BOARDWALK EMPIRE was, from its start, HBO at its best and most frustrating.  The show was sumptuously produced, on a scale that no other small-screen purveyor of content could match, famously including the recreation of a chunk of the 1920’s-era Atlantic City boardwalk.  Its ambitious were enormous, ranging eventually through four decades and at […]

  DIVORCE:  Sunday 10PM on HBO – In the Queue In its opening half-hour, HBO’s DIVORCE doesn’t show much interest in the “-medy” part of “dramedy.”  The series creator is Sharon Horgan, who with Rob Delaney is also the co-creator and co-star of Amazon’s wonderful Catastrophe.  Part of what makes that show so extraordinary is […]

  It’s difficult, even after a full and absorbing season, to know exactly what to make of THE AFFAIR.  The series hasn’t fit neatly into either of the genres it seemed to be invoking:  despite the title and occasional bits of premium cable-level sex (as in tonight’s season finale), physical passion isn’t its main subject […]

  ARROW had a somewhat unsuper fourth season.  That was partly due to its villain:  Damien Darhk, however enthusiastically played by Neal McDonough, was an all-smirk-all-the-time Big Bad in dapper suits, a Bond-ish villain whose added dimension of magic was very sub-Darth Vader, with much flicking of the wrist to send foes flying into nearby […]

  One of NBC’s many puzzling decisions this year was the choice to hand over its most important timeslot for launching dramas, the post-The Voice hour on Mondays, to the merely serviceable summer medical soap THE NIGHT SHIFT.  The series had done well enough against weak off-season competition, but there was nothing to suggest that it […]

  Losing both David Letterman and Jon Stewart in a single TV year is more than a viewing public should have to endure, but tonight it was Stewart’s turn to walk through the exit door of THE DAILY SHOW WITH JON STEWART after 16 years on the air, a run that changed the very concept […]

  Donald Glover’s ATLANTA would have been unimaginable on a mainstream television outlet just a few years ago–let alone as a show that could achieve success in the ratings.  It’s very much a post-Louie series (both air on FX), with its disregard of typical TV format and structure, but even Louie, for all its brilliant […]

> WARNING:  Spoilers Abound That expelled breath heard around the country this evening was a collective sigh of relief:  HOMELAND‘s season finale didn’t collapse.  On the contrary, it delivered a satisfying conclusion that resolved Season 1 storylines while setting the stage for an intriguing, and somewhat different, Season 2. No recent show has walked a […]