"The Village"

NBC has come up with a "This is Us" follow-up pairing.  "The Village" is a hanky-inducing sob-fest about various members of a small apartment building in New York.  SPOILER ALERT  Characters are what you might expect.  There is the mother with the pregnant teen daughter, played by the too-pretty Michaela McManus and the somewhat too old to be playing a teen, Grace Van Dien.  There is the disabled, troubled vet played by able-bodied Warren Christie.  There is a law student who brings his mouthy grandfather home to live with him.  There is a cop who loves a woman who is an undocumented immigrant.  When she is taken by ICE, he takes in the woman's kid.  Lastly, there is the oft-under appreciated Lorraine Toussaint, the social worker who holds it all together for everyone else but is hiding her own health crisis.  It lacks the personal touch of "This is Us" but has potential.  The show walks the line between truly good drama and soap-opera pablum.  Not sure which side it will land on but l am more than happy to watch for now.