As interesting as Bull‘s juror-research aspects are, the actual courtroom scenes are over-the-top, with witnesses arguing with lawyers (and, in one case, assaulting them) from the stand.

By cramming a Gen Z worldview into a pre-Y2K sitcom format, Happy’s Place is trying to straddle two eras… and is all the more shaky because of it.

Apple TV+’s WWII epic Masters of the Air is gorgeously filmed but dull, with a distinct lack of narrative urgency.

Ripley boasts beautiful cinematography and a strong lead performance, but it stretches its story out so thin, it ruins the thrills.

NBC’s The Irrational puts a fun spin on the procedural formula, but it’s dragged down by clichés and convenient plot twists.

The Old Man seems to be shooting for something tense and riveting like Homeland or The Americans, but it doesn’t deliver the depth or nuance needed to bring us along for the ride.

What’s fascinating--and disappointing--about Confirmation is that we somehow manage to learn more about Hill in the recreation of scenes that are essentially dramatic re-enactments of C-Span clips you can watch right now on YouTube. That leaves about an hour and a half of bloodless storytelling that ping-pongs from law offices to congressional corridors to Thomas’ living room.

A lot of his [Nate Bargatze's] jokes felt weirdly dismissive of the very industry the Emmys are supposed to be honoring. I’m all for taking the hot air out of a self-important awards show, but this actually ruined the vibe of the whole show. .... But the ceremony also threw in a few quick nostalgia hits to keep us entertained, like Gilmore Girls stars Lauren Graham and Alexis Bledel reuniting on their Stars Hollow porch. These kind of moments are what the Emmys do best.

Overwritten and underbaked, Your Friends & Neighbors borrows from other, better shows — notably star Jon Hamm’s Mad Men — but falls short by comparison.

Hollywood comes as a disappointment, then, in spite of its stellar cast and admirable ambitions. It’s kind of like some of the big-screen icons that rose to fame in the early days of Hollywood: plenty of gloss, but not enough substance.

Michael Cudlitz has a few nice moments as gruff but tenderhearted dad Mike, but ultimately, the show isn’t funny or heartwarming enough to overcome how familiar it feels.

Sirens tries to follow in The White Lotus’ footsteps with soapy drama in a luxury setting, but the satire falls flat, and the tone is hopelessly jumbled.

All told, the new Battle feels more like a skirmish.

I do appreciate the effort to highlight some of the stories the film didn’t tell. But the fun is conspicuously missing, and the muddled and labored end result is a far cry from the movie that inspired it.

This detachment from reality effectively neuters the show’s myriad soapy storylines — ranging from financial woes to extramarital escapades — giving the whole thing an unfortunately low-stakes vibe.

If The White Lotus is 30 Rock, then Nine Perfect Strangers is Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip: not “good,” exactly, and definitely way overblown, but still watchable in its own strange way.

It was a mostly safe, by-the-numbers affair that was woefully short on buzzy watercooler moments.

Despite some nice touches and performances, Kidding gets stuck somewhere between comedy and drama, and isn’t entirely successful at either.

Little Fires Everywhere, I realized, must be what watching Big Little Lies is like for people who don’t like Big Little Lies. In my eyes, though, that show managed to find a way to elevate this kind of soapy, pulpy material into something great. Little Fires Everywhere, sadly, does not.

Hulu’s How I Met Your Father has a strong cast, but lame jokes and an excess of schmaltz make it fall short of the original.

Really, it looks like all of the actors are having a blast filming Zoey‘s big musical numbers... but that fun never fully translates to us at home.

It’s hard not to root for the Codys to get busted--or worse. And that seems like it could be a big problem for the series going forward.

The absence of Lecter and his indelible dynamic with Clarice leaves a huge void that Clarice struggles to fill. The result is a disappointingly run-of-the-mill procedural — another dark, grim Criminal Minds clone with a shiny brand name slapped on the front of it.

So, is Firefly Lane good? Alas, no. But is it entertaining? Kinda — and not even in a mean way. It’s an adequate time-passer till the shows for which you’re really jonesing are back on. There’s no more shame in indulging in it than there is in equating sex to ice cream.

The Gilded Age is a feast for the eyes, and its aesthetic pleasures are undeniable — but those are the only pleasures to be found here.

Nothing particularly clever happens as the heroes endeavor to extricate themselves from their respective predicaments in the second half; you keep waiting for it, but aside from a bit of pickpocketing... nope.

A thoroughly mild, easily digestible sitcom that unfortunately dips into Disney Channel levels of saccharine too often to merit a recommendation. It’s a hard show to hate, but without Elba to anchor it, it’d be so lightweight, it’d disintegrate in the air like a dandelion.

Paramount+’s Fatal Attraction takes all the thrills out of the classic thriller, with leaden flash-forwards and stilted dialogue.