TV TIP

Poppa’s House

8:30 p.m. Mondays, CBS

This is the best new comedy of the season. Watching the show, you immediately relax because you know you’re in the hands of humor experts — Damon Wayans and Damon Wayans Jr. The father and son make everything effortlessly funny, whether senior is blowing on a hot cup of tea or junior is ill-advisedly putting a shoe-clad foot on the couch. Wayans Sr., who also co-created the series (with Kevin Hench) and sometimes co-writes episodes, stars as a radio host with old-school attitudes about life. Damon Wayans Jr. is his son, who is working a job he doesn’t like while he strives to be a filmmaker. The writing is solid, but it’s the two stars who make every scene sing. “Poppa’s House” is a worthy partner to “The Neighborhood,” which airs right before it on Mondays. I guess now Mondays are Must-See TV.

– Kristina Dorsey

TV TIP

The Comeback: 2004 Boston Red Sox

Netflix

This subject has been discussed and covered a LOT. But not like this. In the fall of 2004, the Boston Red Sox became the first (and, so far, only) professional sports team among the three major sports to overcome a three-games-to-none deficit in a best-of-seven series when they beat the New York Yankees to win the American League championship. That alone makes the material worthy. But the intense hatred between the two teams, the fact that the Sox hadn’t won a World Series in over eight decades, the “Curse of the Bambino,” a similarly tense and bitter series the previous year, and the numerous subplots combine to provide a storyline that’s almost unbelievable. For all the familiar territory, director Colin Barnicle has, over three one-hour episodes, found new material, verified apocryphal elements, conducted amazing interviews with the principals, and masterfully edited and paced this series. For those who lived those anxious nights real-time in front of the TV (or in the ballpark), it’s sorta creepy how deliciously fractious the whole experience is again. And if you weren’t around the first time, THIS is why playoff baseball is the best thing in sports.

— Rick Koster

MOVIE TIP

We Live in Time

If you doubted the greatness of Andrew Garfield and Florence Pugh, see “We Live in Time.” They elevate this film, not only with their chemistry but with the soulfulness they bring to every scene. Garfield and Pugh play a British couple — he works for Weetabix cereal, she is a chef — who fall in love after she hits him with his car … while he’s walking in his bathrobe … to get a pen … to sign his divorce papers. Yes, the script weaves rom-com conventions (The meet-cute! The dramatic birth scenes!) in with the heart-rending tale of a wife and mother facing a deadly cancer. The screenplay by Nick Payne mixes up the timeline, so we jump between eras in their relationship. The problem is, a lot of those scenes feel abbreviated, not letting the drama build enough before we hop to another year in their lives. Even so, Garfield and Pugh make it all work.

— Kristina Dorsey