“One of the best shows on TV”

In a post on Wednesday, I made the following declaration:

If you’re not watching [Friday Night Lights], and odds are you aren’t, you’re missing out on one of the best shows on TV.

But then I thought about it: how many shows on the air today would I consider “one of the best shows on TV”? So I compiled a list:

  • Battlestar Galactica
  • Lost
  • Friday Night Lights
  • Supernatural
  • The Daily Show
  • The Colbert Report
  • The Office
  • Entourage
  • House
  • The Shield
  • Weeds

Add to that the plethora of just-ended shows, like Rome, The West Wing, and Deadwood, and I have a pretty substantial list. So either there’s been a ton of great television especially recently, or my standards are low. What do you think? What’s your list of “the best shows on TV”?

This entry was posted on August 31, 2007 at 4:20 pm and is filed under rankings, television. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

6 Responses to ““One of the best shows on TV””

  1. bmarts Says:
    August 31, 2007 at 4:39 pm

    Smallville
    Lost
    Heroes

    … I’ll forgive anyone who doesn’t watch Smallville.

    I’d seen a handful episodes of The Office in the past but never made a point to watch it. That has served me well lately as I’ve watched reruns. It really is a brilliant show.

    Scrubs is a great show. I find Rules of Engagement very funny. Last Comic Standing is a fun summer series.

    I have to disagree with you about House.

    Other favs: Law and Order (CI and SVU), Monk, Psyche, CSI (Miami, Vegas, NY). But these I don’t watch with as much regularity.

    That seems like a lot of television, but maybe it seems like more than it is.

  2. amc.dawes Says:
    September 1, 2007 at 7:18 am

    The list is shorter on basic cable but they are all included on your “master list” :-)

    Lost
    House

    I’ll make time for these shows. Other shows that I won’t skip over if just surfing:

    Scrubs
    The Office

  3. jwambaugh Says:
    September 2, 2007 at 11:32 am

    For me it’s Battlestar Galactica, The Office, Lost, House, and The Venture Brothers.

    My guess is that the only ones people will care about in twenty years are Battlestar Galactica and The Office… maybe The Venture Brothers.

  4. bmarts Says:
    September 2, 2007 at 2:14 pm

    The only ones people will care about in twenty years

    There are still Coach reruns on… just saying, don’t underestimate what people will watch.

  5. brianbunton Says:
    September 3, 2007 at 1:49 pm

    I had Psych and the rest of the NBC Thursday night (My Name Is Earl, Scrubs, and 30 Rock) on my list for a while, but I ended up taking them off. In Psych’s case, it’s tremendously funny, but it’s too formulaic. (We can–and have, I think–get into a whole discussion about whether “formulaic” equals “bad”.) The others just don’t quite break the plane of consistently funny and original. (Can you tell I’m ready for football season?)

  6. bpt2 Says:
    September 3, 2007 at 2:55 pm

    “Consistently funny and original.” Did Brian just sum up college football?

    By the way, the thesaurus on my computer suggested one might consider replacing formulaic with paint-by-number. I thought about taking its advice, but that seemed… well, you get the idea.

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