HBO's documentary series "Addiction" premiered last night to generally positive reviews, with critics calling the production "extraordinary" and "sobering."

Writing in the San Francisco Chronicle, reviewer Davie Wiegand says, "Yes, ["Addiction"] targets addiction for what it does to the lives of those who can't help themselves and for what it does to the lives who can't help loving them. But part of what makes the project so important and compelling is that the nine films that make up "Addiction" collectively target the various mythologies of addiction that perpetuate and exacerbate the problem."

"Many films about addiction and substance abuse seem to fall into one of two categories: They are either entirely cautionary, like those films we were subjected to in high school, or they show us how the sun can shine over a clean and sober life," wrote Wiegand. "By constructing a single film from nine works by individual directors, [Susan] Froemke and her co-producer, John Hoffman, reflect the multiplicity of problems, viewpoints and, yes, mythologies surrounding addiction."

The New York Times' Virginia Heffernan says, "Don't expect needles here ... or ravaged street kids turning tricks, or spectacular scenes of delirium tremens. No one even gets high in 'Addiction'; no fervid expression gives way to one of stoned beatitude.

"It's enough to make you kind of mad: 'Addiction' is holding out on us. And, surely, this is the point," she adds. "... Intended to do more than entertain or alarm ... 'Addiction' is meant to sober people up. To that end, its message is this: Drug and alcohol addiction are diseases of the brain, and they can be treated, at least partly, with medicine.

"This straightforward message is remarkable for at least two reasons. First, it's intrinsically controversial, since A.A. for a long time expected its participants to refrain entirely from drug use, even prescription pills ... Second, it's remarkable that so many topnotch filmmakers have consented to push someone else's point so hard. It's almost ominous." Heffernan does not necessarily see this as a positive: "The sameness of the films in 'Addiction' might aid its effectiveness as propaganda, but as art it's monotone; it's hard to believe it's the collaborative work of so many otherwise individualistic artists."

Devon Gordon of Newsweek says in a March 14 commentary that the series helps answer the question, "What happens to drug addicts who don't get the help that they need?"

"Drug addicts who don't get the help they need get worse, and their addictions grow and grow, until their compulsion has consumed everyone and everything around them," writes Gordon. "They destroy families. They turn to crime. They put other people in danger. They make bad decisions, stick around in violent relationships, have children they're in no position to raise. They get sick. They don't work. The ripple effects of their addictions go on and on and on. Eventually, their problems become our problem -- big time.

"This is the inconvenient truth for anyone who chooses to see addiction simply as a failure of personal responsibility," he writes. "It doesn't matter if you're right, because scorn isn't a solution. And moral high ground isn't much of a consolation when an addict robs you at gunpoint, or runs your car off the road or breaks your mother's heart. HBO's massive new documentary series ... has many astonishing revelations to share about our country's drug and alcohol crisis. But there's one point above all that it desperately wishes to communicate: whether we accept it or not, we're all paying for the scourge of addiction, and the price tag is only going up."

David Kronke, television critic for the Los Angeles Daily News, sees the series as ultimately delivering a message of hope.

"The grim realities presented in HBO's ambitiously altruistic Addiction Project are enough to drive one to drink," he writes. "But the portraits of resolve and suggestions that new medications and programs can provide some semblance of hope might help wrest the monkeys off addicts' back."

"Drug and alcohol addiction is a woe confronting not just the millions who are in the thrall of their disease, but their families, friends and employers, as well," says Kronke. "HBO's series posits the malady as a medical, not moral, condition afflicting brains which have ceased to function correctly, and argues addicts don't have to hit bottom to seek help."