The Top 10 TV Shows of 2025

Summary

The Watch — The Top 10 TV Shows of 2025

Podcast: The Watch (The Ringer)
Hosts: Chris Ryan [A], Andy Greenwald [B]
Date: December 16, 2025

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Overview

This annual “Best TV of the Year” episode is a hallmark for The Watch — with Chris Ryan and Andy Greenwald assembling and debating their top 10 shows of 2025. This year, they shake up their usual format by constructing a consensus “Watch Top 10,” combining their individual lists and featuring spicy honorable mentions (“the spicy fives”). The conversation goes deep on trends, critical fragmentation, international gems, the state of streaming, and hidden standouts — landing where the landscape of television sits after a landmark year.

Their tone is signature: fast-paced, irreverent, self-aware, and often veering into meta-commentary on TV criticism itself. Expect inside jokes, critical analysis, and loving dissections of what makes TV great — or just notably weird.

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Table of Contents

1. Opening: Format and State of the Pod
2. Remembering Rob Reiner
3. A New Approach: How the List Was Built
4. 2025: Year in TV — Themes & Observations
5. Honorable Mentions (“The Spicy Fives”)
6. The Top 10 TV Shows of 2025 (Consensus List)
7. Key Quotes & Memorable Moments
8. Listener Shout–Outs & Final Thoughts

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<a name="opening"></a>

1. Opening: Format and State of the Pod

• The episode begins with light banter, a running Oasis/Liam Gallagher joke, and chat about The Watch’s schedule ([01:20–03:01]).
• Chris and Andy introduce their annual best-of tradition, noting tweaks to the format for this year. Rather than two separate lists, it will be a “Watch Top 10,” a mashup reflecting consensus, with input from producer Kaya and (in abstentia) Sam Esmail ([10:10–12:14]).
• They explain: Individual “spicy five” honorable mentions each, then the combined Top 10 ([13:01–13:40]).

<a name="rob_reiner"></a>

2. Remembering Rob Reiner ([04:26–10:02])

• Chris and Andy address the shocking tragic murder of filmmaker Rob Reiner and his wife Michelle, offering a heartfelt tribute to his impact.
• Andy:
  “His affability and his gregarious public persona almost betrayed the enormous importance and influence and body of work he contributed to entertainment over the last half century… both as a filmmaker and as an actor.” ([04:34])
• The conversation explores Reiner’s cultural legacy, from All in the Family to The Bear, and how he shaped what adult, mainstream American film "used to be."
• Andy shares personal anecdotes about meeting Reiner at a Castle Rock panel, reflecting on the power, loss, and evolution in the TV/film world.

<a name="the_list_approach"></a>

3. A New Approach: How the List Was Built ([10:19–14:21])

• Chris confesses that he suspected their lists would overlap too much, prompting a single "Watch top 10" to avoid "groupthink."
• Sam Esmail (Mr. Robot creator and frequent pod guest) texts in his (satirical) wish for their #1:
  “My hope is your number one is Andor. My fantasy wants it to be the Chair Company. But the correct answer is obviously the rehearsal.” — Sam Esmail ([14:19])
• Kaya contributes at points but declines a full top 10. Both hosts reflect on their long, shared taste and the value of including more voices to break up consensus.

<a name="year_in_tv"></a>

4. 2025: Year in TV — Themes & Observations ([15:10–29:36])

• General Impressions

  • Chris: “The best shows of the year and the best TV of the year I would put up against any TV from this decade... but I found very little room in the top 10 this year.” ([15:23–15:47])
  • The “highs” were immovable, though there were fewer obvious standouts than some past years.

• Critical Fragmentation

  • Andy notes: “At the top, we are seeing, coming out of the five–year death spiral of Covid and the strikes, TV gets some of its swagger back in a new era...” ([19:14])
  • Chris observes inconsistent critical lists and evolving taste: “There was a lot of like, ‘I like this, this year,’ going on... the lack of critical consensus... that’s the same thing for film right now.” ([18:43])

• Streaming, International TV, & Cultural Change

  • More international (and even indie) TV is breaking through; the “state of the medium worldwide is strong.” ([25:40])
  • They discuss how “vertical video” (TikTok, Reels) is reshaping comedy and food TV ([26:49–28:25]), and how younger audiences consume new shows as “events” but otherwise prefer bite-size content ([21:41]).

• TV as Comfort — and Consolation

  • A running sub-theme: TV remains a sanctuary, a source of collective experience, and, increasingly, a splintered collection of personal obsessions.

<a name="spicy_fives"></a>

5. Honorable Mentions (“The Spicy Fives”) ([29:36–57:32])

Each host picks five additional shows (no overlaps) as their “spicy five,” celebrating personal favorites and oddities that speak to the breadth of 2025 TV. Highlights:

Andy’s Picks:

1. English Teacher (FX, S2) —
   “Pound for pound one of the funniest things on TV... I do not understand what happened. ...It seems like an enormous disservice to Sean Patton, Stephanie Koenig, the great cast that all of their work seems to have been washed away... Is it because Brian Jordan Alvarez didn’t want to do press? I don’t know. I’ll miss the show.” ([29:51–34:24])

2. Platonic (Apple TV+) —
   “My comfort food show this year... if Apple just wants to set aside a couple hundred million for Seth Rogen to make TV shows forever and this is one of them... great. I love Rogen in this. I love Rose Byrne. The show made me very, very happy.” ([37:03–38:54])

3. White Lotus (HBO, S3)

   • Lauds its “All Star Game” of acting and the sheer abundance of ideas, even if the season was bumpier:
     “At this point, what we are seeing… TV gets some of its swagger back in a new era.” ([41:45–43:09])

4. Chair Company (HBO)

   • Andy: “Not even a comedy anymore. It's a portal into a completely different upside down universe... Tim Robinson and Zach Canan’s absolutely unhinged... It is absolutely a very, very odd, dramatic conspiracy thriller that is minute to minute, one of the most surreal and funny things that's been on TV in a long time… HBO doing what it does best — investing in a unique voice who’s ready to level up.” ([46:15–47:49])

