This is the first end-of-year list I’m writing for 2023, and thus it’s the first time that I get to mention that I spent six months this year on the picket lines with the WGA and SAG. Six months of listening to horror story after horror story about writers being fucked out of a fair wage and treated like dirt for their hard work, all of which affected my relationships with the media I consumed in 2023. Case in point: It was hard for me to give a shit about TV this year.

Truth be told, I had that sense before the strikes even started, and I don’t know what’s changing in me. Maybe the streaming model’s finally taken its toll, or maybe I’m digging movies more these days, or maybe my tastes are evolving away from much of what TV’s doing at the moment. I don’t know. But I just wasn’t into it this year, and then the strikes happened, and it was hard to see the message beyond the medium.

But then that thing happens that happens every year. I’m down on X MEDIUM, and then I make the lists, and suddenly I remember, “Oh yeah, X MEDIUM was actually pretty fantastic.”

I may have a raw seething hatred for massive entertainment conglomerates, one that already existed before the strikes. But I have to remember that TV shows are still made by incredible artists who kick ass, and they spent a lot of time making incredible original TV this year. In fact, I’m particularly happy I can put a special emphasis on “original” this year because the majority of this list consists of brand new shows I’ve never gotten to talk about before. There’s a lot to be negative about, but you gotta love that.

HEAVY SPOILERS BELOW!!!

Runners-Up: A Bunch of Shows I Loved That Ended This Year That I Want to Say Goodbye To

If this was my usual de facto number 11 spot, AKA the part I use to show some love to the last show I cut from the main list, that pick would be I’m a Virgo. A lot of critics and outlets have sung its praises at this point, and though I’m not sure how I feel about a lot of the plotting and there’s the not insignificant issue of Boots Riley being a tankie, I largely join that chorus for the same reasons. (By the way, I can’t wait for the film/TV world to discover that Boots Riley is a tankie, a subject that hip hop fans are already familiar with.)

However, a lot of shows I care about ended this year, and since a lot of these shows didn’t wind up on this year’s list, I wanted to give them a little bit of what they’re due. So let’s anthropomorphize them for some reason and say goodbye.

So long, Archer. You were probably the last show I actually fan boyed. I discovered you the summer before I went off to college, and I was obsessed with you for your first handful of seasons. (I even spent a lot of time ripping you off in my first screenwriting class.) You lasted much longer than I ever thought you would, and you had some quality dips over the years. But even at your worst, you were still pretty damn enjoyable, and you were a nice little constant over the years. Thank you for all the laughs.

So long, Barry. A lot of people in my circle didn’t like your final season. I strongly disagree with them, and I’ll more than likely regret not having you on the main list. But divisive final season aside, there was nothing else like you. A surrealist showbiz satire that focuses less on the shallowness of the industry and more on the broken core of the worst kinds of people who pursue fame and acceptance within it. How it turns people into monsters, or in some cases, how it turns monsters into worse monsters. Moreover, you had great critiques on the worship of anti-heroes, some of the weirdest action TV has ever offered, and you gave us NoHo Hank. So thank you for that.

So long, How To with John Wilson. I’m also going to regret not putting you on the list. Your last season was, in a lot of ways, your most emotionally poignant, surreal, and even by your standards, experimental. Trying to explain you to others was frequently difficult. And yet, every time I did so, I made you a new fan. There was truly nothing else like you and I’m going to miss having you around.

So long, Sex Education. I’m not going to lie, your last season was a little rough. It wasn’t really your fault, as during your previous three seasons, you’ve created countless new stars with your cast and it was a miracle that you could gather any of them long enough to make a season of television in the first place. (I also don’t know if this was related, but a bizarrely high number of said cast was in Barbie.) And even though your final season was rough, I still quite liked most of it! Particularly, Eric’s journey with his relationship to the church, a storyline I should’ve hated due to the obnoxious teen atheist in me that I don’t think I’ll ever fully be able to get rid of. On top of that, even though your ending was the weakest of the triumvirate of coming-of-age shows that defined the late 2010s (which includes you, PEN15, and another show I’m about to talk about), you’re still my favorite of the bunch. I’ll see you come my inevitable rewatch.

Alright, proper list time!

