Kristen Baldwin

Platonic mainly serves as a showcase for the considerable rapport between its leads, both of whom are clearly having a blast razzing each other like sarcastic siblings.

Bupkis' ever-shifting tone sometimes leads to long lulls between the laughs, and the premiere leans too hard on lazy, lewd antics that aren't representative of the show's evident ambitions. But even when Bupkis fails to be funny, it's consistently interesting — sometimes weird and sad, but interesting.

It feels strange to root for a brand extension, but young Queen Charlotte's is a universe worth exploring further.

Anchored by arresting performances from Joshua Jackson and Lizzy Caplan, Fatal Attraction is a solid thriller about a man felled by hubris and handsome-white-guy privilege — but the show undermines its entire message with an infuriatingly dumb ending.

A wonderfully wackadoodle work of meta — featuring a spectacular performance by Betty Gilpin — that never stops winking as it unspools a story about mothers and daughters, forgiveness, faith, and free will.

The hopeless hitman takes his atonement efforts to the extreme in the fourth and final season, a pensive and beautifully peculiar deconstruction of our need for redemption and the (im)possibility of true change.

Just as it seems that Beef is going to go full misanthrope in its chaotic, surreal final episodes, the show pulls itself back from the brink of utter hopelessness at the end.

Rise of the Pink Ladies is built to appeal to as vast an audience as possible, from musical buffs to neo-Gleeks to olds like me who fell in love with the original as a kid. That may not be the most interesting approach, but as far as prequels go, there are worse things they could do.

Very important things happen, none of which would be right to spoil, but it's fair to say these events inform and propel the family's interactions in ways we have not seen before.

Yellowjackets still hasn't shed any light on what it means, though the new episodes nudge the explanation ever so slightly toward the "supernatural" end of the spectrum.

Quibbles aside, UnPrisoned is the type of show that's still a rarity on TV: An intimate, heartfelt comedy about one family's piece of the Black experience.

Basgallop, who regularly packs an hour's worth of supernatural suspense into under 30 minutes with Servant, keeps the story momentum humming over the eight half-hour episodes. And it helps that said story is marvelously weird and darkly funny.

Documentaries about cults are never breezy affairs, but Stolen Youth is a particularly tough watch. ... What keeps Stolen Youth from being unbearably grim is its final hour, "Larryland," which follows Isabella Pollack, and Felicia and Yalitza in the aftermath of Ray's 2020 arrest.

In season 2, Tracy Oliver's terrific comedy about four friends in the titular NYC neighborhood elevates its keen wit, engrossing relationship drama, and sly cultural commentary with even more confidence.

This is a promising and unique venture, blending highbrow (shout-out to Carl Jung!) and lowbrow (projectile vomit humor!). The sharp writing offers poignant feels, and the cast seems up for anything.

Accused offers well-cast, engrossing mini-mysteries with twists viewers (mostly) won't see coming. In the Dark Ages of broadcast TV, that qualifies as a glimmer of light.

The program is, as expected, a tawdry and slight exercise in misery porn, a rehash of tragedy told largely by talking heads, crew members, and people who call themselves friends of the deceased.

Abby is a relentless, cat-blouse wearing optimist who pushes everyone to realize their full potential. It is a testament to Rauch, an adept and amiable comedian, that the character comes across as endearing instead of annoying. Larroquette brings a new warmth to the now-widowed Dan, but he still serves as the needed bitter to Abby's sweet — and he still gets all the best lines.

As Nikki, Ramirez offers a stalwart, no-nonsense balance to Jason's off-kilter energy, and she handles a showy stunt sequence in the premiere nicely. And Caan, reliably, is the everything bagel seasoning that keeps Alert from being just another bland lump of procedural dough.

The six-episode series starts as an imaginative twist on the overworked true crime genre, but it eventually devolves into a Threat Level Midnight-style endeavor that lands somewhere between enabling and exploitation.

It's not something one expects to binge breathlessly in a weekend. But this gripping adaptation, developed and exec produced by Branden Jacobs-Jenkins (Watchmen), expands Butler's groundbreaking exploration of America's racist history into a profound puzzle-box thriller. ... Newcomer Johnson is absolutely mesmerizing as Dana.

At times the plotting is facile, and the scripts have their share of groaners ("Agent Rossi has forgotten more about serial offenders than we will ever know!"), but nobody comes to Criminal Minds for complexity and nuance. Showrunner Erica Messer knows that her viewers want something very simple and satisfying.

Welcome to Chippendales doesn't reveal much those other projects haven't already covered, but it's buoyed by commanding performances from stars Kumail Nanjiani and Annaleigh Ashford.

Kreiling is sufficiently inscrutable as Amandine, one of those gorgeous, stubbornly mysterious seductresses that screenwriters can't seem to resist. Jamie is the kind of cuddly everybloke Corden excels at, though the comedian also exposes the core of his character's heartbreak with intriguing intensity. Alas, by the final half hour, there is little sympathy to go around for Jamie or any of the primary mammals in Mammals.

Season 5 ... undermines the dramatic stakes with circuitous storytelling and choppier-than-usual pacing.

Though there are a few promising Brooklyn-style running jokes, Blockbuster is a well-meaning disappointment that can't quite justify its own existence.

Not everything works in the two episodes made available for review, but even the ones that miss elicit a few chuckles. You can't ask for more from sketch comedy than that — except maybe the chance to hear Jon Glaser say the words "monthly drippy-drips."

The eight-episode series, based on Tegan and Sara Quin's 2019 memoir of the same name, is a moody and touching tale of queer adolescence told with artful simplicity and excellent '90s alt-rock.