5. Families Like Ours (Netflix)

   • “So haunting, so compelling, thought about it nonstop… a very, very human dystopia. …It is not an environmental catastrophe show. It is an immigration catastrophe show... making a very, very human-based family drama, which it is. …It is not episodic escapism; this is about right now.” ([51:40–54:23])

Chris’s Picks:

1. Shorzy (Hulu, S4)

   • “Honestly hysterical hockey comedy... every time I say Shorzy on this podcast, people DM me: ‘Set the tone.’ ... I went and saw the cast play hockey against retired L.A. Kings... There were 7,500 people there. …I don't think I've ever done anything like that outside of Comic Con.” ([54:24–56:35])

2. Death by Lightning (Netflix)

   • “Historical TV done at the highest, highest level. Two central performances from Michael Shannon and Matthew Macfadyen among the best of the year... an excellent act of adaptation” ([48:34–49:56])

3. Blue Lights (BritBox/BBC, S3)

   • “The best cop show going right now... Incredibly digestible, thrilling, a little bit of Homicide: Life on the Street, and a little bit Line of Duty.” ([45:09–46:15])

4. Slow Horses (Apple TV+, S5)

   • “Addictive... London-based group hang season. Oldman's best moments among the best of the series...” ([40:05–41:31])

5. The Beast in Me (Netflix)

   • “Trash prestige at its best… two towering performances [Claire Danes, Matthew Rhys]... a gripping New York thriller. Mechanics of pulp but the prestige of the best actors you’ll see.” ([34:41–36:46])

Extra: “The Summer I Turned Pretty” gets a “hat-tip” as water-cooler, fandom TV but isn’t officially placed. ([39:16–39:59])

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<a name="top_10_list"></a>

6. The Watch’s Top 10 TV Shows of 2025 ([58:26–91:13])

The shows are discussed in reverse ranking (10 to 1), with debate, context, and wild digressions throughout. Timestamps mark key entry points.

10. Department Q ([58:28])

• Netflix; Created by Scott Frank
• Detective drama set in Scotland with Matthew Goode and Kelly Macdonald.
• “The best version of Department Q is a detective series version of The Pit on Netflix… but it is also an auteurish type show.” ([61:06])
• Unclear on S2 timing, but confirmed more is coming.

9. The Studio ([62:02])

• Apple TV+; Executive produced by Seth Rogen, Evan Goldberg
• “Melancholic love of an industry in transition—deep Rolodex of celebrities playing versions of themselves… A joyful act of creation that translated to the audience.” ([63:27])

8. The Eternaut ([64:28])

• Netflix; Directed by Bruno Stagnaro
• Argentinian adaptation of a beloved sci-fi graphic novel.
• “Just sick—hit at the right time... Surprising, compelling, very strong first season... reminds you Netflix will empower Argentine filmmakers to tell their own stories.” ([65:15–66:42])

7. Eastern Gate ([67:03])

• HBO Max (International, Polish)
• Polish espionage thriller; “my thriller of the year” ([67:17])
• Lena Góra’s star-making performance as a spy in a hyper-detailed European setting.
• “So contemporary, so bracing, horrifying and incredibly entertaining… Points toward what spy genre can be now.” ([69:26–69:52])

6. The Lowdown ([70:51])

• FX/Hulu (U.S.); created by Sterlin Harjo
• Tulsa-based neo-noir, spiritual cousin to Altman/Chandler.
• “A love letter to Tulsa… shaggy, left-handedly written, loose and curious… one of the all-time great TV casts” ([71:34–73:24])
• Big heart, big ensemble, “why we get up in the morning” TV.

5. Task ([73:42])

• HBO; Created by Brad Ingelsby
• Philadelphia-set crime and recovery drama, starring Tom Pelphrey and Mark Ruffalo.
• “The most sincere and vulnerable show made in America… about forgiveness, God, fatherhood, the lingua franca of where we’re from… The performances are God-tier.” ([74:45–75:59])

4. Pluribus ([76:03])

• Apple TV+; Created by Vince Gilligan
• Slow-burn genre-bending show with meditative pacing.
• “A miracle... What it's doing, in terms of asking a pretty addled society... to watch someone do very simple things in a very complicated environment — one of the best tests I've had to take in a long time.” ([76:10–77:26])
• Debate over pacing; acknowledged as “divisive” among critics. “You can only do this in an operation that has been so successful for so long…” ([77:57])

3. The Pit ([81:56])

• NBC; Created by John Wells
• Modern ER, med drama set in L.A., ensemble led by Noah Wyle.
• “Old school pleasures, new school package... love people, root for people, feel connected to human struggle—The Pit just understands that in its bones.” ([83:41])

2. Adolescence ([84:26])

• FX; Standalone season
• British tragedy, astonishing two-hander (Owen Cooper, Erin Doherty).
• “A singular statement of technical achievement, emotional devastation... stands alone. …That has to stand for something for me.” ([85:31–86:59])

1. Andor (S2) ([84:27–89:25])

• Disney+; Created by Tony Gilroy
• Sci-fi epic closes out with “essentially flawless” two-season arc.
• “One of the more incredible accomplishments in entertainment of our time… what we can do with this medium if we rewire our brains... Not just putting Star Wars on TV.” ([84:27–85:17])

Consensus: For Andy, Andor S2 is #1 for the “accomplishment” of its two-season opus; for Chris, Adolescence lands as the most purely affecting. “1A/1B.” ([85:31])

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7. Key Quotes & Memorable Moments

On The Year in TV:

• Chris: “The best shows of the year and the best TV of the year I would put up against any TV from this decade... but I found very little room in the top 10 this year.” ([15:23])
• Andy: “At the top, we are seeing... TV gets some of its swagger back in a new era.” ([19:14])

On White Lotus:

• Andy: “The fact that this show not only exists but is now one of the more beloved and probably profitable franchises... is shocking to me. And I, you know, we could do a whole podcast, and we did multiple podcasts of all the nits one could pick with season three.... The highs were remarkable.” ([41:44–43:09])

On Pluribus and TV Pacing:

• Chris: “I was watching the most recent episode and thinking to myself, how many pages was this? ...You could write the script for an episode of Pluribus in probably 30 pages, but the episodes themselves are 55 minutes... you can only do that in an operation so successful for so long.” ([77:27–77:57])

