Brian Tallerico

There are just enough moments of B-movie action thrills in the season’s best episodes to keep people watching, but this is the definition of Netflix’s “Watch While You Use Your Phone” television—maybe you won’t notice its lack of new ideas or willingness to repeat the same lame bits over and over again.

“Platonic” works because it balances subtle character beats for Byrne and Rogen with its broad, sitcomish set-ups.

As much as Roach gets the job done here, I wondered if Stiller might have pulled the pieces of this inconsistent effort together with a more needed flair. ... Arquette rocks here yet again, holding “High Desert” together even as it threatens to wander off into the barren TV landscape.

Sometimes, it feels like the timelines aren’t equal in terms of storytelling or viewer interest, but the writers and editors are smart to let long scenes play out within them before zipping to the next. I hope the show doesn’t get more manic with the time jumps because it’s right on the verge of doing that a bit too much already.

“Silo” has echoes of projects like “Blade Runner,” “The Expanse,” and even “The Platform,” but it also has its own confident voice, a complex storytelling tone more reminiscent of literature than traditional streaming dramas. ... One of the best of 2023 so far.

The show is at its best when Davidson allows it to feel revealing about his insecurities, relationships, and flaws. The first season is a bit rocky in terms of overall quality, but there are enough unexpected comedy beats and moments of truth to make it feel like it could be the first real breakthrough for Davidson the actor, even if he’s also playing Davidson the public figure.

It’s a show filled with talented, funny people, and they generally make smart decisions, especially Theroux, Gleeson, and Barinholtz. Harrelson ends up with more mixed results. ... However, a lot of the issues with Harrelson’s mediocre performance here go back to the writing, which is way too content to merely add a few jokes to the Wikipedia highlights of this story.

Olsen becomes increasingly riveting as “Love & Death” unfolds, forcing us to question how much we should like, forgive, or understand her. I’m not sure we ever will. But we’ll clearly continue to be fascinated by her.

The characters are boring; the action is blandly choreographed; the cinematography is flat; the plotting is simplistic. ... It’s so thin that one’s mind starts to wander.

This one pays off your patience. Don’t overthink it. Don’t watch it with your phone on. Give into its strange storytelling structure and breathtaking acting display. You’ll be rewarded. You may be nauseous too. But you won’t be thinking about the original.

It’s an extremely talky show. ... Luckily, the creators hired an ensemble of performers to make this kind of intellectual discourse genuine. So even as “The Diplomat” circles the same drains of dissent and diplomacy, it remains interesting for anyone intrigued by what makes the political world tick.

While “Mrs. Davis” sometimes feels like it lacks the teeth or focus to really land, it is never anything less than fascinating, even when it’s frustrating. It helps that Lindelof and Hernandez found a performer as fearless as Gilpin.

“The Last Thing He Told Me” doesn’t bother to be escapist fun. It’s plodding to the extreme, wasting the talents of almost everyone involved—the one exception being that I would watch Aguilera in a cop show.

The final half of the final season of “Barry” takes a turn that could end up more divisive than the recent one on that other lauded HBO show. Give it time. Actually, give this whole season time. It deserves it. And it works at a slightly different pace.

I found the way the writing and acting here thread that needle to be invigorating. The unpredictability adds to the tension. The next scene could be funny or terrifying. Anything could happen. Your whole life could change because of a honked horn.

All three episodes feel like nothing else on TV right now, but they also speak to how often FX has allowed creative voices the freedom to express themselves in ways that feel deeply personal and ambitious.

There are minor and major joys in this season of “Schmigadoon!,” a three-hour comedy/musical that could easily be watched in one sitting.

While the plotting may be initially concerning, the scene-to-scene writing is still spectacular, buoyed by one of the best ensembles on TV.

This is a confident show, one that doesn’t insult the viewer’s intelligence with a pile-up of contrivances as much as set a plot in motion and follow it through to its bloody end.

"Rabbit Hole" is ultimately for the hardcore Kiefer Sutherland fans only, who can forgive the inane plotting to get a hit of that Jack Bauer thrill back again. Going down this “Rabbit Hole” only made me want to watch “24” again. Heck, maybe even “Designated Survivor.”

It’s clearly well-acted—Odenkirk always delivers, and he’s surrounded by great character actors—and the writing is sharp enough, but it’s still only in the “promising” phase of its existence.

“Extrapolations” could be so much more than just a series imparting a message. The show is at its best when the rich ensemble gets to not proselytize but instead embody real people caught up in the push and pull of the fate of the planet. When the show operates at its highest level, it’s hard for the viewers not to see themselves in them.

All these performers know their characters completely by this point in the arc of “Ted Lasso,” giving the show a more laid-back, easy feeling than the start of the first and second seasons. There’s more of a sense that we’re dropping in on familiar faces, which gives the comedy a comfortable rhythm but also sometimes leads to a lack of urgency.

“Daisy Jones & the Six” is too concerned about being cool instead of finding the true currency underneath the façade of rock history.

It really feels like it needed one more voice in the writers’ room to iron out some of the bits that feel comedically rushed, like someone just accepted the first idea thrown up on a whiteboard and moved on.

This "True Lies" doesn’t have much energy when it becomes a show that’s not really about, well, lies told in marriage. Much worse than going for something that’s more “Mr. and Mrs. Smith” from the jump is how bafflingly dull the actual spy missions are in each episode.

Satisfying enough. Neither has an action scene to rival the season two premiere. Neither has major plot developments to rock the Star Wars landscape. And yet there’s something to be said for a show that’s consistently satisfying.

Ultimately, it’s not a bad show because it’s never a boring show, but it also feels like it never quite clicks into its full potential.