Some shows you snack on and do not feel fulfilled.

The Gilded Age? That’s a full-course meal you linger over, savoring every detail.

By the time season 3 rolls around, it’s not just a television series. It is the kind of richly layered novel you stay up all night reading, promising yourself just one more chapter until the sun comes up.

From the beginning, Julian Fellowes has done for New York’s high society what he did for Downton Abbey where he constructed a living, breathing world of ambition, class maneuvering and whispered scandal.

Season 1 gave us the foundation. Old money versus new, the shimmering ballrooms and the quiet drawing rooms where the real battles were fought.

Season 2 pulled back the velvet curtain even further, showing the stakes beneath the etiquette and embroidery.

Now, in season 3, the characters have fully stepped off the page and into our heads. We know their ambitions, their weaknesses, their secrets and we care about them, even when we don’t like them.

As with a great novel, The Gilded Age doesn’t just tell you what’s happening. It lets you live in the world. You hear the rustle of silk gowns, taste the champagne, feel the icy undercurrent in a perfectly polite conversation and as each episode ends, you’re left with that delicious ache of wanting to know what happens next.

If this is what television can be, sumptuous, smart and full of characters who feel like old acquaintances then I am happy to admit I am hooked.

Season 3 is not just another chapter. It is the point in the book where you realize you’re in too deep to stop.

Honestly, I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Thankfully, The Gilded Age has been renewed and the magic and intrigue will continue into season 4.

Full disclosure…I have a mad crush on George Russell. Brains, Power, Family Loyalty, Ambition, Money and an appealing physique are definitely enticing characteristics wrapped up in all that baronial splendor.