Full disclosure: I possess a sense of humor that has, throughout my life, made some people look at me askance … so when I first heard about the Netflix series Dead to Me I was all in without knowing anything more than the title. For the uninitiated, the show is a dark comedy, or tragicomedy if you prefer — my favorite kind of comedy! Dead to Me premiered in May 2019 to generally rapturous reviews. The second season debuted in May of this year, smack in the middle of the pandemic. The critics were even more excited about the second season than the first. Each is 10 episodes.

Dead to Me is about a friendship that blossoms between Jen Harding (Emmy Award-nominated Christina Applegate) and Judy Hale (Linda Cardellini). Jen is a recently widowed real estate agent based in Laguna Beach, trying to come to terms with her loss through therapy, exercise, and other methods. She meets Judy in a therapy group for bereft spouses and a deep bond develops between the two. As the story unfolds, Jen works to unravel the mystery of her husband’s death and Judy deals with some very deep, dark (there’s that word again) secrets. If you haven’t watched, trust me when I tell you it would be unfair of me to give anything away. The delicious supporting cast includes James Marsden, Max Jenkins, Sam McCarthy, and Luke Roessler. This is truly extraordinary television. Don’t miss it!

“Dead To Me” season 2 is now streaming on Netflix.

Creators Micah Bloomberg, Eli Horowitz, and Sam Esmail have pumped the second season of Homecoming with a shot of adrenaline, and just like in the show, they erase everything we thought we knew and feed us clever plot twists that always keep us guessing.

Season One pulled back the curtain on a seedy facility known as the Geist Group, where memory-erasing meds were tested on psychologically damaged military vets like Walter Cruz. But instead of wiping his war traumas, the drugs left Walter an empty shell of himself. For Season Two, Janelle Monáe (The Glorias) takes up the mantle as a woman suffering the same ungodly fate — she wakes up in a boat on a lake with no clue how she got there or who she is. The name on her ID doesn’t match the name on her car registration, but she finds an address that ultimately leads back to Geist where each answer can’t quite crack the greater mystery. As always, Monáe is captivating on screen, effortless in how she moves from cunning to vulnerable in a performance worthy of an Emmy.

With an exceptional cast that also features Hong Chau (Watchmen), Stephan James (#Freerayshawn), Bobby Cannavale (Mr. Robot), Alex Karpovsky (The Ride), Joan Cusack (Instant Family), and Chris Cooper (Little Women), Homecoming is just the kind of drug we need.

“Homecoming” is currently streaming on Amazon Prime.

If you’re looking for an antidote to pandemic stress, check out Space Force starring Steve Carell, John Malkovich and Lisa Kudrow.  I mean, the cast itself is enough to give it a try, despite some spotty reviews. I responded well to its goofy, side-splitting humor, and who couldn’t use a few good belly laughs right about now?

Created by Carell and Greg Daniels (The Office), Space Force is a political satire about Air Force General Mark R. Naird in command of a new military division racing against China to put “boots on the moon” by 2024.  Kudrow plays his criminal wife, Maggie, who is serving time for reasons that are oddly undisclosed. During a conjugal visit, she discloses her new relationship with a female prison guard and urges Mark to seek his own companionship on the outside (which eventually he does, much to his daughter’s chagrin). Some of the biggest laughs come from legendary comic Fred Willard (“Anchorman”) who sadly passed away in May. He is hysterical as Mark’s senile father, bumbling through his twilight years and throwing wrenches in Mark’s otherwise orderly military life. And although his part seems oddly unformed considering it was written with the actor in mind, Malkovich is as brilliant as ever as eccentric scientist Dr. Adrian Mallory. With obvious nods to the current Administration, the series tries to push farcical boundaries about American government, but the series is almost more reality show than satire.

“Air Force” is streaming now on Netflix.

This true crime anthology series has returned with another bad romance, but for the second season, creator Alexandra Cunningham (Chance) has painted a more complex portrait of a woman scorned in which winding up the killer might not make you the bad guy.

Sweet-faced Amanda Peet (Brockmire) dons the murderous hands of Betty Broderick, the Stepford wife and mother who sacrificed and slaved away for years so that her college sweetheart Dan could finish law school and become a hotshot lawyer. While Betty basks in the luxurious lifestyle she has vicariously earned, Dan treats himself to more than just the big house and fancy sports car by indulging in a torrid love affair with his beautiful assistant Linda. Betty’s desperate antics to salvage her broken marriage quickly devolve into outright lunacy, and what ensues is the melodramatic fun of watching hurt people hurt people. Peet delivers a devilish performance, masterfully turning Betty’s crazy into charming to such a degree that each episode will have audiences ditching their ethical call for legal justice and instead rooting for Betty to win herself some poetic justice.

With commanding performances by fellow superstars Christian Slater (Mr. Robot), Rachel Keller (Legion), Missi Pyle (Impulse), Emily Bergl (The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel), Holley Fain (The Rookie), and Lena Georgas (Westworld), Dirty John succeeds with another season of killer entertainment.

“Dirty John: The Betty Broderick Story” is now airing on USA.