FROM TOP: JUSTIN LUBIN/SHOWTIME; KEN WORONER/HBO; APPLE TV+
Dormer gets
supernatural in
Penny Dreadful.WeverPrincetravel by train to see if they still
have that old chemistry. Boy,
do they! The heat is palpable
enough to carry this oddball
mix of sexual farce and Alfred
Hitchcock thriller, as their esca-
pade is continually interrupted
by a woman (Archie Panjabi)
from Billy’s past. As funny as
Gleeson is as a would-be master
of the universe who’s secretly
a pushover, the main attrac-
tion is Wever, unleashed in her
long-overdue first star vehicle.
The irresistibly loose, self-depre-
cating energy she’s used to steal
scenes in countless other shows
and movies loses none of its
potency when she’s the focus.
(She even somehow manages
to sprint sheepishly.) Ruby is a
woman who skips out on her
family and understands just how
bad that is. Yet her reckless be-
havior is understandable, even
sympathetic, because of Wever’s
boundless appeal.GREAT ESCAPE
Run
NETWORK HBO
AIR DATE April 12th, 10:30 p.m.
4When Merritt Wever won a
supporting-actress Emmy for
Nurse Jackie in 2013, she gave
an eight-word acceptance
speech before practicallysprinting off the stage — “Thank
you so much! I... gotta go. Bye!”
Perhaps it was a moment of
foreshadowing to this series,
produced byFleabag’s Phoebe
Waller-Bridge and created by
Vicky Jones, in which Wever’s
character, Ruby, receives a one-
word text that gives the show
its title. The missive prompts
Ruby to blow up her life and go
on a cross-country adventure
with college boyfriend Billy
(Domhnall Gleeson), where theyKID VICIOUS
Home Before Dark
NETWORK Apple TV+
AIR DATE April 3rd
#“I’m ajournalist!” Hilde Lisko
tells her father, Matt. “You’re a
fourth-grader!” he replies. Both
are right. In this drama inspired
by the work of underage report-
er Hilde Lysiak, Hilde (Brooklynn
Prince fromThe Florida Project)
has trouble making friends at
elementary school, but she’s
also seenAll the President’s Men
36 times and runs her own local
newspaper. When a suspicious
death points to a crime that
traumatized Matt (Jim Sturgess)
as a boy, Hilde investigates. Like
Stranger Things (but without
superpowers and demons),
Home Before Dark is unabashed
in its love of Eighties Spielberg:
Episodes are filled with kids on
bikes going where they’re notsupposed to and stirring up
trouble through inquisitiveness,
while their parents mostly shrug
off the danger. (It’s also scarier
and more casually profane
than its cute-kid heroine would
suggest.) The 10-episode season
is repetitive in spots, but Prince
is endearing, as is the sense of
optimism even amid the tragedy
Hilde seeks to unlock.A.S.DARK ARTS
Penny Dreadful:
City of Angels
NETWORK Showtime
AIR DATE April 26th, 10 p.m.
@The originalPenny Dreadful was
anAvengers of iconic 19th-cen-
tury British literary characters
like Frankenstein and the
Wolfman, made special due to
the bananas performance by Eva
Green as a powerful medium.
This spinoff relocates the action
to late-Thirties L.A., as a pair of
cops — a determined Mexican
American rookie (Daniel Zovatto)
and a weary Jewish veteran
(Nathan Lane) — investigate
murders that involve Mexican
superstitions, institutionalized
racism, cults, the Nazi bund (led
byDreadful alum Rory Kinnear),
and a shape-changing demon
(Natalie Dormer).City of Angels
gorgeously re-creates the
period, but there’s no one like
Green to elevate the hard-boiled
clichés. As a singer-turned-spir-
itual-guru, Kerry Bishé has mo-
ments that come close, butCity
feels more pretty than essential.What to stream, what to skip this monthWATCH LISTWATCH LIST
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