Best Shows of 2023

Best New Shows of 2023

5. Gen V (Amazon)

4. The Last of Us (HBO)

3. Beef (Netflix)

2. Poker Face (Peacock)

1. Scavengers Reign (Max)


Best Finished Shows of 2023

5. Archer (FXX)

4. Justified: City Primeval (FX)

3. The Fall of the House of Usher (Netflix)

2. Barry (HBO)

1. Succession (HBO)

Best Shows of 2015

Man, the competition was CUTTHROAT this year. While pretty much anything I liked made it onto the other lists, there's so much good TV from 2015 that didn't make it to the top 10. The Jinx, Show Me a Hero, Broad City, Daredevil, Inside Amy Schumer, the ends of Key & Peele, Parks and Recreation, and Aqua Teen Hunger Force... by limiting this list to ten, there's a ton of great stuff I don't get to talk about. Which tells you how much I liked what did make the list.

Best of 2015

10. Wet Hot American Summer: First Day of Camp (Netflix)


As I mentioned in the movie post, there were a lot of sequels after long gaps last year, though Wet Hot American Summer may be the only one that moved from film to television. Well, not television exactly, since it was on Netflix... which you can watch on your television... what is television anymore? Anyway First Day of Camp tackles multiple things that are really hard to pull off. Comedy sequels are tough, and so are prequels in general, and so is waiting this long to return to a simple idea. But having pretty much the entire cast back works great, all the new faces mesh in perfectly, and the way the show plays with expectations, works in the prequel format, and develops its own running jokes while returning to existing ones all works much better than could be expected.

9. Jessica Jones (Netflix)


Of the four shows set in the Marvel Cinematic Universe last year, Jessica Jones had the most going for it. The cast is really good, particularly Krysten Ritter as the troubled but resourceful title character and David Tennant as Kilgrave, who is perfectly horrible and menacing even when he's giving you serious Doctor Who vibes. I've heard people describe Jessica Jones as barely or reluctantly a super hero show, which is a bit odd when it's much more open about its various super powered characters actually having powers when Daredevil kind of danced around it. My point is that there's a lot of variation possible within the story space of having super powered characters, and Jessica Jones finds an interesting angle, with Jessica finding that she's better at snooping on people than helping the downtrodden. There were a few moments that didn't work for me, but the cat and mouse game between the hero and the villain provides for several huge twists and thrills, and create one of the most bingeable shows this year.

8. Review (Comedy Central)


Review is plenty funny, but the comedy isn't exactly why it makes this list. Despite the premise (Andy Daly's Forrest MacNeil tries various viewer-submitted life activities and rates them on a five-star scale) sounding every bit like it would result in one of the most episodic shows imaginable, it's actually the long-term storytelling that causes it to really shine. The first season ended with Forrest divorced and depressed, punching his boss and going into hiding. The second season begins with him back in the fold, but it isn't long before the crazy things his audience asks him to try out cause his life to once again spiral out of control and deeply affect his relationships with loved ones. It's really a show where you have to see every episode, because mistakes in the past always find ways to come back and bite him again, and the darkly funny miseries he gets put through work best when you understand exactly how he gets to where he is. I'm not sure if there will be a third season, but I hope so, as much as I wonder how Forrest could possibly handle it.

7. The Knick (Cinemax)


The second season of The Knick isn't quite as great as the first, but it's still one of the most compelling dramas that aired last year. This is another one where I'm not sure if it will come back, but if it does I'll be sure to watch it. It stars Clive Owen as a cocaine-addicted genius surgeon at the Knickerbocker Hospital in New York City at the turn of the century, and explores the struggles of the personal lives of he and several others at the hospital as they try to advance medicine in various ways, some of which we know will work, and some of which we know are disastrously wrong. Historical hindsight is a real bastard on this show. Every episode is directed by Steven Soderbergh, so it's one of the most cinematic shows on TV, and the great writing and cast make sure the quality of the show goes beyond the visuals. If you don't mind something that basically jumps between horrible people being horrible and horrible things happening to the couple decent folks around, or the amazingly gruesome surgery scenes, it's definitely worth watching.

