Apple TV+'s Lincoln assassination limited series Manhunt casts Anthony Boyle as John Wilkes Booth, plus Lovie Simone

Mark Laita, the host of the Soft White Underbelly youtube channel, is one of the first to highlight the Whittaker family. Mark first came to know the Whittaker family in 2004 while working on his book ¨Created Equal¨.

Communities often form in the aftermath of a tragedy, from neighbors standing outside a burning house to survivors founding an advocacy group, and in 21st-century television, these ad hoc societies are often tinged with terror: Think of the cult on Yellowjackets, the smoke monster that chases the Lost islanders, or the troupe of artists that learns to kill on Station Eleven. Considering the anxiety that’s pervaded this century — and the catastrophes that have stacked up like leaves on the ground — this fraught tone might almost feel necessary. And that’s why Dear Edward is such a heartrending surprise. Though it begins in grief, it refuses to stay there.

[Editor's Note: This post contains a mild spoiler for Dear Edward Season 1, Episode 4.]. Apple TV+’s Dear Edward isn’t just an excellent drama. It’s also literally a “must-watch” series, meaning that if audiences look away from the screen for too long, they’ll miss something crucial. Though there’s plenty of dialogue, every episode has several scenes that play out in silence, sometimes without even music on the soundtrack. And in some ways, the lack of words heightens the impact, because the show trusts viewers to hear what’s unspoken.

When the story broke in 2019 that a coercive sex cult had been uncovered on the campus of Sarah Lawrence College, you could practically hear the documentary cameras getting set up. There's a fascination with cults on TV — look no further than HBO's The Vow for proof — and, in particular, with how free-thinking, rational people can fall under the sway of a charismatic figure who convinces them to act in ways that both harm them and isolate them from their loved ones. The Sarah Lawrence cult had a grotesque but compelling character at its center in Larry Ray, who moved into his daughter Talia's campus housing and within a couple of years wreaked emotional, physical, and sexual damage on a small group of Talia's friends and classmates.

[Editor’s Note: This post contains spoilers for The Last of Us Season 1, Episode 4, "Please Hold My Hand."]. Last week, The Last of Us deviated from the course of the original video game narrative to tell a self-contained, pandemic-spanning love story between two survivors, to more or less huge acclaim. In this week's episode, the show departs some more, introducing a wholly original character into the mix. Melanie Lynskey makes her first appearance as Kathleen, the leader of a band of rebel citizens in Kansas City who are seemingly bent on a mission of vengeance for reasons that are only revealed in bits and pieces to the audience. Lynskey, an Emmy nominee for Yellowjackets who's riding one of the hottest streaks of her 30-year career, is a canny bit of casting for a role like this. She's an unlikely choice to lead a violent band of survivors, but that's exactly why she works so well.

When the Black vocal group The 5th Dimension released their 1969 anthem “Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In,” they sought to capture their community’s skepticism about the government. Taken from the counter-cultural musical Hair, the song’s lyrics are a call to action: regain control of your environment, let the sun shine in, and you will have “no more falsehoods and derisions.” Three years later, when Shirley Chisholm became the first Black woman to run for president of the United States, she echoed those sentiments in her announcement speech, calling for a need to “reshape our society and regain control of our destiny.” Music captured the feelings of a community, and the community responded with an organized social movement. The New PBS documentary Fight The Power: How Hip Hop Changed The World argues that this call and response helped hip hop become a tool for Black Liberation, but as it seeks to prove that thesis, it skims over the inherent challenge of advocating for radical political reform while trying to appeal to a mainstream audience.

Series star Molino and showrunner Emily Fox tease what's to come for Freeform's new mystery. Editor’s Note: This interview contains spoilers for the first two episodes of The Watchful Eye, “Hen in the Fox House” and “Hide and Seek.”. After making her U.S. television debut in...

Anyone eager for a sophisticated dramatization of the Gwen Shamblin story should wait until HBO Max releases its upcoming series with Sarah Paulson. However, those craving a tawdrier take on the life, death, and weight-obsessed ministry of the accused cult leader can fire up their screens now. Lifetime’s new movie Gwen Shamblin: Starving For Salvation may not be tasteful or even very artful, but it lays out the facts with gossipy zeal, like someone screen-grabbing the juiciest bits of a tabloid story and texting them to a group chat. And to be clear: That’s fine. Sometimes, lurid escapism can be just as satisfying as tony drama, and Shamblin’s story is compelling enough for both.

Freeform thriller The Watchful Eye may look like a spiritual successor to Cruel Summer, the anthology that became an instant hit when it debuted in 2021, but viewers would be wise to resist comparing the two. While Cruel Summer’s first season examined grooming and the villainization of women by 1990s media culture, The Watchful Eye layers a Hitchcockian premise with the “eat the rich” sentiment that has taken hold of contemporary pop culture. The result is a young adult drama that’s both compulsively watchable and socially aware, a rare combination in the genre.

He may have the silliest name, but Tricki Woo is the most powerful dog on TV. Consider this clip from “What a Balls Up!,” the Season 3 episode of All Creatures Great and Small that aired January 29 on PBS. Clip provided by Masterpiece. Those who watch the...