IN CASE YOU MISSED IT
5 binge-worthy shows that made their debuts this year
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There have been some great new TV series so far this year. Some almost-great TV, too. So it was a joy to come up with a list of the best new TV I've seen this year, with the understanding there is a lot more TV (and a lot more year) to come.
The usual caveats apply. I don't see everything. (As the great Janeane Garofalo says in "Cable Guy," playing a harried waitress, dude, I got a lot of tables.) But I see enough to know that I enjoyed all of these, and loved a couple.
1 'Widow's Bay'
The best thing on TV this year, and in a while. Matthew Rhys plays the mayor desperate to bring tourists to his cursed — literally — island. Like "The X-Files," it has an overarching storyline, but monster-of-the-week episodes carry it along (and like with "The X-Files," I like those best). The supporting cast is like an acting all-star team: Stephen Root, Jeff Hiller, Dale Dickey and more. But Kate O'Flynn as Patricia, the mayor's assistant, is not just the show's most valuable player. She also gives the best performance of anyone on TV right now. Whether she's inadvertently casting spells or fending off a "Halloween"-like slasher, she does no wrong. The show is genuinely scary and laugh-out-loud funny. If it hadn't been renewed for a second season (it has), that would have been a tragedy.
Where to watch: Apple TV
2 'Maximum Pleasure Guaranteed'
Tatiana Maslany has struggled to find a role as brilliant as the series of clones she played in "Orphan Black" (for which she won an Emmy). With "Maximum Pleasure Guaranteed," she's struck gold. She plays Paula, a fact-checker recently separated from her husband (Jake Johnson) and trying to make a good life for their daughter, Hazel (Nola Wallace). Paula also is achingly lonely, which explains the camboy (Brandon Flynn) she schedules for regular online sex. During one session things go awry, and Paula has urgent reason to put her fact-checking skills to use. (Any more would spoil things.) Maslany is funny, desperate, sad and, more than anything, fiercely loyal to Hazel. It's a great performance.
Where to watch: Apple TV
3 'Something Very Bad Is Going to Happen'
Don't let movies have all the horror fun. Haley Z. Boston's show lives up to its title and then some, as Rachell (Camila Morrone, so good in "Daisy Jones and the Six"), goes with her fiancé, Nicky (Adam DiMarco), to visit his family, who live in a creepy mansion in the snowy woods. Ted Levine and Jennifer Jason Leigh are good as Nicky's parents, but Gus Birney steals the show as the loopy Portia, Nicky's sister. There are some genuine twists, not just in an episode, but in the entire direction of the series. Like so much streaming TV, it could stand to be about four episodes shorter, but it does not skimp on the crazy. Bonkers, man.
Where to watch: Netflix
4 'Rooster'
Steve Carell plays Greg Russo, a famous author who takes a job at a college in the Northeast to keep tabs on his daughter (Charly Clive, the breakout performance here), whose husband (Phil Dunster) has left her for a grad student (Lauren Tsai). Danielle Deadwyler plays a professor who becomes friends without benefits with Greg. Kudos to John C. McGinley for bringing the strange as the college's president. It has to be the lowest-stakes show I've ever seen, despite some drama, and it's the Bill Lawrence-iest of Bill Lawrence shows ("Scrubs," "Shrinking"), so it gets a little gooey, but it is a comfort watch that gets better with repeated watchings.
Where to watch: HBO Max
5 'DTF St. Louis'
"DTF St. Louis" is a murder mystery involving kinky sex, betrayal and male loneliness. A real barrel of laughs, you might say. Jason Bateman plays Clark, a skeevy TV weatherman. David Harbour plays Floyd, his American Sign Language interpreter. Linda Cardellini plays Harbour's wife, Carol. To battle stale marriages, Clark suggests a dating site, Floyd ends up dead and it is so much weirder than even that sounds. The cast is great, but Harbour really shines.
Where to watch: HBO Max
