“The Lowdown,” Sterlin Harjo’s new series, after co-creating the brilliant “Reservation Dogs” with Taika Waititi, is a genre exercise — a noir-nodding murder mystery — much as Donald Glover followed “Atlanta,” that show’s aesthetic cousin, with a spy series, “Mr. & Mrs. Smith.” On the face of it, this might seem a step backward. Though genre dominates television production almost to the point of saturation, it may, of course, be done poorly or well, may be obvious or subtle, stale or fresh. The elements may be familiar, but there are only six different pieces in chess, and the combinations are infinite; “The Lowdown,” which premieres Tuesday on FX, wins the game.

We are once again in Oklahoma, off the rez and in the city. Ethan Hawke plays Lee Raybon, introduced on camera by a vape

See Full Page