On The Pit:

• Andy: “We can be challenged, we can be provoked... but really, one of the greatest things TV’s ever been able to provide is love… the pit just understands that in its bones.” ([82:00–83:41])

On Adolescence:

• Chris: “It challenges you to have empathy for the villain of the show… and I remember I have recall for Adolescence in a way that I don’t usually for TV shows.” ([86:11–86:59])

On Andor:

• Andy: “Andor season two is essentially flawless and one of the more incredible accomplishments in entertainment of our time...stands for what’s possible.” ([84:27–85:17])

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8. Listener Shout–Outs & Final Thoughts

• Kaya chimes in to “shout out” I Love LA and The Pit. ([91:04])
• Chris and Andy wrap with gratitude for another year, tease future episodes (Pluribus finale coming up), and joke about awarding Dr. Noah Wyle a Nobel in TV. ([91:13–end])

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Timeline Index

• [01:20] – Podcast housekeeping, format intro
• [04:26] – Rob Reiner tribute
• [10:19] – Explaining new Top 10 format
• [13:01–13:40] – Spicy Fives (“Honorable Mentions”)
• [15:10–29:36] – The year’s TV trends & observations
• [29:36–57:32] – Honorable mentions, in-depth
• [58:28–91:13] – The Watch’s Top 10 TV shows — main list breakdown
• [91:13–end] – End-of-pod shout outs & future schedule

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For the full depth of debate, celebration, and scene-setting, this edition is essential listening for anyone looking to catch up on TV’s elite, discover overlooked gems, or understand where television—American and global—is heading next.

Transcript

[A]

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[B]

Stand up and walk now.

[A]

Hello and welcome to the Watch. My name is Chris Ryan. I am an [e-mail] and joining me in the studio, the best of the year, every year in San Diego Green World.

[B]

Do you want to do a. I.

[A]

Did a little Liam Gallagher there. Did you just like a little, like. Oh, backed away from the microphone, but.

[B]

Were you leaning in, looking slightly constipated and then leaning back? Yeah, I'm gonna go out on this year. The way I came into it, provoking Oasis fans, I saw what might have.

[A]

Been a fake Liam Gallagher tweet where he said, I'm doing pilates, drinking sparkling water and got addicted to reading.

[B]

I think that was my tweet. What are you talking about? Fake Liam Gallagher Tweet? That's my 2025.

[A]

It's good to see you.

[B]

Do you want to do, like, at the end of this pod? Or maybe Kaya could do it. Like, top 10 performances of me on a top 10 pod. On this pod. Like, what year was my best?

[A]

Oh, like across. I mean, I have some. Some thoughts on that.

[B]

Do you answer that too quickly? Yeah.

[A]

I've got Goldsberry making your shot chart right now. Andy. Today is our annual best TV of the year episode. We're going to do it a little bit differently this year, so we're excited to talk to you about that before we get started. Housekeeping.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Inbox, Instagram, YouTube. It's the [e-mail] we're doing a news mailbag to end the year. So please hit us up. We've got some great Questions so far, but we can always use some more Instagram, the Watchpod underscore, if you want to follow us there. YouTube, you can watch us on Ringer Dash TV. You can also watch us on Spotify, where I hope you're listening to us. Here's our schedule right now. So today, obviously, we're doing best of the year. Thursday, I think will be a normal podcast if it's not our mailbag. But you'll have an episode on Thursday.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

I believe you will also have episodes Monday and Thursday next week.

[B]

Wow.

[A]

We shall see. And then we're gonna be off for the last week of December, early January. We'll be back on the fifth, I believe it is. What else do I have to tell you?

[B]

I definitely wanted to say that I appreciate how Kya did her best to make our Instagram reel stuff. Very sticky, very controversial. And I feel like last week Kai kind of did some really nice reputation shaping to make me more like the older maler. Less informed Kyla Scanlan. It was like real business.

[A]

Let me explain how money works.

[B]

Yeah. Which I don't understand at all. Or no. Nor am I qualified to opine on, but I really appreciated that guy.

[A]

I guess I'm curious, like, why that this seems to be the central preoccupation of your life is what our. What our watch social media strategy is. Yeah.

[B]

Because it feels very invasive. Like I, you know, for years.

[A]

Invasive. You're a podcaster.

[B]

Well, okay, but that used to mean that we would go into a dark room and talk.

[A]

I could be like, missing a tooth.

[B]

And that was fine. Now, like, on a weekend, I just happen to open up my old Apple phone and the first thing I see is this stupid face being like, I mad because I watched it two weeks ago.

[A]

Mute yourself. Mute. Mute the watch. Unfollow us.

[B]

Why would I mute the watch? It's like, collaborate with us on this reel. Like, everything is promotion, man. You know? Yeah.

[A]

I have an uncomplicated relationship with it.

[B]

You know, with fame.

[A]

Yeah. That's why you can find me at the Red Sea Film Festival.

[B]

What better place for creativity and expression of the yards?

[A]

I'm stalling because I don't want to do this. At the top, we should probably acknowledge the really, I mean, what a just absolute fucking trash weekend.

[B]

Dog shit weekend.

[A]

But, you know, Sunday news broke that Rob Reiner and his wife Michelle were murdered at their home in Los Angeles. And this story is. It's obviously tragic and heartbreaking and also kind of pushes beyond belief, as many headlines do over the last few years and there's really like, I mean, I can talk a little bit. We can talk a little bit about Reiner, who I think his affability and his gregarious public Persona almost betrayed the enormous importance and influence and, you know, body of work that he has contributed to entertainment over the last half century, longer, both as a filmmaker and as an actor. I was going through his filmography yesterday and I'd kind of even just forgotten that he was recently on the Bear. And when you go from all in the Family to the Bear with Stand By Me, A Few Good Men and When Harry Met Sally and Princess Bride in between, I mean, unbelievable life and career and.

