Hotel's introduction is a sprawling phantasmagoria of depravity and decadence, but it already risks being strangled by its own needlessly elaborate aesthetic.
The first season of HBO's The Leftovers proved one of the most divisive in recent memory. Throughout ten maddening, mesmerizing episodes, the series came into its own as a haunting exploration of grief, depression and earthly purpose, all the while dancing around its central mystery - why did two percent of the world's population vanish into thin air? - without concrete plans to ever answer it. Instead, the series dove headfirst into the lives of characters forced to adapt to something inexplicable, dwelling on the misery and mystery of survival under such strange circumstances. The results were alternately soul-crushingly brutal, heart-wrenchingly beautiful and straight-up baffling; and on more than one occasion, they were all three.
As far as major networks go, CBS isn't exactly known for its devotion to innovation. From its laugh-track-heavy, half-hour comedies (The Big Bang Theory, Mike & Molly) to its brand-name procedurals (NCIS and its spinoffs, Criminal Minds, CSI: Cyber), the channel has a business model that, conventional and conservative as it may be, runs reliably as a decade-old, well-maintained Toyota Corolla.
It's still frustratingly common to see Brooklyn Nine-Nine described as "that Andy Samberg cop comedy," but in the show's strikingly confident third season, what's never been clearer is that the series is a true ensemble piece, dependent not only on Samberg's endearingly childish Jake Peralta but a whole host of characters to really gel as a collective whole. And from Stephanie Beatriz's delectably dour Rosa to Andre Braugher's gentle giant Holt, the first two installments of the new season give almost every player in and around the 9-9 some time in the spotlight - but, crucially, the show also remains devoted to continuing to juggle all of its colorful narrative balls in a meaningful way.
A sudsy, snappy mash-up of How to Get Away with Murder and Homeland, ABC's Quantico boasts one of the most breathless major network premieres in recent memory, a brisk and batty hour packed with dramatic confrontations, steamy car sex, deadly standoffs, off-the-wall twists and just about every other trick in the soap-opera sandbox. Here is a series that, similar to NBC's Blindspot aping The Blacklist, would have looked drastically different in a pre-Shondaland world, and that works diligently to align itself with the Scandal creator's ethos of diversity and duplicity.
In 2015, it would be surprising (to say the least) to hear anyone extol NBC as a bastion of creative thinking - but even if its latest dramas are a little generic, action-thriller series The Player feels insultingly recycled. Haphazardly cobbled together from the scraps of infinitely better series, this supposedly high-octane product lacks just about everything you might want from a fall TV viewing selection. An engaging plot? Nope. Enjoyable characters? Zero. Innovative action? Ha.
The Barden Bellas ruled the box office this summer with Pitch Perfect 2, and now that Universal is bringing the collegiate comedy hit to home media, We Got This Covered is proud to offer up one pitchin' prize pack to a lucky reader.
Fox's Scream Queens wants to be the missing link between Scary Movie and Scream, peppering its wacky humor with a wicked knack for gruesome violence in a way both stomach-churning and gut-busting. And given that co-creators Ryan Murphy and Brad Falchuk (reteaming with their Glee co-creator Ian Brennan) never met a genre they couldn't invigorate with their trademark, devil-may-care theatricality, viewers might tune in optimistic about the series achieving that undeniably admirable goal.
Television certainly isn't lacking for procedurals that pair dedicated cops with kooky partners, but it's almost impressive (or dismaying, if you're not feeling so generous) how many spins on the formula have hit the small screen over the past few years. last year, ABC's ironically short-lived Forever brought in an immortal medical examiner to help crack hard cases; The CW's iZombie, returning for its sophomore run this fall, finds an undead medical resident aiding a local murder cop; and later this month, Fox will thrust the Precogs of Steven Spielberg's Minority Report into a familiar buddy-cop scenario.
Given how frequently Kurt Sutter's last FX series, biker-gang drama Sons of Anarchy, showcased a near-medieval penchant for savage bloodletting, perhaps it shouldn't be too surprising to see that the creator has flourished in the grimy, grisly 14th-century setting of The Bastard Executioner. Replete with torture chambers, sadistic lords, noble warriors, beheadings galore and miles of entrails, the Middle Ages feel like Sutter's kind of sandbox.
