Friday, 3 August 2007
It seems that every year there are more and more tv shows coming out, and with them, sadly, more and more reality shows. So in order to help you sort the wheat from the chaff, and in order to properly recognise the good work of those shows that have really stood out, I will now rank the top 10 tv shows from this past year. Feel free to leave feedback or disagreements.
10.Grey's Anatomy- Obvious inspiration from scrubs aside, 'A show written by women for women', would be my main complaint with this medical show. It can be fun to watch, and it's certainly better than most shows out there but really half the time the medical setting is redundant, you might as well call it 'desperate medical practitioners'. Nevertheless a good tv show which happens to be blessed with the finest soundtrack since the golden days of scrubs.
9. Robot Chicken- What would happen if Seth Green and his friends (with guest appearances from other comedians such as seth mcfarlane) smoked a lot of weed and then hammered out the most random thing that came to mind? this show is the answer, and even though there is a lot of mediocrity between the 'shock' sketches and the genuinely brilliant comedy ones, even that is somehow addicting to watch.
8. Law and Order- Still the best crime series on tv after 17 years, we all miss Brisco but he has been ably replaced. So long as the writing stays this brilliant there is no reason to stop. long live law and order!
7. House- 'written by men for women who like abusive men' this is a very good show, if a little silly. What really makes this such a superb series is the top notch performance of star hugh laurie, who has come a long way from his blackadder days and shown how versatile he truly is. I had the pleasure of acting with his son at Eton and i can tell you there's a natural ease which runs through the family. How many americans even know hes british?
6. Scrubs- the glory days may be a thing of the past but that doesnt mean you can stop watching, particularly in the latter half of this season where the drama picked up again. The highlight this year was undoubtedly the musical episode. Next year is the final season ever so lets all tune in and give our old friends the send off they deserve.
5. Family Guy- the heir to the simpsons throne of cartoon kings, mostly because its so similar to the simpsons except with added edginess that audiences these days lap up. It should come as the highest honor that after years of copying bits from the simpsons, the simpsons have started to take ideas from family guy now.
4. Heroes- Without a doubt the best new show this year, and an unexpected hit. Many reckon this is the best there is right now, even exceeding Lost for the prize of best drama on tv, i'll come back to that.
3. Lost- still the daddy. people who prefer heroes tend to do so by criticising lost's tendency to involve long unresolving twisted storylines rather than short episodic dilemmas that only takes heroes a few episodes to complete as opposed to seasons like lost. However this is one of the very reasons we love lost so much, and is why its still the best, for those with a long enough attention span to enjoy it.
2. Life on Mars- The only bad thing about this show is that it is british, and therefore doomed to end after only 16 episodes. However for the same reason the upcoming AMerican version will never ever be as good. Top acting, top writing, amazing soundtrack and direction, this is the best british show since fawlty towers and truly mesmerising as both a cop show and a sci fi show.
1. Arrested Development- Technically not a show from this past year, but since theyre only showing it in england now, where it first came to my attention, I will allow it. This is one of the greatest shows ever written for a variety of reasons, and probably even surpasses the glory days of old scrubs. Sadly it is equally underappreciated as scrubs was, mostly due to two reasons, the inability of americans to stick with a tv show that requires time and attention to fully appreciate, and the tendency of british people (mostly the networks) to just follow america and watch whatever they like to watch. This show is now cancelled but at least we can always look back at 3 seasons where every episode is perfect.