6. Rick and Morty (Adult Swim)


Being a returning show rather than a new one, it was a little easier to see where Rick and Morty relied too heavily on returning to the same dramatic constructs it keeps using or excessive violence for easy laughs, and the experience of watching it wasn't quite as magical as it was before. Still, there were six or seven episodes that were as perfect as anything else I watched in 2015, and there are bits in even the weaker ones that will stick with me for a long time. Being a great comedy and great science fiction at the same time is tough, but Rick and Morty pulls it off.

5. Justified (FX)


This might be the show I'm saddest about ending last year, because its combination of gritty crime drama with highly amusing, wonderfully-styled dialogue seems hard to replace. Being the final season, it had to stop dancing around and tie off its ongoing plot threads, and that means bringing the story of Raylan and Boyd to a close. It doesn't go quite where you expect, because it's written in the style of Elmore Leonard and there's a bunch of other interests at play so of course it doesn't, but it still works out in a way that is dramatically satisfying and fun to watch. Sam Elliott is a strong presence as the driving force behind the season's main elements, and Jonathan Tucker is remarkable as the one last hot shot villain that Raylan has to contend with. I'm glad that the last season cements Justified as one of the great modern crime dramas on TV.

4. Game of Thrones (HBO)


There was some understandable controversy over the way Game of Thrones continued to use sex, particularly sexual violence, for dramatic effect in its fifth season. At some point your audience understands that being a woman in this world is no picnic, and it stops having a purpose being shock value. It ultimately seemed small to me though, in a season that had so many good things going for it, from big fantasy action on a scale that TV basically never has, to great success at moving the story forward in important ways, and for the first time, massive surprises for people who had read the books already. Since the next one won't be out before season six airs, book fans and TV-only fans are on the same level, and it feels exciting, not know what's going to happen and waiting to see how the cast of dozens handles what comes at them with seemingly anything being possible.

3. Better Call Saul (AMC)


I wasn't even sure if I was going to watch this, with my general distaste for spin-offs, but I gave it a shot since Vince Gilligan was involved. It was much better than I expected, telling the surprisingly earnest story of Jimmy McGill, a man who tries his hardest to put aside his dishonest past and find his way as a real lawyer, but is stymied repeatedly by circumstances beyond his control. Eventually he reaches a decision, which is not unavoidable but certainly understandable, and puts himself on a path that will lead to him becoming Saul Goodman. We haven't seen that transformation yet, but it's coming, and I'm definitely excited to see how it happens. It should also be mentioned that coming from a lot of the same people as Breaking Bad, Saul maintains that show's incredible cinematography and sense of style while shifting to a notably more mundane central plot.

2. The Leftovers (HBO)


I watched the first season of The Leftovers last year and enjoyed it, but I guess it didn't really stick with me. That changed with its brilliant second season, which I loved enough to question whether I had paid enough attention the last time it was on. They shifted location from New York to Texas but kept the core cast and general tone of the show intact, which explores grief and loss through the prism of a mysterious event that caused about 2% of the people on Earth to disappear at once. A few years have passed since that happened, but things are still far from normal, and the show's exploration of its characters' reactions and inner lives delivers poignancy and "oh shit" moments at an incredible pace. It's not easy to explain why it works so well, but if you watch it knowing that the point of the show is not to answer its own mysteries but examine how they affect people, it's powerful and mesmerizing with every single episode.

1. Mad Men (AMC)


Mad Men's final season aired in two chunks over the last two years, bringing its cast out of the 60s and into 1970, as their efforts to keep Sterling Cooper as its own entity finally run their course and their lives begin to permanently alter irrevocably. Since the plot is basically driven by the decisions and personalities of the main characters rather than something more direct like an inevitable violent confrontation, it's not as easy to know what the conclusion will be or to reach it in a fulfilling way, but Matthew Weiner and his team of writers understand these people and the world they live in, and managed to find a perfect ending for pretty much everyone. There are multiple ways to interpret the final scene, but they all have the same general dramatic meaning, and its one that works as a way of summing up the whole series. I look forward to revisiting the show somewhere down the road, and I expect that to be as worthwhile as watching it all for the first time.

