Where do we draw the line between the personal and the professional? Friends and neighbors? Is it OK to point a laser pointer at someone in the middle of a conversation? (The answer to the last question is of course “yes”, it’s always fun.)

The theme of boundaries dominates the first two episodes of the second season of Shrinking, the Apple TV series starring Jason Segel, Jessica Williams and Harrison Ford as a trio of L.A. therapists whose practice has become an emotional hub for patients, friends and family is.

The first season of the series, created by Segel alongside Ted Lasso’s Bill Lawrence and Brett Goldstein, was one of last year’s true television delights: an expertly written and performed comedy that veered between grief, trauma and emotional catharsis, mostly in the same hilarious rhythm.

It was also the best role Harrison Ford has played in nearly a decade (Age of Adaline fans, I see you and I feel you), showcasing the superstar’s rarely seen ability to be fleet-footed and incredible beneath his gruff, late-career exterior to be silly.

Even by normal standards, “Shrinking” made an impressive shift in tone at the end of its first season. After spending the year dealing with his wife’s death in a car accident, cognitive therapist Jimmy (Segel) celebrated the wedding of his best friend Brian (Michael Urie) in a joyful, dance-filled celebration – all while the patient, the After counseling him to leave her abusive marriage, she was busy pushing her husband off the edge of a ravine (yes, it was a literal cliffhanger).

It was quite clear that Jimmy’s unorthodox involvement in his patients’ lives – which had become a way for him to deal with his own problems – would harm him again.

Hard borders or none at all?

As season two begins, attempted murderer Grace (SNL’s Heidi Gardner) sits in the slammer awaiting trial, and Jimmy wakes up screaming. His colleague and professional mentor Paul (Ford) knows that Jimmy has become too close to his patients – especially Sean (Luke Tennie), the young veteran whom Jimmy has taken in.

It is, to say the least, a clash of different therapy styles. But could Paul, whose sarcastic defenses capture Ford so indelibly, have too many limits?

Even though the grizzled therapist has come to terms with his Parkinson’s diagnosis and reconnected with his estranged family, he’s afraid to admit that romance with his neurologist (the great Wendie Malick) might be the real deal. “I love you,” he tells her in one scene, to which she responds (recalling one of Ford’s most famous movie moments), “Well, that sucks.”

Meanwhile, Jimmy finds himself embroiled in an affair with his other colleague Gaby (Jessica Williams), a situation further complicated by the fact that she was his late wife’s best friend. It seemed like the only dubious story choice of the first season, but thanks to Segel and Williams’ willingness to deal with the mess, it starts to pay off.

Just as she begins her new college professorship, she “catches feelings” from her in-office affair with Jimmy – a nuisance that Williams continues to play up with an endless supply of truth-telling lines.

“I’m such a pathological caretaker,” she tells one of her students, “that if you show me some trainwreck of a man, I’ll just jump in that pool like a black lady, Michael Phelps, every single shit. Royal time.”

Punchlines and emotional punches

One of the great achievements of “Shrinking” is its ability to juggle so many emotional registers in short scenes, ensuring that all the characters get their due within the brisk running time.

As the main character drama plays out, we spend equally devoted periods of time with Sean and Jimmy’s endearingly nosy neighbor Liz (Christa Miller) as they open their food truck business. Jimmy’s teenage daughter Alice (Lukita Maxwell) and her upcoming driving test (particularly nerve-wracking given her mother’s fate); and himbo MVP Derek (Ted McGinley), whose interactions with his doting son (Gavin Lewis) provide some of the episode’s funniest asides. (“Remember, Alice is just a friend,” he tells his sad boy, “not someone whose skin you want to wear.”)

Writers Rachna Fruchbom and Annie Mebane (whose vomit-soaked first-season episode was a highlight) keep the punchlines – and the emotional punches – going, while director Randall Keenan Winston and Australian cinematographer John Brawley’s sunny compositions belie the mania at work the affluent suburbs of LA.

With a show like this, it’s easy to slip into outright frivolity or, conversely, drift into the cozy California core of hope – threatened by Benjamin Gibbard and Tom Howe’s soaring theme song. But the writing is so sharp and the performances so skillful that “Shrinking” avoids tonal whiplash and consistently finds the humor without diffusing the drama.

Take the exchange in which Paul’s attempts to counsel Jimmy repeatedly fail because he has just lost a few teeth.

“It’s not this kid’s job to heal you,” barks Ford.

“He’s my biggest story,” is Segel’s answer.

As always, the humor is mixed with the darkest, messiest things. There’s a moment near the end of the first episode that is emblematic of the series’ psychological back-and-forth, when Jimmy and Alice are hit by something that threatens to undo all the work they’ve put into dealing with their grief.

Like most of us, these characters are never far from their next emotional blow – or their next breakthrough.

Season 2 of Shrinking is now streaming on Apple TV.