Neil Genzlinger

Atypical takes a while to get used to. The transitions from humor to heft can be jarring. The voice-overs from Sam are supposed to take us into his world, give his perspective, and they do, but in a surface sort of way.

The channel has been betting big on sitcoms for a while now, and this one is in the same pleasantly, somewhat raunchily mindless vein as “The Detour.” And, like those shows, it grows on you, because it sharpens as it goes along.

Admirable care went into the costumes and settings; the script, not so much. There is quite a bit of awkward, didactic dialogue here. Nuance, apparently, had not yet been invented in the 1930s.

In any case, the noisy proceedings eventually work their way to a climactic group sword fight with a pirate theme. It’s blood-free and choreographed like one of those stage shows you see at a Disney theme park: dazzling for the kiddies, endless for the adults.

The icing on this amusing cake is Mary McCormack, who plays Casey, an American and the no-nonsense vice president of the company that bought the four misfits’ concept. ... When she flies in to take a hands-on approach to managing their lives, this show (based on the Israeli series “Mesudarim”) really takes off.

If you’re a theater lover who was hoping for an intelligent treatment of the great man’s formative years, it will all seem a bit silly. If you like overstuffed costume dramas with a veneer of literacy layered over debauchery, latch on.

You need to ask yourself: Is it O.K. for a mockumentary about a tarnished sport to include in its cast the athlete responsible for much of the tarnishing? If you can give that a “yes” and have a high tolerance for raunch, this star-filled parody, which has its premiere on Saturday night, is a hilarious home run. If your response is “no,” it’s still pretty funny but will leave an icky aftertaste.

The series is at its best when it uses these home-movie-style vignettes, many of them poignant in their ordinariness. Big events make up much of each episode, but when the series goes small, it finds the real humanity behind the march of history.

If you’ve made a television horror series, you probably don’t want to see it described in a review as comfort food. Yet that’s how the first episode of The Mist registers.

The peel-the-onion format here is familiar by now, but Stephen Brady’s script and a group of fine performances keep it intriguing, nonetheless. A fine diversion for summer evenings.

[Grace (Christina Ochoa) and Arthur (Alan Ritchson)] are paired as partners in the race, and their good cop/bad girl dynamic works pretty well. The real attention-getter here, though, is Colin Cunningham, who is hilariously invested in his role as Julian Slink, a sort of steampunk master of ceremonies for the race. It’s hard to make an impression in a series that is so insane, but Mr. Cunningham (who played John Pope in “Falling Skies”) manages it.

[The Tony Awards] had trouble figuring out what to do with Kevin Spacey, the evening’s host, making use of him in ways that ranged from torturous (the opening number) to tolerable (he does pretty good Johnny Carson and Bill Clinton impressions). It fared far better when it was about the work being honored and the people who did it.

The film, elusive and impressionistic, is at least somewhat successful in capturing that inner tumult.

The film would have been better if it had gone further into this [Is it possible to enjoy vital life even with health problems?] and some other areas, like health care costs for noncelebrities, but at least it starts the conversation. It provides delightful evidence that there is plenty of life yet in the population born before the Great Depression.

Despite the vast population of figures from the play, this isn’t a show aimed at Shakespeare scholars; a mere passing acquaintance with “Romeo and Juliet” will do. It’s also not “Shakespeare in Love”; it won’t dazzle you with quick references, wittily deployed Shakespearean lines and so on.

A real musical deploys its songs organically; here they tend to interrupt rather than enhance. ... [A] sterile imitation.

[Martin (voiced by Samm Hodges)] is unfunny, uninsightful and--once the curiosity factor wears off, which is almost immediately--unwatchable. The humans in the show aren’t much better.

The strangeness of this killing speaks for itself, and the director, Erin Lee Carr, largely just lets it do so.

You say darker, I say richer. ... Ms. James and Mr. Thomson lend the stability of skilled veterans to the proceedings, which helps Ms. McNulty do the difficult work of selling a complicated character who is simultaneously vulnerable and proud, self-denying and self-absorbed, practical and prone to fantasy. Her portrayal isn’t seamless, but it’s endearing.

This is an uneven show--a lot of sharp jokes jumbled with dumb ones. You will not feel smarter or hipper for having watched it. Sample it only if you’re in the mood for mindlessness.

Judging from the first two episodes, this is a skillfully acted, richly detailed historical show that would not be out of place on PBS or a high-end pay-cable outlet.

Watch the film for a well acted Cliffs Notes version of the book--intriguing and thought provoking, but also frustrating.

The series builds to that climax in an almost casual way, fleshing out some characters and plotlines but leaving others thin. That can be frustrating at times, but it’s all a sort of misdirection that makes the final episode all the more jolting.

The opening episodes feature a lot of violence and not many characters you really want to latch onto.

If you loved the baseball film “Major League” but always wished Bob Uecker’s broadcaster character had been darker and more bawdy, this is your show.

The ingredients that fans of the old show are looking for are certainly here: a prison, an escape plan, a slowly emerging conspiracy, old-favorite characters newly imagined. But once the thrill of becoming reacquainted wears off, you’re left with a somewhat muddled, not at all credible yarn.

Yeah, it’s amusing, but in a forgettable sort of way. Too much about it resembles too many other shows.

There is so much going on that it demands your full concentration. After two episodes, it’s still unclear where it’s all headed, but you’ll want to watch at least one more to find out.