Delayed Entry

This is the best show that didn't air in 2015 but I didn't watch until then.

The Simpsons (FOX)

While I'm not actually done watching the show, I plan to stop well before I catch up to the current season - I just finished the 11th, and I'm really feeling the decline everyone who kept up with it experienced years ago. If you can ignore the fact that The Simpsons has been bad for longer than it was good, you can find a show that holds up as one of the best and most influential series ever made, casting a shadow over the 90s just as big as Seinfeld or anything else. The fact that it couldn't keep up after it reached double digits in years shouldn't count too much against it, since almost nothing else even gets a chance to. There's a period there, probably the 3rd through 8th seasons, where it's just unbelievable, where every joke is laugh out loud funny or at least undeniably well constructed, and where it's coining words or phrases constantly that still get used today. I'm glad I finally took the time to see why people love this show so much.

Best Shows of 2013

The list of shows I watch has slowly dwindled in size as many series have been ending while I've been slower to add new ones. Combine that with a few previously excellent series taking dips in quality, and 2013 wasn't the best year for TV in a while. Still, everything on this list kept me thoroughly entertained and engrossed.

Best of 2013

8. Treme (HBO)


There were multiple shows that ended in 2013 in ways that drove home their themes and big ideas gracefully, like 30 Rock and Spartacus, and Treme was one of the better ones. The show has never gotten a fair chance from a lot of people because it wasn't and never could be as propulsive as The Wire, but it's still a completely effective drama that shows how a city stuck in a horrible situation worked to pull itself together, and that there's still a lot of work to be done. There's only five episodes to this fourth and final season, but they're among the best five in the show's whole run.

7. The Venture Bros. (Adult Swim)


Even including last Halloween's special episode, the fifth season of The Venture Bros. was only around for five hours. Still, Doc and Jackson once again proved they're making the best animated series on television. I just know there will be enough of it. Every new direction they go in reveals even more history and interesting new characters, and there just isn't enough time in the world for two guys to get every last drop of fun they could out of it. All this while it's amazing how much they usually manage to cram into about 22 minutes of air time. The hour-long premiere essentially feels wasteful for not getting its story across in half that time. I like The Venture Bros., is what I'm saying.

6. Parks and Recreation (NBC)


It might be because I don't watch enough new shows, but I think Parks is still the best comedy on TV right now. The entire cast is full to the brim with talent and clearly enjoys working with each other, as they constantly find new spins on old relationships and hidden details that delight when discovered. "Leslie works in the council" might not be quite as compelling a throughline as "Leslie runs for council", but they still find a lot of ways to poke fun at modern politics and get some solid bits of comedy and real meaning out of the concept. I'm still not sure when the show's ending, and I have the feeling it might be soon. If that's true, I'm glad to keep watching it while it lasts.

5. Mad Men (AMC)


It's only through association with the dazzling fifth season that the sixth seems a little disappointing in comparison. But while I'm glad the show is finding out where it wants to go and extremely perturbed by the decision to chop its final season into two halves, I'm still really enjoying it while it's on. Great writing, great acting, great humor, and plenty of surprises still left with unexpected plot shifts and an unending supply of new layers to discover in the characters.

4. Justified (FX)


I like how each season of Justified is able to develop its own unique little personality while still fitting into the grander ideas at work in developing one of the most fascinating depictions of crime and law in modern television. Justified was more subdued in 2013 than it was in 2012, slowly building a D. B. Cooper-esque mystery while a web of danger and suspicion wraps tighter and tighter around those in the center. It's the kind of season you can only get after a few years of buildup, as all the pain in these characters pasts comes back even stronger for some of the show's very finest moments. It might be the show's best, when all is said and done.

