The Night Manager stands tall as a stand-alone gem that elevates the cat-and-mouse game without ever entrapping itself. Bravo.

Although its principal supporting players are first-rate, Rectify would be lost in transition without Young’s stellar work in the lead role. It’s a fearless, fully immersed, Emmy caliber performance tinged with sadness, searching, primitive pleasures and even a little comedy.

This is an incredible film that never releases its hold on viewers.

Intercut with brief, unobtrusive reenactments and accompanied by a dangerous-sounding music track, The Jinx very much looks like a masterwork of the true crime genre.

This is HBO’s best “limited series” since Angels in America, which in 2004 won all of the major Emmy awards in its category.

The 90-minute HBO documentary, one of the very best in a long line of standouts, is in no way a pity party for Flood.

Pleasant viewing it’s not. But in terms of capturing a time and place, the five-part miniseries succeeds on every level. ... HBO’s extraordinary retelling of what went down in Pripyat and the then Soviet Union at large is its own reward for now -- and a certain multiple trophy winner during next year’s awards season.

It’s a remarkable piece of filmmaking that fully rises to the occasion of its remarkable subjects. Television’s new season is upon us, but this is an achievement for all seasons.

Judging from the first eight hours, it truly will be grand. Downton Abbey looks for all the world as though it’s steaming steadily toward happy or at least contented endings for one and all.

It keeps going about its business, getting better than ever each season with a restrained but gripping approach that's also sure to wear well decades from now.

Whatever your viewing regimen, Honorable Woman is highly recommended for its distinctive approach, bravura performances, overall digestibility and, yes, degree of difficulty.

Deadwood’s trademark blend of literacy and crudity continues to harmoniously co-exist. ... Deadwood: The Movie ends with beautifully paired scenes featuring Bullock and Swearengen. Both are moving in their own distinctive ways, bringing one of HBO’s very best series to an end that does David Milch proud. Very proud indeed.

It has Emmy caliber performances from its two leads and an authenticity that won't quit.

These first two episodes are gut-busting, non-stop fun.

Show Me a Hero hides its agenda in plain sight. It could stand to pick up the pace at times. But this journey to the promised land for some and tragedy for others is by and large expertly crafted and intrinsically important.

In its scope and a mostly impeccable selection of images, quotes and anecdotes (Ho Chi Minh once worked as a New York city pastry chef), The Vietnam War boldly and bravely stands its ground and almost assuredly will stand the test of time. Its story is told in affectingly human terms by the mostly unheralded men and women who bled, died and survived.

Get Shorty is superbly entertaining, both dramatically and comedically, and buoyed by performances that still lack official recognition from various trophy dispensers.

It's compelling, enthralling and steeped in current realities.

Handmaid’s Tale had a tough act to follow, but its second coming soars on multiple levels. It’s intense, heartbreaking, full of resolve and perfectly paced.

It is an extraordinarily intelligent and compelling look at racial dynamics and polarities.

Epic in scope, basic in motivations, it will fill the next 10 Sundays with “appointment viewing” of the highest realm.

Freak Show looks like a beauty, with a wealth of fascinating characters and a little smattering of heart helping to balance out the grisly appointed rounds of a so far unidentified clown with a hellish half-mask.

Louie begins Season 5 in great and oftentimes phenomenal shape.

In the end, it may be the most fun you'll ever have with a Ken Burns film.

The drought-stricken, spirit-sapping Great Plains of the 1930s get the lyrical and learned Burns treatment.

So far it's the televised documentary film of the year, with its truths stranger than fiction from opening move to checkmate.

It’s all quite enthralling and majestic.

Based on these first five episodes, The Americans shows every sign of maintaining if not exceeding the high bar it set in Season 1.

McDormand's portrayal of Olive Kitteridge is even more accomplished, in turns aggravating and affecting while always seeming just right. Jenkins is likewise superb.... This is a nuanced, slowly simmering look at bent and spindled lives molded by previous bent and spindled lives. The bright spots are there, but never glowing. Self-realization is the payoff.

A polished jewel of the genre starring an actor-comedian who has seized this opportunity and soared with it.

Viewers craving a satisfying gourmet meal rather than another summertime "reality" Moon Pie are urged to make The Hour a Wednesday night ritual for the next six weeks.

Schilling, Prepon and Mulgrew are uniformly terrific throughout, whether in prison garb or flashback civilian clothes. But other characters are equally compelling, giving this series innumerable stories to tell for hopefully many seasons to come. Based on the first six of 13 episodes, Orange is the New Black has passed virtually every test with flying colors.

You might as well pencil in stars Rachel Brosnahan and Alex Borstein for return visits to the Emmy podium next year. They’re still that good in a comedy/drama series that remains peppy, snappy, musically magnificent and bursting with living colors. ... Mrs. Maisel remains loaded with special moments and deft asides.

