Only a few short years ago, when digital streaming was still flush with potential, programs like Game of Thrones and Breaking Bad had us calling it a time of "peak television." As studios scrambled to make the shift to the new format and capitalize on the binge-craze, the quality of streaming offerings declined proportionate to the increase in quantity, and hasn't entirely recovered (looking at you, Disney+).

Your Friends & Neighbors doesn't quite reach the peaks of the days of the Red Wedding, but it benefits from mature writing and top performers navigating a script that delivers far more promise than it does disappointment.

Unlike most of today's streaming options, Your Friends & Neighbors uses every part of the buffalo, doing yeoman's work in efficient use of screen time. The showrunners do an excellent job of making each episode feel like a necessary ingredient of the larger story's evolving complexity rather than retreaded filler meant to eat up time (looking at to you again, Disney+)

The cast is equally strong. Jon Hamm consistently feels like a hidden gem, despite past successes. It's true that his character in this show doesn't stretch credulity sufficiently to warrant a Daniel Day-Lewis method actor to crawl within the skin of a man wildly out of step with societal norms. However, if you need a subtly commanding presence and a fully committed and natural performance by someone with great comedic instincts, Hamm's the man for the job.

Amanda Peet, who plays Hamm's ex-wife, isn't given as much to work with as Hamm, and her character, though intended otherwise, is significantly less sympathetic; however, the veteran actress handles the part with grace.

Those who play tertiary characters need not stretch themselves much, as the dialogue is very natural, and their interpersonal relationships utterly organic. Regardless, it doesn't seem as though any of them need the help.

One of the program's greatest strengths is the underlying thrum—an interwoven and ever-present but subtle tension—brought on by the absolute knowledge that the lives of these characters, whom we're beginning to connect with, are going to take a dramatic turn for the worse and there's nothing that we can do to stop it.

Your Friends & Neighbors might not be genre-defining television, but it's definitely Worth it.