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101 TV Shows I Have Enjoyed the Most [Part 4 – 55-41] – Blue Towel Productions


In my 50+ years on this mortal coil I have watched a fair share of TV. And thus there have been a lot of shows that I have enjoyed over those years. Now it’s time to countdown the 101 shows I have enjoyed the most.

How do I determine such a thing? Through a series of rigorously logical tests and evaluative rubrics, of course.

No, just kidding. Obviously, it’s all instinct and preference, of course, but also heavily influenced by how recently I have watched a show, how much of it I have actually seen, and how well I remember it. Any genre or style or length is eligible, as long as it’s a scripted television show, and I have seen some of it and enjoyed doing so.

Incidentally, it’s interesting to think of all some of the shows that might have been on this list if I’d done it at various earlier points in my life. Maybe Batman (the live action show from the 60s), maybe the old One Day at a Time, maybe The Smurfs…definitely Super Friends. But none of those shows will make the cut now.

What does make it? Well, read here for Part 1, here for Part 2 and here for Part 3. For Part 4, read on!

55. The Young Ones

(1982-1984, BBC Two)

Some time in the 1980s, my brother was watching something on MTV. I was sitting there as well, doing homework, and not really paying attention to whatever he was watching. The show ended, and out of inertia nobody changed the channel or turned off the set. Then, an episode of something called The Young Ones played. The episode was called “University Challenge,” and it was hilarious. My brother and I just sat there dumbfounded, staring at the TV and laughing our heads off. When it was over, he turned to me and said something like, “Okay, from now on, we need to record that, every week.”

And we did, eventually filling up a VHS tape with hours of the show, each one full of irreverent humor and bizarre asides and non-sequiturs. Ostensibly, the show was about four university students and their misadventures, but really that was just a loose framework to shove four contrasting personality archetypes (a punk, a hippie, a hypocritical activist, and a cool guy) onto a stage together and let them be funny. The show as full of slapstick violence and clever dialogue which always skirted the edges of what was acceptable, and included surreal things like puppeted animals or objects suddenly speaking to the audience.

The series starred Adrian Edmondson, Rik Mayall, Nigel Planer and Christopher Ryan as the four boys. Mayall wrote the series alongside Lise Mayer and Ben Elton. And every episode also starred Alexie Sayle playing a variety of characters (most frequently, the boys’ landlord Jerzei Balowski), who would show up and basically deliver a stand-up routine to the audience. Most episodes also had a musical guest, including bands like Motörhead and Madness.

54. The Prisoner

(1967-1968, ATV [ITV])

The Prisoner was a British science fiction espionage show from the 60s which told the tale of an unnamed spy who had resigned, only to find himself kidnapped and transported to a mysterious community known only as “The Village”, a seemingly idyllic locale where everyone is comfortable and happy, and completely devoid of individuality or free-will. People have numbers instead of names are never allowed to leave. Our hero, labelled Number Six (and played by one of the series’ creators, Patrick McGoohan), struggles to find a way to escape his gilded cage, while his captors do what they can to break his will and get him to reveal his secrets–particularly the key question of why he resigned in the first place.

The show was an exploration of themes such as conformity, paranoia, and individuality, and did everything in an oblique and surreal fashion. It included elements such as the Village’s “guardian”, known as Rover, a large inflated ball which would emerge from the water, roll across the beach or down the street while roaring, and subdue or suffocate anyone who was trying to escape. You can read more about it here.

The Prisoner ended after 17 episodes (which was ten more than McGoohan wanted to do in the first place) in an episode that feels more like a frantic fever dream than an actual story. None of the show’s extensive questions and mysteries were explained in any satisfactory manner, which has led to decades of fan speculation and frustration. Nonetheless, the overall strength of the design and the production, combined with the unique concept and McGoohan’s anchoring performance have all allowed The Prisoner to endure as a classic example of British espionage TV.

53. Mystery Science Theatre 3000

(1989 – 1999 & 2017 – 2018 & 2022 – present, KTMA-TV / The Comedy Channel / Comedy Central / Sci-Fi Channel / Netflix / The Gizmoplex)

There is not another show on this countdown that is anything like Mystery Science Theatre 3000. Created by Joel Hodgson, the premise of the show is that some mad scientists have kidnapped some hapless dude and imprisoned him on a satellite. There they perform experiments on him by forcing him to watch bad (usually science fiction) movies. To keep his sanity, the original victim in this fiendish plot (Joel Robinson, played by Hodgson) built some robot friends (“‘bots”). The majority of most episodes is watching the bad movie that is part of the experiment, and listening to Joel (or his successors) and the Bots making fun of the films. Interspersed before, during and after the movie they or the scientists (the “Mads”) perform skits.