Louis C.K. shoots from the lip and keeps scoring. The beauty is the seeming ease with which he does this. And the knowledge of how hard it really is.

Broadchurch, with its recurring crashing waves wiping some slates clean, is thoroughly captivating from start to finish.

Whatever your thoughts about country music, expect to be immensely entertained, educated and even edified throughout this master course in pickin’, grinnin’ -- and so very much more.

FX sent the first five half-hours for review, and they're all gems.

True Detective is a marvel of craftsmanship, storytelling and performances through these first three hours made available for review.

Be assured there’s still nothing else like it--on FX or anywhere else. Atlanta depicts “The Black Experience” without preachments, but with pride of authorship.

They thoroughly come alive in this instant classic about show biz addiction and rejection.

Haggard’s performance (she’s also a co-writer) is a marvel, whether she’s exuding vulnerability or dishing the sass. Used and abused but never quite de-fused, she propels Back to Life to the top tier of this season’s newcomers, with ample help from a crackerjack ensemble.

Watch at whatever pace you'd like--immediately. Given its quality, I think you'll be drinking it all in sooner rather than later.

HBO has done it again, investing in a project of substance and a lead actress who powers it home.

The new Fargo bobs, weaves and occasionally unravels a bit. Still, it’s never less than entrancing, with the recurring panoramic shots of an unforgiving deep freeze serving as stolid supporting characters.

Each hour’s blazing horns, during the closing credits, are a weekly must-hear. The dialogue is sharp and suitably dicey ... There’s nothing pretty here. But in the eyes of this beholder, you’ll otherwise know great drama when you see it.

[The first four episodes of Season 2 available for review are] riveting from the first minute, with stellar, resonant performances driving a story with a high fiber content.

Enjoy and appreciate all three of these principals in a Season Two that matches and sometimes surpasses the quality of the series’ initial 10 hours. The Crown remains a joy to behold and savor. ... This is drama of the highest calling.

When We Rise is an enriching, bonafide TV event of the first order and also powerful enough to change more than a few entrenched minds.

Performance is never a problem for the cast of Masters of Sex. Caplan, Sheen and the supporting players keep everything humming in the best new drama of the fall season. You’ll want to watch.

It's HBO's most mature half-hour series ever, rising above the material worlds of Sex and the City and Entourage to offer a road worth taking in pursuit of a "higher self."

Legion jars the senses as a jagged-edged jigsaw puzzle that can’t easily be put together. But there’s no inclination to ever stop trying because the overall artistry is beautiful to behold and just won’t quit.

The Americans in my view is the best TV drama of this season. It excels to even greater degrees on levels large and small, with the intimate details of human interaction mixing with the humanity-at-stake, cloak and dagger goings-on that keep Philip and Elizabeth tenuously on point.

This is a riveting film with a bravura performance by Cranston, who’s been the signature television actor of the past decade.

Gilligan and company keep on pushing Breaking Bad to new highs.

Thoroughly absorbing through the first six episodes made available for review, it fully lives up to the FX come-on: “You Don’t Know the Half of It.”

The fun is in the snappy dialogue and the impeccable actors delivering it.

Masters of Sex is without question in Mad Men’s league as a period drama that looks inward, outward and unsteadily ahead. The performances of Sheen, Caplan, Janney and Bridges rival those in any ongoing TV series.

Orange Is the New Black remains a vibrantly hued, singular achievement. Darkly dramatic and comedically spiked, it deals in the dehumanization and restoration of both guards and inmates.

The first four episodes sent for review give every indication that this all-new story with mostly new characters will reach if not surpass FX’s first time around with Billy Bob Thornton, Martin Freeman, Allison Tolman, Colin Hanks, Bob Odenkirk, Keith Carradine, etc.

You won't find a better rendering of time and place anywhere else on the sprawling TV landscape. This is still the real deal, through and through.

Vikings enthrallingly captures the world of Norsemen and oarsmen, circa 793 in the Eastern Baltic but soon heading West to England.

The pace hasn’t quickened. Nor does the storyline congeal. Instead, Sunday’s re-opener builds to a terrifically poignant finish accompanied by music that likewise cries out in pain.

Comedy Central's The Daily Show at last has a worthy rival in the "fake news" game.

Bold, provocative and at its core heartbreakingly endearing, it borrows from the original mold--and then breaks it.

An explosively funny satirical descendant that can hit home without being even slightly preachy about it. Mostly, though, have fun with both the madcap characters and the notion that one of the Pakistani demands in play is a full membership with the Augusta National Golf Club.

For now, The Killing has made a very good re-start.

