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Jerusalem
May 20, 2004

Would you be my new best friends?

Here's my Top Ten, click here to bypass all these :words: and jump straight to just the list!

It was an incredible year for television, and a nightmare to put together this Top Ten list because there were so many great shows that I felt terrible about not including. Strange New Worlds almost made the list, a series that reignited my love for Star Trek after years of disinterest (and also got me watching the delightful Lower Decks). House of the Dragon was a very pleasant surprise after how truly wretched Game of Thrones had gotten in its last season. The Sandman was on track to make the list in its first half but the quality dipped (but was still good) in its latter half, though the Calliope special episode that came out later in the year was a hopeful sign of the high quality to come in Season 2. What We Do in the Shadows was a lot of fun as always but the competition was too stiff this year for it to make the list, and there were a bunch of interesting but flawed also-rans like Stranger Things, She Hulk (bad start, strong finish), Ms. Marvel (strong start, weak finish), Harley Quinn, Tokyo Vice, For All Mankind, and hell technically speaking The Expanse was a 2022 series too. But none of them made the top ten, and I hope this is a "problem" I face in 2023.

https://i.imgur.com/j11fVLc.mp4
10. Raised by Wolves: I love this ridiculous, stupid, and sadly canceled show. Picking right up from the madness of the end of the first season, the second just keeps ramping up the crazy. Flying space snakes who love pumpkins, a deranged cult-leader who ate radioactive eyeballs and pretends the deadly heat emanating from his body is divine energy, a faceless child android going Jason Vorhees on a bunch of cultists, carnivorous mermaid aliens stealing babies, a wife who turns into a tree, Grandma tricking Mother into a full-body condom, robo-dad joining a fight club, million-year-old alien monk who snorts some tooth and turns into an alien wolf, more double-crosses than you can shake a stick at, upside-down T-Poses, and the casual reveal that Satan lives in the center of the planet.

Canceled by cowards too scared to let a weird-rear end show like this exist, Raised by Wolves may not have been the best show of the year (and only pipped Strange New Worlds for me on the Top Ten because I knew there would never be another chance to vote for RWB) but it was frequently the weirdest, which is saying something in a year of truly surreal television. Phenomenally entertaining if frequently bewildering, I'm so sad we'll never get to see what happened to Mother, Father, Grandmother and the various idiotic humans (and Marcus!) blundering about in their way, and never again hear the truly wonderful opening theme song. All that is left is to Praise Sol for what we did get of this beautifully weird and strange show.

https://i.imgur.com/5xflgCr.mp4
9. Only Murders in the Building: The pleasant surprise that was Season 1 and the relatively quick turnaround for Season 2 had me worried that this might be trying to capture lightning in a bottle twice. Happily, the sheer charm of the actors/characters carried the season through a few odd seemingly dropped plot-lines (and characters, the disappearance of Oscar gets one entirely inadequate single-line explanation) and a preponderance of red herrings. Deftly avoiding a number of points where the show could have easily taken the easy cliched route, it ended up delivering an extremely satisfying payoff to the mystery setup at the end of the first season... and of course created an intriguing setup for Season 3. Along the way, the show makes a number of amusing meta-jabs at the danger in presenting sequels, which could have come across as a little too cute/smug but again works because of the charm of the characters.

The introduction of new characters is handled well, including avoiding the problems that usually come with bringing in a child actor (or worse, Michael Rappaport). But the show also did a great job of adding depth to some of the side characters from the first season, most especially "Bunny", with an episode dedicated to her that did a remarkable job of humanizing her and reminding of the significance of the tagline "Every body has a story." We also get added depth to our main cast, but the show never forgets it is a comedy even when dealing with some dark moments. "Charles" breaking up with his ex-girlfriend is an amazing scene in a season full of plenty of great comedic moments. The mystery works well too, with a very satisfying conclusion, providing the viewer with just enough information to piece together potential suspects while also withholding just enough that one extra revelation is enough to make everything click together.