10. Never Have I Ever

In hindsight, it should’ve been obvious that Devi wasn’t going to get into the majority of the schools she’d spent the previous seasons of the show dreaming of attending. The creative minds of the show probably knew that it would be supremely unsatisfying for her to not get into at least one, but they did an expert job of making us sweat. Not only did she get waitlisted at Princeton, but she also nearly alienated the school rep who came to her school, one of her best friends got in on early acceptance, and we had to watch her struggle with the idea that maybe she wouldn’t get in at all.

This particular storyline spoke to me this year because for the first time, I advanced in a major screenwriting competition.

I submitted this psychological thriller I had written to the Big Break Competition on a whim, and at some point in August, having forgotten about it completely, I got an email saying that I advanced to the quarter-finals. This was the first tangible thing that’s ever happened to me as far as success in screenwriting is concerned, and I was able to remain cool about it for a least a week.

Then I started freaking out. What does it mean? How should I feel? What if I don’t advance? Am I actually talented?

Eventually, I didn’t advance, and it took me a while to find some sort of peace with that. But the existential meltdown was real, and I thought about the end of the season a lot in the hours and days that came after that rejection. The way Devi had to find some sort of peace with the idea of not getting into the school of her dreams. Of course, she had a better fate than I did, but I also feel that if things had gone the other way for her, then she could’ve handled it.

There was, of course, a lot else going on with the season beyond that. Devi finally having to leave her friends and family behind. Paxton finding a path for himself that actually may lead to some sense of fulfillment. The idea that your sense of drive and workaholism might lead to your downfall and your destruction. Take all those together and I think this was the strongest season of the show since its first.

However, despite me being as far from a teenage Indian girl as humanly possible, it was probably the most I saw myself in a show this year, even if it wasn’t for the best of reasons. Comfort shows. Sometimes they are what they say they are.

Favorite Episodes: “…wrecked my future,” “…been to New Jersey,” “…said goodbye”

9. Beef

Maybe I spoke a little too soon when I said Never Have I Ever is the most I felt seen by a TV show this year.

Again, not in a literal sense. The only two things I share in common with Danny and Amy is that I live in Los Angeles and I’m also a millennial. (I think Amy and Danny are supposed to be a few years older than I am, as I’m closer to 30 than 40, but I’m willing to call it close enough.) We share some of the same cultural memory, and we’re both deeply unsatisfied.

Danny’s unsatisfied because he still has to struggle. Because he’s perceived as a fuck-up and a loser who rarely receives any reward, financial or otherwise, from his work as a carpenter. Amy is unsatisfied because she has everything that you’re supposed to want, and yet, none of it makes her happy. Either way, both struggle under the weight of the American Dream and the things they’re conditioned to want. There’s no joy in seeking it, and there’s no joy in finally attaining it.

I spent six months on a picket line. You know where this is going.

That said, let’s talk about what’s really important: Intentionally shitty needle drops.

There was a period where I was being driven to school every day and I had to listen to the radio. I’ve never been alive during a period where radio was allowed to play interesting music or break new artists, so I distinctly remember many a morning and afternoon commute being forced to endure Hoobastank’s “The Reason” over and over again. When Danny pees all over Amy’s bathroom and the song plays while she’s chasing him, I knew exactly what it meant.

A similar point can be said about pretty much every one of the show’s licensed songs, be it “Drive” by Incubus or “Fly” by Sugar Ray or “Somewhere Only We Know” by Keane. (Confession: I actually like the third one.) All you’d need to do is swap out the general time frame. Some of them, like “The Reason,” were late middle school tracks. Some of them were earlier. Whatever the case may be, most of the songs the show deploys are terrible and perfect. Songs that wield a weird nostalgia, but not for the songs themselves, but where you were when you were listening to them, at least if you’re my age.

They’re songs from better times when the weight of the world wasn’t on our shoulders and we were less affected by the obvious horribleness of everything around us. A feeling Beef taps into maybe a little too well if you’re a fellow millennial.

Favorite Episodes: “Just Not All at the Same Time,” “I Am a Cage,” “Figures of Light”

8. The Last of Us

They did it.

