The show hasn't lost its clever agility at building pressure-cooker suspense and then lobbing in a surprise. [8 Oct 2012, p.55]

The Show has evolved into a modern underworld Western--there's nothing else like it. [18 Jul 2011, p.41]

The show is an absolute original. [28 Jan 2013, p.44]

These are almost closer to short stories than sitcom episodes--and yes, they're fantastic. [23 Jul 2012, p.38]

Season 4 launches with an episode focused on TV's most mysterious ad executive-and since Jon Hamm's watchful yet charismatic performance makes the show tick, that's excellent.

[A] taut, ingenious spy series. [10 Oct 2011, p.44]

In season 2 of PBS's richly clever Sherlock, the Victorian tales have been refitted to our century. [14 May 2012, p.44]

What gives the show its kick is the gleefully childish lack of repentance shown by most of these rascals--countered by Olyphant's coolly amused control. [4 Feb 2013, .39]

There's event television, and there's Game of Thrones. [8 Apr 2013, p.41]

It's mesmerizing. [26 Mar 2012, p.44]

The show is a trampoline that sags clear down to the ground, the better to catapult you off into the air. [18 Jul 2011, p.35]

The first three episodes are full of impressively strong criminals. [23 Jan 2012, p.40]

[It] looks to be a season of solid suspense. [30 Jan 2006, p.37]

As an ensemble they are, like their teacher, attractive but not very exciting. [10 Apr 2006, p.35]

The show's a letdown, especially since it comes with one of the most lovingly assembled casts of any series. [9 Oct 2006, p.41]

The show is gorgeously produced and spectacularly violent but its success depends chiefly on Buscemi....A brilliant, brutally funny performance. [20 Sep 2010, p.51]

Can. Not. Wait. [9 Apr 2012, p.39]

The relationship of saint to sinner has seldom been so moving. [26 Feb 2007, p.39]

The show still tends to go suddenly flat--it's hard to tell whether the party is supposed to be dead or it's just incompetently staged--but Hamm is always superb as Don. [2 Apr 2012, p.37]

In its second season, the spy parody remains my favorite animated series, thanks to its retro visual design--this is a cartoon for the age of Mad Men--and the vicious, dead-aim put-downs that make up most of the dialogue. [14 Mar 2011, p.42]

Awesomely clever, it's the Inception of sitcoms. In season 2 the show has preserved its core concept of friendships in a community-college study group while piling on daringly odd jobs. [6 Dec 2010, p.49]

Matthew Weiner has advanced the show far enough into the '60s that its fundamental philosophical question begins to generate its own oppressive suspense. [15 Apr 2013]

Co-created by David Simon and Eric Over­myer, the team behind The Wire, this is a lovingly textured, slowly unfolding series set in post-Katrina New Orleans. [26 Apr 2010, p.40]

It's a raw, ironic, occasionally touching comedy of post-millennial manners. [23 Apr 2012, p.37]

Andy's humiliations as a minor celebrity aren't quite as funny as was his earlier shame at being a nobody, but as a satire of showbiz vanity, Extras can still be described as (what else?) stellar. [29 Jan 2007, p.43]

There are small funny moments along the way. [4 Dec 2006, p.39]

This remains far and away the best prime-time sitcom: crisp and farcical, but very kind. [25 Oct 2010, p.37]

It's the jungle version of Saving Private Ryan's opening battle, over and over across 10 hours. Why, then, is this so excitingly powerful instead of just numbing? Because the stakes are huge: The historical momentum pulls you in and drags you along.