As a follow-up to Season 1, this season keeps the strong momentum going, but is a charming, funny, sometimes dark but more often optimistic quality piece of television in its own right, and just like last season I've been left wanting more.

https://i.imgur.com/oi5hU6T.mp4
8. The Boys: The Boys continues to somehow spin gold from the straw that was Garth Ennis' terrible source comic books, still retaining all the blood, sex and gore while managing to avoid feeling like a 13-year-old edge-lord's weirdo power fantasy. But while there's plenty of sex and violence, what makes the show work beyond even the delightful parody of the superhero genre, celebrity culture, and exploration of the impact (and exploitation) of society, is the strong character work and excellent acting.

Karl Urban's Butcher, the "anti-hero" of the series, is a gigantic piece of poo poo, is fully aware of that, and his refusal to change in spite of his self-loathing is equal parts frustrating and compelling. Jack Quaid's Hughie goes through a fascinating (if somewhat divisive) portrayal of how ideas of "masculinity" can completely gently caress everything up. Erin Moriarty's Starlight makes tentative, halting steps towards turning the machine that has sculpted her entire life back on itself, weaponizing her popularity. Laz Alonso as MM shows how trauma can damage even the seemingly strongest and most stable of us. Even Frenchie and Kimiko's somewhat lambasted plot-line shows the development of a tender and loving relationship between two damaged people who feel like they are doomed to hurt the ones they love. But the villains also get plenty of development too, from the hilariously pathetic Deep, to the trauma/mental health issues behind Black Noir's seeming stoicism, to Queen Maeve's despondent commitment to sacrificing herself to rid the world of what she sees as its greatest threat, to A-Train's stumbling efforts to rebrand himself crashing headlong into the openly embraced racism of the organization that makes him a star.

But while all the above characters are great, and the inclusion of Jensen Ackles as Soldier Boy was utterly inspired casting, it's Antony Starr who again steals the show. His Homelander is an astonishing creation, an utter monster whose own past/upbringing explains so much but doesn't excuse the atrocities he commits. The narcissism, the instability, the clawing self-doubt he tries to hold down as things start to fall apart, the constant need for approval from people he simultaneously despises, it all makes for a volatile mix. Sure at times the show leans in a little too far on the Trump allusions, but Homelander's perfect surface level appearance, his powers, and his growing insanity make for a truly terrifying mix, which hits all the harder in the final scene of the season where he finally goes over the line and murders a protestor in full view of the public... and they cheer him for it, and he realizes once again that "I can do whatever the gently caress I want"... and his equally powerful child drinks in that message right alongside him. I worried that this show wouldn't be able to sustain the novelty of its first season, but after three seasons it remains one of my favorite shows, and I can't wait to see where they go next.

https://i.imgur.com/xnxS4h6.mp4
7. We Own This City: This is all real. This all actually happened.

I had to keep reminding myself of that as I watched this show, jaw often agape. The story of Baltimore's Gun Trace Task Force is the type of thing that a writer would be lambasted for being unrealistic if he'd made it up... but it all happened. The show is the creation of David Simon and George Pelecanos, working back together in Baltimore where the latter wrote for the former on the magnificent television series The Wire. That was a fictional story heavily based on Simon's own reporting days in Baltimore, but this is a true story heavily based on the work of reporter Justin Fenton, and as a "sequel" of sorts to The Wire it is compelling, fascinating, and deeply depressing.

The naked corruption, the complicity of top police brass AND politicians, the sheer audacity that these police demonstrated makes the reason behind the show's title as clear as day. They did these things because they knew they could get away with it, and they didn't even do them well! Planted evidence, stolen money and drugs, openly working with drug dealers to take out rivals, brutality, bullshit arrests, home invasions... all while Wayne Jenkins was being touted as the poster boy of the modern police in Baltimore: a guy who supposedly looked down on brutality, who was honest as the day is long, who was a leader and an exemplar for other cops to follow, and yet his crimes were so blatant, so obvious, so ill-hidden if he even bothered to hide them at all. And like Capone getting done for taxes, it was arguably the blatant theft of overtime that finally did Jenkins in.