[B]

And to place him in just an unbelievably unbelievable and unbroken chain of American entertainment from his father Carl. And thinking about Rob Reiner growing up in Los Angeles, best friends with Albert Brooks, whose father was also like, coming out of that, like post vaudeville performance lane. And the way they took that baton and made what had started as sort of niche kind of very Jewish comedy and then like became like the language of comedy and the language of togetherness and button pushing. Socially aware entertainment for decades is really moving and honestly makes this kind of blow, like really, really hard to swallow, both on a, on a personal level for someone who, whom we didn't, didn't know. Although I, I do, I did, I did have, I did spend time with him once, which I don't know if we've ever talked about, but. But also just, just as part of our shared cultural memory. Yeah. And just a horrific tragedy and, and.

[A]

And an absolutely garish end. Dual life, like, you know what I mean? Like, yeah, it's really, really.

[B]

This is meaningless. But I, I just had this, like, this. I got shuddered thinking about, like, I don't want Mel Brooks to know about this.

[A]

Right.

[B]

I don't, I don't want this. Yeah. This is so awful. A couple years ago I was, I was, I don't know how this happened, but I became like the de facto moderator for this producer, Dan Lin, he's now head of film for Netflix.

[A]

Sure.

[B]

When he was an independent producer, he very community oriented kind of guy. And he would have these like, like salons with filmmakers or cultural people and for an invited guest list. And I moderated a few of them. And that's how I got the chance to be on like on a dais with Richard Donner before he died, which is really cool. And one that we did was the anniversary of Castle Rock Entertainment. So it was all the founders of Castle Rock, including Rob Reiner. And it was just like these old, extremely successful men. And it was really moving to see the way that they talked about working with each other and like how they picked the Seinfeld Chronicles script off the slush pile or whatever. But it was also incredibly fortunate and memorable to be in the same room with a guy who was so completely comfortable being himself. Everyone gravitated toward him. Everybody wanted stories with him. Everybody wanted to share their stories about his entertainment that they loved. Very familiar with this, very used to it. Very comfortable being professionally Rob Reiner. But the, the gravity and the presence of a person like that who has lived such a deep life that went that bird and furrowed and burrowed into every aspect of our cultural memory since we were alive is just.

[A]

Yeah. I mean, in some ways, like, you know, obviously he's thought of as a different kind of filmmaker, but like he and Spielberg honestly have as much to do with like the way that like shaped my ideas about like what happened on big screens when I was a kid. And really, like, I think I can look at several of his films. Sure thing. Stand By Me and then A Few Good Men as. And to some extent Princess Bride as these little markers in my life, you know what I mean? Of high schooler. Maybe a somewhat more self aware late teenager thinking about my life. It's just an incredible contribution.

[B]

We're not even talking about. We didn't even talk about When Harry Met Sally or we didn't talk about Spinal Taurus.

[A]

Right? Yeah. Or American President. Yeah.

[B]

It also speaks to a kind of whenever we in our aging cusp. Gen Xer or whatever we are way mourn the death of a monoculture. I think at its best. Sometimes what we're thinking about is a Rob Reiner movie which sort of moved. It's like an overton window of like what was the most mainstream entertainment possible. And they could be gentle like Stand By Me was. Or they could be as he matured as a filmmaker. Like A Few Good Men is a big meaty prime rib of American entertainment of the type that isn't really made anymore. It was made for everyone to be like, oh, that's a compelling adult movie with movie stars in it. It's not like a small fiddly thing on the margins, which is the sort of thing that gets nominated for Oscars these days. Nor is it Avengers 4. Right. It doesn't exist anymore. But he was the bedrock of that kind of entertainment for our life.

[A]

Yeah. He'll be missed and just an absolutely terrible loss. Why don't we Take a quick break and then we'll come back and we'll do our 10 best of the year. Okay, man, here we are. It's the 10 best of the year time. Now. Here's a little bit behind the scenes stuff.

[B]

Yeah, this is good. Process is everything. Process over, results.

[A]

Well, okay, so this, this episode is historically one of my favorite ones to produce over. You know, to do with you. Over the years, we've been doing like.

[B]

In the Lindsey Buckingham way. Like, you also produced it. Yeah, it's like you're leaning over on the board.

[A]

Andy. You just got to take Andy down.

[B]

Take Andy way down.

[A]

This is where I talk about lioness. So what happened is I was about midway through this year, I started to get a sneaking suspicion that you and I were going to have very similar lists. So similar, in fact, that it would be a little bit of a boring podcast. Alarmingly, I went back through the last four or five, six years of our show and I looked at these lists and in the especially post Sam Esmail era, and Sam obviously is a beloved.

[B]

Part of this pod, I have a statement from Sam.

[A]

Do you really?

[B]

For today's pod? Yeah, but we.

[A]

Did you do some reporting?

[B]

I did. I did boots on the ground reporting.

[A]

Like nuzzy style or.

[B]

Well, how it started. Yeah, I mean, I don't know how it's going to end, but yes, in the sense that I fired off a text to him as I was getting in the car this morning to come and he responded. He did. That's nice of him.

[A]

Do I want to know what it is before I say this or after?

[B]

No, let's finish our.

[A]

Sam was an invaluable part of these episodes because he broke up our groupthink. Now, Andy and I cannot apologize because we've just known each other for a really long time and we have very similar tastes.

[B]

It's probably why we're friends.

[A]

And you can kind of hear that over the course of the year on the pod. Now, often what will happen is there's like six. Five or six shared shows.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Four or five.

[B]

You know, personal choices and placement can vary.

[A]

I kind of had a feeling even up until the last couple of weeks that we were gonna have like, pretty much locked in lists. I thought maybe it would be more interesting this year is to present a top 10 that is the watches top 10.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And we also. I did. We did ask Kaya if she wanted to contribute and she will be correcting the record at certain points, but for the most part did not want to do her own top 10.

[B]

I didn't ask her. For what it's worth.

[A]

Well, I asked her before we started the show. I did not have enough time to watch this.

[C]

There.

[A]

You guys see some.

[B]

Did you notice that I didn't ask you for yours? I apologize.

[A]

Honestly, it's like you can either be nominated for a Golden Globe or you can watch fucking television. You can't do both.

[B]

What's beautiful about this is like originally I think Sam dipped out of participating in this because he was like making a movie.

[A]

Yes, he was watching too. He wasn't watching enough television because he.

[B]

Was making a feature film. And Kya had to dip out because she is nominated for one of Hollywood's major awards. And yet you and I, the work goes on. You know what I mean? Like, we don't begrudge anyone their success. Yeah. Year in, year out, here we are.

