TV Review

TV ReviewGame of Thrones:Game of Thrones proves yet again why it's one of the rare genre series to not only be taken seriously but to prove its worth season after season. It's well-written, well-acted and has created so many wonderful characters -- who, of course, will probably die. This is a show with no rules -- and that's partly why tension and expectation are both always running high. TWITTERSeason four of the epic fantasy series begins to bring the warring factions closer and reiterates just how great this show truly is -- as it operates with intimacy and grandeur. HBO’s sprawling, epic fantasy drama hit Game of Thrones returns for its fourth season on April 6, and the one thing fans will realize – as they do every year – is just how many plates are spinning in this series.It’s incredibly impressive.The initial realization that Game of Thrones is one of the most densely packed stories on television and filled with what often seems like an endless parade of castmembers, is sometimes truly daunting. Viewers have to recall allegiances, deceitful and otherwise, plus remember all the backstabbing plans that have been put in motion from the start of the show. Barring a rewatching of season three, a really long and involved "previously on" might be the greatest gift HBO can give to viewers.PHOTOS: 'Game of Thrones': 20 Best QuotesOnce up to speed, however, that old feeling returns rather quickly – a nagging addiction to the myriad stories and incredibly well-written interplay between them all. Those plates stay spinning – not wobbling – because series creators and writers David Benioff and D.B. Weiss – along with George R.R. Martin, the man who dreamt it all up in book form (and writes episodes as well) –are masterful at what they do. That just can’t be overstated.Fans who haven’t read the books, which is likely the majority, learned in season one what the book fans already knew: Nobody is safe. Major characters are killed off with regularity – the clock is always ticking on someone. (In fact, the slogan for season four is “All men must die”.) That creates a sense of unease for viewers. By creating a world where anything can happen, the drama is ratcheted up, giving Benioff, Weiss and Martin a lot of room for creative string-pulling.But this serie s doesn’t lean too hard on the swords, arrows, knives and machetes (and let’s not forget a certain someone’s dragons), giving equal weight to the considerable verbal arsenal of many of the main characters, some of whom display a special fondness for cutting one-liners and malice-filled threats.Billboard: GoT Character Playlist | Inside the GoT MixtapeThe writing has always fueled the series, but Game of Thrones is criminally neglected when it comes to Emmy recognition not only in that area but also in the acting categories. While everyone is essentially a supporting actor on this show, not even a fraction of the deserving are given their due.Heading into season four, Benioff, Weiss and Martin start ratcheting up the ominous threat of all-out war. It’s been coming for three seasons, and the fact that the Lannisters have managed to drastically reduce the threat of the Starks and Baratheonsdoesn’t mean that all is well or that war, in and of itself, is over. The battle for power is ever ongoing in Game of Thrones.Reminder: “All men must die.”Daenerys (Emilia Clarke) and her dragons are rolling up huge numbers of soldiers and will likely be able to get the ships they need to sail to Westeros and restore the Targaryen glory. ManceRayder (Ciaran Hinds) and his Wildlings are closing in on the Night’s Watch at The Wall, with even more ragtag types joining their ranks (and the White Walkers are certainly not giving up their advance, either). Meanwhile, a new threat arrives from Dorne, with Oberyn Martell (Pedro Pascal) wanting to avenge past injustices by the Lannisters.In short, all hell is breaking out and nobody is safe.PHOTOS: 'Game of Thrones' Stars Invade New York for Season 4 PremiereHaving seen the first three episodes – which contain enough twists and shocks to make pretty much all fans happy –it’s hard to express enough appreciation for the complex successes of Game of Thrones. To keep this massive story afloat is a sublime feat, and the series even manages to minimize the issues endemic to such a sprawling epic. For instance, the story's myriad moving parts often mean viewers are only given very short amounts of time with certain integral characters, which can be frustrating. But the show manages to make maximum use of that time, with characters like Arya Stark (Maisie Williams) and The Hound (Rory McCann) getting some run, and good old Jaime Lannister (Nikolas Coster-Waldau) being as riveting as ever. Also effective: shifting the emphasis to other characters who maybe were