Jon Bernthal's portrayal of Jenkins is remarkable, a loud-mouthed braggadocio who is clearly deeply insecure and desperate not only to belong but to be loved. But while he's the centerpiece of the show, the other characters shine too, in particular Jamie Hector as the mild, soft-spoken but deeply serious Detective Sean Suiter. The wrap-up of his plot-line was controversial - given the still contested cause of his real-life death, was it suicide (most likely) or murder, either pre-meditated or pure bad luck? - but Hector's performance was another reminder that he's capable of far more than just the dead-eyed Marlo Stanfield he portrayed so well in The Wire. Plenty of Wire alum show up in the show too, which is a treat, but there is no stunt-casting, the show is all about telling a story. A hosed up, weird, maddening story... but a true one. And while Simon et al couldn't resist a number of clumsy references to Trump (the story jumps back and forth in time, but is predominantly in the year leading up to the 2016 Election) there is little else to critique about this remarkable show.

https://i.imgur.com/h8IHHGG.mp4
6. Peacemaker: I liked The Suicide Squad movie, and I liked John Cena in it. With that said, the idea of this being turned into a series seemed like a bizarre idea, even with James Gunn at the helm, but I figured why not give it a go... and thank God I did. Gunn had written the whole thing while holed up at home during COVID, and the result is a beautifully weird tv that is equal parts campy and deeply touching. John Cena - derided for years for being a robot built to sell merchandise to children - is a revelation and the longer time a TV series affords to explore a character allows him to add real depth to his Peacemaker character. He's gross and stupid of course, and funny, but there's a real sense of the horrible upbringing he was subjected to by his utter monster of a father - an excellent turn from Robert Patrick - and in spite of all his flaws, he's capable of growth and perhaps more importantly, introspection.

His murder of Rick Flagg in the movie constantly haunts him, as does the death of his older brother at his own (unintentional) hands when they were children. His bluster is a front to try and project the idea of a "man" his terrible father instilled him, even though nothing is ever enough for that piece of poo poo, and as the series progresses he grows, his team become friends and by the end, perhaps even family. But it's not just a character piece, there's a great story acting as the foundation for all the comedy, some inspired musical choices (ESPECIALLY the opening theme, though the assault on the police station is great too), intriguing villains, a wonderful supporting cast, some laugh-out-loud moments even beyond the constant comedy, oddly touching bromances (including casual threesomes!) and some welcome plot twists.

This series came as a complete surprise, a true delight near the start of the year that became appointment viewing. The season wrapped up in a way that felt like it COULD be complete but that there was potential for more to come, and happily a second season was quickly announced with Gunn again writing and directing the full thing. HBO Max has suffered after the Warner Brothers/Discovery merger, but thankfully it seems Peacemaker was not one of the casualties of either that or DC's continued struggles to produce movies that can match up to the success of Disney/Marvel's. Television remains their strong suit, and Peacemaker is probably the best of all of them.

https://i.imgur.com/kFpGzgj.mp4
5. Andor: What if we made a Star Wars... but good!?!?

This highly unusual premise for a Star Wars show was even more surprisingly approved of by the people at Disney, in spite of it running against the direction that The Book of Boba Fett and Obi Wan were following. Tony Gilroy got to sit down with a production crew and together they fleshed out a 2 season plot to lead in to the events of the Rogue One movie, with the first season covering the start of Cassian Andor's recruitment into the nascent Rebellion and the second season to cover the several year period between that and the start of the movie.

What this meant was that the show had time, a coherent plot, thought out narrative, consideration of implications, and room for character development and the story to breathe. In short, the opposite of what we got from the Sequel Trilogy of films! Taking a more "grounded" approach (I mean, it's still Star Wars!), Andor allows plenty of time for events to marinate, and builds tension masterfully. Across its 12 episodes, it manages to introduce dozens of characters, some of whom only appear for 1-2 episodes, and never feel overly packed or underdeveloped. It travels from the industrial ship-breaker yards of Ferrix to the opulence (and slums) of Coruscant, from underwater prison/labor camps to lovely Space Miami, from the Space Highlands to the Space Mujahideen. Cassian sees friends and enemies alike trod over by the Empire, is used by and uses others, takes part in a heist, gets to retire, goes to prison, breaks out, returns home, and sees firsthand the outbreak of revolution that a naive but inspired young rebel had extolled so passionately.

All this as other characters live and breathe, undertaking their own little personal rebellions (or larger), living in fear, paranoia or dread. We see firsthand the impact of living under a fascist state like the Empire, but also those who thrive (or want to thrive) under that system. We see workers exploited, "police" corruption, the slow strangulation of individuality and culture, the horrible compromises made in pursuit of an ideal, the bickering in-fighting of the "good", the backstabbing and manipulations of the bad, the cold arithmetic of spymasters etc.