[A]

So what we're going to do is Andy and I have chosen five. Call them honorable mentions. Call them 10 to 15. Call them also. Also our most loved television of the year. There will be no repeats on that.

[B]

Yeah. We each picked five wild cards, so to speak. I think that if we. And maybe it would be useful to share at some point, like I think each of us had, did, did generate an individual top 10. Some of the five on our wildcards were on our top tens. Yes.

[A]

But we decided to make a Borg.

[B]

Style in the spirit of consensus.

[A]

In the spirit of pluribus.

[B]

In the spirit. Beautiful.

[A]

Yeah, we love these shows.

[B]

This was inspired by being by Senator Cory Booker posting a video of the five living presidents in 2009 in the Oval Office, being like, we wish each other well.

[A]

You, you really. Your algorithm is incredible.

[B]

Do you know what my algorithm is?

[A]

You and Dem senators.

[B]

No, it's actually all soup content. It is all soup. Some of it is in Italian, but it is all people making variations of the same chicken soup. And I watch all of it. It is just slop. Just poured into my mouth. Just slop.

[A]

It's soup. Slop.

[B]

It is wild. Okay, so this is. This is Sam. Esmail weighed in and he said this.

[A]

Was okay for public consumption and attribution.

[B]

You know, I assume if you text a reporter, text a public figure.

[A]

Exactly.

[B]

You know what I mean?

[A]

Exactly.

[B]

As. As Mark Sanford learned, you know, it's all fair game. He said this message is more to you and Chris. That's. That's me and you not to. And this is what he said. My dwindling non existent watch fan base, which is far too self deprecating.

[A]

I'm Glad he's keeping up on the.

[B]

It may be dwindling, but it is vocal. Yes, it is a strong, strong vocal minority. My hope is your number one is. Andor my fantasy wants it to be the chair company. But the correct answer is obviously the rehearsal. Good job by you. Yes, good job by you.

[A]

Which was the last time he did this? I think it was 23.

[B]

Right.

[A]

Rehearsal. That was also the year that he spent an hour boring a hole into us.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Rehearsal was his number one, so I'm not surprised.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Okay, so let's talk a little bit about the year in television.

[B]

Yeah, I'd like to.

[A]

I have a couple of different places we can start.

[B]

So we're going to do our. We're going to talk about the year. We're going to do our fives. Our spicy fives, and then we're going to unveil the top 10.

[A]

That's right.

[B]

Great.

[A]

I thought that this was an excellent year in television and that the best shows of the year and the best TV of the year I would put up against any TV from this decade. I have had years where there are 25 to 35 shows that are in the conversation.

[B]

Yep.

[A]

I found it very. I found very little room in the top 10 this year.

[B]

I felt the same way.

[A]

I felt like the shows that I loved, the shows that I had a tremendous amount of respect for, kind of just staked their claim and it was. There was no moving them off the block. Not unlike Andre Drummond.

[B]

And so resurgent this year. Yes. Great.

[A]

So, I mean, how did you feel in terms of the dispersion and in terms of, like, how many shows were competing? How many shows you considered for this?

[B]

I was grateful when we shifted to, like, Wheel of Fortune to the let's just give him RST LN&E method of doing this list because I was struggling. And last year, notably, I just had a shrug emoji on my list. I put Three Body problem on my list just for the lulz, because I liked the idea of what that show was. I enjoyed watching it. Some of it was excellent and some of it was awful. Yeah. And I found that engaging. And that is. That's fun. That's a fun zag. I think people loved it. Yeah.

[A]

People were just like, this guy Andy, gotta have him at a dinner party.

[B]

Electric. You never know what he's gonna do next. But it was also, you know, in the fullness of time, I think it was an admission of kind of a relatively weak year that I could indulge something like that.

[A]

Sure.

[B]

That was not the case this year where if we hadn't broken it up, I was really struggling with what I was going to put on and what I was going to leave off. I think that the highs, and I think you and I will quibble about some numbers, but, you know, between four and six were just not just locks for this year, but would compete in most years and we could make a case for greatness.

[A]

I would say four, I would think would be on every critics list.

[B]

Should be.

[A]

Honestly, two of them, I think, are. No, duh, we were always gonna love this. And then there are a few that we just obviously were very passionate about. I am a little bit self conscious about the fact that it's becoming a bit of a rhetorical crutch for me to be like, this is already on my top 10, 25 times over the course of a year. But I am sitting with the goat.

[B]

Who should say this.

[A]

Yeah, declared Presumed Innocent the show.

[B]

It solved television last year. Yeah, he's a great pilot.

[A]

You know, I say that about the consensus and I say that about, oh, these four shows should be on every critic's top 10. Kind of a fascinating critically at the end of the year, I found it just a fascinating variance between critic to critic. You know, I think that our list will have a lot of similarity with say, Allison Herman at the. At Variety, used to work at the Ringer. I thought there are some others that I was just like, damn, I don't even know if I watched that. You know, I tried my best to check in on some stuff. I will admit that I did some cramming in the last couple of weeks, but for instance, Daniel Feinberg had Mussolini Son of Century, which is a movie series directed by Joe Wright about Mussolini and his rise to power and eventual fall.

[B]

Spoiler.

[A]

Yeah, sorry.

[B]

Shows an alt history.

[A]

That was his number one show, Hollywood Reporter. Damn. Like, there was a lot of like, I like this is what I like this year going on. And I think that that probably speaks.

[B]

To.

[A]

A, you know, the strength of the year if, if people can feel passionate about a bunch of different stuff. And also I think maybe the lack of, I mean, maybe it's just the lack of critical consensus that we're experiencing. And that's the same thing for film right now as, as we see an Ella McKay critical revival four days after it's been released.