The whole thing is purposely make-shift feeling, like it was done in someone’s garage. The Bots, for example, are obviously cobbled together from fairly ordinary objects, like a lacrosse stick or a gumboil machine. After a number of years, Joel left the show and was replaced by Mike Nelson, played by Mike Nelson (one of the show’s writers). After years of struggling to find a home, MST3K (as it is known) went off the air, but eventually found new life thanks to a number of successful Kickstarter campaigns. Hodgson returned to the show as its driving force, but stayed mostly behind the camera, with new hosts Jonah Heston (Jonah Ray) and Emily Connor (Emily Marsh) taking the starring roles.

It’s actually kind of hard to get through an entire episode of MST3K in one sitting, because most of the episode is just watching an obviously bad movie. But even though they require some perseverance, I still find a lot of joy in the series.

52. The Newsroom

(2012 – 2014, HBO)

The Newsroom was about a fictional CNN-like cable news station and all the inner workings that went on to break the stories. It was written by Aaron Sorkin and was full of all the sorts of things he likes to write, so one might love it or hate it depending on your opinion of his work. For the most part I loved it. There were a variety of interesting characters played by the likes of Olivia Munn, David Harbour, Dev Patel, Alison Pill and Sam Waterston, but the heart of the show was the relationship between conflicted news anchor Will McAvoy (played by Jeff Daniels) and his former girlfriend / new producer MacKenzie McHale (Emily Mortimer). The two had one of my favorite will-they / won’t-they dynamics that I’ve seen on television: when they eventually got together, they just stayed together and stayed pretty happy. One of the cool things about The Newsroom is that it often dealt with real-world news stories, like the taking down of Osama bin Laden or the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. Viewers wouldn’t know what real-life situation the episode would be dealing with until the characters suddenly learned of the situation–only then would the date show up as an on-screen title.

51. Endeavour

(2012 – 2023, ITV)

Endeavour is a prequel to the highly popular Inspector Morse series, based on the stories of author Colin Dexter. Shaun Evans plays the young Endeavour Morse, who begins the show as a disillusioned Detective Constable. He is highly educated and brilliant, which sometimes creates friction with his fellow officers, but often helps him to solve crimes in the university city of Oxford. In addition to the actual mysteries, a focus for the series is the relationship between Morse and his senior officer, Detective Inspector Fred Thursday (played by Roger Allan). At times, the two men are almost like father and son, but over the series there is mounting strain in their relationship, which parallels Morse’s increasing cynicism and dependency on alcohol. Ultimately the show has a bit of a tragic air, as Endeavour must inevitably become the jaded and lonely detective we see in the original series.

50. Andor

(2022 – present, Disney+)

In a world of mediocre live-action Star Wars series (yes, even The Mandalorian), along came Andor, blowing away all our expectations by delivering a mature, intelligent science fiction set a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, even if it sounds like a story about the meeting of two conjunctions coming together as never before. Cassian Andor himself is a character that I had no particular interest in revisiting, but the show rises above my disinterest and puts the character at the heart of a fascinating and gritty tale about life under the cruel fist of the Empire, and the challenges of guiding a nascent rebellion. Diego Luna is fine as Andor, but the real acting trophy probably goes to Stellan Skarsgård as a rebel leader more committed to his cause than his people.

Also, Andy Serkis is really good as a fellow prisoner of. Andor’s during an extremely good prison break story arc. So far, we’ve had the first of two proposed seasons, and I’m looking forward to the second, hoping they can maintain the high bar of quality that we’ve had so far, and deliver a satisfying conclusion to the series’ story.

49. Chernobyl

(2019, HBO)

Chernobyl was the 5 episode miniseries about the nuclear disaster in the infamous Russian city in 1986, which brought to life in painful intensity just how terrible the crisis was and how much worse it could have been if things had gone differently. It’s not fully historically accurate, but is still truthful enough to be shocking, with powerful writing and editing that makes for an incredibly stressful viewing experience. It’s the second show in a row on this countdown to feature Stellan Skarsgård as the second lead–in this case, he’s the government official in charge of the response to the disaster, and is just one of many figures whose stories are told. It’s a bleak and challenging series about people whose fates are pretty sealed once they even show up to help with the clean-up, but it’s absolutely compelling.

