The Gilded Age

Because he works with types—types he himself has established in his various programs—Mr. Fellowes can move the narrative along its track without sacrificing dialogue to the inconvenience of character development. We know who these people are. They're clichés—not unpleasant but wholly unsurprising. ... The real drama resides in the Russells, who are the least believable characters in the series. (Only five episodes were made available for review, which doesn't bode well, but maybe it gets better?)

For the most part, it entertains without illuminating. Fellowes recycles too many of his favorite archetypes, from the closeted gay couple to the scheming servant. And while he includes two households’ worth of “below stairs” characters, their story lines go largely undeveloped in the five episodes sent for review.

None of the stories are dull, but they’re somewhere between bland and familiar. The same is true of the look of The Gilded Age. ... At its best, Downton Abbey was a brainy, polished soap opera of the highest order and, thus far, The Gilded Age could use more of that soapiness.

It’s far more ambitious than anything Fellowes tried with Downton, but at times more ungainly, too. The servants barely have anything to do, for instance, and it can be hard to keep track of various relationships and feuds among this huge cast.

An exquisitely empty story of Old New York, “The Gilded Age” wanders aimlessly through Edith Wharton territory, minus the self-awareness, the wit or even halfway decent writing. ... That said, I do like some of the show’s visual motifs.

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.

“The Gilded Age” simply lacks bite. It’s a “costume drama” that gets the first part beautifully right but smothers the drama part of that description with airs of pretense and perfection. Like so many artifacts of this year, it looks great but carries no weight.

The whole thing feels much too rote and timid for HBO—even if the costumes deliberately evoke modern sensibilities and wouldn’t be out of place on the ladies of And Just Like That, who are trying as resolutely to assert their relevance in a changing world as Agnes is. The mood is too saturnine, the occasional nods to social criticism too stilted.

Beyond a normal, warmblooded amount of interest in a developing love triangle between Marian, a handsome young solicitor (Thomas Cocquerel), and the maybe-slightly-more-handsome young scion of the Russell family (Harry Richardson), I truly can’t bring myself to care about these people and their airless drawing room lives.

The series’s headlining star is Carrie Coon, who’s trapped in an iciness from which Fellowes barely lets her stir. (She’s hardly alone; the sprawling cast is chockablock with beloved actors, nearly all saddled with frustratingly underwritten characters.) ... Apart from Peggy, whose journeys between the Black and White New Yorks provide some novelty, there is hardly anyone to root for or invest in.