bit players in the previous season while that part of the story was being told. It’s a difficult task to satiate the hard-core fans, but writing sparkling dialogue that the actors in turn nail (within the short scenes where they are featured) alleviates much of the frustration.Game of Thrones also does much of its best work visually – it often masters dense, dark interior scenes where crisp dialogue slays a family member or foe, or a knife or blow to the head (sometimes repeatedly) reiterates the cruel world that the diverse Thrones characters are populating.The series also echoes the breadth of the stunning opening credits by transferring asense of expanse to the viewer with well-choreographed exterior shots that give a sense of place and scale. Along those lines, scenes that take place in forests or rolling hills, darkened seas or dry, foreboding deserts always convey that those who run in the kingdoms of the world are seeking to unite them and are thus rushing inevitably toward one another. Without this visual composition of a vast and seemingly limitless exterior world, viewers would be without essential information on how difficult it would be for, say, Daenerys to complete her journey and exact revenge or how soon the Wildlings and the people beyond The Wall will be at another’s doorsteps. By being deft with external and internal visuals, Thrones gives viewers the scope they need to absorb the magnitude of the story.The first three episodes are predictably spot-on –action-packed, terrific scenes full of searing dialogue bumping up against others where volumes are spoken with facial features or silence. The consistent excellence in Game of Thrones is truly something to behold. Even in three episodes, viewers will sense things tightening up – that winter and war are coming and they are coming on full-stop. If there’s anything to complain about with Game of Thrones it’s the 10-episode seasons, which cry out for 13 episodes given the immense world that Thrones inhabits. But since that’s unlikely to happen (for a number of reasons –none of which I find very compelling), what’s left are just enough hours to prove the series’ power and allure, thus leaving viewers dying for more the next season. As a strategy, tha t’s not a bad one.'The New Yorker Presents'A nice addition if you already subscribe to Amazon, but similar fare exists elsewhere. TWITTER2/16/2016A visually pleasing but not groundbreaking new series that brings to life many of the stories and features of the prestigious magazine.At this point both Amazon Studios and Netflix have shown that they are interested in getting into business with just about anyone or any place willing to make a TV show that will be interesting to their respective subscribers. In essence, neither streaming platform has a very clear identity other than, on the surface, “That sounds good” and, probably on a deeper economic level, “This will work out for our business model.”That’s certainly no knock, but there is an assumption that both services are getting the newest and brightest and perhaps most different (anti-TV?) of what’s out there when that’s not actually the case.Take Amazon’s new partnership with venerable magazine The New Yorker, a series called The New Yorker Presents — by Oscar- and Emmy-winning filmmaker Alex Gibney and his Jigsaw Productions — that is a mostly nonfiction showcase of its many stories, people working for the magazine and favorite features. It’s not exactly groundbreaking for television, which has d one these kinds of unscripted explorations for years, but it’s a nice little add-on if you’re already a Prime subscriber and someone who readily views Amazon’s TV offerings.That is, getting in bed with The New Yorker is certainly going to be “on brand” f or lots of Amazon subscribers, so it’s a fine idea.And there are parts of The New Yorker Presents — which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival on Wednesday evening (episodes two and three were made available for critics and the first is on the Amazon site) —that make you wonder why such a collaboration took so long. Gibney and Jigsaw do an excellent job in the opening credits of bringing some of those beautiful and evocative New Yorker covers to life in animation, and any time the series decides to give viewers a look inside the magazine at its people the results never fail.But right now, in this early going, those snippets are all too short — a brief glimpse of Roz Chast doing her cartoons or two diligent employees in the fact-checking department are bits that should be expanded on. Just watching someone work, a slow visual meditation on their environment and what they do, is one of those unexpected visual treats that Charles Kuralt and CBS News Sunday Morning did so well for so long.In The New Yor