seeks to right.

With the relationships among MacMillan, Clark, and Howe in the foreground, Halt and Catch Fire makes impressive use of its time period without treating it as an elbow-to-the-ribs joke.

He anticipates pretty much every move made against him, as you might as well, given that they’re made by people designed to remind you of previous people in Jack’s universe.

There are a few elements of Silicon Valley that are still works in progress at this point. The force of Miller’s personality can be overwhelming, and a little of Erlich goes a long way.

Still impressively detailed and masterfully assembled, the show again focuses on the classed relations among employees and employers, relations that can be both supportive and dysfunctional, and, increasingly, affected by external forces.

It’s not always clear what either woman gains from the friendship, and while maintaining the imbalance of power would feed the show’s bleakly comic seam, the fourth episode’s final scene suggests an impending shift when both Em and Doll audition for the same role, creating new and welcome tensions going forward.

The film offers a version of the real Mitt, performative and authentic, charming and awkward, occasionally at the same time.

Archer‘s affection for character and craft makes it more likely to be remembered as one of the great TV shows of our time, and not just another dirty cartoon.

The show is becoming more complex along with its characters, and as a result, the viewer feels a greater investment.

Valentine Road features a range of interview subjects who voice conflicting concerns and express their discontents, but it also resists casting judgment against one person or another.

The jokes fly furiously during the first episode, and the delivery is impeccable all around.

An intriguing twist suggests her involvement in his scheme is more complicated than the setup suggests, but we knew that. Moreover, she may also be more complicated than Red anticipates, which might make the introduction of this so familiar dynamic more a point of departure than a retread. That will be helpful because, based on the first episode, The Blacklist‘s plot makes little sense.

These couple of episodes give hope that Kaling the writer means to continue to skewer her character’s fantasies with the same combination of intelligence and acid wit as before.

Even the actors in the smallest roles are three-dimensional, a rich tribute to Britain’s theatrical talent. If these are, as Horowitz claims, the last episodes of Foyle he writes, both he and his longtime actor-collaborators are bowing out on a very high note indeed.

The show doesn’t only deliver fast-paced action and fine performances, but also, increasingly, poses questions concerning responsibility.

While The Flag ponders the whereabouts of Shirley and Spiro’s flag, it raises other, broader, variously resonant questions too, questions concerning how symbols and icons become significant, as well as how stories are told and myths are disseminated.

In 10 years of reviewing film and television for various publications, no comedy has given me as much pleasure as The Office.

Most viewers will recognize the South Park-like humor, critiquing the problem by critiquing the mainstream response to it. But unlike South Park, which usually offers something like “hope”(however sarcastically rendered), High School USA! is mostly just bleak.

The brilliance is precisely a function of its incongruity.

Even as all of these seeming oppositions are set up, the show insists on the blurring of lines, the bridges as well as the borders.

Bruckner takes on the role with gusto, and she and Harron together create someone whose unthinking commitment to the pursuit of “F-U-N” (in Anna’s phrasing) achieves something close to sublimity.

Copper reveals not only the grim living conditions of 19th century New York, but also the implications of unchecked police power.

Twisted combines a handful of stereotypical ideas about romanticized teenage criminals with fresh perspectives on how humans understand or fear one another under intense stress.

While Kieren does contend with zombie-style gore, the show isn’t a kill-fest like The Walking Dead. But as it raises the sorts of questions that classic zombie fare, In the Flesh also draws some perceptive connections to our own social and political contexts.

While the mystery genre has a rich history of incisive social commentary animating a compelling investigation, this series struggles to balance an examination of women’s place in post-war Britain and a classic race-against-time mystery.

Despite character-based faults and multiple narrative cul-de-sacs, [Parade’s End] does come around to revealing the consequences of maintaining public status and reputation at the cost of personal realization.

As the fifth season begins, Southland appears to be stronger for its ordeals. The ensemble is streamlined to the most compelling characters and the direction is crisp.

As much as the series' pitch seems clear--it's another period series, with terrific design details, long story arcs, and complex performances--it is also something else, a reframing of what it might mean to be Americans, then and now.

Although the nature documentary elements are the focus, the added color of travel show features as well, as the general feeling of spontaneity (however carefully cultivated) adds a peculiar appeal to the package.

Referencing literary works and imitating horror films may seem derivative, but by drawing from the familiar, The Following obviates the need for extensive exposition and jumps right into the action.

Even though Archer does occasionally overwhelm its sharp wit with violent fight sequences or simplistic shocks, it usually recovers with a one-two punch of cool animation and skillful wordplay.

1600 Penn's tone may be apolitical, but it is also very funny.

At last, Sasha is less a collection of TV teenager tropes and more convincingly a Sherman-Palladino creation.

For now, the Bowers and Joanna provide enough mystery to maintain our interest, but we're left wondering whether the show's compelling start is actually taking us somewhere, or if instead this, too, is only a deception.

