“Fallout can be quite ugly and self-serious … but it’s got a penchant for the goofy and eccentric, too. There’s a lot of blood, gore, and violence. Limbs are blown off, heads are chopped off, and dogs munch on giant roaches. On the flip side, the series balances it out by sewing replacement fingers (convenient) and scoring its violence at times to old-timey songs. Additionally, we have funny robots that won’t shut up, action movie tropes flipped on their head, and two hammered dudes running an organ-harvesting clinic.”

“Forget riffing on classic film noirs, Sugar outright invokes them. And I’m not talking mentions. The Apple TV+ series goes further and slips in shots and dialogue from said films into its scenes. Like plonk them right in the middle. […] It’s obvious that creator Mark Protosevich … has a deep reverence for all things film noir. The era, the history, and the pop culture.”

“You don’t really see your enemy, as they are either zipping past you at jet speeds or firing anti-aircraft rounds from below (flak, as it was called then). There’s an eerie quiet between the two, and Masters of the Air perfectly captures that feeling. The respite from the constant flak bombardment turns into a sense of dread as the bombers scan for the German jets that are about to come and pick them off one by one.”

“The golden age of TV is nearing its end. Mergers between Hollywood giants, layoffs across the board, downsizing budgets and obliviating content for tax write-off purposes, and months-long strikes for fair compensation—it’s clear that the streaming world will never be the same after 2023. It will result in fewer big swings and a lot more safer choices. […] For now, though, things are thankfully unchanged.”

“Too often, the dialogue feels inorganic and didactic. And a part of that is tied into its desire to address a thousand things every episode. It’s why the episodes run overlong. It also means you can’t do nuance because you don’t have the time for it. At worst, the lessons are ham-fisted and promptly forgotten. At best, it hits the mark. Usually, though, it’s somewhere in the middle: a little inelegant and on the nose.”

“[Just] because you’ve a plan in mind, doesn’t mean the plan is great or the execution is rock solid. (Hello, Game of Thrones!) With overlong episodes, unbelievable plotlines, botched character arcs, and the lack of the ol’ Lasso magic, the third and final season of TV’s favourite heartwarming series crumbled under the pressure and scored a howler of an own goal.”

“[Gets] caught up with national-level politics, while ignoring the need to establish new characters who are central to its main thread: India’s first atom bomb test. […] Distracted and led astray—it seems to be working overtime in putting [Homi] Bhabha and [Vikram] Sarabhai in the inner circle of the country’s top leaders—Rocket Boys season 2 fizzles out and self-combusts before it can ever truly take off.”

“[Nothing] says you’re trying to cash in on the success of the Lord of the Rings films than The Rings of Power‘s ultimate villain […] Sauron. After a brief tease at the start, just as with the movie trilogy, he mysteriously disappears. […] That hollowness is intentional, for [it] hangs itself around the suspense of Sauron’s true identity. Take a trip around the Internet, and you will notice that a majority of the discussion about the first season during its six-week run revolved around ‘Who is Sauron?’”

“House of the Dragon is a thing of beauty […] Of course, the Thrones prequel benefits from existing world-building—Westeros, King’s Landing, and the Red Keep aren’t foreign to us now—but the writing, direction, and performances elevate it further. It nails scene construction, narrative momentum, and the moment-to-moment flow. These might seem like small things, but they can make or break a TV show.”

“Obi-Wan Kenobi had no time for the character to have a journey. And hence, despite [Ewan] McGregor’s best efforts to imbue some depth to the role he reprised after a gap of nearly two decades, he couldn’t make him feel like a living breathing human. There wasn’t any room for that growth, of a disillusioned Jedi Master, who had pulled himself away from the Force, finding his way back to his old way of life.”

“[In] trying to be bigger, grislier, and longer than ever, Stranger Things 4 … ends up feeling a lot like standard genre stuff of its ilk. The bigger problem though isn’t that the new season of the hit Netflix series is formulaic. It’s that it’s in lacking in joy and humour. Stranger Things 4 is so immersed in its plot demands that it forgets what made the previous seasons exciting.”