ker Presents there’s a lovely, slow pan through the archives where bound books containing the names Truman Capote, Mary McCarthy, John Cheever and J.D. Salinger and their collected New Yorker stories rest with dignity —it’s an all-too-short bit of porn for New Yorker fanatics, and they will undoubtedly want more and lengthier peekslike that. Any time the camera is in the office, the show feels special. It’s not clear whether Gibney and company realize that yet.When the series moves outside to bring to life in HD the many stories readers have become familiar with through the years, the results are more mixed. There’s a bull-riding story that initially feels intimate and then seems like something you’ve seen hundreds of times before and ends mostly without a real ending — a recurring issue in these early episodes.This is particularly evident in a story about Atlantic City that feels only one-quarter developed. Where The New Yorker Presents feels more like the pages are coming to life are in bits like an essay from Edwidge Danticat titled “Black Bodies in Motion and in Pain” (even though, in the poetic description, she repeats the phrase “black bodies in motion, in danger and in pain”), where words and images coalesce in colorful clarity. Elsewhere, the series seems original when, in a short, odd, funny little film, Paul Giamatti plays Honore de Balzac discussing the alleged 50 cups of coffee he drank every day.It’s not that The New Yorker Presents doesn’t get the more full-feature pieces right — a piece on delusions and people suffering from “The Truman Show Syndrome,” where they think they are being filmed for a reality series 24 hours a day, is intriguing not because of the standard psychiatrist interview but due to the drawings from a patient who details his story but doesn’t show his face. That combination works, whereas other segments feellike you can find them anywhere else on TV.And even when Gibney himself does a mini-doc, from a story by Lawrence Wright detailing how the CIA withheld information from the FBI prior to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks — and what might have been had it not — feels like it needs another hour or so, not the limited minutes that Gibney is held to here. That might be a minor gripe — wanting more from a filmmaker like Gibney because the form is too limiting — but it shows some of the issues The New Yorker Presents will run up against as the ongoing series gets dropped on Amazon’s site. It’s a nice addition if you already subscribe, but it’s not different enough, alone, to make you want to have it at all costs.The Magicians': TV ReviewThis entertaining series delivers more than sleight of hand in post-Potter landscape TWITTER1/25/2016A surprisingly effective and intriguing first two episodes make it look like Syfy got this trick right.It’s always a pleasure to find a show that’s a lot better than you might have expected and, simultaneously, to have a channel steady its aim after being frustratingly erratic.Both happen Monday with the two-episode premiere of The Magicians on Syfy. The series is based on the best-selling books by Lev Grossman but, as with most adaptations, viewers are more likely to come to it without the source material.In the case of The Magicians, its bigger task is to sidestep the inevitable Harry Potter comparisons — the study of magic at a mysterious, impressive magic school; a campus divided not so much by houses but areas of specialty; dark forces ever at the gates of the school, etc.While there will always be whiffs of Potter et al around the edges of the fictitious Brakebills University, the series separates itself rather easily by portraying students in their 20s —mostly with a darker (depressed, troubled) mental starting point — who are hotter and into drinking. Basically, a real college with magic. Despite a fairly hilarious sex scene where the participants’ pants were still on but the sex and moaning happened anyway – as if by magic! – The Magicians manages to get all the other scenes right. In fact, its ability to be entertaining and compelling with remarkable consistency in the first two episodes given to critics is a real and pleasant surprise.Created and written by Sera Gamble (Supernatural) along with John McNamara (Aquarius, In Plain Sight), The Magicians fairly nimbly gets the story rolling by introducing us to Quentin (Jason Ralph, Aquarius) and his best friend, Julia (Stella Maeve, Chicago P.D.). The two got into the kids books about magic, “Fillory and Further,” when they were younger while also realizing they were both different, both possessing at least some cursory magic skills. But as Julia moved away from all of that and became a high achiever about to get into the Ivy League, Quentin got lost in life and in his head. He’s on meds