3. Boardwalk Empire (HBO)


While Nucky is still Boardwalk's closest thing to a central figure, season 4 was definitely all about the supporting cast. Chalky White, Richard Harrow, and the entire Chicago subplot got a lot of focus this time around, and it was generally to tremendous effect. The Al Capone scenes have always had a certain weight behind them because he's probably the show's best known real-life figure, and there was a lot of strong moments as his life as one of America's most infamous criminals began to really get going. It looks like we won't be seeing a lot of that though, because HBO's announced that the fifth season later this year will be the show's last. It's surprising, because the show is still so good and there's a lot from the period they haven't gotten bored with. And a lot of what happened this year was among the most gripping and tragic stuff I've seen in crime television. They've still got it, and they want to end things when they're still riding high.

2. Game of Thrones (HBO)


I mentioned before that this season would be adapting (a large part of) my favorite book in the series, and I was excited to see them depicted on screen. And good lord did they ever pull it off. One scene in particular made history with the impact it had on unfamiliar viewers, especially on social media, and besides it being one of my favorite moments in the pop meta-culture of the year, it was just a damn good scene, getting everything right it needed to to match the feeling of reading it for the first time. And while it's great that they're nailing the big plot points that every fan of the books knows, it's also great that the show totally works on its own too, looking at the continuing warm reception from almost everyone who sees it. Not everything was great - the Theon scenes kind of went nowhere a lot, and the very end of the season finale was dull after the exciting cliffhangers in the first two seasons. But it was still one of my favorite things to watch last year.

1. Breaking Bad (AMC)


Well of course this was going to be at the top of my list. How could it not be? It's the final fucking season of Breaking fucking Bad. Possibly the best final season of a great show ever made. The writers wrote! The directors directed! The actors acted! The cinematographers cinematographied! I actually wouldn't have minded an ending that was a bit more daring and unexpected, but once in a great while, what a story needs and what the audience wants to see actually kind of line up, and it works out for everyone. I'll always remember Breaking Bad for its dark humor, its electric cast, its razor-sharp tension, and the utterly human drama at the heart of it all. One of the all-time greats.

Delayed Entry

This is the best show that didn't air in 2013 but I didn't watch until then.

The Thick of It (BBC)

The Thick of It is probably the most realistic depiction of modern politics ever seen on television while being devastatingly funny the entire time. The casts rotates a bit but is generally pretty solid, and they play a group of people who hate each other, hate the government opposition, hate the citizens of Britain, and basically hate everything else while they're at it. Almost every episode is about some stupid crisis about nothing that shouldn't be happening snowballing into even worse scandal as their sorry attempts to cover it up or apologize get ruined by even stupider mistakes. It's like a symphony of human garbage. I watched it because one of the regulars, Peter Capaldi, is the new star of Doctor Who. I think it's brilliant casting - just replace the caustic Scottish foulmouthed wit with caustic Scottish sci-fi gibbering and you're pretty much there.

Best Shows of 2012

Since I only consider shows that complete a season in a given year, and Breaking Bad only aired the first half of its final run, this will be the first year since it started that it won't be on my list. What show will take its three years running top slot?

Best of 2012

10. Homeland (Showtime)


People sure can turn on a show quickly. I wasn't as disappointed by the quicker pace and bigger action of Homeland's second season as some others, but I did find it to be a step down in quality. Still, the acting is great, the dramatic scenes are played with a lot of effective tension, and those guys still know how to spin an exciting yarn of terrorism and the people who counter it.

9. Luck (HBO)


Based on the fact that they were reportedly already filming the second season, I believe that Luck really was canceled because of the unfortunate death of horses they were using, and that wasn't just a cover-up of the fact that the show hadn't succeeded financially yet. It's a shame, because David Milch created a really interesting environment for a much longer series. The intricate dialogue was handled with skill by a great cast led by Dustin Hoffman, and the scenes of the actual races were absolutely breathtaking. I'll always wonder what could have been.

8. Sons of Anarchy (FX)


There are lots of dramas, and even crime dramas about bad guys specifically, that are more graceful, classier, subtler, more emotionally meaningful, and a lot of other words you can think of than Sons of Anarchy. Few of them though ever approach this show's ability to put together a plot. Characters are always hiding things, discovering secrets, getting into and out of trouble, and the shit just seems to never stop piling up against them. Yet it never totally breaks. I was highly disappointed by the finale of the last season, but not only did they manage to earn back my trust this year, they actually made those seemingly bad decisions look like good ones. I don't know how much more there'll be, but I'm on board.