[Marnie's] one element in the rich vein of personalities that The Hour only began to mine in its first season, and one of the many reasons the second season is looking very good indeed.

It's a lively conversation that's nicely balanced between oral history and behind the scenes anecdotes.

At the same time [Eros Hoagland is taking pictures], his process is also the subject of a picture--shaped in part by the remarkable work of photographer and cinematographer Jared Moossy, who shoots all four episodes of Witness--a picture that shows both context and effect, the sort of broad view that might emerge from the most specific images.

Again and again, Ethel insists she doesn't like to "talk about" her self, doesn't like to be introspective. And so the film offers images for the rest of us to parse, public performances that may or may not reveal what we want to see.

No such show has come even near to Glee's success. Nashville may be the exception, with its clever, even cynical, mix of middle-aged crises and youthful ambitions set in country music's Mecca.

This being The Good Wife, a show renowned for complicating what might seem obvious, Alicia's new position as a kind of moral compass leads to a new series of dilemmas. Some of these are predictably topical.

The season opener, "Transilience Thought Modifier Unit-11," is so incomprehensible that it suggests a no-compromise posture for the remaining episodes. Which is exactly what the loyal fans want and deserve.

While Grace must seek to do right, The Mob Doctor is most compelling when she has to sort out what that is, and also when she has to justify what she does wrong.

The lack of cynicism is at least a bit unusual in the current sitcom universe, conferring novelty and a genuine, rather than confected, sweetness.

If it strains our credulity at times, Copper also assumes our intelligence, specifically, for introducing us to an unfamiliar world and, rather than explaining every simple detail, expecting us to keep up with plot and context.

It's more interesting when Elaine takes aim at the easy-target man's world she inhabits.

What makes Hit & Miss one of the strongest UK dramas to hit US TV so far this year is its reframing of such high-concept premises within unsensational contexts.

Louie is back, as raunchy, candid, and hilarious as ever.

A lean moral thriller, Inside Men considers the core impulses of such justification, and draws out severe implications with considerable skill.

Weight of the Nation encourages viewers to feel responsible for their own lives and to make informed choices.

In its focus on such details, the show finds humor in the contradiction between the staff's renowned arena and the petty ways they get things done.

With its precisely drawn characters, winning performances, and frank, well-observed humor, Girls is a knockout.

The new episodes present an almost a too intricate meditation on power. Game of Thrones demands that you pay attention or be left behind.

It's more subtly, and more forcefully too, a quest for understanding, specifically an understanding of how the world works.

Frozen Planet recycles some material from previous films from under the same umbrella (I'm pretty sure those duck-hunting wolves were in Life) as well as covering territory very well-trodden by other films.

Herzog listens and interjects his own helpfully perverse insights.

Amid this seeming disorder, Jason Isaacs breathes a wry life into Britten, as a man who slowly feels himself accessing levels of consciousness and perception he never imagined, even as his psychiatrists label them "illness" and his work partners question their relevance.

The special effects won't keep you up nights, the transformations and the blood remain un-frightening. Instead of such visceral sensations, the show reveals what's human in monsters and vice versa.

The River plainly evokes Lost.

If Smash lacks the benefit of Aaron Sorkin's hyper-literate and unmistakable dialogue, it follows Studio 60's format, observing the producers, writers, and actors who collaborate on a show, particularly what happens backstage.

For these all-too-brief moments of sheer visceral exhilaration, all of the related backroom machinations, self-destructive manipulation, and blithe dishonesty of the characters seem completely justified.

So far, its mix of spirituality and science, familial and global struggles, is galvanizing.

On Freddie Roach [is] Peter Berg's extraordinary six-part HBO series.

The animation remains a little crude, but the show is at least trying to be a bit more dynamic in its action sequences this year. And the roughness contributes to the comedy.

It's an exhilarating take on a couple of familiar genres, balancing horror, humor, and heart.

Quarles and Limehouse can't replace Mags, but they add new dimensions to Raylan's ongoing dilemma, that is, how to be a lawman when the law seems anachronistic.

The hallmark of all three films has been their understanding and embrace of subjects' self-presentations./

Stick with it through the second episode: it gets moving quickly in the subsequent episodes, and turns into a grim frontier revenge saga, with intriguing personalities and interconnecting storylines.

Even if it slips into generic tropes here and there, Whitechapel's own veneer of nicely crafted entertainment remains intact.

In its premiere episode, Once Upon a Time offers a mix of hope and cynicism, coupled with familiar television and film allusions (not unlike the Shreks).

Despite its gratuitous nudity, double-crossing gunplay, and growing pile of corpses, Bored to Death is a remarkably gentle show and its characters surprisingly lovable.

In many ways, it was where the series ought to have begun.

Each episode moves her closer to some sort of insight, demonstrating that enlightenment is a moving spot on the horizon.

The Oedipal quagmire only enhances the political treachery.