Don't crack that celebratory bottle of Rolling Rock just yet. While HBO would love to air a second season of "Mare of Easttown" and viewers would kill to see more of Mare and her vape pipe, neither creator Brad Ingelsby nor star Kate Winslet have quite committed to bringing everyone's favorite small-town detective back for another round of crime-solving.
So what's a lovesick "Mare" viewer to do? You could cry over your cheesesteak, or you could dig into some of the best fierce-female performances currently streaming on a screen near you.
From the Zen serenity of Natasha Rothwell to the globe-trotting lunacy of Kaley Cuoco, here is a look at six seriously sensational TV women. While you wait for "Mare," they've got your back.
Jennifer Coolidge and Natasha Rothwell, 'The White Lotus'
(HBO Max and other streaming services)
With its hothouse stew of family drama, class warfare and assorted personal dysfunctions, the White Lotus resort hotel is not the escapist Hawaiian paradise its rich, pampered guests signed up for. But for fans of first-class acting, this HBO miniseries of the same title is a slice of TV heaven.
As the resort's increasingly unhinged manager, Australian actor Murray Bartlett is the show's breakout star, and sight of Bartlett waltzing through the hotel in his salmon-colored blazer will put you in an instant state of viewing bliss. But save some love for veteran character actress Jennifer Coolidge ("Best in Show," "Legally Blonde") and "Insecure" wisecracker Natasha Rothwell, whose performances as a damaged guest and an empathetic spa manager are the soul at the heart of director-writer Mike White's canny satire.
Everything about the befuddled, grieving Tanya (Coolidge), the saintly Belinda (Rothwell) and their transactional friendship is ripe for lampooning. But White and the actresses give the characters and their relationship a respectfully funny depth that nudges "The White Lotus" from terrific to practically perfect. There will be Emmys.
Kaley Cuoco and Zosia Mamet, 'The Flight Attendant'
(HBO Max)
To watch Kaley Cuoco on "The Big Bang Theory" was to love her for making the ditzy Penny so much more than a sexy second banana. But to watch Cuoco careening through "The Flight Attendant" is to be shocked and amazed. Shocked because Cuoco's performance as Cassie Bowden, an alcoholic party girl who may have killed a guy during a blackout, is amazing.
You can say the same for Zosia Mamet. The "Girls" star is a deadpan delight as Cassie's best friend Annie, a high-powered lawyer whose no-nonsense cool helps mask the reality that Annie works for very, very bad people. As Cassie lurches from one bad scene to another and Annie uses her wits and rule-skirting savvy to bail her out, Cuoco and Mamet have the edgy chemistry of spies who know their partners too well to trust them, but need them too much not to.
The eight-episode series is a dizzying mix of bloody violence, black humor and screwball-comedy energy, but with its crew of capable women in control, "The Flight Attendant" sticks its landing. It has been renewed for a second season. Here's hoping Cassie has Annie on retainer.
Jennifer Aniston and Gugu Mbatha-Raw, 'The Morning Show'
"Apple TV+"
When it premiered in the fall of 2019 on Apple TV+, "The Morning Show" was more of a well-tailored punching bag than a TV show.
With its big stars (Jennifer Aniston! Reese Witherspoon! Steve Carell!) and #MeToo plot inspired by the downfall of Matt Lauer and Harvey Weinstein, the series was such a big prestige project, it really had nowhere to go but down. So it was no surprise when it was greeted with mixed reviews from critics who looked at the zillion-dollar cast and the Apple-related hoopla and were enthusiastically underwhelmed.
The bigger surprise is that "The Morning Show" is sharper than you'd think and tougher than it looks. The fishbowl world of the coddled co-anchors (Aniston as Alex Levy, Carell as the soon-to-be-disgraced Mitch Kessler) is examined in close, skeptical detail. The cynical tragedy-of-the-day demands of the news cycle do not get a pass, and the double-standard faced by women in the TV world is there in every well-observed frame.
But the show's best moments come during its exploration of the #MeToo minefield, which is where Aniston and Mbatha-Raw come in.
No one understands Alex's weird life except Mitch, and she loves him for it. But when the truth about Mitch comes out, Aniston unpeels multiple, painful layers of denial and complicity as Alex realizes how willfully blind she was to her co-anchor's predatory behavior. And as a young booker who is manipulated into having sex with Mitch and ends up getting promoted to shut her up, Mbatha-Raw gives a heartbreaking performance that captures the many shades of survivor's guilt, anger and terror.
The second season of "The Morning Show" debuts on Sept. 17. Set your alarm.
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