7. Louie (FX)


This season was definitely less consistent than the second, with a few episodes that weren't particularly funny, which would usually be fine with this show, but in this case failed to have significant merits elsewhere at the same time. When the show's like that, it's still good enough to watch, but you know Louis C.K. can do better. Luckily , some of the season was really, really good, notably the appearances by Parker Posey and Chloë Sevigny as brilliant takes on the problems with a typical "manic pixie dream girl" character (I kind of hated typing that) and an arc where Louie tries to win Letterman's hosting job with the help of a strange mentor played by David Lynch. The show won't be back until next year, and I'm going to miss it.

6. Justified (FX)


It's probably a good idea that Justified didn't try to top the pure, unnerving menace of Margo Martindale's Mags Bennett from season two, instead aiming for a bit more color with its new characters who end up trading threats with Raylan Givens. It might be taking the easy way out, but the show is already more colorful than others of the same type, which is part of what makes it stand above the rest. Justified's version of Harlan county and the surrounding areas is becoming as well developed and entertaining as any fictional place I can think of, and it's one of the few shows where I don't care if what's happening ties into a larger story or not. It's fun to watch regardless.

5. Community (NBC)


Season three of Community was not without its share of problems. Some of the supporting characters continued to be used to less than their potential, larger story elements lurched at times, and it could not quite be counted on to be brilliant every single week. But I simply cannot pretend that a show that made episodes like "Remedial Chaos Theory", "Documentary Filmmaking: Redux", "Regional Holiday Music", "Pillows and Blankets", "Basic Lupine Urology", and "Introduction to Finality" is not one of my favorites.

4. Game of Thrones (HBO)


Game of Thrones' second season took a lot more risks than the first, intentionally changing the story from the books more often and attempting things like showing a large siege battle that most shows wouldn't even think doing. It mostly paid off, and continued to be a bloody, sexy cable show that managed to have a good story and good acting anyway. The third book in the series has some of the story's most infamous scenes, and I can't wait for the show to get to them.

3. Boardwalk Empire (HBO)


You always wonder what will happen to a show when one of its central characters is no longer around (Game of Thrones fits this too), and it's a bit surprising how much better Boardwalk Empire seemed with Michael Pitt gone. The other characters got to have their own stories a bit more, and they ended up with the best buildup and climax to an arc yet, one that focused on the war between Nucky and a competitor for his illegal goods played by Bobby Cannavale. The 1920s setting is still pretty fascinating, and it's interesting to watch how Terence Winter weaves his gangster tale with the truths of history.

2. Parks and Recreation (NBC)


Some things are growers. They can be albums, foods, people, and in this case, a TV show. Was Parks and Recreation markedly, demonstrably better in 2012 than it was before? Probably not. But the more I see it, the more I just like spending time watching it, and seeing what will happen to the characters, who I can't help but feel attached to, whether things are going fine for them or they're struggling. I hope it stays on the air for years to come.

1. Mad Men (AMC)


Like Parks and Recreation, Mad Men has been a grower for me. I can't rightly say that there's an objective reason that it was my favorite show of 2012 and not one of my top 10 in 2007, I just know that it was, and it would take a second watch of the whole series to dig deeper into the question. It does seem less focused on social commentary and reliving the 60s, and more focused on the character relationships and memorable scenes, which are things I tend to prefer. There was a period of time when the show was just absolutely on fire in season five, every episode absolutely stuffed with brilliant writing, directing, and acting, and even though there's no ticking time bombs or unexpected gun fights, it was the show I anticipated most from week to week.

Delayed Entry

This is the best show that didn't air in 2012 but I didn't watch until then.

