the five best american television shows ever

The Simpsons, Saturday Night Live, South Park, Twin Peaks, The Jeffersons. Words cannot express how upset I am that The Cosby Show and What's Happening!!! aren't on this list.

top 5 = dem simpsoids, hill street blues, twin peaks, st elsewhere and the flintstones

Jennifer Aniston: So, you're going to meet up with Ross, huh? Are you going to wear that top?
Reese Witherspoon: Yeah, isn't it cute?
JA: Well... it's kind of slutty.
RW: *frowning* I got it from your closet.
JA: *tries to cover with a bright smile* Well, I'm a slut.
RW: *giggly and conspiratorially* Me too!
*JA joins in with fake giggling, but is obviously DISMAYED that her sister plans to fling the nappy dugout at a man she still has feelings for*

I suspect it translates much better on the screen. (Hence the inclusion of comedy phrase "nappy dugout".)

'At that moment I looked at my Dad and realised I'd never feel the same way about milk/cosmetics/enemas...' and so on.

Also Frasier. Actually, I really do like Frasier. How embarrassing. What about ALF, and Little Wonder? And Perfect Strangers? And Degrassi Junior High. No, wait, the last one's Canadian.

I'm rather amazed that no-one else has mentioned it thus far.

Manimal: Classic or Dud?

My favourites, the ones I have watched religiously, are M*A*S*H, Dallas, Twin Peaks, Anne of Green Gables and its sequel (but not the dodgy third one where she becomes a WW1 secret agent, which is utter pants) and oh, go on then, the Simpsons.

I was trying to think of good American documentaries that have been shown in the UK and the only ones I can come up with are the one on the Civil war and (I think) one on slavery made by the same team. From what I see on cable TV, the majority of US made documentaries seem to be very high level and showbiz gossipy - is this a true picture, or are we just being sent a load of rotten stuff to fill up our schedules?

2/Larry Sanders Show

3/Cheers

4/The A-Team

5/The Critic

6/Oz

7/Freaks and Geeks

8/Angel

9/Seinfeld

10/My so-called life

I went to college with a girl who'd been one of the Walnut Grove kids on Little House; she went on to scale the heights of cinema glory as the lead in LAMBADA: The Movie.

1. Futurama
2. Babylon 5
3. the simpsons (it seems thats the most popular show ever! So many votes)
4. the Goodies
5. the Young ones (jesus ppl ;P)

Delete the last 2 and add:

4.Frasier
5. CSI

1. curb your enthusiasm
2. freaks & geeks
3. seinfeld
4. twin peaks
5. columbo

― cºzen (Cozen), Thursday, 23 December 2004 13:41 (4 years ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink
6. larry sanders
7. oz
8. CSI
9. beavis & butthead
10. pete & pete

― cºzen (Cozen), Thursday, 23 December 2004 13:49 (4 years ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

imagine this list looks different now

in no particular order:

seinfeld
twin peaks
the wire
sopranos
arrested development.

NYPD Blue
The Sopranos
The Dick Van Dyke Show
The Mary Tyler Moore Show
NewsRadio

The Simpsons!

Letterman.

seinfeld, twin peaks, the honeymooners, star trek the original series, three's company

fuck i forgot freaks & geeks.

simpsons, sopranos, freaks and geeks, soul train (lol youtube), weeds

i haven't seen any twin peaks.

i haven't seen sopranos or weeds :(

mystery science theater 3000
my so-called life
buffy
sopranos
homicide

xxpost, thank you for reminding me. The New Dance Show (thanks youtube) should be on this thread.

Otherwise the wire, classic simpsons, and arrested development. A few years ago I'd have said Mr. Show, but nah.

weeds is pretty funny, esp. last season. it reminds me of arrested development but it's funnier and cheesier. i could see people on here not loving it.

i just added weeds to my netflix dealie. people have been telling me to see that for years.

season 4 > season 1 > season 2 > season 3 imo, something like that.

but u should probably watch it in order, it's pretty continuous

Where in god's name is Once Upon A Hamster in this thread?

Arrested Development
Sopranos
Simpsons (first decade or so)
Larry Sanders Show
Dr. Katz, Professional Therapist

Soap, The Days and Nights of Molly Dodd, Mr. Bean, Sopranos, Mad Men.

Bean's not American, so let's say...I Love Lucy.

Weeds, Arrested Development, Twin Peaks, 90210/Beverly Hills 90210, Golden Girls

oh, and Curb Your Enthusiasm (and Are You Afraid of the Dark? and My So-Called Life and Real World and whoa)

A few years ago I'd have said Mr. Show, but nah.

If any American sketch show qualifies, it's definitely Mr. Show. It'd be on my list.

Molly Dodd

Nice.