Whatever your takeaway, the performances of Spacey and Wright remain assured and now ingrained in a series that ranks as the best body politic drama ever.

Vietnam In HD is vivid and compelling without being intrinsically political.

Better Call Saul looks very much as though it can stand on its own, even with occasional drop-ins from prominent Breaking Bad characters other than Mike Ehrmantraut. Jimmy/Saul’s life isn’t in jeopardy as long as he stays in the past.

Not everything is letter-perfect about The Big C. But Linney sure is--and that's more than enough.

HBO subscribers thereby are the beneficiaries of a film with star power and staying power. It won’t surprise you with its outcome--or for the most part, how it gets there. But it may well have more of an impact than anticipated.

Ali is impressive in all three life stages, but his performance as the haunted and addled 70-year-old Hays has the most resonance.

Ash vs Evil Dead succeeds by merrily and seemingly effortlessly making a mess of things. The biggest budget consideration might be the cleanup bills. But the mayhem is never cringe-worthy and the heroics can be a riot... You’re gonna have a blast.

In the end, fans of well-paced political potboilers will find much to like about Game Change. As will those who simply want to be entertained by a crackling good melodrama.

Buoyed by a bravura performance from Australian Ben Mendelsohn (The Dark Knight Rises) as prodigal son Danny Rayburn, Bloodline is an absorbing, fractious family drama that captivates despite giving away Season 1’s major development in the very first hour.

Creator and executive producer Vince Gilligan isn’t afraid to let it all air out at a measured pace. But Better Call Saul is still avoiding the pitfalls of simply running in place. Instead, great expectations remain intact for a Season 2 that so far continues to make its mark by delivering just a little at a time.

It sometimes lapses into the abundant cliches of its genre. Pound for pound, though, you won't see many better dramas this season. Gloves on or off, it keeps scoring points.

Authentically grimy, solidly built and well-paced, Hatfields & McCoys is violent without being gratuitous.

It’s a film that asks a lot from West and Bonham Carter, who deliver time and again in roles that could have eaten them alive. Instead we feast.

Counterpart blooms and grows as an absorbing sci-fi/spy thriller with elemental questions about how identities can be forged and changed by environments and circumstances.

The first two hours of Last Resort are bracingly strong on pulling power.

This film is much more than that. From the boyish exuberance of Ben Affleck’s and Matt Damon’s joint 1998 acceptance speech to Hanks’ anecdote about a hard-of-hearing Bette Davis, this is a rich-bodied appetizer for TCM’s 31 Days of Oscar main course.

Grammer's performance is thoroughly engaging and convincing. And the events swirling around him never fail to snap, crackle and pop.

Do expect an absorbing tale of justice rendered but not necessarily justice served. Its star players have no formal acting training. But for better or worse, they all look born to play their real-life roles in another true crime drama that knocks fiction for a loop.

The Americans enthralls with its complexities, simplicities and overall derring-do.

The story has ample pulling power. But the music is its driving force--all day and all of the night.

In the end, the only open question (from a crime solving standpoint) is whether this indeed is the finale for Broadchurch. Creator, writer, executive producer Chris Chibnall emphatically says that it is. If that’s really so, Season 3 acquits itself exceedingly well.

Be assured that Shrill gains its footing en route to being something special by the end of its first season.

A summertime winner here on the strength of strong acting, engaging writing and an immediately gripping premise.

Given the otherworldly circumstances, it all moves along quite logically and at a brisk pace that leaves dawdling for dead. There’s no flabby midsection here, just one major development after another. The fight scenes are well-choreographed and frequent. And the twists are imaginative while also being grounded in the grim realities of this ramped-up universe.

For now, Season 5 is proof that Downton Abbey remains in possession of a strong pulse and story lines. It minds its manners--and its stately manors--while keeping its characters vital and vulnerable.

It’s terrific fun as well as involving drama.

This is the series that puts Amazon Prime on the map, if not yet on the same level with competing streamer Netflix.

The disparate detectives of The Killing may have their own means and methods of getting to the bottom of this. But the overall air of believability is palpable from the start. All the better for taking a deep breath and diving right in.

Some might find For Whom the Bell Tolls to be too easy on, if not downright deferential, to McCain. But this last testament in many ways also underscores the respect and admiration he has won from those he’s battled fiercely.

Galifianakis, Anderson and Kelly fit their roles like the thick rubber gloves used in emptying human waste from portable johns. What fine messes they’re in.

Bette and Joan gives Lange and Sarandon a sublime showcase from the first moment they hit their marks.

Showtime’s taut and pretty terrific Ray Donovan.... Schreiber brings a solid, stolid presence to the role. But it’s Jon Voight as Mickey who gives this drama its ferocious, dangerous and sometimes creepy edge.