It's not a perfect show, and not always the most subtle (A space communist literally gets crushed to death by money!) but by comparison to everything else Star Wars it's one of the best things since The Empire Strikes Back. The production quality is incredible, set design is masterful, costuming and hair superb, the direction and writing confident and secure enough in its ideas to allow improvisation (both physical and verbal) from its actors... ALL it's actors, extras included. It incorporates very good to great actors, with Andy Serkis a stand-out in his brief role, Genevieve O'Reilly bringing a sense of dread bubbling over towards panic beneath the perfect surface of Mon Mothma, Kyle Soller's revolting Syril Karn and his fascination with Denise Gough's repellant Dedra Meero, Fiona Shaw as Maarva, a woman rediscovering her spark late in life... but in particular the character of Luthen Rael steals the show, with Stellan Skarsgård as magnificent as always. Diego Luna does a fine job, deliberately portraying Cassian as NOT the biggest and most important person in any room, making the point that he is just one part of a greater whole that is being built. It makes for what feels like a living, breathing galaxy... albeit one far, far away and a long time ago.

https://i.imgur.com/YeX10sZ.mp4
4. Atlanta: After a 4 year absence caused by COVID, Atlanta returned with its two final seasons both airing in 2022, a feast of new content that also marked the end of the show. Each season was very different despite keeping the often surreal, experimental tone of previous seasons, with Season 3 in particular trying something different before returning to "normal" (whatever that means for Atlanta) for Season 4. The results were mixed, and as odd as it seems to say, Season 3 "suffered" from a "problem" that most shows would kill for: every single episode was excellent.

The trouble was, they mostly stood alone. While Earn, Darius, Paper Boi and Van appeared and had their adventures, every episode felt mostly detached from the other, not helped by every other episode feeling like something out of an anthology show, usually having little if anything at all to do with the main characters. Each episode was a delight, but nothing really seemed to hold together, despite an effort to bring everything together in the final episode where a seemingly alternate reality version of Van won't stop moving from one crazy scenario to the next in Paris. It didn't help that the season wasn't set in Atlanta either, with most US-based episodes being the anthology ones with other characters, while the main cast were moving through Europe on Paper Boi's headline tour (distinct from the supporting act he was doing for ANOTHER tour at the end of Season 2, adding to the confusion). So every week the quality was high, the episodes were enjoyable, the acting and especially the cinematography/direction were great... but it all didn't really hold together as a full season. It felt weird to complain because the episodes were so good, but there was something off.

Then along came Season 4.

The first episode, fittingly called "The Most Atlanta", was for the most part back to the Atlanta of the first two seasons. There was still all the surreal elements from season 3 and odd one-offs - Work Ethic! is a drat good episode, even better once you realize the context in which it was made, and The Goof Who Sat By the Door is a hilarious and beautifully constructed mockumentary about a black animator accidentally promoted to CEO of Disney who sets about making "the blackest Disney film ever made" - but the bulk of the show was once again about Earn, Van, Paper Boi and eventually in an exceptionally strong finish to the series as a whole, Darius.

The sense of closure permeates the season: it's time to move on, to change, to try new things, to move on. Earn has long since moved past the crippling self-doubt and fear that he wasted his potential, even if The Homeliest Little Horse demonstrates to the viewer AND himself that he REALLY needs to stay in therapy. In Snipe Hunt he finds the courage to open himself up honestly and emotionally to Van and to talk about how much she and Lottie mean to him, which also marks the point where she finally sets aside her own fears that she is nothing more to him than the mother of his child. Paper Boi struggles with concerns over his legacy before finally embracing the fact that he can just be happy and relax wherever he wants to, that his success has taken him to a place where it's more important to pursue what brings him joy, even if that is as simple as fixing a tractor and hanging out on his farm and growing a shitload of weed. His past is always there, as shown in the hilarious Crank Dat Killer, but as Light Skinned-ed demonstrates, sometimes escaping really is as simple as just walking away from the petty small-minded bullshit.