“[A] thoroughly unconvincing transformation of a 47-year-old housewife … into an ice-cold operator who’s thinking two steps ahead of everyone. She repeatedly discovers key information simply through luck, mostly by being at the right place at the right time. If your protagonist’s superpower is chance, you’re going to get eyerolls if not outright laughter. She also survives … through plot armour or because of others’ incompetence.”

“[Poor] and lazy writing. The first four episodes, devoted to [Boba Fett], were entirely useless. The backstory was largely boring … and the present-day story moved at a humdrum pace. Stuck in one place … The Book of Boba Fett ground to a halt. It could have overcome that if it had something to say or show [… But] when they ran out of Fett’s past and present, [it] simply ditched him and switched over to Din Djarin.”

“[Wants] to depict the slow but inevitable descent of a man who is caught between sticking to his principles and pulling out of [an admirer]’s orbit. Except Yeh Kaali Kaali Ankhein takes too long to get there—and the journey is not remotely interesting or intriguing enough.”

“Deep into Hawkeye episode 2, Kate [Bishop] notes that [Clint Barton] lacks branding. Clint protests that he is not trying to sell anything. ‘That’s your problem,’ Kate says, ‘you’re too low-key. People want sincerity.’ […] And like the title character, Hawkeye has the same issue: it lacks branding.”

“[What] better way for Star Wars to expand its horizons than to return to its roots—and trust the next generation of filmmakers from whence it came? It’s the circle of life.”

“Today’s broken ‘digital India’, extrapolated to 2031 with sentient AI robots, is ripe fodder for a sci-fi series. But OK Computer has none of [The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy]’s satirist powers or the intellect to imagine [a dystopian India]. Its creators have digested some of the world’s leading sci-fi works, but what they’ve produced is essentially the series equivalent of Deep Thought’s answer. It’s Pav Bhaji.”

“In contrast to the Star Wars lore-lite that was season 1, The Mandalorian season 2 intertwined itself more with the franchise’s past. […] If season 1 was about bringing in new fans to the Star Wars galaxy far, far away, then it seemed like The Mandalorian season 2 was about rewarding older fans. I mean, you can’t go much bigger on the nostalgia chart than Luke [Skywalker].”

“[It] thinks it’s a ‘cool’ show but it’s not. That doesn’t stop season 2 from trying, over and over. […] What it actually needs are characters with depth, interesting conversations, and a meaningful journey. Instead what it serves up are scenes after scenes set to a peppy soundtrack.”

“Deconstructing Dark‘s takeaway towards the end is a curious choice, not least because it negates what Dark has been trying to say since the beginning, but also because it helps bring about what’s bound to be a polarising end. Maybe it’s a case of the Dark creators trying to outsmart the audience and the fans with their endless theories, but in doing so, Dark season 3 prioritises surprise over internal logic.”

“[It] could do well to learn from its close cousin in Barry, whose co-creator and star Bill Hader also comes from a comedic background, but does a much better job handling the wacky end of the spectrum. Hasmukh is unfortunately all over the place, as it dissolves into a B-grade cable sitcom now and then.”

“All too often, Afsos finds itself in a much different comedy subgenre, an absurdist one, one where the laughs are dependent on the audience leaving its brains behind. That in itself may be generous, as [Anirban] Dasgupta largely fails to channel his comic talent on screen with few exceptions.”

“Inside Edge continues to be an unnecessarily over-the-top TV show in season 2. In fact, given how melodramatic it usually is, it’s less of a TV show and more akin to a soap opera. Slot it alongside today’s Kyunki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi and no one would bat an eye.”

“[Though] the visuals are on point, the writing isn’t. Despite the elements at its disposal—talking animals, a modernised Victoriana fantasy, and scheming, tyrannical individuals—it’s made to feel ordinary, especially the farther it gets from its fantasy trappings.”

“The meat and potatoes of the new Watchmen … is a deep-seated exploration of racial inequality in the US, with [Damon] Lindelof … seemingly interested in delving into its cross-generational effects. Watchmen goes to great lengths to showcase the hate, violence, injustice, and disregard meted out to African-Americans, and how that leads to a corrosion of society itself.”

