Well, I seem to be late to the party in weighing in on Homeland’s most recent jawdroppers, unleashed in the hilariously titled “Broken Hearts” episode. With the week nearly over and episode 2.11 days away from hitting our screens, I am compelled to take a minute and see where we are and how we got here.

The backlash has been fervent this week, responding to the improbable events surrounding (OK, seriously, SPOILERS) the death of the Vice President. Other backlash topics include the frenzied over-emoting of Damian Lewis as Nick Brody, the bad-season-of-24-style-terrorism of Abu Nazir, the sudden and ridiculous surveillance-fails of the government, and the Lifetime-movie behavior of Carrie Matheson. The backlash-to-the-backlash articles have followed suit, reminding readers that this is indeed a television show, one that has always been more interested in maintaining suspense and surprising viewers than in subtlety or in portraying the business of fighting terrorism with any degree of realism.

After the winter finalé of Once Upon a Time, I am left with both hope and skepticism. While this latest episode managed to retain a sense of cohesion and resolved a few of the perplexing concepts of the plot, quite a few issues with this popular series still remain. Despite some mediocre acting, a scattered and sometimes illogical trajectory, an overwhelming abundance of characters and unclear character motivations, Once Upon a Time still keeps me coming back for more. But why? What is it about this world of fairy tale (and Disney, and Arthurian, and Gothic novel) characters that remains so compelling?

As the seventh season of Dexter unfolds on Showtime, with an eighth and final season scheduled for late 2013, it seems like as good a time as any to look back at each season of the series. Since this is the internet, and since rank-order is the best way I know to organize my opinions about most things, I present below my tour through Dexter’s first six seasons. Of course this is entirely my opinion, and I encourage vocal disagreement. It’s hard not to want to just start talking about the quality of season seven and where it might end up ranking in this list… but let’s try our best not to.

I am currently making an effort to watch Fringe, which is streaming on Amazon Prime (and probably Netflix). By currently, I mean at this moment—it’s on in the background as I write this.

I began my interaction with Fringe when it premiered five years ago; as a Lost fanatic, I was drawn to the JJ-Abram-ness of the enterprise. I dutifully watched through the middle of the first season, then just never came back.

As a viewer of serials, I find myself incredibly impatient with procedurals, and while even in those early episodes I could sense elements of The X-Files in Fringe’s blend of procedural and serial, it just didn’t take. There were just too many episodes that began with someone turning into a pile of slime.

The new season of The Walking Dead has, if possible, been overshadowed by its incredible surge in ratings. One reason for this trend is that the ratings truly are incredible. In terms of total viewers, the first two seasons were impressive for cable—averaging 5.24 and 6.90 million viewers, respectively. Despite off-screen production turmoil—news stories chronicled the battle for AMC’s funds among its various series, particularly with respect to the enormous cost of Mad Men in relation to its inferior ratings—ratings went up during and between seasons.

However, the beginning of the third season last month saw an incredible jump, with the premiere drawing 10.87 million viewers, including an unbelievable (it’s true, it’s on Wikipedia!) 5.4 million viewers in the coveted 18-49 demo, with the number growing even larger when factoring in re-airings, DVR viewership, etc. It’s amazing how impressive these numbers are, as these demo numbers (which it has basically maintained through the first half of the current half-season) are higher than any broadcast demo numbers, outside of football.