It's in It Was All a Dream where everything comes together. The final scene will likely be scrutinized, discussed, and argued about for years to come. But wherever you come down on it all, that final shot of Darius smiling in contentment as he (but not we) see whether Judge Judy is thicc... well it's just a wonderful way to end a wonderful series full of wonderful writing, wonderful performances, wonderful direction and cinematography and well... everything. What a show, and how I'll miss it.

https://i.imgur.com/xIjACfI.mp4
3. Barry: Like Atlanta, Barry also had considerable time between its 2nd and 3rd season. It also made a triumphant return, with Barry's horrifying degradation happening slow and then incredibly quickly. Always a deeply disturbed person, the Barry of Season 1 and even Season 2 had at least been able to mostly keep up the facade of a relatively normal if slightly awkward human being. In Season 3 however, his decline rapidly demonstrates that he's even begun to lose the ability to realize what is an acceptable front to put up in front of others. This is mined for comedy, and it IS hilarious... but also insanely uncomfortable. Barry dictating a phone-call to his ex while shopping is an amazing scene, and just one of many to be found throughout the season.

As the mask falls apart, the people in Barry's life react in wildly different ways, usually based around their own personal wants and needs. Henry Winkler's Mr. Cousineau's fear and rage turning into an unexpected career resurgence, Sally's ultra-controlling and self-obsessed show-running turning to rage when it's all taken away from her by a loving algorithm, NoHo Hank trying to save his nemesis-turned-lover from his in-laws, Fuches' doomed efforts for "revenge" as he ignores literal paradise multiple times... all of them get wrapped up in either trying to use Barry, to protect him or to take him down, and each of them suffer for it.

All of these create a pattern of behavior that makes the viewer expect certain things. Barry is always going to "win" because people simply can't help but do the selfish thing, to try and take the law into their own hands or to exploit it or to take advantage of the deranged but VERY efficient killer. Which makes the end of the season hit so strongly. Robert Wisdom as Jim Moss, father of the detective slain at the end of Season 1, turns everything on its head not once but twice, as he refuses to let his baser instincts rule over his head. When made aware of Barry by Fuches, unlike all the other family members of various victims, he chooses not to take the law into his own hands. He hands over first Fuches, and when it seems he plans to orchestrate a plan to get Barry alone to try and kill him, he just repeats his earlier decision and actually uses the set-up as a way to get Barry into the hands of the police, caught dead-to-rights attempting to murder a man in cold blood.

The set-up for Season 4 is fascinating, the show - like Atlanta - preparing to wrap up after 4 seasons and go out on a high note. Will Barry be in jail? A mental institute? Has Sally returned to Joplin to lick her wounds or because she's gotten a taste for killing and wants revenge on her ex after losing the avenue of her television show to do so? Will Mr. Cousineau's suspiciously altruistic ways crumble apart now that he's gotten his own revenge and his late success can only mask his selfishness for so long? How long can NoHo Hank and Cristobal last with no more muscle, no organization to speak of, no drugs etc to keep them in cash? I can't wait to find out, even if I dread the end of a show this well written, well acted, well shot, and perhaps most importantly of all so deeply, deeply funny.

https://i.imgur.com/9bcAp0g.mp4
2. Severance: Some shows take a little while to find their form, others start strong and then fade, and then every so often a show comes along that just seems immediately 100% confident about exactly what it is and what it is trying to do, and it pulls it off flawlessly. Severance is one of those shows, with one of the strongest and most compelling first seasons of any recent show I can think of. It's a fascinating concept that it executes extremely well, raising all kinds of questions and offering just enough answers to satisfy while leaving the viewer wanting more. That's a dangerous balance to strike, shows like LOST reveled in weirdness raising intriguing questions that it really had no ability to answer, but so far at least Severance feels like a lot more thought and planning has gone into it.

The premise is "simple" enough: a company has figured out how to divide the mind into two completely separate experiences. The "Outie" is the original person, who goes about their normal life. But the "Innie" is the one who goes to work and earns the money. The two cannot exist at the same time, every morning (or evening, depending on shift) the Outie shows up to work, hops into an elevator... and instantly finds themselves leaving work, a little tired perhaps but otherwise completely unaware of the 8 hours that just passed. Thus the Outie finds themselves getting to enjoy a work"free" life. They go out, they eat dinner, they go on dates, enjoy themselves, get a good night's sleep, head to work and... it's time to go out, have dinner etc again.