now,never fitting in but sometimes falling out (and into a mental hospital).The Magicians is thus a coming-of-age story a bit more advanced than that of Harry Potter, with college-age adults struggling for an identity and falling, in this case, under the alluring throb of New York City. Gamble rather quickly moves the story along to introduce how Brakebills University is on the other side of some ethereal existence and that if its faculty think you’ve got what it takes, they lead you to the college (and if it turns out your magic skills are more m undane than natural, your memory is wiped and you’re returned to the boring real world).With Quentin struggling to stay in Brakebills while Julia (who manages to create a marker of the event, thus proving to herself that it was real) struggles to accept her rejection, they both find side roads that promise some interesting (and yes, magical) connections other than just the story of Quentin finally fitting in somewhere.The special effects are better and more convincing than expected in The Magicians (which goes a long way toward making it more interesting) and one of them introduces a dark, malevolent force accidentally summoned through the Brakebills security by Quentin and Alice (Olivia Taylor Dudley), a magician with a family history of magic, that is genuinely well conceived; the arrival of this character, or being, should be a compelling storyline.While Brakebills itself provides a number of interesting characters, from the cocksure Eliot (Hale Appleman), who reluctantly becomes Quentin’s guide to this new world, to bad boy Penny (Arjun Gupta) and the aforementioned Alice, the “outside” forces (some possibly good, others clearly evil) are also well populated. It’s a mere two episodes, but The Magicians provided enough evidence that it has enough talent and ambition to keep the surprises coming.'American Horror Story: Freak Show': TV ReviewRyan Murphy's interest in the freaks of 'Freak Show' is only skin-deep TWITTER'American Horror Story' returns for a fourth season, this time set in the macabre world of freak showsI would enjoy being transported back in time to the bygone era when circus sideshows featured human oddities among their gleefully seedy cons — the sword-swallowers, the bearded ladies, the barkers who shouted “Step right up, folks, to see the Two-Headed Girl!” —all of which makes me an ideal audience for Ryan Murphy’s latest edition of FX’s premier scare-fest, American Horror Story: Freak Show. Alas, I found it insufficiently lurid — slow-paced and obvious. And if the show can’t even appeal to a viewer like me, eager to be hoodwinked by its premise, what hope does it have to lure into its tattered tent those more squeamish or more indifferent to circus lore?This new AHS iteration is, as always, a gorgeous-looking production featuring many excellent performances. Set in 1950s small-town Florida, the show makes clear that co-creators Murphy and Brad Falchuk immersed themselves in the period details ofold-fashioned carny atmosphere. You can almost choke on the dust on the fairground floor, feel the greasiness of the thick makeup the circus performers wear. I would never say that Kathy Bates was born to play a bearded lady, but by gosh, she’s wonderful in the way she embodies the gruff, chin-whiskered Ethel Darling. Bates pulls off the tricky task of portraying a performer who’s stiffly self-conscious in the spotlight glare of the big top, without seeming so herself.Read more 'American Horror Story': Watch the Twisted 'Freak Show' Opening CreditsThere’s near-wizardry in the way Sarah Paulson has been filmed as the show’s two-headed girl, Bette and Dot Tattler. If only the imagination it took to achieve that special effect had extended to the storytelling. Based on the first two episodes, Freak Show is a variation on previous AHS scenarios, with Jessica Lange again serving as a wicked, dictatorial yet ultimately pathetic leader of weaker souls. This time, she’s Elsa Mars, a German would-be singing star who oversees a traveling sideshow called “Elsa’s Cabinet of Curiosities.” As always, L ange excels at imperiousness, but so far, Elsa is a lot of sneer, some self-pity, and little substance.The fundamental problem in the opening hours is the lack of an original storyline to move the show beyond a series of gaudy shock reveals, such as the unique anatomy Angela Bassett’s Desiree displays in the second episode. The plot isn’t much different from the granddaddy of all freak-show films, Todd Browning’s 1932 Freaks — unusual performersband together as a defensively hostile group, persecuted by the “normal” citizenry repelled by them. This notion of superficial differences that provoke cruelty and result in alienation is a theme that resonates deeply with Murphy and runs through