Sometimes cloying, sometimes moving, and - by the end of the pilot - deceptively clever, This Is Us might be too sappy for some, but anyone who succumbs to its emotional wavelengths will likely be satisfied.
There isn't much hand-holding in the opening hours of HBO's insane new epic Westworld. Like the guests in the show's western theme park, there isn't a helpful guide to show you around, or a succinct orientation video with a dancing DNA strand to fill you in on bits and pieces of how the park even started. As one of Westworld's robot "hosts" says to a nervous guest early on, "Figuring out how it works is half the fun."
Being a standout television show in the era of "peak TV" requires a level of effortlessness that a lot of shows fail to achieve. Cliffhangers are forced, character deaths are orchestrated for optimal shock value rather than sensible storytelling, and twists are tacked on faster than their hashtags can trend online. It's exhausting, and essentially impossible to keep up with all at once.
As one of the boldest and bravest new comedies this season (and, maybe, of the last few years), Fox's new single-camera sitcom Son of Zorn disappointingly falls back on a few expected sources of humor in a way that all-too-often negates the bravura, bananas premise of the show. Set initially in the far-off island land of Zephyria, Son of Zorn eventually migrates into the real world - California in particular - while keeping the animated sprites of anything related to Zephyria's Saturday morning, G.I. Joe day-dreamscape very much intact.
A back-to-back binge of Notaro's Netflix doc and genius standup will produce a funnier, more emotionally resonant picture of the comedian's fascinating backstory than anything in the first few inconsistent and drab episodes of One Mississippi.
Mary + Jane struggles to balance the strangeness of Broad City with the somber truth of Girls, and it leads to some tonal issues, but at its funniest this is a noteworthy, endearing, female-centric comedy with high potential.
Although it has the noblest of inclusive intentions, Loosely Exactly Nicole ultimately falls flat because it doesn't present its progressive ideas in intriguing ways and - most problematic - it just isn't very funny.
True "dramedies" feel like a dying breed. Some shows are great miniature 30-minute dramas disguised as comedies (as Julie Klausner would say), like Hulu's cute and compassionate show Casual. Others lean more on the straight-up humor side of things without diving too deep into dramatic weeds, a.k.a. anytime the bunker is brought up on Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt.