48. Babylon 5

(1993 – 1998, PTEN / TNT)

In 1993, science fiction TV was limited mainly to Star Trek, and so Babylon 5 was interesting as just something different, with a new and unique interstellar landscape. The show was about a space station which was intended to be a bridge between major space-facing civilisations–a place to allow trade, diplomacy and cooperation. As the show progresses, it also becomes a battle ground for various forces, ancient and modern, looking to assert control over the galaxy. Nearly unique in science fiction TV at the time, the whole thing was conceived of as a five chapter novel, set to run over five seasons, with characters and situations that constantly evolved and a story which had a preconceived beginning, middle and end.

That plan had to adjust quite a bit due to changing cast members and situations, but to the credit of creator J. Michael Straczynski, the series manage to continually adjust to keep on track, even if it did struggle at times. Straczynski wrote 92 out of the show’s 110 episodes, including the entirety of the third and fourth seasons, so it was all obviously a major passion project for him. Often the show’s storytelling was clunky, especially in the early years, with wooden direction and stilted dialogue. But there was something about the pacing and plotting that was absolutely compelling, and by the third season it had all paid off brilliantly and was something you just had to keep watching.

The series originally starred Michale O’Hare, but after a season he was replaced by Bruce Boxleitner. There were a number of good actors who featured with him, but the most interesting presences were Andreas Katsulas and Peter Jurasik as two of the station’s alien ambassadors. Both managed to create fully compelling characters, even under layers of sci-fi makeup.

47. Hill Street Blues

(1981 – 1987, NBC)

Further up this countdown, we had St. Elsewhere–a show that we probably could not have had if not for the critical success of Hill Street Blues. The same goes for ER, LA Law, NYPD Blue, or any other primetime drama show featuring a large ensemble cast, overlapping storylines, and a mix of procedural and emotionally-intense character-driven plots. Hill Street Blues was about a fictional inner city police office in an unnamed city, and the many struggles that the officers had to address the crime and social problems in there. The series starred Daniel J. Travanti as the station captain, but he was surrounded by a whole bunch of memorable character actors, including Michael Conrad, Betty Thomas, Charles Haid, Michael Warren and Bruce Weitz.

46. Star Trek: Strange New Worlds

(2022 – present, Paramount+)

Strange New Worlds is the highest “modern” Star Trek series on this countdown, and easily my favorite show from this era. Strange New Worlds is a direct spin-off of season 2 of Star Trek Discovery, which included re-cast versions of Original Series characters Spock, Number One and Captain Christopher Pike. With Strange New Worlds, we now get to see these characters having their own adventures on the USS Enterprise, some years prior the five year mission under the command of James Kirk.

Anson Mount stars as Pike, and he does an excellent job bringing one of the more deliberative and balanced commanding officers of the franchise to life. Ethan Peck is the iconic Mr. Spock, and whilst he is obviously different than Leonard Nimoy, he makes for a compelling character. They are joined by new versions of people like Christine Chapel and Uhura, and a bunch of new characters.

What makes the show stand out against the rest of modern Star Trek is its ability to tell complete single-episode stories. This is the only one of these recent live action Star Trek shows that doesn’t try to make one giant movie and split it into weekly instalments. Instead, it brings us back to the show’s roots by being actually about the voyagers of a Starfleet vessel and her crew, with its mission of of exploration, diplomacy and defence. It’s the return to form that the franchise desperately needed, and I’m looking forward to seeing it continue.

45. Only Murders in the Building

(2021-present, Hulu)

Only Murders in the Building is a comedic mystery-drama from Steve Martin and John Hoffman, starring Martin alongside Martin Short and Selena Gomez. The show is about three tenants of the same apartment building in New York City where a shocking murder is committed. They all get involved in investigating the crime, as well as recording a true crime podcast about their adventures. There are many twists and turns throughout the series about the crime, but what keeps it entertaining is the dynamics between the three lead characters (a retired TV star, a struggling former Broadway director, and a young artist) and they way they both work together and clash throughout the story.

The show has had three follow-up seasons so far, each of which focuses around another murder, each of which takes place, as the title says, in the same building. The payoffs to the mysteries are not always the most interesting, but the show itself has remained consistently fun.