his shows such as Nip/Tuck and Glee as well.The “freaks” in AHS periodically lash out, and yet we in the audience know, as the cornball dialogue has it here, “If they just got to know us, they would see that we’re just like them!” and “We’re people, just like everyone else!” Both of these lines are delivered by veteran AHS ensemble player Evan Peters, whose character Billy has deformed hands that earn him the nom de cirque "Lobster Boy."Thus far, the show’s most dramatic figure of fright is a horror-fiction staple: the murderous clown. This one is notably unoriginal in appearance, its mad gaze and large slash of a mouth a visual rip-off that crosses the Batman comic art work of Brian Bolland with the Heath Ledger, Dark Knight version of the Joker.Read more 'American Horror Story: Freak Show' PremiereEach incarnation of AHS has been characterized by plot twists and turns that take the series down different paths than its opening episodes initially suggest. This is one of the strengths of Murphy as a storyteller: his willingness to defy conventional methods of linear TV plotting. So I hope he and Falchuk have some better, more novel surprises to springon us as the season proceeds.AHS could use more of the spirit of William Lindsay Gresham’s 1946 novel Nightmare Alley, in which the tricks of the trade are revealed over the course of its portrait of a dowdy carnival. But that would mean being genuinely interested in the power of human desires — lust, ambition, greed —whereas Freak Show is permeated primarily by Ryan Murphy’s typically ironic sympathy for the freaky.Resurrection: TV ReviewABC's newest drama has enough issues of its own to sort out but suffers in comparison to the brilliant French series, "The Returned," as both share nearly the same premise. Those who never saw "The Returned" when it aired on the Sundance Channel may like "Resurrection," but are otherwise advised to stream the original on Netflix. TWITTER This paranormal mystery tells the story of Jacob, a lost boy who is brought home to rural Missouri, where it is discovered that he died 32 years earlier.There are a number of things that ABC's newest drama Resurrection, has going against it. For starters, the concept -- dead people return from the dead but they aren't zombies, is on the face of it exactly like The Returned, a French series that aired to great acclaim on the Sundance Channel.Secondly, the first two hours of Resurrection made available to critics is enough proof that it won't be playing anywhere near the same league as The Returned, which was one of the most original and mesmerizing series of 2013 – I ranked it no. 3 on my best dramas ofthe year list. (The Returned is now available on Netflix, so go check it out.)PHOTOS: The Faces of Pilot Season 2014However, what Resurrection has going for it is the fact that very few people, relatively speaking, have seen The Returned and thus won't make the unfavorable comparison. And without another reference point, there's reason to believe that Resurrection could find itself an audience lured into the concept that has so many good storytelling options to it.For the sake of being clear – which will no doubt confuse things even more – Resurrection is based on a best-selling book called The Returned by Jason Mott. (Whereas the French series The Returned was based on a 2004 movie, They Came Back.) For those of you who may have read Mott's book, the producers of Resurrection are only using that source material as a jumping off point and the the series will differ greatly from the book.OK, now what we're clear on the confusing lineage, what's going on in Resurrection to get excited about? Well, dead people are returning as normal living people – not zombies –and complicating the hell out of the lives of those they left behind, often many, many years earlier. You don't see that every day (excep t in The Returned, but that’s the last time I'll make that comparison, probably).STORY: Mixology: TV ReviewViewers will have to opt in to the concept for Resurrection to stand a chance, however. Because once you open the door to paranormal activity, the audience often walks through it looking for at least a set of guidelines they can understand. For example, Resurrection starts with an 8-year-old American boy named Jacob (Landon Gimenez) waking up in a rice field in rural China. Once a likable ICE immigration agent named Martin "Marty" Bellamy (Omar Epps) gets the dazed and uncommunicative boy to say that he's from Arcadia, Miss., Marty brings the boy home. The only problem is that the house he remembers as home is populated by Henry (Kurtwood Smith) and Lucille Langston (Frances Fisher), two 60-year-olds. Their son, Jacob, died 32 years ago.If you're guessing that Jacob really is who he says he is, you're right. That's what