Debuts have come unceasingly in the last few weeks.

Catching up to them is a work in progress, but three that began airing this weekend – “Mindhunter” and “The Meyerowitz Stories” on Netflix and “White Famous” on Showtime – triggered my curiosity more than new traditional network series, which will be dealt with in an upcoming column.

Of the three, only “The Meyerowitz Stories” held my interest enough for me to want to go back and see more. Even it did not have engage me or make me admire it the way “Ozark” recently did. Or, for that matter, any of the “Fargo” seasons, “The Night Of,” or, among regular series, “Better Call Saul.”

The situation may be one of television programs becoming too formulaic. All three shows seemed to smack of cliché, or at least “seen it before.”

“Mindhunter” may be the most original in concept, yet it treads territory that feels familiar and doesn’t invite further exploration.

Taking place at the end of the 1970s, “Mindhunter” signals a breakthrough in crime detection and criminal motivation. Charles Manson, David Berkowitz, and similar serial slayers do not fit a pattern of murderers from earlier eras.

Or do they? The lead character, Holden, played by Jonathan Groff, is taken by the revelation that addicted assassins are not killing people they know or against whom they hold a grudge. They are killing randomly and acting out in ways that compound the irrational act of choosing to end another person’s life via stealthy violence.

New ideas and research seem exciting to Holden. The problem is, even with an excellent director and yarnspinner like David Fincher at the helm, “Mindhunter” seems sterile and academic rather than probing or involving.

Holden, beset by veteran law enforcers and looked down upon by psychologists and other categories of experts he’s consulting and trying to recruit for the FBI, is so interested in learning and imparting what he knows, “Mindhunter” seems weighed down in classrooms and in the trading of theories. More drama comes from Holden having to cope with disdain, and from his learning to be less than a straight arrow guy and relax as a human being, than from the murder cases “Mindhunter” cites.

It is Holden’s idea to go the source of mayhem. He visits prisons to interview mass murderers and try to find their motive, or at least what spurred their psychosis to the point they carried out their urge to kill.

While some of these visits can be chilling, as when you hear one convict dispassionately reviewing his crimes as if he’s talking about a ball game or a chili recipe, most remain as clinical and as unriveting as hearing professionals in any field discuss shop talk.

Joan Benny, Jack’s daughter, seems an odd person to cite to provide an example, but in the book she wrote with her father, she talks about how serious the mood was in the room where uproarious, lasting comedy was created. The writers would trade jokes and one-liners in the way a stock broker might go on about shares and options. It was quiet and serious business, a nod or matter-of-fact acknowledgement of ‘That’s funny” being the primary reaction rather than a laugh or non-stop merriment.

‘Mindhunter” fails to grab because it makes it feels as if you are not only watching a class but attending one. It’s practically devoid of emotion, suspense, intensity, or anything that drives most successful series. I watched two episodes and doubt I’ll return. Never in hours of viewing was I drawn to the screen. The prisoners’ cold relation to their crimes on MSNBC’s “Lockup” offers more insight that “Mindhunter” does.

“White Famous” is tedious in a different way.

Jay Pharoah, once of “Saturday Night Live,” plays a comedian named Floyd who has a following at mostly black clubs in L.A. but hasn’t made any kind of general splash.

He’s recognized by valet parkers and a few folks on the street who have caught his act, but he is hardly a star.

He has a feisty agent, played by Utkarsh Ambudkar, who thinks Floyd can go further, crossing over to attract a broad range of fans – read here a white audience – and become “white famous.”

Floyd is resistant, and here’s where one the major premises of the show, that Floyd wants to be his own man and won’t kowtow to Hollywood powers, be they producers, directors, or Jamie Foxx, a “White Famous” co-producer, backfires.

Floyd is so obnoxious, so insulting, and so ready to take offense at the slightest instance, he can have all the talent in the world, the talent of a Jamie Foxx, and no one would want to put up with him.