In some ways, mainly in the handling of Bill and Frank, they did it better. In some ways, it was pretty much the same. In some ways, mainly because key moments of the game translate better to an interactive medium (specifically the final hospital sequence and a few others) they did it only a little tiny bit worse. But I imagine that only affected people like me who played the game before watching the show.

It is, in other words, a video game adaptation that doesn’t suck and not only understands what’s great about the source material but translates it well to a filmed medium. That miracle alone makes it worthy of this list.

Favorite Episodes: “Long, Long Time,” “Endure and Survive,” “Kin”

7. Succession

This is the first time I’ve ever put Succession on a list.

It was partly an issue of timing. I didn’t watch the first season as it aired because a lot of people whose opinions I trust didn’t care for it and it took me a while to catch up after season two finished, when everyone and their mother fell in love with it. Season three was the first season I watched as it was airing and while I liked it a lot, I thought it was a slightly weaker season than two and I had more passion for other shows that year. Now we’re here.

However, if I’m being perfectly honest, Succession lives in a weird place for me. While the rest of the world was frothing at the mouth over it, my enthusiasm was much muted. A lot of the emotionality of it was lost on me, not because the Roys are disgusting people who are largely not worthy of empathy, but simple tonality. The way its stories unfold and the way the characters react just leaves me a little cold. I can laugh at the comedy, but when you asked me to feel anything more, it took me slightly longer to get there.

However, just to be abundantly clear, I still loved it. I believe everything I just said. However, what it ultimately amounts to is the difference between an A+ and an A. I’m not going to say it’s one of my favorite shows of all time, but I’m certainly not going to tell anyone they’re wrong for thinking that.

And even if I hated this show, you gotta give it up for just about everything that happens starting with episode three.

More digital ink has been spilled over Succession than any other show in recent memory, and I don’t have a lot to add to the conversation. The only thing I got is that Succession is a show about a bunch of rich idiots who’ll spend their entire lives kneecapping themselves because of who they are and the ways they were raised, and the entire country gets to be sucked up in their undertow. It’s rare you know you’re watching something evergreen when it’s right in front of you.

Also, I didn’t like the ending, but whatever.

Favorite Episodes: “Connor’s Wedding,” “Honeymoon States,” “Church and State”

6. Our Flag Means Death

I thought season one was fine.

I’ve spent some time reading about the golden age of piracy, so the idea of a comedy set in that world sounded intriguing enough. I watched the first season and found it to be a pretty agreeable comedy. I did like it more in the back half when it started investigating the budding romance between Stede Bonnet and Ed Teach. However, that aspect felt to me like something the show accidentally stumbled into and didn’t correct as opposed to a choice the show was always intending to make on purpose. Which is fine! Only it led to me not having the same level of enthusiasm as a lot of its loudest fans on the internet.

Truth be told, I don’t really know why I gave season two a shot. But I’m glad I did because this was my feel good hangout show of the year.

There’s more to it than that, of course. I think it did an overall better job at telling its stories, evolving its relationships, and defining its characters. But moreover, the choice it made that I found incredibly affective was to evolve beyond simply being a romcom about two pirates. Instead, it became a show about evolving in general.

You had shitty parents and wound up a shitty person, and you spent your days inflicting as much pain and destruction on as many people as possible. Oftentimes, you did this in the most literal sense possible. But you also treat the people you care about like dirt and though you’re feared and admired by others like you, you wind up alone.

But then you see a different path. How do you get yourself to a place where you can take it? Can you go through the process and stay honest with yourself at the same time? Is this new path actually better or are you just trading one kind of emotional torment for another? What if you don’t want to be a pirate anymore?

Season two is about these very questions, and it explores them not just in terms of Stede and Ed, but everyone else in their lives as well. Some characters get better, and some realize that they want to get better first. Everyone moves forward.

It’s warm, it’s inviting, and it was a balm to much of the chaos I experienced in 2023. It maybe doesn’t hit the highs of many a show you could name in 2023. But sometimes I don’t need my boundaries pushed. Sometimes I just want a show to help me stop and smell the roses. Season two was a big ol’ hug. Sometimes I need that.