[B]

Well, I mean, I, first of all, I'm here for that. I am ready to have a conversation about that. I would go out of my way to see that movie. Yes. You know, that about me, I think that there's two. Not to critique the critics, but I do think there's different spirits with which people can do these lists. And for example, Robert Lloyd, who's the television critic at the LA Times, I think year to year has a list that everyone should check out because it's not just that he is contrarian, because I don't think he is at all. I think that he's celebratory often of things that, I mean, I learned about the existence, like you were just saying about the Mussolini show, like on Robert Lloyd's list at the LA Times, I learned about some animated shows that I'd never heard of. A show called Damascus, a black science fiction show on Tubi. I learned about a show. Well, you had mentioned this to me, but I didn't even realize this. The Cooper Race show, Hal and Harper, which is very good, which I have not checked out, but I wish that I had. I think that it's good, broadly speaking, it's good for the medium when some of these lists look like top 10 record lists from 20 years ago, where it's just like, I am making a strong case not for this indie record, not because I don't like Beyonce, but because this moved me in a way that I'd like to communicate to you. So that's very cool to see. I think that at the, at the top, what we are seeing coming out of the five year death spiral of COVID and the strikes we are seeing, TV gets some of its swagger back in a new era in terms of like, we can make things that work for right now that hearken back to classic relationships with television shows, but feel of the moment, feel there's a reason to be getting behind these things. And I'm not only talking about the Pit, which obviously is on our main top 10 list. There's also. This is also the year when I think I'm starting to feel not just my age, but the age of the medium and the age with which we talk about it. Because I look at the way that my kids engage with culture. And it's not that my older daughter doesn't watch tv. She was very adamant that I mention that Wednesday season two was her number one show of the year, even higher than Summer I Turned Pretty season three. But that for her, new TV shows are kind of. It's like everything has slipped a rung. New TV shows are events, the way movies have become events. Yes, but they otherwise don't really compete with the endless churn of vertical videos, which is how people watch and engage with the world now.

[A]

Yeah, I think it's like, what we're going to see is that, you know, you have people who don't know life without the Internet, and then you have people who don't know life without smartphones. And soon we'll have people who don't know life without binge watching and without that kind of personalized, curated, algorithmic relationship to what is quote unquote on tv. The idea. I don't even know if your daughters could operate a cable guide button. Like, would they even know what? Like, would they just be like, what do you mean I have to wait a half an hour to watch this movie?

[B]

What do you mean? I have to press down, down, down, down, down to get to the next screen. I know that's asking a lot.

[A]

That'll be if we're doing this pod ten years from now.

[B]

I mean, if we are, I can't wait.

[A]

Kai has eight Golden Globes.

[B]

It's not just Kai. It's like Kai.

[A]

She's beaming in from Kawhi, but Kai.

[B]

Is gonna have a Pulitzer Prize. Like, everyone who touches this goes on to greatness. The coaching tree of this pod is amazing. But, yeah, we don't do it for the glory.

[A]

That's right. We're just waiting for Lizzo to drop part 98 of Telos.

[B]

Lizza or Lizzo?

[A]

Lizza.

[B]

Okay, I just. I misheard you.

[A]

I just. I thought we were joking about those. Those wacky kids.

[B]

I don't joke about the fourth estate. Take it very seriously.

[A]

One other thing that I would note that is, you know, for as much as you and I loved a lot of the same stuff, I think that it's worth interrogating whether or not not liking things is contagious. So there were a few shows this year that. And this is actually born out of a chat I was having with Joanna Robinson about end of the year lists. And she pointed out, quite rightly and not at all pointedly, she was just like, I think I was a little bit higher on some of the big tent stuff than you guys were. And that would obviously be, say, like, Severance, you know, or Last of Us or. And she didn't specifically name these, but White Lotus, Alien, Earth. I think that we're always open to loving any of that stuff. You know what I mean? And there's various reasons for why we didn't for each one of those shows, but those are all pretty successful shows that we like, liked, or disliked to varying degrees that probably won't wind up on our top tens, maybe in our honorable mentions. Try to think of what else was really interesting about it. You mentioned actually something. Oh, and you know, I would actually throw the bear in there as a show that I think is a little bit stuck between stations right now of what it used to be and what it might surprisingly become. With the fifth season, I was pretty, I think I was like a little bit of an outlier on. Not an outlier. I was a little bit on an island. With the fourth season, third season, and then the fourth season, I think I found a bit challenging in places. But ended, I thought, on a quite searing note. You mentioned Helen Harper and some of the disparate far flung places you can find television. I'd say the same thing goes for the international pipeline, which is always really interesting. We have some stuff on our top 10, but there continues to be discoveries, especially on Netflix all the time. You know, where you just find out that Stefano Selima made a, a mafia show set in Florence. And I was like, I didn't even get a note. Like, you know, like, it's like these things don't get publicized as much, but they are out there. They are in the, they are in the stacks. You just gotta look for them.

[B]

Also there's things. There's like a Channel 4 sitcom called Boys that is beloved by people that I, that I've become friendly with in the UK and I've checked it out. It's really, really good. It, I think it appeared on, maybe it was on the New Yorker top 10 list. It's interesting to me that like you would think with so many streaming services desperate for anything that it would have found a more consistent home to get some promotion, but it hasn't. Like there are just shows that still don't get here somehow. And the state of the medium worldwide is fairly strong. Yeah.

[A]

And the Helen Harper thing is, is really interesting. I mean, we talked a while ago about whether it was possible to have an independent television scene.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And I think Howard Harper was pitched all over town. I mean, Lili Reinhart, who's the co star of the show, has talked about this, about just being mystified as to why, like nobody seemed interested in a show that, that dealt with this. It was just like it's not like reinventing the wheel. It's a very straightforward like family drama show. Mark Ruffalo's on it and Mark Ruffalo and Betty Gilpin's in it as well. And it's very good. But I can't remember exactly how it wound up on Mubi or how they went about shooting that. But Rafe is like an accomplished independent filmmaker who knows how to make things cheaply. But, you know, I don't know necessarily whether, like, we're going to be here in three years from now and then the consolidation is either wiped out the. The nascent idea of like, hey, maybe we can fund this cheaply and then sell it.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Or whether or not there will actually be a little bit of a thriving independent television scene because of that consolidation. Because people are going to choose to like, hey, if I can get $3 million to do it like this, maybe I can then sell it up upstream somewhere.

