These shows shine an intimate, even glaring light on humanity in its less flattering manifestations.

Both the heroes and villains of “Ted Lasso” remain quite ordinary. And it is the show’s portrayal of that daily reckoning with good and evil, those small temptations, that make it easy to relate to.

How did a Catholic TV station known for its prayer programs get involved in broadcasting attacks on the pope that he felt compelled to publicly denounce as “the work of the devil”?

“Midnight Mass” feels like a throwback to the world that received “The Exorcist” in 1973.

The show is not about Haredi Jews; rather, it is about humans who happen to be ultra-orthodox religious.

Maybe the problem is not that men or “celebrities” don’t know how to be vulnerable or messy but that we don’t like to be reminded that they are. (And we are, too.)