1. Swat Kats: A Radical Squadron (such cool artwork and action/characters are pretty alright)
2. House
3. How I Met Your Mother (get on the bandwagon seriously)
4. The Office
5. Pete and Pete

1. sopranos
2. cye
3. seinfeld
4. wire
5. simpsons

(6. twin peaks)

hoping 6ft under/ entourage/ homicide/ the corner (all asyet unseen) will get up there too

ctrl-f lost and nothing
wtf

any real answer to this question would actually be pretty boring

also nobody loves deadwood? that would be my number one.

pete & pete, while a fine thing to watch once in a while, is hardly one of the greatest american television shows.

swat kats, on the other hand, i'd be interested in discussing further.

decided to try to explain my picks rather than just list them:

america's funniest home videos: specifically the tom bergeron-hosted seasons when the show went just by AFV and they scraped the model home living room set and replaced it with this ultracheap minimilist king world warehouse set. the audience sat on these seats made of pipes and aluminum siding and the stage was some the future is now platform with giant video screens. that version had fewer "babies and puppies are cuet" segments and more football-in-groin montages. it was also darker like the hilarious clip where a little girl sobs as her pinata is clubed and mauled by her party guests. and not even the cleverest fraiser writer could come up with something as funny as a fat women falling asleep with her head stuck in the refrigerator

arthur: somehow made moralistic bougie-utopianism and a queasy hatred of modernity charming. probably because during the run of classic seasons it had like two writers and they knew the characters well enough to make william carlos williams-referencing dream sequences feel real instead of winking and cheap. would kill for a proper dvd release

home movies: not going to elaborate or justify if you hate this show then watch the episode "wizard's baker" it will make you laugh and it will make you think. it will make you think that collecting samurai swords is retarded but hilarious and also expensive

once and again: yah okay this show was emo and superdramatic and each season there would be some never-before-seen retarded aunt that needed an emergency abortion the corrupt state senator didn't want her to have but it was still real as fuck. basically the best cast and set-decorated show in history imo so even when it was some episode teaching you not to hate black ppl even if they sold yr stepbrother the crack that got him kicked off the baseball team in into a coma the interactions between the characters were unerringly true

veronica mars: but really only the first season which is one of the all time greats. best use of tv as a serialized medium not because of some bullshit "oh that seemingly unimportant guy in episode two turned out to be vital to the mystery don't u seeee??" but because every episode enriched the show's world. even the ones that didn't directly advance the larger plot.

the way it's phrased, I feel like I should be more objective, but I'm not a TV historian. If I was, I guess I would probably choose a lot of old influential variety shows or whatever.

The Simpsons: Haven't been a fan since probably season 8 or so, but the show was and still is a cultural phenomenon. This show is going to be like the Three Stooges of our era. I feel pretty confident that people will still be watching and quoting from this show when I'm a senior.

The Wire: Other cop shows, a genre i've always been a huge fan of, just seem to me now like they were leading up to The Wire. This show seems more like a long form mini-series to me. It was so focused... there wasn't a single episode that felt like filler.

The Sopranos: I wasn't going to put two HBO shows on here, but fuck it... The Sopranos made HBO original series mainstream, and no other show I can think of creates and maintains such vivid and real characters, or such a sense of place and time, so successfully, and for so many years. It wasn't perfect by any means, but it's one of those rare shows that makes me feel like I lived it.

Seinfeld: I'd much rather watch Curb than Seinfeld these days, but Seinfeld did it first, and had broader appeal. I never go out of my way to watch it, but when I happen to catch it, I almost always have a belly laugh. Even with all the prime-time sitcoms that tried to be Seinfeld, it's pretty clear to me that the networks never really got what made Seinfeld so great. They tried to de-fang it, make it less misanthropic or whatever, and we got "Friends".

Tie: Star Trek & Star Trek TNG. Space ship full of interesting characters cruising through space getting into all sorts of trouble. This show didn't just create a template for sci-fi TV shows, it is ingrained in American culture like no other TV show I can think of save The Simpsons.

Other shows i considered because they are personal favorites:

Cheers: C'mon... unfuckwithable.

Freaks & Geeks: Well, you know.

Curb Your Enthusiasm
In Living Color
The Addams Family
The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour
M*A*S*H
Quantum Leap
Arrested Development
Miami Vice
All in the Family
Sanford & Son
SCTV

Feel kind of like I shouldn't have used Friends as a direct example there. I guess it's probably one of the most successful shows financially speaking, but I always thought it was a pile of shit that totally ripped Seinfeld's format. It was like the Foo Fighters to Nirvana or something.

was gonna say no veronica mars love but then lamp brought it : )

Homicide
Oz
Star Trek (60s)
Outer Limits (60s)
Millennium (second season in particular)

Seperate List for cartoons:

Batman (90s)
Daria
Kim Possible
Downtown
Futurama

Wonder Showzen
Mad Men

Generic Joke List (chronological)

1) snow
2) Native American on test pattern
3) Vietnam War
4) 80s sit-com written by coked-up assholes (alt. title: snow)
5) prime-time Leno

The Shield

god bless u adam

Battlestar Galactica
Arrested Development
Firefly (probably not that great objectively but I love it anyway.)

I feel like I can't list a show unless I've seen and thoroughly enjoyed all available episodes, so maybe in a few months I would add The Wire since I just started watching it and really like it so far. I would say The Office since I like it a lot now, but as with so many other comedies, I might end up being really annoyed with it in a few years (see also Seinfeld, Cheers - I loved them at the time and find them unwatchable now).

Oh, maybe Barney Miller. I still like that show a lot.

Another vote for:

My So-Called Life

Nothing else springs to mind right now.

MASH
Soap
Lou Grant
The Larry Sanders Show
Seinfeld

oh boy i got it's always sunny and AD on dvd for xmas :)

MASH
The State
Seinfeld
The Sopranos
The X Files

oh fuck it, this thread is stupid

Like that's a reason not to do it.