Which is a stealth joke within “Tecto,” and “The Franchise,” and a mischievous stroke of satire that transcends an already absorbing storyline. Mr. Anderson is the Journal’s TV critic.

Hollywood loves a navel-gazing satire about the movie business. Audiences do too, when given a good reason, from the upbeat mockery of 1952’s “Singin’ in the Rain,” to the excoriation of a studio executive in 1992’s “The Player,

Himesh Patel leads the comedy produced by Armando Iannucci and Sam Mendes, set behind the scenes of a big-budget comic book adaptation.