It can't match HBO's upcoming Boardwalk Empire's budget or any network premiere's publicity push. Yet when it comes to scrappy, scruffy charm and sheer entertainment value, Terriers can run with the best of them.

Taken as a fright fest, pure and simple, Dead succeeds admirably well, capturing the terror and confusion of waking up in a world where you've gone from person to endangered-species zombie food overnight.

But the moments it goes too far or feels too slight are countered by the sense you're watching two men who care about their clients and are good at what they do, and by the emotional hook that helps provide. And that may be enough to turn it into a hit.

The Event knows the game it's playing and its risks. You can tell from the wink-at-the-audience last line, delivered by the always-welcome Innes: "I haven't told you everything." Tell us more--and soon would probably be best.

Cougar tends to start out big and a bit nasty, then pull back for a gentler finish. The problem may be that many viewers pull out before it gets there.

Hope, however, has more going for it than a good heart and some good lines. It has a very good cast, with Neff and Dillahunt sure to be welcome weekly presences.

It's a complex story, which may be why Ryan relies in part on an intrusive monologue-narration device to guide us. Still, the intrusions only momentarily interrupt the fast-moving plot, which twists agreeably without losing sight of its moral ambiguities.

What more could you ask? Sharper scripts, for a start, and a better sense that Perry's unhappy central character is strong enough to hold the center of the show. But there's enough promise here, and enough room to grow, that you can't help hoping Sunshine will follow the midterm-correction path set by the show it's replacing, Cougar Town.

Lights Out does turn into a good series. A knockout? No. But sometimes, you have to be content to win on points.

As is often the nature of such programs, Skies does ask you to accept a lot of clunky dialogue and a few too many easily spotted twists. Even so, fans of the genre can embrace it as a summer-viewing diversion--one that's likely to work even better for younger viewers, who haven't seen all the films from which it borrows.

It's a well-constructed piece of popular entertainment from a dependable provider of the same, with an easy-to-like star and an easy-to-grasp premise.

Luckily for Terra Nova, fans of the genre are often at least temporarily willing to overlook bad writing and performances if the battles are exciting and special effects convincing, and they are. That should buy the show time to improve.

It has established genuine emotional bonds between its characters. There is something at stake here beyond the mechanics of the "sting," and that gives the show enough weight to keep it from dissipating in the summer heat.

Simon. He's the gold standard, the judge against whom all others are judged, and his presence is enough to make Factor a factor.

[The premiere is] another well-told story that gives us a bit more insight into the pair while the season's two interconnected running story lines spool out behind them.