I’m not sure when The Voice fatigue will set in, but it hasn’t happened yet – and probably won’t, so long as this particular competition show manages to stay so positive and so hopeful. These days it’s a relief, as much as a pleasure, to watch how the judges react to the competitors and to each other. For example: Last week, one of the opening-round blind audition contestants was a young man named Quizz Swanigan, who managed to swivel two chairs around and have judg

2017

Mar

THE MUSIC OF STRANGERS: YO-YO MA & THE SILK ROAD ENSEMBLE By David Bianculli

The amazing cellist Yo-Yo Ma convened a group of musicians, in the year 2000, to explore what would happen when musicians from different cultures, wielding very different types of instruments, learned to work and play together. In the wake of 9/11, the bridging of differences became an increasingly important focal point – and this documentary, using home movies and performance footage from the time of the inception of The Silk Road Ensemble, charts its growth, its triumphs, and its gloriou

2017

Mar

BATES MOTEL By David Bianculli

Bates Motel is a superb example of a TV series that benefits by knowing the duration, as well as the content, of its end game. This season, pre-announced as the show’s last, allows the writers and producers of Bates Motel to work its way up to the contents of Alfred Hitchcock’s 1960 Psycho film, which inspired this series. But it also allows it to do what the movie didn’t, which is to get inside the mind of Norman Bates. Deeply, deeply inside, where his dead mother, Norma, stil

2017

Mar

HUMANS By David Bianculli

HBO’s Westworld may have gotten most of the attention last season – but AMC’s British import, HUMANS, explored some of the same territory first, with replicants gaining consciousness and seeking independence. And, in many respects, has done it more compellingly. This season, HUMANS has added Matrix co-star Carrie-Anne Moss to the cast, playing a scientist who specializes in replicants. And this week, there are more and more cases of replicants becoming aggressive and unpredicta

2017

Mar

MAKING HISTORY By David Bianculli

SERIES PREMIERE: There’s a baffling surfeit of time-travel shows this season, from NBC’s Timeless and the CW’s DC’s Legends of Tomorrow to ABC’s brand new Time After Time spinoff, which begins tonight. But this new Fox series is a comedy, not a drama, and that may make all the difference. Adam Pally plays Dan, a science nerd who has invented a time-travel device (okay, it’s a large duffel bag), and uses it to travel back in time so he can appropriate, and pre-

2017

Mar

VICTORIA ON MASTERPIECE By David Bianculli

SEASON FINALE: This is the seventh and final episode of this first season of Victoria on Masterpiece. But Queen Victoria has so much historical ground left to cover, it’s a good bet this series, and Jenna Coleman in the title role, will return for another round with the crown. Check local listings.

2017

Mar

THE WALKING DEAD By David Bianculli

Last week, the entire episode was spent with Eugene, as this series continues its divide-and-conquer approach to storytelling. And tonight, the focus turns largely to Rick and Michonne, who spend some of their allotted screen time remembering the departed, and still missed, Glenn.

2017

Mar

BIG LITTLE LIES By David Bianculli

This is episode 3 of David E. Kelley’s multilayered miniseries adaptation – and with each episode, the battles among and between the women in this Northern California neighborhood get increasingly pitched, just as the women tend to act more and more… pitchy.

2017

Mar

FEUD: BETTE AND JOAN By David Bianculli

This new anthology miniseries from Ryan Murphy begins with Bette and Joan, a dramatization of the making of the 1962 low-budget horror film, What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?, starring Bette Davis and Joan Crawford. It’s a skillfully shaped, artfully recreated story, which finds a way to say still-pertinent things about Hollywood and women, while reveling in the last gasp of the good old days of Hollywood. In the title roles, Susan Sarandon and Jessica Lange are a delight as, respectively,

2017

Mar

LAST WEEK TONIGHT WITH JOHN OLIVER By David Bianculli

I know, I mention John Oliver every week. But I watch him every week, and I’m always so grateful for the work he’s put in, as well as the laughs. If you haven’t seen him yet, give him a try. If you have, then, like me, you’re almost certain to return.

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