44. Firefly

(2002, Fox)

Firefly is a show that a lot of people have been talking about for a long time, but I only actually took the time to watch it just recently. It’s a space-opera / Western action-adventure series headlined by Nathan Fillion, and created by future Avengers-director Joss Whedon. The show is smart and stylish and full of really good character dynamics–even with 9 main characters, the show found ways to develop each of them meaningfully in nearly every episode. In addition to Fillion, the cast included some interesting personalities, such as Ron Glass, Alan Tudyk, Jewel Staite and Adam Baldwin.

And with all this, let me just add my voice to the chorus of many who lament the show’s abrupt cancellation–only 14 episodes were produced, but the seeds for a much longer story were obviously there. They got the chance to wrap things up in a feature film that was produced a little later, Serenity. I actually saw it years ago, long before watching the series, which produced a predictably strange experience. I haven’t rewatched it since viewing the show, so I guess I ought to do that at some point.

Oh, Firefly also contains one of the best opening theme tunes that I’ve ever heard for a science fiction series–“The Ballad of Serenity”, written by Whedon and performed by Sonny Rhodes.

43. Red Dwarf

(1988 – 1999 & intermittently from 2009 – 2020, BBC Two / Dave)

Red Dwarf is a science fiction comedy built on a really creative concept: an accident kills everyone on a mining spaceship, with the only human survivor being an uncultured slacker who was trapped in suspended animation at the time. A trillion years later, he is revived, lost in deep space on the large and now deserted ship. His only companions are his obnoxious and obsequious shipmate and a creature who has evolved into a humanoid from a pregnant cat that he used to own, along with a senile shipboard computer. Later, an android named Kryten joins their crew, and together this group get involved with all manner of far-out (and sometimes disgusting) situations. There adventures were always funny, but were often built on legitimately interesting science fiction ideas–and so we’d get cool tales about the group moving through time backwards, or trapped in virtual reality, or facing eternal judgment from avatars pulled from their own subconscious. This made the show surprising and fun.

The first six seasons of Red Dwarf Fran from 1988-1993, and this is the period of the show that I really liked. There were a couple more series in 1997 and 1999 which I saw but did not like as much, and then another revival starting in 2009, most of which I have not seen.

42. Lost in Space

(2018-2021, Netflix)

I have a fair amount of respect for the 1960s Lost in Space as a pioneering and influential piece of science fiction television, but I never really enjoyed it. I did enjoy the Netflix revival from 2018, though. It’s a three season family-friendly science fiction adventure about the struggles of the Robinson family as they participate in a massive mission to find a new home for the human race after the earth has been devastated by a global catastrophe.

The show has an engaging plot, good special effects and strong characterisation amongst its leads, successfully modernising the core concept without sacrificing the show’s commitment to the idea of family, something we don’t often see so strongly in space opera shows like this. It therefore became a show that my whole family could enjoy together, even the ones who are less likely to automatically gravitate toward science fiction.

My personal favorite characters is the father, John Robinson, played by Toby Stephens–he’s a tough guy (when his son finds out someone attacked him with a crowbar, he asks his dad if the other guy is all right) who is growing as a husband and a father while he attempts to keep his family alive. But the real breakout character of the show is Dr. Smith. She’s played by Parker Posey, and is the revival’s strongest innovation over the original–a conniving figure who is sympathetic even as she is capable of great selfishness, whose moral journey is as much a part of the show as anything else.

Also, there is a really cool new version of the show’s famous Robot! Let’s not forget that!

41. Get Smart

(1965-1970, NBC / CBS)

In the 1960s, high-tech spies and espionage were all the thing, and in the midst of all the serious spy stories and the light-hearted spy stories, there was Get Smart, which was just straight-up comedy and satire. Don Adams was perfectly cast as Maxwell Smart, aka Agent 86, the lead character who was sometimes cunning, always brave, and frequently idiotic lead agent working to stop the insidious forces of KAOS. He was ably supported by Barbara Feldon as Agent 99 (whom he eventually married) and Edward Platt as the Chief–Max’s long-suffering boss.

The show was full of just so many clever gimmicks, many of which became recurring bits. Max regularly communicated on his shoe-phone (an even more far-out idea back in the days of only landlines), he would insist on the ever-malfunctioning Cone of Silence whenever there was something confidential to discuss, and his apartment was full of innumerable traps and hidden weapons.

It was all pretty slapstick, but also awesome.

Onward to Part 5!



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