For the Innie of course it's another matter. "Born" on a conference table in an underground office, the Innie can walk, talk, think, perform fine motor functions etc but they are effectively children. Every moment is spent at work. They "wake up" in an elevator, go to their office, work their bizarre job for 8 hours, get into the elevator and... "wake up" back in the elevator ready to go to work again. It's... hell. A life of nothing but work, no meals beyond the occasional snack or the even rarer celebratory brunch, and maybe a little "dance party" if you're lucky.

The show explores this through several characters inhabiting a bizarrely large but empty "office" deep underground, doing work they don't truly understand, monitored closely by supervisors who act more like a schoolteacher and the Principal. Outside we largely only see one of the "Outie" versions, learning slowly the reasons that caused him to agree to be "severed" and live a half-life. The show is mostly concerned with the Innies, their growing resentment of the existence they never asked for, the discovery that their freedom to leave is entirely dependent on the goodwill of their "Outie" who they can never TRULY communicate directly with. Infantilized despite their adult bodies and the growing development of their own distinct personalities, they explore more of the truly surreal underground building that makes up their entire life, and we learn more and more about the bizarre world that skews so close to our own but just not quite.

Everything builds up magnificently to an incredible final episode, revelations that change up the context of everything we have seen or thought we saw, and raises disturbing implications for where things will go next in future seasons. Every aspect of this show is phenomenally put together, and in any other year it would have been the Best Show of the Year. Hell, just the fact that it was in the conversation with the eventual winner just goes to show how good it was, and hopefully how good it will continue to be in the following seasons to come.

https://i.imgur.com/eZ6zdsU.mp4
1. Better Call Saul: But nothing could beat Saul. One of the best shows on television wrapped up with an incredibly strong final season split into two parts with the laudable goal OF GETTING RHEA SEEHORN HER GODDAMN EMMY. The story of Jimmy McGill finally reached its resolution in a season that bridged the period from Jimmy McGill to Saul Goodman to Gene Takavic before coming to a final, beautiful conclusion. Everything is wrapped up beautifully, as all the various plot threads of the past and future come together, with a few brief dalliances in the Breaking Bad time-period to boot.

For years, people asked when we were finally going to see Jimmy become Saul. It happened gradually, and even at points where he literally changed his name to Saul he was still obviously "Jimmy"... and then it happened all at once, following the brutal scene where Kim Wexler lays out all the reasons why she and Jimmy can't stay together, ending with the devastating line,"I love you too... but so what?" - the sudden transition from a miserable and lonely Jimmy to several years later and the loud and brash Saul Goodman obviously doing everything in his power to not have to be alone or have even a moment's instrospection for even a second was abrupt but incredibly effective. We didn't need to see his decline, we already knew all we needed to, and had years of Breaking Bad to see Saul at his worst if we wanted to.

Some criticized the bulk of time spent on Gene Takavic in the lead-up to the final episode, but I personally loved it. Since Season 1 we'd seen the life Saul was reduced to after escaping Walter White's lethal orbit only in bits and pieces, and now we got it whole hog. Seeing how quickly Gene set aside his humble persona to play Jeffy for a fool demonstrated just how much of that persona we'd seen over the last six seasons was just that: a persona. Gene was still Saul, and his utter contempt and belief in his own superiority shone through until of course everything went wrong as of course it must.

Because the show had always really been about Jimmy McGill, and seeing Gene become Saul again and revel in not having to hide right up until the moment when he finally cast that persona too aside and became Jimmy again was masterfully done. It all relied on Kim of course, the part that made Jimmy feel complete, the missing piece that he'd tried to pretend hadn't left a hole in him. That the series ends with the prisoners refusing to see him as anything other than Saul, and Jimmy and Kim sharing one last moment together in a call-back to the first episode of Season 1... well it was just an incredible capstone to an incredible series.

