TV Guide learned a long time ago that “List” issues are big sellers. The Top Ten Comedies. The Top Twenty Dramas. The Twenty-Five Best TV Actors. The list goes on, and on, and on, until you’re sure you saw that cover blurb a year or two ago. And maybe you did.
So the latest-greatest is, in honor of the magazine’s 50th Anniversary, a list of the Fifty Greatest Television Shows of All Time — at least as produced and broadcast in the US.
The list (and my inevitable thoughts):
1. Seinfeld (Never have figured out the attraction.)
2. I Love Lucy (This, on the other hand, was a true classic.)
3. The Honeymooners (See #1. Gleason just never did it for me.)
4. All in the Family (Groundbreaking, I guess.)
5. The Sopranos (Any show less than five years old — or even any show still in production — should be excluded from such a list, sez I. That having been said, badda-bing, I’ve enjoyed all two episodes I’ve watched on business trips.)
6. 60 Minutes (Groundbreaking news show. Hell, I remember watching this when I was still living with my parents!)
7. The Late Show with David Letterman (I’d rather give the nod to Johnny (#12). Or even Steve.)
8. The Simpsons (Yup.)
9. The Andy Griffith Show (Never have cared for it.)
10. Saturday Night Live (Certainly wins the “This Show Will Be Cancelled After This Season” Anti-Prediction Award.)
11. The Mary Tyler Moore Show (Triffic stuff.)
12. The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson (Never watched it much, but it was a seminal show in its influence both on talk shows, on comedy, and on late-night TV.)
13. The Dick Van Dyke Show (Probably one of the most brilliant comedies ever.)
14. Hill Street Blues (As a trend-setter for grim-n-gritty, sure.)
15. The Ed Sullivan Show (No comment.)
16. The Carol Burnett Show (Was to the Variety Show what Dick Van Dyke was to the sitcom.)
17. Today Show (No comment.)
18. Cheers (Never much cared for it. The characters spent way too much time being mean to each other.)
19. thirtysomething (No comment.)
20. St. Elsewhere (Was to doctor shows what HSB was to cop shows. Great, great stuff.)
21. Friends (Another show I have never “gotten.”)
22. ER (At least they had the decency to rank it below St. E.)
23. Nightline (No comment.)
24. Law & Order (Entertaining, yes. Long-lived, absolutely. One of the greatest? Feh.)
25. M*A*S*H (The Tragicomedy. Good, solid stuff, even if it got preachy as time went on.)
26. The Twilight Zone (Give me the Outer Limits any day. But I’ll take the nod to sf/fantasy.)
27. Sesame Street (No comment.)
28. The Cosby Show (Entertaining, but I liked Bill on a number of other shows he did a lot better. I, Spy, anyone?)
29. Donahue (No comment, except to note that his successors in the talk show arena make Donahue look like Einstein.)
30. Your Show of Shows (No comment.)
31. The Defenders (No comment.)
32. American Family (No comment.)
33. Playhouse 90 (No comment.)
34. Frasier (See #18.)
35. Roseanne (See #18.)
36. The Fugitive (Probably the best of the QM herd. Great, audience-gripping action, formulaic as all hell, and a marvelous herd of guest stars. This one deserves to rank higher.)
37. The X-Files (Another show I never got into. Given that folks have said it’s sucked for the past few seasons, I’m not sure how it ranks here, except as a cult classic.)
38. The Larry Sanders Show (Funny.)
39. The Rockford Files (I’d prefer Maverick, but they’re basically both the James Garner Show, so I’ll take it. But the greatest?)
40. Gunsmoke (No comment.)
41. Buffy the Vampire Slayer (Damned sight better than a lot of the ones ranked above it.)
42. Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In (Okay.)
43. Bonanza (One of the better westerns, which is not saying much.)
44. The Bob Newhart Show (I can’t believe this one ranks below Cheers, Frazier, Roseanne … It’s another MTM classic.)
45. Twin Peaks (Cult classic. Yawn.)
46. Star Trek: The Next Generation (I’d rate the first three seasons of DS9 as better than any season of TNG … but I’d probably have to rate TOS as the best of the franchise, all told. And Farscape beats any of them, hands down.)
47. Rocky and His Friends (This should be in the Top 20.)
48. Taxi (Another show I never understood. If you want dark, urban comedy, how about Night Court?)
49. The Oprah Winfrey Show (No comment.)
50. Bewitched (What?!)
You can also go vote for the Best Single Series of All Time at the site. Dick Van Dyke got my vote.
Dude, did you ever watch Twin Peaks?? Seminal television, I sez.
And while I agree about Roseanne, Cheers and Frasier…aren’t they, by your definition, at least true to Art Imitates Life? However sad and pathetic that may be…
Cheers and Frasier have never struck me as particularly realistic. You can certainly make more of a case for Roseanne — and, as I consider it, I may have been a bit harsh, since while there was a lot of verbal abuse all around, there was also demonstrable family love, and that was kind of neat.
I watched one episode of Twin Peaks. I had no real desire to watch two.
Roseanne is great, just see the irony in life…
simpsons… same, but greater!
cosby show is irony in a nice jacket.
friends… lettin’ yourself go with real friends 😉
But whatever… life goes on, bad shows don’t.
GRtZzzZ