Veronica Mars (UPN/CW)

I'm surprised I didn't notice the parallels between this and Buffy the Vampire Slayer a bit sooner. A show on UPN about a plucky and beautiful but dangerous and talented blond girl (Kristen Bell instead of Sarah Michelle Gellar) in high school, that plays with genre conventions (mystery instead of supernatural horror), and gets a bit worse when she moves on to high school? It's kind of scary, actually. The first two seasons of Veronica Mars have her solving both basic but inventive cases week to week and bigger, season-spanning conspiracies in the long term, and the way they balance humor, drama, and intrigue is remarkable. The third season is disjointed and lighter in tone, which definitely hurts it, but it's still worth seeing. It's a show that's easy to gorge on, and it's too bad that there aren't more than 64 episodes to enjoy.

Best Shows of 2011

Once more, with feeling: this list was chosen from seasons of shows that had their season finale air in 2011. So for the network shows, material that occurred way back in the fall of 2010 is relevant, and the brand new seasons aren't. It's just the only way to make it work, okay? I don't see the value in looking at it otherwise. Stop looking at me like that.

Best of 2011

10. It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia (FX)


It's Always Sunny doesn't have the human core that it would take to be my favorite comedy on television right now, but that's by design. It's about a bunch of loudmouth jerks who do terrible things to each other, and that's been the launching point for a lot of great comedy in the last seven years. Just going by the strength of the laughs, this was one of the better seasons in the show's run, which is quite a feat considering how generally consistent it is with its cast and its writing. It's not that new anymore, but what they're doing is still so good that I don't really care.

Favorite Episode: "Frank's Pretty Woman"

9. Sons of Anarchy (FX)


This could have possibly ended up higher on the list if the finale turned out differently, but it was still an exciting, tension-filled season of a show that does a great job of balancing baser thrillers like gun fights and car chases with some really strong human drama that drives everything. It turned out to be sort of a table setting season in the end, but the journey to reach its lukewarm conclusion was at times as brilliant as anything else I saw on TV last year.

Favorite Episode: "Hands"

8. Parks and Recreation (NBC)


The third season of Parks and Rec built wonderfully on the second, continuing to develop its ensemble cast into one of the most lovable bunches on television while adding two more talented people to its cast in Adam Scott and Rob Lowe. They also did a lot to gradually turn Pawnee, Indiana into one of the most fully developed and enjoyable fictional towns in TV history. It's just a show that's always growing, and never feels like it has to stop. It doesn't blow my mind as much as shows higher on this list, but it's wonderful all the same.

Favorite Episode: "Media Blitz"

7. Louie (FX)


I don't know if I'd like Louie more if the show made more of a concerted effort to be funny. Because as much as I love the fact that Louis C.K. can do pretty much anything he wants with the show, and am frequently moved or affected by some of his wilder experiments, I still often find myself thinking that the inserted moments of his regular stand-up comedy are the most enjoyable bits of the show. Still, it's hard to fault the show for what it is; an incredibly honest and inventive series that's more concerned with doing something different and interesting than making you laugh a few times. That's admirable, and the show is good enough to pull it off.

Favorite Episode: "Oh Louie/Tickets"

6. Game of Thrones (HBO)


You know I think was a strong year for drama on cable when a nearly perfect adaptation of one of my favorite books is my fifth favorite. George R. R. Martin's fantasy series is the definition of meaty, and television would be the only reasonable way to adapt it without totally gutting the story. That some things are simplified or lost in translation is besides the point - Game of Thrones is highly successful at bringing the series to a larger audience, and is a lot of fun to watch whether you're familiar with the books or not. The production values and quality of the cast are outstanding for television, and the dark, unforgiving world the story takes place in fits right in with the gritty cable feel. Again, not perfect, but plenty good enough.

Favorite Episode: "The Pointy End"

5. Boardwalk Empire (HBO)


For a lot of these dramas, the favorite episode is somewhat randomly chosen. Pretty much episode has something good to it, and what it comes to is which one had that one killer moment that jumps out more than the rest. Boardwalk had a very successful debut last year, and it was improved this time around, expanding on the scope of its examination of the way crime and politics intertwine in early 20th century America, and giving more time for all of its characters to grow into believable people that you care about. It's a bit too stately and concerned with symbolism to match the gripping personal intensity of HBO's very best crime dramas, but it's still damn good and always fun to watch.

