"Great TV comes in all shapes and sizes." That's become my motto over the course of this year, and something I want people to remember when they find themselves pre-judging a show based on some arbitrary standard. We're increasingly moving away from the idea that every good drama has to be an antihero show in the vein of The Sopranos and every comedy has to be something fast-paced and single-camera like Arrested Development. Now, we're living in an age where the best new series of the fall is a CW show based on a telenovela (watch Jane the Virgin, people!) and one of the best comedies of the year is a charming little Australian show that airs on a network called Pivot (watch Please Like Me, people!). Say it with me now: Great TV comes in all shapes and sizes!
2014 was not quite as good of a year for television as 2013, which I consider the best year of TV since I started following the medium closely. Last year featured a breadth of terrific new shows, but some of them faltered a little bit in 2014 (Masters of Sex, Orphan Black). Even still, there are so many great shows popping up out of new places. For example, this year saw Amazon solidify themselves as serious content creators with Transparent, Jill Soloway's shaggy, intimate tale about family and identity. As a result of this continued expansion of the medium, I watched more television than ever this year -- the number of shows I followed completely in 2014 was a whopping 104.
There was quite a bit of turnover between my list last year and the one this year, with 14 of the shows that appeared on 2013's list being absent on this one. Even what I consider to be some of my favorite shows are missing. Game of Thrones had a fourth season that had some astonishing individual moments, but the show as a whole feels like it's increasingly spinning off its axis. For every time Girls was brilliant in season three, it was just as maddening a scene or two later. Orphan Black was fun and exciting while it was airing, but a bit of a mess when viewed in hindsight. Justified had a chance to go down as one of my favorite dramas of this generation -- and it still does, if it sticks the landing -- but it's hard to see this year as anything other than a misstep for the show. And I've thoroughly enjoyed the final season of Parenthood, but NBC chose not to air the entire run in 2014, so the material that would've likely pushed it in to the top 20 won't appear until next year.
Another trend I noticed is that this year was a better year for comedy than last year, if my lists are anything to go by. Last year only featured two pure comedies, while this year has triple the amount at six. So don't let anybody tell you that TV isn't cyclical.
The rules: Shows are considered for this list based on the episodes that they aired in 2014. This is a pretty plain and simple rule for cable dramas, where full seasons usually air within a single calendar year. However, it gets slightly messy when considering network shows, which usually air the first half of their season in the fall and the second half starting January of the next year. So something like, say, Brooklyn Nine-Nine would be judged based on the second half of its first season (which aired at the beginning of the year) and the first half of its second season (which started in the fall of this year). As for what constitutes a TV show, anything that airs on, you know, a TV station counts. But shows that air exclusively on Netflix, Hulu, or Amazon count too. Unfortunately, "web series" don't qualify (but watch Jules and Monty anyway, because it's great), even though that distinction is becoming harder and harder to make. Okay, everything clear now? Good, let's get this list started...
Another trend I noticed is that this year was a better year for comedy than last year, if my lists are anything to go by. Last year only featured two pure comedies, while this year has triple the amount at six. So don't let anybody tell you that TV isn't cyclical.
The rules: Shows are considered for this list based on the episodes that they aired in 2014. This is a pretty plain and simple rule for cable dramas, where full seasons usually air within a single calendar year. However, it gets slightly messy when considering network shows, which usually air the first half of their season in the fall and the second half starting January of the next year. So something like, say, Brooklyn Nine-Nine would be judged based on the second half of its first season (which aired at the beginning of the year) and the first half of its second season (which started in the fall of this year). As for what constitutes a TV show, anything that airs on, you know, a TV station counts. But shows that air exclusively on Netflix, Hulu, or Amazon count too. Unfortunately, "web series" don't qualify (but watch Jules and Monty anyway, because it's great), even though that distinction is becoming harder and harder to make. Okay, everything clear now? Good, let's get this list started...
