In “Fargo,” Thornton’s character was pure evil, but in Goliath he's just flawed--despicable at times, but with a good heart that shows often as he pursues justice against his old law firm and partner. This one’s quite bingeworthy.

The show has the kind of jaunty professionalism of a John Grisham novel, in which an outmatched lawyer takes on a, yes, goliath, and usually wins at great personal expense.

Kelley and Shapiro are a little too in love with their quirks to create a show that doesn’t occasionally tip over into unearned melodrama and/or Gothic horror, and the series’ understanding of lesbian relationships, in particular, is straight out of 1992. But at its core, where it counts, Goliath does more good than bad.

What keeps Goliath watchable, and it's certainly quite watchable, is the superlative ensemble cast, particularly Billy Bob Thornton, whose gift at taking predictably quirky characters and making the beats of that quirkiness slightly off-kilter is close to unmatched.

That's a lot of acting chops squeezed into one series, and Kelley is too gifted a writer not to produce some clever dialogue and twists; still, the tale of a drunken lawyer seizing this shot at redemption can't help but feel a tad stale, almost like a variation of Thornton's "The Bad News Bears" role.

Thornton seems to be playing against script. His Billy seems to be thoroughly enjoying himself, despite the dire circumstances he finds himself in. It’s about the only surprise in Goliath. By the end of the second episode, it becomes obvious there are forces in play that will stop at nothing to thwart Billy’s quest for answers.

Even great casts have their limits, and in the case of Goliath, they give this shaggy drama just enough electricity to keep interest without offering a genuine reason to care about what’s going on episode to episode.

Great show. Has all the best ingredients - compelling plot, characters you can root for and plenty of humour. Really hope this gets a second season and the attention it deserves!

I agree with Adspe completely--"disjointed and pretentious" is dead on. There were attempts at artistic flavor, but the photographers, the directors, and especially the writers simply weren't skilled enough to pull them off. They were trying for Stanley Kubrick in some scenes, but they ended up with Michael Bay. Especially annoying was William Hurt's character: a villain who could have been interesting but was merely rendered comical. The burn scars, the dark penthouse, the clicker--what was this, a Bond movie? Totally unnecessary. In Hurt's more than capable hands, he could have conveyed menace and evil beautifully, but all the schlock hindered him. Furthermore, the pacing was deplorable. Too many scenes that lasted WAY too long. Found myself screaming at the screen "Get on with it!" Too bad. There are some great elements--wonderful performances, a sense of realism, and a terrific moral center. But 'Goliath' was trying to do too many things at once, trying to be something that it wasn't. I'll give it a 6 myself just because of the performances (despite one of the best actor's performances being stifled by comic-book banality), but a great deal of the show failed. If there's a second season, let's hope it improves.

This is a series that has everything, great actors, wonderful productions values, an interesting story. But the simple truth is it falls short. It is disjointed and pretentious. Big things happen for dramatic affect when a smaller event using a bit of finesse would of worked much better. The big failure was the writer, it is like they were trying to hard, wanting to tick every box. Not the worst TV you will watch. I have rated it 6, it should have been better and I wanted it to be better. But it is not. The production lacked finesse !

Complete waste of time. Formulaic, slow moving, cliche' riddled...just **** awful really...after seeing good reviews I was compelled to warn others...a lot of these reviews have to be fake.

Season one was ok watching Billy's hair change was fun, season two was time in my life I will never get back. It made no sense at all one show seemed to be from a different series?