Favorite Episode: "Ourselves Alone"

4. Homeland (Showtime)


Looking back, this might be the only brand new show that I watched in 2011. And if that's the case, it was a darn good pick. What starts out as a nice paranoid spy thriller quickly grows into something more, as the characters doing the watching start interacting with the watched, and it turns into a messy smashing together of personal and political turmoil. The show doesn't quite have the breadth of other dramas on this list, being so focused on a single story and a small group of characters. But what they do with that limited scope is very impressive, and worth celebrating.

Favorite Episode: "Marine One"

3. Justified (FX)


For some reason, the first season of Justified was more concerned with telling a bunch of cool little modern cowboy stories than creating a real story for its great main character, and that seemed to be the case for a little while in season two as well. But it wasn't long before it became clear what the greater plan was, as smaller squabbles gave way to an incredibly compelling story of deep rooted family rivalries in a dangerous community that never forgets past slights. Margo Martindale gave a supporting performance for the ages, and just like that, the show morphed from a solid, stylish police drama into something much greater that everyone should watch.

Favorite Episode: "Brother's Keeper"

2. Community (NBC)


Community doesn't have the consistency of tone and content that other shows might have, that probably help them establish larger and more casual audiences who know what to expect when they turn the TV on. Community's eccentricity might have contributed to its low ratings, and its removal from the spring schedule and possible eventual cancellation before it was even nearly done telling stories. But if removing the less safe elements of the show so it could stay on the air a few years longer meant that it wouldn't be as potentially exciting, unique, and simply hysterical as it routinely is, I wouldn't make that trade. The second season of the show took a lot of risks, but they almost all paid off and helped create one of the best single seasons of a sitcom I have ever seen.

Favorite Episode: "Abed's Uncontrollable Christmas"

1. Breaking Bad (AMC)


Another year, another first place finish for Breaking Bad. I can't help it. There's just no show that combines a unique visual flair, stupendous acting, dark humor, and a shocking and unpredictable plot like Breaking Bad. I don't quite think it was better this year than it was last time, but I was impressed with how they managed to shift the focus away from Walt without compromising the show's unerring watchability or the long term goals that they're striving toward. And with the way the spotlight returned to him as the season ended, it reinforced my belief that he is the most interesting, and doomed, protagonist on TV today.

Favorite Episode: "Crawl Space"

Justified - Season 2

The first season of Justified was a very good cop show, often ignoring an overarching story in favor of occasionally familiar stand-alone cases for Tim Olyphant's Raylan Givens to solve, but loaded with good acting, great dialogue, and a ton of culturual flavor specific to the southern region it takes place in, and finished strong with a bloody, multi-episode conflict between Walton Goggins' Boyd Crowder and his father. The second season looked like it might do the same thing at first, though the early cases connected much more directly to the grander story threads that begin in the first episode and it wasn't very long at all before the plot kicked into high gear. Tangential subplots still sprang up, but everything felt much tighter this time, like the writers sat down and hammered out a full story before they even thought of doing anything else, and it resulted in a deeper, better show this time around. It wasn't perfect, but I fully expect it to end up as one of my five favorite TV dramas of this year. And if it doesn't... well, I can't wait to see what could possibly be in store from the rest of the medium.

Raylan was a big reason the show was so fun in the first place, bringing a thrilling sense of old fashioned justice to some otherwise ordinary story ideas. What's remarkable is that the show hardly even needed him to be like that this year to be great. Of course Raylan doesn't hurt anything, and he's still a very interesting guy. But he became much more just a part of the series' incredibly rich tapestry of interwoven, unfriendly families, and I would say he's probably only the third most intriguing guy on his own show at best. Boyd spends a good amount of time not sure what he wants as the season starts, but he eventually gets back in the game and is as fascinating as ever. And most impressive was Margo Martindale as Mags Bennet, a woman who at first seems to be a friendly, motherly shopkeeper, but turns out to run illegal activities in her county with a frightening verve and keen intellect. We see how Raylan wasn't the only person to grow up there with that old sense of right and wrong and how things should be dealt with, and the exploration of the history of the Givens, Bennet, and Crowder clans while those rivalries reignite in the modern day is exciting and compelling every step of the way.