“White Famous” is another show in which every character who is not Floyd, including black characters, fall into traps by unconsciously saying things that send Floyd on riffs about racism and other sensitive matters.

Humor fades because it’s so one-sided. Yes, it must be irritating when you’re Floyd, waiting for a valet to bring your car, and someone hands you his ticket assuming you are the car jockey who’s going to deliver his. Yes, it must be hard putting up with people who try to be politically correct, then trip over everything they say and expose their prejudice.

But these gambits have become cliché. Television and movies have used them for comedy for decades. On “White Famous,” they’re so by the book and predictable, including Floyd being affronted, the reaction is “Move on. I pass. Call me when you have something new.”

Pharoah doesn’t help. He’s not charismatic. You don‘t want to go with him and congratulate him for being smarter, more sensitive, or cooler than thou. You dismiss him as a hothead who can’t see past his outrage, or silly promise to his late father, to help himself. Pharoah doesn’t make Floyd likeable or someone you think is on the right side of an argument. He’s as intolerant and as aggressively gauche as the people “White Famous” attempts to parody.

No go for Pharoah. No further go for “White Famous” on my viewing agenda.

It’s the acting that puts “The Meyerowitz Stories” above the two shows discussed.

Dustin Hoffman is wonderful as a vain, self-absorbed patriarch of a family that functions in spite of its members being virtual strangers and having the feelings and recriminations children have for parents and siblings for each other.

Hoffman plays a man who is known in art circles at a sculptor. A piece of his graces the courtyard of New York’s Lincoln Center. Another piece is owned by the Whitney Museum, though not exhibited.

Harold Meyerowitz talks about and worries about his marginal career as if he was famous or even great. Praise of “the work” he’s done and criticism, often biased by jealousy, peppers any conversation. He’s wounded by the tiniest slight or failure to acknowledge his achievement. Hoffman displays all of these tics and creates a thorough and interesting character.

Adam Sandler and Ben Stiller as his sons, half-brothers, and Elizabeth Marvel, as his daughter, Sandler’s sister, Stiller’s half-sibling, follow suit. Each of them find the core of their characters to the point they make family dynamics interesting and fun to watch even if “The Meyerowitz Stories” never becomes engrossing or demands further viewing.

Sandler, Stiller, and Marvel are talented enough to seem realistic within their roles. You believe you’re watching them operate as genuine people and not as stars with good parts. This naturalness comes out most after Hoffman’s Harold requires brain surgery. You see sibling behavior, including rivalry, at work along with lots of love.

Emma Thompson makes an impression as Harold’s fourth wife, Maureen. Thompson starts by making you think Maureen is dotty, but she grows the character until Maureen is as complex and interesting in the others.

Candice Bergen is fun as Stiller’s mother who apologizes to Sandler and Marvel for not being a more attentive step mother to them. Grace Van Patten holds her own among this feast of stars as Sandler’s daughter, a film student at the school at which Harold taught for decades.

Judd Hirsch and Adam Driver do significant cameos. Sigourney Weaver is part of a scene that becomes hilarious because of the way Harold keeps relating it.

No fireworks, but great acting and a good story puts “The Meyerowitz Stories” above the other shows in this week’s sampling.

Ukee on the Eagles

Ukee Washington looked so natural holding a mike and reporting from a sports event, it was easy to forget for a moment that Ukee hadn’t covered local teams in more than a decade.

Yet there he was in Charlotte, talking about the Eagles-Panthers game with current Channel 3 sports anchor Don Bell. Both in open-necked white dress shirts, Washington and Bell appeared during the NFL match, to comment and to tease their upcoming “Eyewitness News” show, which led, of course, with the announcement of the Eagles 28-23 victory over a rival they could, if consistent, face again in post-season playoffs.

Channel 3 made the most of their home team’s national appearance on CBS’s “Thursday Night Football.” The Eagles next contest in also national, a Monday night home game vs. the Washington Redskins on Oct. 23. NFL Mondays belong to NBC, and the game can be viewed locally on Channel 10.