Here and Now

I've watched nearly half of Here and Now, and I have no idea where it's going or how ambiguous the paranormal elements will turn out to be. ... And then there is Bacon, whose lovely, lightly inhabited, lively performance anchors the show in a more ordinary, yet highly individual reality.

In the first four episodes, Here and Now suffers from wanting to cover too many topics. By episode four, the characters start to become less annoying, but that's asking viewers to be patient in a world where there are hundreds of other shows to watch. The main problem, in the early going, at least, is that "Here and Now" feels less like a drama with fully developed characters than an essay on The Way We Live Now, with doomstruck observations about the difficulties of finding harmony among races, cultures, genders, and so on.

Running parallel to the family Sturm und Drang is a mystery, possibly supernatural in nature, involving hallucinations on Ramon’s part that seem to connect him to his Iranian-American psychiatrist (Peter Macdissi). Reminiscent of the brain condition that gave Peter Krause’s character visions in “Six Feet Under,” this story strand provides some reason to watch, along with Mr. Robbins’s affable performance and the overall polish always supplied by Mr. Ball, who wrote the first two episodes and directed the first. It remains to be seen, though, whether there’s anything new about Mr. Ball’s new reality.

There is probably a good show somewhere in all this liberal muddle about America, and it will be interesting to see if Ball can find it before viewers get tired of the rudderlessness.

Here and Now is filled with compelling performances, specifically from Macdissi and Hunter, but they can’t overcome an unnerving sense of artificiality. From the characters built around talking points to the family dynamic itself, the whole show feels written--overwritten.

There are moments in Here and Now that threaten to turn the corner and reward a viewer’s patience. But just as quickly, things bog down again. The acting isn’t at fault, but the preachments and overall ponderousness are.

If HBO was looking for a “This Is Us” with nudity, “Here and Now” is an aimless, unsatisfying result.

Ambitiousness is not a problem with Here and Now. But there are definite issues in the four episodes HBO sent for review as the series tries to figure out, without much success, just what show it wants to be. ... When Here and Now focuses on Ramon (and Henry) or the Shokrani family, it has extra depth.

Sadly, the first four episodes are--despite a very HBO combination of worldly themes and super-horny sex scenes--more of an irritant than an intoxicant.

Like so many prestige dramas right now, then, Here and Now lacks a strong reason for any of its individual episodes to exist. The show is just a chronicle of stuff that happens to this family, with a vague promise that something important will happen somewhere along the line.