And my verdict is: not bad (I mean, I did feverishly finish 18 episodes in the span of 3 days).
Its major flaw is probably that the stories and characters are "too perfect."
The reason why I love The Wire, Black Mirror so freaking much is their "rawness" and "ugliness" which is always refreshing. Too many TV shows play it safe, making things cute and happy and all that which is definitely fine if it's a comedy (like Modern Family, Friends, 30 Rock- my big loves as well) but when it's supposed to be a realistic drama... that's where it can fall as a bit corny and cliche.
This is Us veers on that line between heartfelt and cheesy just slightly. Mostly it still stays in the realm of heartfelt, warm, loving drama about family-marriage-life-death, all that goodness. It certainly does a good job of making you care about the characters (I have sobbed like a baby at a couple episodes), and *ahem* making you keep watching (one of my irritations in fact, explained below). By the end of S1 though it started to feel a bit dry (although, I still can't stop thinking about it and hence this post...)
I confess I ran out of time and patience around episode ~14 or so. I started doing that thing where I skip forward just to watch the bits that interest me (*covers face* not proud of it). I started getting obsessed with just finding out one thing...
SPOILER ALERT