[B]

I genuinely don't know. And this is probably a better conversation to punt into the new year just in terms of like, industry stuff. But, like, I don't have an answer for you in terms of scripted television because it is so expensive to make and the margins are so specifically what they are. But I have just been trying to pay more attention to the ways that vertical video churn has changed expectations for comedy. And specifically because of the natures of my algorithm for food television, which I'm passionate about. And as someone who got really into the Food Network in the late 90s and has been watching Iron Chef and the MTV Chef and all this stuff, I was pret. Pretty cool. You were at bars. But I was like, oh, damn. Mario really cooks that live. I'm sure he's great in his personal life as well.

[A]

The. The spotted pig.

[B]

I wish I could go upstairs.

[A]

Yeah. The.

[B]

Just how. Just without almost effortlessly, people have made cooking look completely different and super appealing in 90 seconds with like a GoPro attached to their forehead, versus all of the bells and whistles that are required on television. Or even just like on a more specific level, like the way like the top jaw content, which is very on brand for me, it's very British and restaurant based. But the. I love watching that stuff. I think that guy Jesse is incredibly charming.

[A]

Have you watched his Apple show?

[B]

And I watched some of the Apple show, which he is a very charming host. It's very well made. I like food content, but it just.

[A]

You want him standing on the street being like.

[B]

Well, because the framing of that show is that Michelin stars are the most important thing in the world for diners or restaurateurs or whatever. And they do matter for a certain 1% of the 1% class of both diners and people putting up money for restaurants. But it just feels so completely detached a from most people's lives or interactions with food, such as the kind that we see on topjaw, but also just detach from what the relatability and the pleasure of the food content of just like, here's someone making a soup as opposed to manufactured drama of like, I need to like, will he or won't.

[A]

He get this star right.

[B]

Yeah, we need to tweezer this quick, more quickly so an anonymous person can say, oh, I noticed that. That was a sore relief. And thus has Topshop come here to la?

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

Why would they come here?

[A]

I don't know. Go to Houston, interview me about my favorite slop bowls.

[B]

Genuinely. Yes.

[A]

There's CR outside a goop kitchen.

[B]

Glub, glub, glub.

[A]

That was $70.

[B]

That's the thing. Don't come here like there isn't anything good here. This place is a wasteland.

[A]

Anything else? Top notes about the year?

[B]

No. I think we should get into it. I feel like we can have. I think we can express ourselves through the beauty of shows five to one on our honorable mention list. And I'm going to start a little spicy.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

A little controversially.

[A]

Sure.

[B]

English Teacher on FX. English Teacher Season 2.

[A]

Do you want to speak to the controversy and spiciness?

[B]

I do. Okay. So English Teacher, Season 1, one of the best new shows of 2024, one of the best new comedies to emerge in a long time. And season two, a very, very confusing narrative and experience. I'll say that on screen, just in terms of the television show, I continue to love this show. I think it is pound for pound one of the funniest things on tv. I think that like the performances from Stephanie Koenig and Carmen Christopher and Enrico Colettoni, the entire ensemble. Jordan Firstman this year, especially in a bigger role, just the kind of ensemble you dream about getting in a comedy with a very, very specific and unique to itself rhythm of jokes. And like the season premiere, especially where the kids don't want to do Angels in America because they don't get it but they want to do a Covid musical is so, so fun and just like the sweet spot of what this show is. I think the season petered out a little bit, although it rebounded in the finale. What I genuinely want to present is I loved the show and I do not understand what happened. So big picture of what we can speak to is that last year when the season one was airing, New York magazine ran an expose on reported bad behavior of Brian Jordan Alvarez while working as a sort of before his glow up into mainstream entertainment when he was making web series and YouTube, it was a very deeply reported and passionately reported piece that was essentially could be boiled down to a he said, he said about whether some bad behavior on set was consensual or was it ever. Okay, Unclear. Right? Actually, I don't want to say unclear because the behavior does not seem great.

[A]

Sure.

[B]

There was a comment from Brian Jordan Alvarez in response to it. And then the show, I believe, had already been renewed or then was officially renewed, went into production on the second season. The second season was dropped into a absolute black hole. Press silence.

[A]

Yeah, there was no press for it.

[B]

There was no press for it. I wasn't able to ascertain exactly why I did not catch up on the show because I was traveling most of the fall and I only just finished it in the last few weeks. I feel like this show deserved better. I can't say because I don't know what happened, but I do feel like it is a great injustice that the show is gone, that no one spoke to why it is gone. No one spoke to what actually happened. It seems like an enormous disservice to, like I was saying, the, like Sean Patton, Stephanie Koenig, the great cast of this show, that all of their work seems to have been washed away. Is it because Brian didn't want to do press for it? Is it because FX didn't want him doing press for it? Is it because they couldn't agree on a press strategy for it and they just wanted it all to go away? Was there ever a fair shot for this show in the second season? Should it have gotten one? I don't know. I'm not here to adjudicate the moral behavior of the people who make the art that we like. I just feel like this is a great. It's just greatly unfair that we don't have a full understanding of what happened here. And beyond that, it's a bummer because the show is fucking funny and I liked having it in my life.

[A]

I thought the second season had maybe not the highs of the first season, but it had a consistency for me and also maybe settled into what it could have been for years to come. It kind of was like, okay, we don't need to have a, like, crisis or will the school close kind of thing. In fact, the second season often made fun of the sort of, like, big swings sometimes shows make where everybody thinks, like, the principal is going to be retiring.

[B]

Yes. Or even like 15 years. What's the name of the kid who's like a YouTube kid, who's in the class, who's one of the Funniest background players. And there's a sense in the finale of, like, you're graduating. And he's like, actually, I failed, so I'll be here next year. Right, Right.

[A]

So it's a shame because it's like, obviously got legs. I really, honestly, I gotta admit, like, I. I don't even understand. I don't even wanna get into, like, what that article was about and, like, what he did or didn't do.

[B]

The thing that I think that I struggle with. And there are things that are more important than us liking comedies that we have on our tv. I'm not trying. I don't wanna get aggregated for. For coming down too hard on one side of what could be sexual malfeasance on the set of something.

[A]

Sure.

[B]

My understanding of it, though. And again, no one's talking, so let me know if I'm wrong here. But my understanding is nothing was nothing. No bad behavior was related to this production with all of these people working on it and giving it their best. And it's a bummer. It's just a bummer. I'll miss the show.

