Welcome to Now See This, THR chief TV critic Daniel Fienberg’s weekly viewer guide newsletter dedicated to cutting through the daunting clutter of the broadcast, cable and streaming TV landscape! Comments and suggestions welcome at daniel.fienberg@thr.com.

The Smart of the Deal

The first season of HBO Max's Hacks won an unsurprising Emmy for star Jean Smart and slightly more surprising trophies for the pilot script from creators Lucia Aniello, Paul W. Downs and Jen Statsky as well as for Aniello's direction of the pilot. The comedy returns with iconic comic Deborah Vance (Smart) hitting the road to test new material along with perpetually anxious writer Ava (Hannah Einbinder), and the first six new Hacks  episodes — two now available — are fully of clever barbs and excellent acting moments for Smart and Einbinder (who, frankly, should be treated as full-on co-leads at this point). It's good to have this one back and even better that we didn't need to wait two or three years between seasons.

Imitation of 'Wife'

You don't usually see two adaptations of the same relatively new book in short order, but HBO's The Time Traveler's Wife comes 13 years after Robert Schwentke's feature version of Audrey Niffenegger's 2003 novel. Steven Moffat's take on the almost self-explanatory property features Rose Leslie and Theo James as the time-crossed lovers and, thus far, reviews have been decidedly mixed. Personally, I appreciated how Moffat's humor cut into some of the more problematic aspects of the book. Moffat's affection for the book was previously evident in the Doctor Who episode "The Girl in the Fireplace," available now on HBO Max. Moffat was also our guest on this week's  TV's Top 5 podcast, discussing his own feelings on time travel, the book's central romance and, of course, the future of Sherlock.

Hall-y Would Reporter

The Kids in the Hall is/are back, not that the oft-touring Dave Foley, Bruce McCulloch, Kevin McDonald, Mark McKinney and Scott Thompson have really been gone for long. The beloved Canadian sketch troupe's latest run of episodes will air on Amazon and through the five (of eight) episodes sent to critics, this is solid stuff, with some very funny efforts and a few duds as the gang jokes about Brain Candy, aging, nudity and the last glory hole in Toronto. Amazon also has the surprisingly emotional two-part — both 48 minutes, so why it isn't just a feature is a contractual mystery — retrospective documentary  Comedy Punks, with the core quintet and some appreciative celebrity fans. 

'Essex' Education

A trio of literary adaptations round out the weekend's TV offerings. Based on the Sarah Perry novel, Apple TV+'s The Essex Serpent is more thoughtful costume drama than supernatural thriller, but as our Angie Han puts it, "excellent performances and an eye for beauty anchor the genre shifts." Angie was less enamored with Hulu's Conversations With Friends , saying the Sally Rooney adaptation is "elegant and sensitive, but perhaps too cool for its own good." And I was disappointed with Netflix's The Lincoln Lawyer, from the Michael Connelly series, which is entertaining enough if you can get past the underwritten main character and as many as three bland legal cases per episodes. But speaking of Sex Education — watch it on Netflix if you haven't already — how about Ncuti Gatwa being named the new Doctor?

Honoring Fred Ward

The late, great Fred Ward, who died this week at 79, was at the pinnacle of the character-acting mountain, delivering fully inhabited performances whether you cast him as a lead or in a walk-on cameo. I feel like I recommend The Right Stuff, streaming on HBO Max, every week, but Ward's performances as Gus Grissom is just one of the film's many pleasures. HBO Max also has Ted Kotcheff's 1983 film Uncommon Valor, in which Ward starred opposite Gene Hackman, while Tubi has a pair of key Ward vehicles in Miami Blues and Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins . And if you have Starz, you can watch Tremors and Thunderheart OnDemand. Lots to choose from, nary a bad turn in the bunch.

This Week's THR Staff Pick

Awards editor Tyler Coates is enjoying HBO Max's The Staircase. He raves, "There are many twists and turns in the true-crime limited series starring Colin Firth as a man accused of killing his wife (Toni Collette), who was found at the bottom of a staircase in their North Carolina mansion in 2003. With a truly bizarre murder case at its center, this ensemble drama features scene-stealing turns from the talent in its stacked ensemble — including Parker Posey, who seems to be having the time of her life as the tough-as-nails Southern district attorney prosecuting the case."