The 5 Best New TV Shows of January 2024

TIME

TIME magazine's TV critic Judy Berman, shares her favorite new TV shows of January 2024.

Transcript

00:00 (upbeat music)

00:02 Times TV critic Judy Berman breaks down

00:08 her top five new TV shows of January 2024.

00:12 (upbeat music)

00:13 - My mother's addiction.

00:14 Her leaving their father.

00:18 - In the premiere of "Boy Swallows Universe,"

00:22 Eli, who was growing up in a dusty Brisbane suburb in 1985,

00:26 watches his loving stepdad Lyle,

00:28 a factory worker who deals heroin on the side,

00:31 try and fail to appease some intimidating thugs.

00:35 His kind mother, Frances, struggles with addiction.

00:38 Berman says, "Boy Swallows Universe is dark and gritty,

00:41 "and if you can't stand the sight of violence

00:43 "against children, it might not be for you.

00:45 "But what makes the whole thing work so effectively

00:48 "is the care with which Lyle and Frances' dangerous world

00:52 "is filtered through Eli's dreamy, alternately curious,

00:55 "and terrified perspective,

00:57 "neither sanitizing the constant threats his family faces,

01:01 "nor reducing his existence to a condescending sob story."

01:05 - Bruce, our family is head of the Jade Dragons.

01:08 (dramatic music)

01:10 - So we're like criminals.

01:12 - Berman says "The Brothers' Son" is a tale

01:16 of two halves of one nuclear family living oceans apart.

01:20 In a modest Los Angeles home,

01:22 Michelle Yeoh's canny matriarch, Eileen,

01:24 dotes on her son, Bruce, a dorky medical student.

01:28 What she doesn't know is that he's been using

01:31 her tuition checks to finance his true passion, improv.

01:35 What he doesn't know is that his estranged father,

01:38 known in the Taiwanese criminal demimonde as Big Son,

01:42 runs a powerful triad, the Jade Dragons,

01:45 and has groomed a brother Bruce hasn't seen since childhood,

01:49 Charles, to be a deadly assassin.

01:52 Years ago, the sons split up as a safety measure.

01:55 Their mantra, protect the family.

01:58 - You know, Hong Kong was supposed

01:59 to be a fresh start for me.

02:00 - A fresh start, really?

02:02 At 24?

02:03 - Berman calls "Expats" the first

02:05 truly excellent series of 2024.

02:08 She writes, "The farewell filmmaker Lulu Wang's

02:11 "stunning Amazon drama 'Expats,'

02:14 "a six-episode adaptation of Janice Y.K. Lee's novel,

02:18 "The Expatriates, follows three women

02:20 "whose families become intertwined by tragedy.

02:24 "Each is an American living abroad in Hong Kong,

02:26 "and each seems to be approaching

02:28 "an emotional breaking point."

02:30 What elevates the series beyond a potentially maudlin plot

02:34 is the nuanced sense of connectedness Wang conjures,

02:37 not just among central characters plucked

02:39 from their home countries, but also between the expats

02:42 and the diverse, teeming, politically precarious

02:45 urban island they've chosen to inhabit.

02:47 In her review of "Feud," Berman writes,

02:50 "Half a century ago, the Andy Cohen of the Upper East Side

02:53 "was Truman Capote, and the women whose world

02:55 "he insinuated himself into were A-list socialites.

02:59 "For two decades, Capote heard their confessions

03:02 "and dried their tears."

03:03 - Only you can show us these women, Truman.

03:06 - Then in 1975, he published a story in "Esquire"

03:09 that exposed their deepest humiliations.

03:12 FX's "Feud, Capote vs. the Swans,"

03:15 the long-awaited second season of a Ryan Murphy anthology,

03:18 traces the friendships and eventual schism.

03:21 It's a messy rendering that at times reverts to cliche,

03:25 but beneath the distracting artifice

03:27 is a psychologically rich, wonderfully acted portrait

03:30 of an artist torn between his work

03:32 and the life that fueled it.

03:33 As Berman writes of "True Detective,"

03:36 "grotesque murders, jaded yet obsessive cops,

03:39 "a vast, majestic, but terrifyingly extreme rural landscape,

03:44 "the suggestion of a malevolent occult

03:46 "or supernatural presence,

03:47 "dialogue that is both cryptically philosophical and profane."

03:51 Yes, it's another season of HBO's "True Detective,"

03:55 one that in many ways feels closer than ever before

03:58 to the anthology's blockbuster debut.

04:01 But this fourth installment,

04:02 returning after a five-year hiatus,

04:04 is also a reinvention, a reawakening,

04:07 maybe even a rejoinder to everything that preceded it.

04:11 - The night country, it takes us one by one.

04:16 This isn't gonna be good.

04:18 - Subtitled "Night Country"

04:20 and directed by the Mexican filmmaker Issa Lopez,

04:22 who wrote or co-wrote every episode,

04:25 Lopez's gorgeously realized story

04:28 grounds its hard-boiled mystery

04:29 in multidimensional characters,

04:31 believably immerses viewers in a unique community,

04:35 and makes a strong case

04:36 for the continuation of the franchise.

04:38 (upbeat music)

04:41 [BLANK_AUDIO]

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