Favorite Episodes: “The Innkeeper,” “Calypso’s Birthday,” “Mermen”

5. The Other Two

Season three of The Other Two is the season when the show fully embraced the darkness. Fitting, not just in that it was the final season, but also in that creators Chris Kelly and Sarah Schneider turned out to be the kind of abusive petty entertainment industry types the show was regularly making fun of.

Cary finally gets the career he always wanted, or at least a version of it. In return, he nearly severs his ties with his best friend and the community that built him up in the first place. Brooke deludes herself into thinking she’s going to do good and that she can leave this industry behind. Instead, she fails to do both, partially out of stupidity and partially because “doing good” turns out to be a virtual impossibility in an industry that runs on suffering. It almost swallows her whole and consumes her relationships with both her romantic partner and her family.

The industry finally reveals an ugliness in Pat. An ugliness that we only briefly saw in seasons past, and an ugliness that’s brought about by reaching a level of fame and wealth far beyond what the show could imagine in its first season. And once again, Pat is not only forced to sabotage her relationship with Streeter, but also any sense of normalcy she had left. Normalcy she thought she wanted. Normalcy that she finally gets a glimpse of and discovers she no longer wants.

It’s the most openly sad the show has ever been. And yet, this is still the season of television that gave us Disney’s “unapologetically gay” goo monster, the compound for ex-girlfriends of teenage pop stars, the concept that all billionaires shave their heads and become obsessed with being higher than everyone, and so much more absurdist showbiz bullshit.

I don’t quite know how to square this with the ugliness surrounding the show’s two creators, other than an obvious cynical point about how the industry ruins everything. But I’ll still miss it. I’ll always be down for a show like The Other Two, maybe the meanest showbiz satire in recent memory other than BoJack. Hey, did I mention I picketed said industry for six months?

Favorite Episodes: “Brooke Drives an Armpit Across America,” “Booke Gets Her Hands Dirty,” “Cary & Brooke Go to an AIDS Play”

4. Scavengers Reign

There’s a lot about this show that I could criticize if I felt so inclined. I’m not sure how I feel about splitting everyone up into their own story (though I get that I’m probably very much alone on that one), I’m not sure that beginning the story after they’ve already crashed was the right call, considering the amount of time we spend flashing back during certain sections. The cuts to black when transitioning story to story didn’t work for me. The decision to kill off Sam before he could have his reunion with Kamen come off to me as kind of of insane. I could go on.

But nothing feels like this show. At least not in the medium of television. I mean, look at it.

I’m sure there’s anime or independent animation I don’t know about that invokes the kind of surreal science fiction Scavengers Reign is doing. But to me, this is the first time in what feels like ages that I’ve gotten something that feels this fresh. A hard sci-fi show that operates mostly on tone and watching all these interactions I’ll never have the imagination to think of in this endlessly fascinating alien ecosystem.

I could bathe in this show. As weird as that sounds, considering some of the little guys roaming this planet.

Favorite Episodes: “The Storm,” “The Dream,” “The Reunion”

3. Telemarketers

I brought two things with me every day I went to the strike: My sign, which consisted of David Zaslav saying the crassest thing I could think of during any given week, and my 20 lb 100w speaker, which I would use to play frequently explicit music as loud as possible.

Both of these items served a purpose: To tap into the more mischievous side of the picketing. It should go without saying that solidarity and righting injustice are two of the main emotional forces behind any strike. However, if we’re all being honest, there’s an energy you gain from showing up and telling those in power to go fuck themselves. Anger is just as valid a motivation as any, so why not try to annoy a major studio by walking around with a sign that says David Zaslav fucks poodles while a large speaker blares “Back That Azz Up?”

However, in my heart of hearts, I knew that all of my bullshit was somewhat impotent. If it made one fellow striker smile, it was worth it. But most of the people I was trying to annoy would never place themselves anywhere near the picket lines. At best, I was only maybe annoying security guards and people driving in and out of the studio. Also an art director who worked at Netflix. (Long story.)

This is largely why watching Pat Pespas annoy people in power and stir vast mountains of shit was one of the most cathartic experiences I had in 2023.

There are good reasons why heroes of journalism and truth-telling don’t typically take the form of people like Pat. The team who, say, exposed the cover-ups of thousands of pedophiles hidden behind the walls of the Catholic church were educated, competent, and diligent, not flighty unpredictable addicts like Pat. However, that’s also why it’s so easy to root for Pat. There was a problem he had unknowingly been co-opted by. Specifically, scummy telemarketing schemes involving police and firefighter charities. What did he do? What he could. Why? Because he could.