And all of that barely scratches the surface of what happened this season! Lalo! Gus! Mike! Cameos from Jesse and Walt! Marie! Chuck! (gently caress Chuck!), Nacho! Carol Burnett! The way the silly nonsense of the Howard Hamlin scam came crashing headfirst into the very real lethal danger of the Salamanca/Fring feud. Howard's conclusion was stunning, and the callback when Kim makes her confession, as well as her breaking down on the bus was just extraordinary television, another magnificent performance from an actor who deserves every plaudit (and is getting her own non-Kim show with Vince Gilligan in the next couple of years!).

This was a series that did comedy, terror and drama in equal measure and did them so, so well. It was meticulously made television, it looked beautiful, it was shot superbly, the acting and writing were at the top of their form. A show that seemed likely to be a half-remembered 1-2 season ill-advised cash-in on Breaking Bad ended up being magnificent television that was arguably better than the show that preceded it. It's done now, and it ended stronger than it had any right to. It was a close call for 2022, but Better Call Saul could not be denied. This was the Best Television Show of 2022.

Jerusalem fucked around with this message at 03:22 on Oct 21, 2023

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Jerusalem
May 20, 2004

Would you be my new best friends?

A simple version of my Top Ten without all the :words:

10. Raised by Wolves
9. Only Murders in the Building
8. The Boys
7. We Own This City
6. Peacemaker
5. Andor
4. Atlanta
3. Barry
2. Severance
1. Better Call Saul

Jerusalem
May 20, 2004

Would you be my new best friends?

That Home Makeover episode of What We Do in the Shadows really was incredible. The season was good, it was just up against SO MUCH great television this year!

https://i.imgur.com/eOeS4XM.mp4

Jerusalem
May 20, 2004

Would you be my new best friends?

drat Hakkesshu, that's a great list!

I'll definitely check out Black Bird, your write-up makes it sound like something I'd love.

Jerusalem
May 20, 2004

Would you be my new best friends?

Yeah, great list! Another reminder to me that I need to check out The Righteous Gemstones too!

Jerusalem
May 20, 2004

Would you be my new best friends?

Great list Esco, though I didn't make it my TOP show, I am in awe of just how strongly Atlanta nailed its finish, and the sheer confidence on display in both the seasons they put together... hell, even the fact they threw out two seasons in the same year in the first place!

Escobarbarian posted:

06. The Rehearsal (HBO)
This show resembles nothing more than my absolute favourite movie, Synecdoche, New York

I've heard people rave about The Rehearsal but never really felt the need to check it out until I read this line :stwoon:

Jerusalem
May 20, 2004

Would you be my new best friends?

Great write-up, Shageletic! While it wasn't my #1 choice, I can't deny that Andor was masterful at making you FEEL for characters, some of whom literally only existed for an episode or two, and made all those little moments add up, reminding us that the Capital R revolution is built on thousands (milliions) of tiny little moments like an old woman who felt she could finally put on her best coat and walk across the town square she'd avoided for over a decade.

Jerusalem
May 20, 2004

Would you be my new best friends?

Bulky Bartokomous posted:

It sounds like Severance is the best show I’m not watching. Every year this thread finds me another show I would have passed on left to my own devices. This thread in years past inspired me to watch Ted Lasso, For All Mankind, and Fleabag.

Yeah, these threads are how I ended up watching Fleabag which was just an incredible television series.

And yes, Severance rules!

Jerusalem
May 20, 2004

Would you be my new best friends?

King Burgundy posted:

10) SpyXFamily -- I would recommend this to anyone, whether they typically like anime or not. This was such a breath of fresh air. Very feel good/heartwarming. The basic concept is a spy on a mission has to get married and adopt a child as part of his cover, but each individual in the family has their own secrets. It's on Hulu. Try it!

I recently started watching this and it's absolutely delightful :)

Jerusalem
May 20, 2004

Would you be my new best friends?

Yer Burnt posted:

4) Chucky: Jennifer Tilly having the time of her life (including a Bound reunion with Gina Gershon and Joe Pantoliano)

gently caress gently caress fuckity gently caress, guess I gotta watch Chucky now.

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Jerusalem
May 20, 2004

Would you be my new best friends?

Oh man I'm so sorry I missed the countdown, thanks Looten!

Edit: Oh wow, Better Call Saul only managed 2nd, and lost by 50 points to Severance! I loved Severance but that result and the points difference really surprises me. That and Atlanta being so "low" as well.

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