“[An] intriguing mixture—which descends into a hotchpotch now and then—of several genres in one. At times, it’s a murder mystery, a political drama, a love story, or a supernatural fantasy. [… For] a show that offers so much on paper, it’s surprising that not much of it is very engaging in execution.”

“Stranger Things 3 benefits from the change of setting. It’s set in the (American) summer of 1985, which allows it to leave behind the gloomy autumn that contributed to the mood on the first two seasons. On screen, that also contributes to a vibrant blast of colours and nowhere is that more obvious than at the new locale that brings everyone together: Hawkins’ shiny new Starcourt Mall.”

“With [Neil] Gaiman at the helm, there’s a whimsical charm to Good Omens, which blends eccentric humour that takes pot-shots at everything from religion to Hollywood, historical fantasy and sci-fi happenings that span the Roman Empire and nuclear power plants, and adolescent drama.”

“[It] sheds the vibrant colours and the fantastical elements that gave the comics its wacky feel, leaving behind a production with a dour, gloomy aesthetic that makes it feel as generic as many others.”

“Selection Day has nothing to say about modern-day India beyond its checkbox recognitions of the maladies stemming from cricket turning into a new capitalist tool, and the problems of identity faced by a new generation that’s being pulled in different directions.”

“What begins as a homage to [the season 1 hallway scene] turns into a nightmarish walkthrough of a prison riot, involving dozens of actors including [Charlie] Cox and lasting for 10 minutes, over twice as long as the previous one.”

“The option to enter minds and see different takes on events that can’t be witnessed by the two leads or easily told becomes a fascinating narrative device the further the season progresses.”

“[Season 2] brings up the question of what the newly-conscious androids will do with their freedom, and though one hopes the new world Dolores speaks of will be a better one, the answer for now involves a lot of bloodbath. Violent delights, violent ends.”

“An origin story for the origin story—you’re already looking at a narrow, dedicated Superman audience. Unfortunately, even those fans will have a hard time finding something that piques their interest: poorly-sketched characters suffocated by a boring story that assumes importance by attaching a bombastic score is a recipe for disaster.”

“The works of science fiction author Philip K. Dick have been a near-constant source of inspiration for Hollywood. […] And for the first time, his name itself has become part of the title.”

“The Punisher is far from a publicity grab on the growing popularity of Marvel superheroes, and pushes the notion of what we’ve come to expect from the Netflix vigilante dramas. Thanks to Castle’s propensity for gunfire and Micro’s use of technology, the new series can deliver action sequences that will feel fresh to Marvel fans, and contributes into making a show that truly understands the character, warts and all.”

“By allowing the kids gang to branch into their own sub-plots and inter-linking that to explore their evolving friendship, creating a bigger universe of monsters that provides action-packed thrills, and honing the art of the unexpected while knowing when to upend existing tropes, Stranger Things is a more refined version of itself in the new season.”

“For some audiences, that might feel a tad too heavy, especially in what originated as a superhero parody. This Amazon version of The Tick does feel it’s like attempting a balancing act, of playing out as an action-packed superhero comedy, as well as create a more sombre tone by exploring the emotions under the surface.”

“Those moments and asides have given us the season’s best moments – an empowering gay scene involving an Omani native, and commentary on vigilante gun violence and Mexican immigrants among others – which have hopefully shone through despite American Gods’ emphasis on experience over narrative. Now, we pray and wait for season two.”

“The show’s events, based on a series of books written by James S A Corey – a joint pen name for writers Daniel Abraham and Ty Franck – take place over two hundred years from our time, mostly across three different societies living millions of miles away from each other. But the show is still strikingly relevant, and even prescient in other matters.”

“When it comes to content recommendation, Netflix looks at your likes from the time you signed up, the titles you bother to rate, and much more importantly—what you watch, and how much you watch it. Shifting from a five-star rating system to a binary option—thumbs up or thumbs down—is again part of that, as Yellin believes what you say with thumbs is a lot more relevant than what you say with stars.”

“It’s their genuine passion for motoring, mocking known and oft-repeated idiosyncrasies, revelling in their own stereotypes, and engaging in silly banter amongst themselves that made a car show involving three old blokes such fun to watch for over a decade. And so when The Grand Tour gets down to business, it feels a lot like the old Top Gear. “