The show's still violent (in the surprising and poetic way that only the best shows are), but the shootouts don't carry the stories quite the way they did last time. Mags has three sons who help her business (the standout being Dickie who's played by Jeremy Davies, and who you never quite get a handle on the true nature of), Boyd has a new relationship with Ava and a new crew to run with, Raylan has a relationship with his coworkers that continues to develop in fits and starts (Rachel and Tim still hardly count as characters, but Art is great) and an ex-wife with husband issues and a continued uneasy alliance with Boyd, and the way the show lets all of these little pieces get thrown into a blender and come out in unexpected patterns and combinations never stops being fun to watch. Throw in a nefarious mining company looking to get rich off their home turf, and there's a lot to juggle in just 13 episodes, but the cast and crew were definitely up to the task. The plot they cooked up came to a satisfying resolution without forgetting to leave a few threads ready for the third season to pick up and run with next year, a season I am now early in the process of being unable to wait for. I'm not sure I really care about Raylan's home life as much as they wanted us to, but otherwise Justified is as entertaining a cop show as you're ever likely to see.

Justified - Season 1

The only reason I didn't watch Justified when it premiered early last year was that I wanted to see Walton Goggins' acclaimed work there before moving on to the new show he was in. Sort of silly, but I'm glad I did in anyway so my impressions of Shane remained uncolored. The DVD came out in time to catch up before season two begins in a couple weeks, so there's nothing really lost anyway. Justified is a hybrid of police procedurals and serialized drama, set in the deep South of Kentucky and starring Timothy Olyphant as author Elmore Leonard's Raylan Givens, an old-fashioned lawman living in a modern age. The style is sort of a mix of elements from westerns and detective novels, with Givens having both the keen wit and lightning trigger finger necessary to work as the protagonist of either. He doesn't quite fit in to today's world, shown in the premiere when he's shipped from Miami back to his hometown after he kills a man in broad daylight, and put on the low end of the totem pole in the Marshall's office. There's something dark hidden under his cool exterior, and the first season does a good job of exploring that a bit while leaving some mystery intact, and establishing him as one of the most interesting and entertaining protagonists on TV.

There's more to the show than just him though, as he has to deal with his estranged father, the criminal network and family of old friend Boyd played by Goggins, and a multitude of other issues that arise from week to week. The show juggles stand-alone cases with the more long-term elements pretty deftly, especially as the season goes on and the two become more integrated. Only the premiere and maybe the last three episodes don't have any elements unrelated to the central story, but you hardly notice one way or the other just because the weekly stuff is so generally strong. Not every one is a grand mystery, but even the most obvious ones are amazingly enjoyable thanks to near-universally great writing and casting, and when things tie back into larger goings-on it feels like a bonus rather than a relief. The dialogue is sharp, the whole cast is interesting enough with Olyphant and Goggins at the center, and the violence is remarkably bloody and well-filmed for a cable show.

Really, there's not much about the show not to like. Maybe if it was more focused on a story and the main characters rather than having fun with a bunch of different one-offs, it could have pulled off something even greater in the end. But even with the divided attention, they managed to complete a really entertaining and satisfying arc through these first thirteen episodes, basically having their cake and eating it too. There's enough left open to keep the possibilities of the next season exciting, especially with some of the choices a couple characters make by the end, and it's just a well-produced, funny show that you can check out once in a while or watch every week. It makes you wonder why networks can't get this stuff right - so often you either get a serialized show that doesn't go anywhere or an episodic one with highly fluctuating levels of quality from one episode to the next, and Justified handles both aspects with ease. I guess it just comes down to the quality of the source material, the writing, and the casting - Justified is filled to the brim with talented character actors who just aren't famous enough to be on movie posters. It's not perfect, but it's as solid as shows with its somewhat modest aspirations can get.