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maxwellyoung

What are the must-see TV series?

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The Wire and Breaking Bad are probably the two greatest shows I have ever seen. The Shield gets a honorable mention as it's uneven but has one of if not the finest ending in television.

 

I could recommend many other shows, of course.

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Unrelated: I'm gonna break the one-per-person rule and also suggest Planet Earth because fuuuuuuuck

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I was avoiding mentioning documentaries, because soooo many to list, and also I have no idea if they count as 'tv series'. I dunno how this topic is supposed to work.

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The Prisoner was shot in Wales, y'all. Anyway, it has one of those Bluray transfers that makes it look like it was shot yesterday.

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Also BBC's Miranda is great.

 

The BBC has a long history of great comedies...right up until the early 2000's, when they've not made something even remotely funny. Miranda is in my opinion another comedy that doesn't even make me smile. 

 

And to counteract the negativity of that comment because I've not seen it mentioned:

 

Star Trek: The Next Generation 

 

Should be a mandatory watch, great show.

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Well, if we're all doing multiple titles (I'll try not to repeat):

 

 

Magnum pi

Fawlty Towers

Red Dwarf 1-6

Filthy, Rich And Catflap

Breaking Bad

Young Ones

South Park

Father Ted

Brass Eye

I'm Alan Partridge season 1

Knowing Me Knowing You With Alan Partridge

Person Of Interest

The Larry Sanders Show

Wonder Showzen

Powerpuff Girls

Firefly

Fringe (especially 1-3, though 4-5 are still strong)

Hancock's Half Hour

League Of Gentlemen

Psychoville

Curb Your Enthusiasm

Battlestar Galactica

Big Train

Frasier

Justified

Batman '66

Batman TAS

Third Rock From The Sun

Impractical Jokers

Adventure Time

West Wing

Flight Of The Conchords

Supernatural 1-5

Black Mirror

Peep Show 1-2

The Smell Of Reeves & Mortimer

Castle

The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy

The Tick (animated)

ER

King Of The Hill

Jackass

The Sarah Silverman Program

 

and, of course, My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic

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When devising a "television canon," how would one handle ridiculous long-runners where a person couldn't possibly be expected to watch or enjoy all of it? Think Saturday Night Live or Sesame Street.

 

I would say by picking out particularly good/influential seasons.

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The BBC has a long history of great comedies...right up until the early 2000's, when they've not made something even remotely funny. Miranda is in my opinion another comedy that doesn't even make me smile. 

 

You are free to maintain a stern look upon your face.

 

I apologise for my statement that BBC's Miranda is great. No show deserves to have greatness thrust upon it; rather a show must exist free to enchant or repulse based on viewer's subjective tastes. Such Fun.

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That said, I was really surprised when Katherine Cross was singing the praises of Media Watch on Twitter, because that is a show that totally does not travel. It is a 15 minute deep dive into the behaviour of journalists in Australia over the past week, its smugness only eclipsed by its precision.

 

That sounds fucking amazing, and I may need to find some episodes of that to watch. Listening to people criticize/analyze journalists is one of my favorite things. I'd say that's why it can travel, there are sadly not many consistent options for that kind of content in the US. On The Media is good, but they aren't always talking about journalists. I used to listen to a regional show out of Boston similar to the one you described, but I ultimately found one of the hosts to be entirely too infuriating to listen to. 

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The entire run of BBC evening news. No episodes are skipable.

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That sounds fucking amazing, and I may need to find some episodes of that to watch. Listening to people criticize/analyze journalists is one of my favorite things. I'd say that's why it can travel, there are sadly not many consistent options for that kind of content in the US. On The Media is good, but they aren't always talking about journalists. I used to listen to a regional show out of Boston similar to the one you described, but I ultimately found one of the hosts to be entirely too infuriating to listen to. 

 

http://www.abc.net.au/mediawatch/video/

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Louie and Last Week Tonight are my favorite shows still in production. For all-time, I'll go with The Twilight Zone for still holding up 50+ years later.

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I'll suggest some less likely ones to crop up.

 

Over the Garden Wall is a really great cartoon of 10 episodes lasting 10 minutes each, so you could also think of it like a heavily sectioned movie. It's got a really strong sense of its overall aesthetic and tone that oozes through the art and writing. It's also really not a dumbed down show, in the sense that they don't feel obligated to lay everything out for you at the start, they just drop you right in and let the show start.

Also it's gorgeous.

 

An entirely different tact, but if you like deconstructing TV writing, then Heroes is wonderful. It has a strong first season, then a second season marred by the writers strike of the time. The second series ended up floundering and meandering a bit, and the show only got worse and more convoluted from there. By the end of it I was fascinated with what would happen next because it was usually holding my interest for the wrong reason. It's not really a so bad it's good show as much as it's so bad it's fascinating. So I think it only counts as must watch if you're a dork like me who constantly thinks about the structure of writing and is willing to sink time on the show (not that you have to pay that much attention).

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An entirely different tact, but if you like deconstructing TV writing, then Heroes is wonderful. It has a strong first season, then a second season marred by the writers strike of the time. The second series ended up floundering and meandering a bit, and the show only got worse and more convoluted from there. By the end of it I was fascinated with what would happen next because it was usually holding my interest for the wrong reason. It's not really a so bad it's good show as much as it's so bad it's fascinating. So I think it only counts as must watch if you're a dork like me who constantly thinks about the structure of writing and is willing to sink time on the show (not that you have to pay that much attention).

That's really interesting. I remember watching the first season practically enthralled (my first ever American drama show of the modern style), then the second season I just couldn't care less about and stopped watching the show pretty fast. I didn't even know it coincided with the writers strike.

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That's really interesting. I remember watching the first season practically enthralled (my first ever American drama show of the modern style), then the second season I just couldn't care less about and stopped watching the show pretty fast. I didn't even know it coincided with the writers strike.

 

Yeah, if I remember right, the season was cut short and they had to rush to finish some storylines without the original writers and the rushed ending really showed.

 

I don't know what their excuse was after that season.

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Fringe (especially 1-3, though 4-5 are still strong)

I don't dislike Fringe by any means, but I am curious as to why you'd qualify it as "Must-see"? I'm only a few episodes into season two, and am enjoying it well enough, but... I dunno?

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