Little America, the easygoing Apple TV+ series about the immigrant experience in America, returns this week for a second season of predictably uplifting storytelling.

This parade of hard-luck stories features happy endings that range from gentle to ecstatic. Just like last season, the show is largely successful — if frequently too well-behaved for its own good.

Puppy Place returns to Apple TV+ this week with a second batch of adorable, low-stress hijinks centered on a family that fosters cute pooches.

The Petersons and their four-legged charges once again set out to teach us to love dogs — and ourselves in the process. The puppies are cute and plentiful, the lessons come hard and fast, and no problem is so difficult that it might stress out a child.

The show remains a pretty good afternoon time-waster for kids under 10.

Based on a true story about a slave’s quest for freedom during the Civil War, Apple TV+’s oddly positioned Oscar contender Emancipation pairs action with an unflinching look at slavery’s brutality.

It stars Will Smith, whose bizarre post-Slap apology tour makes for strange bedfellows with Emancipation’s stark subject matter and the film’s action-oriented director, Antoine Fuqua. But this cautiously made movie is probably the best possible film this team could have produced. And indeed, it’s quite a bit better than an Oscar-ready slavery drama made in today’s Hollywood has any right to be.

New episodes of Carpool Karaoke: The Series just popped up on Apple TV+, with zero fanfare or build-up or warning, because, well, who’s going to stop them? You? I didn’t think so.

Still, the showrunners did the one thing possible to entice me to review this new batch: They snagged some interesting guest stars. And you know what? A few actually charming moments emerge, despite the cringe-inducing artifice and sheer laziness of Carpool Karaoke’s premise and production.

The docudrama Emancipation hits Apple TV+ tomorrow, and to make sure Will Smith fans can watch it, Apple is offering a free two-month trial of its streaming video service.

That’s much longer than the usual 7-day trial.

Apple TV+ offered a first look at season 3 of its award-winning drama Truth Be Told Thursday, introducing a new cast member in the process.

Actress Gabrielle Union joins Oscar-winner Octavia Spencer on the NAACP Image Award-winning show. Season 3 kicks off on January 20.

The Critics Choice Association showered Apple TV+ Tuesday with 10 nominations for the upcoming 28th Annual Critics Choice Awards. They include Best Drama Series nods for workplace psycho-drama Severance and dark comedy-drama Bad Sisters, plus Best Foreign Language Series noms for Pachinko and Tehran.

Nominations honored six series in total. The other two nominations covered acting in prison suspense thriller Black Bird and family drama The Last Days of Ptolemy Grey. See more specifics below.

The Christmas season is in full swing and there’s good news for fans of the Peanuts holiday specials. Apple will make the holiday classic A Charlie Brown Christmas available for everyone to stream for free. Apple TV+ subscribers can enjoy it already.

That gives everyone the opportunity to watch Linus teach his friends what Christmas is all about, whether they own an Apple device or not.

Allie Fox finds himself in a tight corner this week on The Mosquito Coast, the absorbing Apple TV+ series about a family on the run from the U.S. government. His son Charlie’s been compromised, so Allie must do a local criminal kingpin a favor. And that puts him in a car with William Lee, the man who tried to kill him.

Also, daughter Dina learns something about her mom Margot that changes everything about their relationship. It’s a magnificently tense and very strong episode all around.

“In a world like this, you can have it all,” says actor Billy Crudup, from The Morning Show, at the top of a new Apple TV+ trailer. It’s called “Apple TV+ Winter 2022 & Beyond | Official Preview,” and it’s all about year-end fare on the streaming service and what you can look forward to in 2023.

It short YouTube video may not give you all, as the Crudup clip implies, but it shows a lot of quality entertainment on tap now and upcoming.