makes the series. How he got back -- and whether there are others coming -- will be the hook that Resurrection needs to set.There's a twist at the end of the pilot which, depending on how you like your shows, may be a good thing or a bad thing. But as it plays out in the second episode, it moves Resurrection away from being what it should be -- a catalyst for people to freak out and test their faith in God and wonder whether they are in the presence of a miracle or curse. That's the kind of show that sounds most interesting and Resurrection may get there soon, but the second episode takes the twist and amplifies the ominous nature of it in a way that has me doubting. Arcadia clearly has secrets -- how the writers tell them will definewhether you watch the entire run or bail early.STORY: 'Son of God's' Jesus to Co-Star in CW PilotHowever, for anyone who saw the mastery in the French series, The Returned, will be disappointed about how the reaction of finding someone like Jacob plays out in Resurrection. For starters, any couple who lost their 8-year-old would have a searing memory of what that kid looked like. So not recognizing your own kid, even if you’re understandably flabbergasted, is an oversight from the writers.(Especially because there’s a picture of the kid in the house.)Sheriff Fred Langston (Matt Craven), whose wife died trying to save Jacob as he got swept away in a river 32 years ago, also doesn't seem to be playing by any kind of natural reaction (maybe he’s hiding something -- maybe they all are, actually). But certain things don’t ring true. For example, Jacob s ays it was Langston's wife who fell in and he was the one trying to save her, not the other way around. And that he saw a bald man with Langston's wife (cue shocking music of what mysteries rest ahead). I liked that part until Jacob was asked if he knew th e man and he said, no, but there’s a picture of him right over there on the piano -- and Epps' character doesn't immediately race over to look at it. In fact, nobody looks at it.STORY: TV Pilot Season 2014: By the NumbersThat's a writing worry. And Resurrection seems to be speeding through some of the what-ifs of having a boy return 32 years after he died. The Returned was absolutely precise in keeping the astonished/freaked out part real.Looking long term, Resurrection may be one typical TV dark secret that takes a while to unravel, and maybe that's good enough for most. But it's cutting enough corners here in the beginning to be worrisome.And if you were lucky enough to see The Returned (or will be streaming it asap), then Resurrection won't be for you.Atlantis: TV ReviewFor a Saturday lark of the supernatural variety, viewers could do worse than get lost in "Atlantis." TWITTERThe latest addition to BBC America's "Supernatural Saturdays" is an enjoyable mythological melting pot.Like the mythology it patches together on the show, Atlantis itself feels like a pastiche of many other fantasy-adventure series, from Xena to Grimm to Doctor Who (Atlantis is even premiering after an encore of the Doctor Who 50th-anniversary special). Created by Merlin's Johnny Capps and Julian Murphy, and Misfits' Howard Overman, Atlantis is hoping to fill a Merlin-sized (if not a Time Lord-sized) hole in both BBC One and BBCAmerica's schedules. It will certainly fill viewers minds with misshapen mythology, but does so in a fairly charming, family-friendly way.PHOTOS: 'Doctor Who' at 50: Peter Capaldi and the 12 Men Who've Played the DoctorDespite its title, Atlantis has little to do with the Lost City as most have heard of it. Though it does take place there, this Atlantis is a holding cell for characters who bare a passing resemblance -- or at the very least share a name -- of those from myth and legend (like Hercules and Medusa) and, confoundingly, history (Pythagoras is Hercules' roommate), all set to a "Generally Middle Eastern" backdrop. Of course, the writers can do what they want with Atlantis since it's a mythic city, but aside from an overpopulation of monsters, there's nothing particularly advanced or interesting about this storied civilization.But nothing stays too close to known stories, anyway. Hero Jason (Jack Donnelly) has yet to meet his Argonauts. He also is apparently from Atlantis, but grew up in present-day Britain, but then returns to Atlantis (and strangely acts like he's never been away anywhere else). There's no Golden Fleece, but there are Monsters of the Week, including a minotaur, satyrs and more. The crux of the show is about fulfilling one's destiny, even for Pythagoras, who is "destined to bore children for the ages."Jason is helped along on his quest to fulfill his unknown-but-definitely-heroic destiny by two new friends, the aforementioned Pythagoras (Robert Emms), a brainy but likable chap,。