Television has gotten pretty dark. Tech dystopias, from Black Mirror to Severance , are our water-cooler shows. The true-crime factory pumps out more real-life nightmares every day. Millions of viewers are bingeing on post-apocalyptic misery, whether it takes the shape of The Last of Us ’ fungal wasteland or Silo ’s crumbling underground city or the sterile billionaires’ stronghold in Paradise . Even realistic dramas increasingly rely on a murder-mystery element to build suspense. And yet,