It is still one of the very best shows on television. ... The first [episode] is more of a table-setter than some past Americans premieres have been, but the next two are outstanding, filled with the usual agonizing mix of spy thrills and family drama, and superb performances by Keri Russell, Matthew Rhys, Noah Emmerich, and the rest of the gang.

It’s big and it’s catty, but it’s also smart and elegant, with the old Hollywood setting toning down some of Murphy’s more scattershot creative impulses.

Chicago Justice feels like comfort food in the same way the other Chicago series have when I’ve sampled them, with all the narrative and ethical complexity smoothed out just enough that you won’t miss anything if a sock-sorting problem becomes surprisingly difficult while you watch.

It’s as lively as it is poignant, and at its best when it’s demonstrating how the personal and the political can overlap, and how they can come into conflict.

It’s fun in individual moments, but frustrating overall.

This final incarnation of Bates Motel still has all the strengths of the earlier years, but now with a real sense of shape and purpose.

While there are definitely stretches where I had flashbacks to Downton Abbey--a show whose execution I admired, but whose substance I rarely enjoyed because I could never bring myself to care about the woes of the landed gentry--the work of the cast and Vallée are strong enough that I could mostly overcome my prejudice against the subject matter and enjoy the craft on display.

Creatively, it’s a satisfying return to the world, freed of the Florrick baggage that made the final Good Wife days less exciting, even if her absence seems to limit the new show’s overall ceiling.

When it’s studying and performing the rituals of that new religion [stand-up comedy], Crashing is a treat, and a worthy new addition to the comedy house of worship HBO has been building for decades. But, like the fictional Pete Holmes, you have to endure some mortification to get there.

At this point, if you’re in on Girls, you’re going to watch through the end, and I expect plenty of weirdness, awkwardness, and sadness before we get to the conclusion. It’s definitely time for this story to end, but there can be some interesting tales before we get there.

It’s a delight, existing so far outside the mold of recent superhero adaptations in the 2010s that it couldn’t see the mold even with telescopic vision. It’s a comic book show likely to be as appealing to people who have no interest in comic books as to those who can name David’s famous relative without Googling, if not more, and it’s easily the most exciting new series this young year in TV has offered so far.

Santa Clarita Diet is an unfortunate collection of mismatched parts, and gory humor that quickly becomes numbing.

This material has seen better days, and 24: Legacy makes clearer than ever how much Kiefer Sutherland was needed to sell it.

On the whole, the series is one I’d mainly recommend with an “if you like this sort of thing” caveat (as opposed to BSG, whose appeal transcended space operatics). I happen to be someone who likes this sort of thing, but The Expanse season two is a much better version of that thing now that everyone knows what’s up and can take action accordingly.

It’s a good cast--Hudgens is energetic and likable in the straight woman role, Tudyk can play this kind of obnoxious bro in his sleep, and Pudi and the others (including Christina Kirk as Van’s beleaguered assistant, Jackie) already have a solid handle on what differentiates each nerdy character from the others--and every now and then comes a scene or joke that lives up to the promise of showing an extraordinary world from the most ordinary point of view.

It boldly commits to its campy, overcast aesthetic--and it’s here I’ll note that I’m not naturally inclined toward teen melodrama, but can be drawn in if the execution’s great enough (like The O.C., or Everwood, whose creator Greg Berlanti is an executive producer here)--while struggling at times to turn its characters from archetypes into individuals.

The Magicians overall has come into its own far faster than its young witches and wizards. There’s even more of a sense of playfulness to the material.

The first four episodes of which are even more self-assured and odd and tragic and ridiculous than anything Galifianakis and company tried a year ago.

Yet even with Momoa and McClarnon being more central to the action, it’s middling historical drama at best, like the early days of AMC’s Turn or Hell on Wheels.

Sneaky Pete works because virtually every actor involved is two or three degrees better than required, and every character is written with greater detail and intelligence than the story needs to keep moving forward.

Taboo is slow, dark (visually as well as tonally) and unrelentingly humorless. Any of those three qualities on its own would be fine, but put together in service of what’s ultimately a trashy, if pretentious, revenge story, it’s an utter slog, and the biggest creative misstep FX has made in a while.

It feels even better that the new One Day is so good, and so vital--a throwback to an earlier era that also feels like it absolutely belongs in this one. ... Lydia winds up occupying a lot of the space that Schneider did in the original, which leaves the new hipster iteration a bit adrift. Grinnell is amiable and has his moments, but Schneider’s among the new version’s thinner characters.

It’s startling and impressive how quickly Lucy becomes so central to everything--and how easily Findlay steps into such a prominent role on such a peculiar, funny show.

No story, or joke, goes as far as it needs to in order to really extract the necessary laughs. The FX version of this could be a scream; the Fox version feels watered down and largely forgettable.

It’s weird, and slow, teasing and teasing its way to a payoff that is meant to seem profound and instead plays as utterly ludicrous and at times borders on offensive.

There are a lot of moving parts, some of which work quite well (Mel Harris as a wealthy but naive client who thinks the Haverfords are saving her from a short con when they’re really setting her up for a long one), others of which grind the show to a halt (Dylan Schmid as the inevitable troublemaking teenage son).