Fun fact: 11 of last year’s Top 20 Shows aired zero* episodes this year. That thinned out a real strong herd of TV, and to be frank, left us with fewer great shows this year. While this is still a strong group, they aren’t at the same level as last year, where I had a legitimately had a hard time narrowing a huge field to only 20.

*The Affair aired only the first 5 episodes of Season 3 this year, so I decided to push that season as a whole into 2017.

 

Fun twist to start Season 2, then we’re thrown right back into the same witty banter covering up the craziness of their lives. No other show can navigate so deftly between holy-shit real and stressful situations and sarcastic tomfoolery than Catastrophe. The attempts to give interesting (yet brief) storylines to some of the supporting cast felt a bit trite and uninspired, but they still added laughs where needed.

 

While the main appeal of Broad City is still the frenetic energy of the insane misadventures of a couple of young New York ladies, Season 3 tried to venture out a bit more from Abbi and Ilana’s comfort zone to challenge them in new ways. We got to explore Abbi’s past a bit (Tony Danza!!), and Ilana for the first time (in the show) had to deal with relationships she had kind of taken for granted start to break away. While the shenanigans and over-the-top social commentary continued to break ground creatively and have me rolling on the floor, both actresses/writers managed to bring more depth and a wider range of emotion sprinkled through the season, resulting in what I thought was the best season yet. Kudos.

 

Not since American Horror Story have I seen a show so unapologetically wild and insane. Not all of it worked, but even when it didn’t I applauded the effort. Dark, engrossing, and often hilarious, Preacher has a unqiue tone and style which combines sci-fi and pulp. There’s not a lot of optimism to be found, but it’s a hell of a fun ride, especially thanks to Joseph Gilgun (Misfits) as the extremely likable and charismatic vampire sidekick.

 

Casual Season 2 built on the fairly dull base it had constructed last year, and really started digging into the characters in new and interesting ways. The main characters started spending more time outside of their weird family unit and finding fresh storylines to take part in on their own. Alex got to do more than sit around and whine. (He got to go out, make stupid decisions, THEN go home and whine.) Val also got to get out of her shell and have some actual fun for herself. The season really had a nice progression to it, finally finishing with its best episode yet, a delightfully dark and hilarious episode that brought the whole family back together in a wholly unexpected way.

 

A really fascinating documentary about not only the intricacies of the trial and media circus around it, but of the man, and the trajectory that led him to do what he (most likely) did. It also does a fantastic job of weaving in what was going on in the black community and comparing and contrasting to OJ’s life, and finally to where we were as a society when the trial starts. The episode about his Vegas shenanigans after the trial was a bit messier, and could’ve done a better job at painting a picture (as it did so well in the first 4 eps), but overall it was an extremely tight, compelling, and illuminating piece of television.

 

Half of the appeal of this highly addictive series is the totally spot-on 80’s movie vibe of the whole project. Not only are the hair and makeup and costumes and props perfectly designed, but the camera style, credits, music, direction, all recreate with startling authenticity delightfully retro 80’s scifi flicks. The special effects are obviously CGI elements, but are seamlessly integrated in the same style, so you could with some stretch of the imagination believe they were physical effects. While the painstaking detail of the homage shows a lot of love for that specific time and genre, a lot of the tropes from that period are established and subverted. Characters who seem like the same two-dimensional caricatures we’ve seen a hundred times take a sharp turn and become something else. The nagging mom who just “doesn’t get it” is actually really good at listening and being there for her kids. Throw on top of that just a lot of fun and fast-paced sci-fi storytelling with maddeningly irresistible cliffhangers, and a nearly flawless cast, and I’ve got one of the most entertaining (if somewhat fleeting) TV experiences of the year. Watch it.

 

While the first season showed stretches of promise, and was maybe a bit heavy-handed with its feminist presence, season 2 let Peggy just let her awesomeness be the message. Gone are the cartoony macho Mad Men-esque co-workers, and in their place are characters with their own interests and agendas, which rings a lot more believable and compelling. On top of that, the two scary villains were both women and also great. This season’s arc felt tighter and more interesting, and the ensemble really clicked in a way it didn’t quite last year, surrounding a very strong lead. The only quibble I had was the fairly anticlimactic resolution to the season arc, but for me that didn’t take much away from a very enjoyable season, with an incredible and unexpected musical number.

 

Combining the kind of slow-burn tension of a Breaking Bad with the wit and charisma of Tom Hiddleston, and you have an extremely compelling British spy drama. Throw in a layered villain performance from Hugh Laurie, and a brilliant Olivia Colman as a very capable and pregnant investigator and handler, and you’ve got a very unique TV experience. If they had been able to maintain the kind of subtle tension and character interactions from the first 4 eps through to the end, it may well have ended up in my top 3 this year, but a couple missteps made it a little more generic than I was initially hoping for. Hugh Laurie began twirling his mustache, and Tommy Hidds (as I call him), starting making silly mistakes, and a seemingly interesting character ended up not much more than a typical Bond girl. But even in the slightly disappointing final episodes, there were still some genuine thrills, holy-shit moments, and emotional rides I enjoyed taking. It just didn’t quite live up to the promises it had made.

 

How to describe The Night Of? The double-sized premiere and double-sized finale were fantastic, and then they stuffed 6 half-baked episodes in the middle. Oversimplified a bit, but that’s certainly what you’d see in my episode ratings. The opening 2 hours was a dark, compelling journey of a Pakistani-American college student from a working class family on an adventure filled with so much tension and foreboding, but also hope and optimism. Obviously, it doesn’t go well, and then it becomes a deep dive into the seemingly boring minutia of the criminal justice system, a la The Wire. Enter the heroic but laughed at public defender, played marvelously by John Turturro. His character was the one constant draw through a less subtle parade through prison cliches and legal maneuvering that bogged down the middle episodes. I have no idea why Turturro’s character’s battle with eczema was one of the more compelling storylines through that middle arc, but it felt inspired. And the finale managed to really kick the show back in gear and pull together a satisfying ending, even if they kind of did a disservice to one of the more interesting and seemingly capable characters in the process, in order to service the plot. (I docked it a couple points for that, FYI.) Certainly worth a binge, where the middle chapters won’t feel as drawn out as they did week-by-week.

 

Veronica Mars meets Girls? Ugh, I hate it when people do that. But it’s close. Four millennials, led by Alia Shawkat (Arrested Development) try to find an acquaintance of theirs from college who has gone missing in New York City. It’s one part private detective story, one part character study (what is missing in Dory’s life that makes her so invested in this?), one part comedy (her friends are self-involved millennial types.) A very unique blend of styles, sometimes cringe-worthy, sometimes super intense. And Alia is quite impressive in this complex role. Top it off with an intense and shocking finale, and it was one of the bright surprises of the year.