These shows prove the marathon-watching juggernaut’s concern for both quantity and quality.
In its third season, Treme has become so adept at blending character-based drama with its overarching themes.
Once upon a time, stories of the Old West were the epitome of straightforward, uncomplicated adventure storytelling.
The show’s first mystery, an original plot, isn’t as meaty as classic Doyle stories like A Study in Scarlet, but it’s intriguing nonetheless.
Following its usual method of diagrammatically charting characters’ rises and falls, the third season opens with nearly everyone in flux.
The first two episodes of season five set up more antagonists, complications, and subplots than most shows would in an entire season.
“Dinosaurs on a Spaceship” lets us know up front that this is going to be a “romp”—big, loud, and hopefully fun.
A nominally progressive comedy, The New Normal has more gay jokes and regular old racism than Gallagher’s stand-up act.
Opening a new season with the Daleks has always been a temptation for the producers of Doctor Who.
Much like the clownish mask of its iniquitous protagonist, the show demands further reconstructive work to mend its various glaring imperfections.
Its knack for extracting quiet beauty from all the mayhem lends Boss’s best scenes the precision and artistry of a monstrous ballet.
Its greatest act of public service is the outrageously comforting notion that honest and humane politicians might actually exist.
Much like its intellectually brilliant but absent-minded protagonist, it seems to file away storylines only to move on and forget where they were.
Portlandia is best served in 23-minute portions.
This final season of Damages ups the ante by conflating a banking scam with the murky legality of a WikiLeaks-like website.
Breaking Bad continues to fuss over small details and pick at new threads, even with the end looming.
Like its characters, The L.A. Complex is serious about its setting.
The real stars of the series are the misfits who circle Nancy’s erratic orbit.
Perception borrows from just about every other procedural with an overly idiosyncratic, troubled central protagonist.
Whatever crises occur beyond the scope of the characters’ webcams have only the most oblique impact on their online personas.
One of the pitfalls of creating a satire of the television industry that airs on TV is that it invites comparisons to other series.