Matt Zoller Seitz, New York Magazine (Vulture)
Select another critic »
For 139 reviews, this critic has graded:
  • 41% higher than the average critic
  • 3% same as the average critic
  • 56% lower than the average critic
On average, this critic grades 0.2 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)

Matt Zoller Seitz's Scores

  • TV
Average review score: 63
Highest review score:
Homeland: Season 1
Critic Score 100
Lowest review score:
Liz & Dick: Season 1
Critic Score 0
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 71 out of 139
  2. Mixed: 54 out of 139
  3. Negative: 14 out of 139
139 tv reviews
view
per page
    • Metascore: 71
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 50
    Human Target: Season 2
    In its second season it's a wisecracking caper series with glossy B-movie production values, an appealing cast, an overlay of global espionage fantasy, and action scenes so inventively choreographed that you can almost forgive their cliched shaky-cam imagery and "What the hell just happened?" editing. And that's it.
    • Metascore: 64
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 50
    Terra Nova: Season 1
    Nothing in this pilot is as compelling as the idea for the show, which begs philosophical and ethical questions that Spielberg and company (for now, at least) aren't interested in addressing.
    • Metascore: 65
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 50
    Pioneers of Television: Season 2
    Unfortunately it's more of a survey or omnibus, so it covers many programs somewhat glancingly.
    • Metascore: 74
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 50
    Cinema Verite: Season 1
    Cinema Verite is smart and often moving, but unsatisfying overall.
    • Metascore: 63
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 50
    Touch: Season 1
    What's on the screen is a likable but dumb TV version of what the film scholar David Bordwell calls a "network narrative."
    • Metascore: 60
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 50
    Hell on Wheels: Season 2
    Hell on Wheels seems to be puttering around a circular track, with no straightway in sight.
    • Metascore: 65
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 50
    The River: Season 1
    It's reasonably clever and well acted and has strong atmosphere and a few good scares, and the concept--a found-footage voyage into the Amazon to locate a mysteriously MIA scientist--is catchy. But the format of the show may prove a dealbreaker for me.
    • Metascore: 57
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 50
    NYC 22: Season 1
    NYC 22 isn't the best or worst show you'll ever see.
    • Metascore: 68
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 50
    The Killing: Season 2
    Despite very slight improvements, this series still seems deluded as to what it is and blind to what it could become.
    • Metascore: 73
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 50
    Elementary: Season 1
    This is a slight but watchable show, yet more brain candy from CBS's vending machine.
    • Metascore: 56
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 50
    Wilfred: Season 2
    Wilfred is much more pleasant and consistently enjoyable than Falling Skies, but that might be because the stakes are much lower.
    • Metascore: 41
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 50
    Malibu Country: Season 1
    The dialogue and situations (written by Kevin Abbott) are nothing special.
    • Metascore: 64
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 50
    Revolution: Season 1
    It's not quite so bad that you lose all hope, some of the images and performances are memorable, and it's not inconceivable that future episodes could pique my interest again. But for now I'd put it in the "wait and see" column, without enthusiasm.
    • Metascore: 34
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 50
    Beauty and the Beast (2012): Season 1
    Beauty and the Beast's pilot is rarely more than competent, sometimes stubbed-toe clumsy. But if it can hang around for a while, devise a style that matches its story, and tap its stars' sincerity, it could become a cult hit: perpetually underrated but loved.
    • Metascore: 42
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 50
    The Mob Doctor: Season 1
    The Mob Doctor's pilot is stranded between quality cable nuance and broadcast network spoon-feeding.
    • Metascore: 37
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 50
    Partners (2012): Season 1
    With its stock supporting characters (Ali and Wyatt are attractive blanks) and its lame central contrivance, this is not a great pilot, but it's far from an awful one.
    • Metascore: 69
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 50
    Community: Season 4
    It’s not a terrible show. But it’s missing that unharmonious Harmon-ian spark of madness, that smiling volatility that made the show exciting (for fans) even when a line or scene or whole episode wasn’t quite working.
    • Metascore: 52
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 50
    Deception: Season 1
    It lacks momentum and nerve, and it's sitting on a wellspring of meaning that it's too polite to tap.
    • Metascore: 66
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 50
    Bates Motel: Season 1
    I’m torn between condemning the series for piggybacking on a classic and promising an origin story it doesn’t really care to deliver, and praising it for avoiding the homicidal Muppet Babies formula and pulling a pretty brazen bait-and-switch.
    • Metascore: 73
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 50
    Orphan Black: Season 1
    Orphan Black is a cool, clever show, and I don’t discount the possibility that it could become great, or at least excellent; but for now, both its tone and its premise seem worrisomely limited.
    • Metascore: 69
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 50
    The Killing: Season 3
    As was the case with the first two seasons of The Killing, this new one takes its sweet, sweet time getting going, and as it slowly gains momentum, it carries itself as if it's the greatest series in the history of American television, single-handedly reinventing the police procedural for the 21st century.
    • Metascore: 67
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 40
    The Sunset Limited: Season 1
    Everyone involved with this production obviously meant well--this TV movie doesn't have a cruel or ignorant moment--but good intentions aren't enough.
    • Metascore: 58
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 40
    Camelot: Season 1
    Camelot teeters on the edge of camp, but it doesn't have the nerve to pitch itself into the abyss and just be trashy.
    • Metascore: 59
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 40
    Ringer: Season 1
    It's an oxymoron: a show about identity theft with no personality.
    • Metascore: 28
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 40
    Rob: Season 1
    Despite the general mediocrity of the show's dialogue, these are potentially endearing comic characters played by (mostly) excellent comic actors.
    • Metascore: 63
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 40
    Alcatraz: Season 1
    The characters are so TV cute (and in some cases TV pretty) and the storytelling so mechanical, that I couldn't give myself over to it either way.
    • Metascore: 56
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 40
    Missing (2012): Season 1
    The premiere boasts intriguing hints of self-awareness but never quite follows through on them, and that's too bad.
    • Metascore: 64
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 40
    Falling Skies: Season 2
    Falling Skies is better than it used to be, but it's still whiffing the allegory, the action, and the characterization: three strikes and you're out.
    • Metascore: 62
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 40
    Dallas (2012): Season 1
    Thankfully, both Hagman and Duffy are still around and alert, and their presence holds this new, mostly disappointing Dallas together.
    • Metascore: 60
    • Matt Zoller Seitz 40
    The New Normal: Season 1
    The New Normal humanizes stereotypes without ever quite making them seem like people.
Page:

Top Trailers

See all »
See all trailers »