In an ideal world, you’re motivated by the need to do the right thing and tell the truth. But what if you’re also motivated by spite? What if it’s just about, “Fuck you”? Does that somehow make it worse? Who gets to expose the truth and who doesn’t? Who’s allowed to fill these roles?

Pat is far from perfect. He’s crude and incompetent and he’s clearly not the right guy for the job. And yet, he makes a difference in the end. Who knows how much of a dent he really made, and who knows how much of a dent anyone can make when it comes to phone scammers. However, regardless of the size of the dent, he made one. And for that, Pat Pespas fucking rules.

Favorite Episodes: N/A. There are only three episodes.

2. The Bear

If I’m being perfectly honest, I’m not sure I think season two started out as strong as season one did. There was a lot of table setting and it didn’t have the sense of immediacy that made season one feel like it was going at rocket speed. However, once it gets rolling, it really gets rolling. By which I mean if this was a list of the top 10 episodes of TV as opposed to top 10 shows in general, a vast chunk of those episodes would just be picks from this season of The Bear.

I’m struggling to come up with something to say here. You either know why this show is here or you haven’t watched it yet, but everyone you know is being very annoying about it and you’ll probably get to it sooner rather than later.

I’ll leave off with this: I have a friend whose family owns two prominent restaurants in the DC area. She says the show is too real. Enjoy thinking about that!

Favorite Episodes: “Honeydew,” “Fishes,” “Forks”

1. Reservation Dogs

My common complaint with Reservation Dogs is that it drives me insane every time they split all of the kids up into their own solo journeys. D’Pharaoh Woon-A-Tai, Devery Jacobs, Lane Factor, and Paulina Alexis deserve to be showered with praise and awards and each can certainly carry an episode on their own. But they have so much chemistry with one another that it seems insane to me to silo them off. I know I’ve talked about this in previous top 10 articles, but it’s true.

Season 3 spends most of its episodes laughing at how stupid I am while essentially tripling down on its general strategy. Essentially, it’s a season that stops being primarily about these four kids and becomes about the entire community.

There was boarding school ran by the church. The headmasters and the nuns were vicious, racist, and showed no humanity whatsoever to the children in their care. Many years later, it became a normal public school, and it was here where the people we’d later know to be the elders became a unit. They had children, some of whom became the parents of the generation who had the Rez Dogs.

We see their stories, and we see the parallels they have with the gang we’ve been following from the first episode. There are times throughout the show when it seems like the Rez Dogs were somehow different than the adults who live on the reservation. During the final season, the show made it clear how they’re part of the same wave, and might even continue it going forward.

The four are still put on separate paths this season. But all of their journeys cross with the elders of the town, creating that sense of cohesion that I craved so badly even though we could go an episode or two without seeing any of the crew. Willie Jack spends her time learning medicine from Fixico, whose funeral winds up wrapping the whole show. Bear makes contact with Maximus and the Deer Lady and unlocks not only more secrets from the past, but essentially catalyzes the reunification of many old friends. The elders help Cheese with his dread of his friends moving on and Elora finally meets her father, which sheds more light on Cookie and the generation that got so much attention in season two. It all felt connected, even if our protagonists weren’t around.

All that said, the gang get to spend more time together than any of the previous seasons, and when that happened, there was simply nothing better on TV in 2023. I love this show, and I’ll miss it dearly. Shitass.

Favorite Episodes: “Deer Lady,” “Send It,” “Dig”

Honorable Mentions:

Abbott Elementary
Craig of the Creek
Cunk on Earth
Dave
Fargo
The Great British Bake-Off
Harley Quinn
I’m a Virgo
I Think You Should Leave
Jury Duty
Justified: City Primeval
Poker Face
Rain Dogs
Rap Shit
Stolen Youth: Inside the Cult at Sarah Lawrence
Swarm

Will Watch Someday:

The Curse
Dead Ringers
Dreaming Whilst Black
Mrs. Davis
A Murder at the End of the World
Silo
Slow Horses
There’s probably others