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.

The second season and now the third aren’t exact translations of the books--nor should they be, since what works in one medium doesn’t automatically in another--but they feel to me both like the Harry Bosch from the page and like a very solid TV cop drama.

The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel tells its story with verve and wit and warmth, and it digs deep enough into Midge’s psyche so that we can understand just how well she understands the dilemma that she and Lenny Bruce share.

Within the first five minutes, we get flashbacks to a nine-year-old James sticking his hand in a deep fryer just to feel something, and abundant evidence that he kills small animals. The show actually gets much darker from there. But also, somehow, much more lovable.

Barry’s actions towards the end felt right and honest to me, and elevated the series over the well-executed but familiar and occasionally timid comedy of its first half.

Carmichael Show is actually funnier the darker the subject matter gets.

It’s the same show, but better, which is the sort of sophomore year jump you’d expect from a pair of veteran showrunners like Kripke (Supernatural) and Ryan (The Shield).

It’s the rare revival that not only justifies its existence, but draws most of its strength from how much time has passed and what’s happened in the interim.

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.

Not a pantheon installment--which, given how many amazing episodes the show has done over close to 20 years, is no sin--but wickedly funny at times, and effective at both bringing us back into the fold and setting up this season’s storylines.

So no, this Runaways isn’t a literal recreation of a beloved comic. But it works in its own right, and feels more fun and durable than a lot of its Marvel TV counterparts.

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.

The series doesn’t always tackle these ideas gracefully--or, at least, subtly: its fictional city is called Freeland. But the canvas the Akils are painting on feels much richer for looking beyond basic good vs evil, time travel, doppelgangers, and all the other tropes of the genre. ... But it’s a promising start, and a long-overdue showcase for Williams.

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.

It feels more like, well, a TV show--one that better understands its strengths and its weaknesses, and that is actually going somewhere, narratively as well as physically, after being stuck in an uninteresting place for too long.

At times, it’s a deep and powerful saga, while at many others, it’s more of an exercise in style over substance. But what style!

The emotional balance of the season is very different, even though it’s leading somewhere rewarding and meaningful by the end.

Penhall, Fincher, and the rest of the creative team take a dry, no-frills approach to most of the narrative. The overall aesthetic isn’t flashy, but that’s the point--this is exhausting, sad work involving both victims and perpetrators who led small lives that have become shockingly big--and the drama is more potent because of how plain-spoken so much of this is.

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.

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.

For this to work requires a strong actor playing Cora, and Biel (who also executive produces) delivers.

GLOW takes its time teaching its characters, and its audience, the tricks of the wrestling trade. ... But that’s okay, because it gets the far more entertaining part of the field--the soap opera, and the over-the-top commitment everyone makes to it--right. It’s an absolute pleasure.

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.

The new episodes are more nimble and fun without ever undercutting the tragedies at the heart of the story, and as a result it’s a better showcase for the appealing leads.

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.

There’s a palpable joy throughout, not only in the performances by actors like Thewlis and Winstead who play the more outgoing roles, but in the way that Hawley and his collaborators assemble the pieces. ... If the new season turns out to be a slightly diminished version of what came before, that’s still a pretty good place to be.

If “Dragonstone” was familiar in its structure and pacing, it was also for the most part a very satisfying return to the world of Westeros, resetting the chess board as the endgame draws perilously close.

Once the first few episodes have established the main story threads — Luke’s pursuit of Kate, a feud between the AV and theater kids that Luke attempts to squelch by teaming up to make a ’50s-style sci-fi movie starring Oliver and Emaline, a character contemplating a step out of the closet — Everything Sucks! manages to calm down and, like Kate, just exist. And it’s much more endearing in that mode: a lovable mix of elements from a lot of Netflix’s other recent YA series like Stranger Things, The End of the F***ing World, Big Mouth, and more, that also manages to feel distinctly like its own thing.