Nothing gets my critical pulse racing more than when a show I already love switches around the formula, telling a story from a different angle or in a different style. That happened several times during November sweeps, which is why these are my three favorite episodes of the last month.
Without a Trace, "A Day in the Life" (Nov. 17): A brilliant hour from one of TV's most reliably excellent crime procedurals, this episode was told from the perspective not of our FBI heroes but of two parents (excellently played by Matt Craven and Laurie Metcalf) trapped in what to them seemed a nightmare but to the viewers seemed merely business as usual. When their teenage son fails to come home one night, they watch from the outside in confusion and growing despair as the missing-persons team collects evidence, constructs a time line a
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