[A]

I will go for my number five now. And this is a show that we briefly talked about that you tapped out on, but that I found myself pretty gripped by and will say was, for me, the class of a pretty popular genre. Right. Right now, which is Trash Prestige. And that is the beast in Me.

[B]

I made your list.

[A]

Yeah. I would not call it trash. I mean, I thought it was quite. Quite well done.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And features two, like, really towering performances. Although Claire Danes Lip Quiver has now become full memed. Fully memed. And so, like, women on their peloton are being, like, doing the Claire Danes Lip Quiver. This is just a really well done, gripping, like, New York thriller, you know? And I thought that Antonio Campos offered, like, a really cool visual sensibility to this show. He's a director I like a lot. And it had. For as much as it was like. It just took me back to some of the, like, heyday of the Prestige thriller.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Prestige whodunit. Stuff that we were kind of really enjoying up through Presumed Innocent last year. All her fall, obviously, is, like, a huge hit this year. There's been a bunch of shows this year. Some having to do with the Murdaugh Murders and some having to do with, like, Plastic Surgeons Run Amok. But this was mine. This is one that I really found, like, at the end of every episode, I was like, I kind of want to start the next episode. And had the mechanics of Pulp. But the Prestige of two of the best actors you will see on any kind of screen in Claire Danes and Matthew Rhys.

[B]

And our shared fantasy that New Yorker.

[A]

Writers are celebrities and have sick houses and. Yeah. And oysters.

[B]

It's really nice for us for that.

[A]

Maybe they do.

[B]

I. I don't begrudge this choice at all. I think that even in my limited sampling of it, like, this is an example of something done, something elevated. It didn't need to be this stylish. It didn't need to have these performances going off like this. And anecdotally, in conversations with civilians who watch television the way normals do. Probably no one listening to this podcast. People loved the show. Yeah, like, this was something that people were excited about. Even with the. Like, even at a little Hanukkah get together last night, Cousin was like, this was the perfect show for me to watch with my mom. And that is not small praise.

[A]

Yeah. I think this was a show my wife and I loved watching together and would parcel it out so that it was like, okay, we're gonna watch one, then we're gonna watch it. We're gonna make this last two weeks, but we could have finished it in one night.

[B]

Well, speaking of love, my number four is a show that I cannot really sit here and make a strident argument for on just, like, the aesthetic merits. But I love platonic. On Apple tv.

[A]

You do not have to argue with me about this.

[B]

I think that there is probably a part of me that would like to give a long and winding, impassioned speech about how it is in the public interest, the public trust of these giant corporations to like, give Cooper Raif or whomever the opportunity to make shows and make art within, you know, like, to be the new de Medicis. That said, if they just want to, like, set. If Apple just wants to set aside a couple hundred million every year for Seth Rogen to make two television shows forever and this is one of them. Great. Yeah, great. This was. This was my comfort food show this year. I didn't binge through it. I just had it when I wanted to. And I love Rogan in this. I love Rogan in this period of his life and his career. We're going to get to him, I think, on our shared list. I love Rose Byrne as a comedian, and the show made me very, very happy. Even though it is the least honest about Los Angeles or Southern California driving entertainment products since Collateral.

[A]

Well, doesn't the. Towards the end of the season, like, LA traffic really hinders people getting to and from certain places?

[B]

It Hinders people when necessary. But there are moments in the show that would make anyone who has spent any time here gasp. Like when Seth Rogen says, I. I guess you're right. I guess I have to go confront my ex fiance in San Diego. Do you want to come with me and Rose Byrne's like, I have a large event tonight. My career is dependent on it here in the city that I live in, Los Angeles. But sure, let's hop on the five. Do you know what I mean? Like, it is so this show is a comedy fantasy, but I just, I.

[A]

Really love platonic as well.

[B]

It's really funny and I'm glad that.

[A]

They'Re going to continue to make that.

[B]

Yeah, please keep making it.

[A]

I would like to be able to acknowledge that there's been a costume change in this last cut and I am wearing a hat that says, ask me about my lord and savior, Conrad Fisher. I'm not gonna get too deep into the Summer I Turned Pretty, which is an honorable honorable mention. So I will have six on my honorable mentions. But I did wanna mention.

[B]

Oh, we're just changing rules now. Oh, okay. That's fun.

[A]

But I just wanna just briefly mention that of all the shows that were kind of like water cooler shows or sensations this year, the one I got the biggest kick out of was the Summer I Turned Pretty, which wound up coming out. I think it was over from like July to September, mid September or something like that. And really did become kind of like hysterical kind of thing to wrap the week around and be like, excited about, like, is she gonna choose this guy or is she gonna choose that guy and those crazy kids and cousins and Paris and I just really enjoyed it. So I wanted to say also because I have the hat, but you didn't.

[B]

Enjoy it enough to put it on your actual list.

[A]

No, I just wanted to say that the hat is, you know, it's not. I'm not faking it. I did watch the Summer I'd Turn Pretty.

[B]

This is how you stay popular. You know what I mean? You just, you are attending to every single demographic.

[A]

My real number four.

[B]

And I guess I started this podcast by being like, I'm here to defend an potentially indefensible show. And you're like, who got who here likes candy? I sure do.

[A]

God damn that Conrad, man.

[B]

God, I just do all of this wrong. Like, I really need to rebrand for 26.

[A]

My number four this year was Slow Horses. I'm a little bit boxed in because I kept saying Slow Horses was going to be on my top 10, but I stand by this. It would probably be pretty high on an individual list. I don't know if it would get top six or seven, but it would be on my top 10. Okay, I thought this season was awesome, and I've talked before about how I maybe made the mistake of watching this together bunched up as a binge on its screeners rather than the week to week release schedule that it was parceled out at. But that is, I only did that because I found it so damn addictive and so exciting to watch. This is a much more London based group hang season. After a somewhat more far flung one or a separated one from this previous season, I thought Oldman's best moments in this season were among the best of the series in its entirety, and I don't want to take its consistency and high level of quality for granted. And so I have this season, which was season five, I believe, of Slow Horses, as my number four pick of the year.

[B]

Not on any part of my list, but I agree with you that I'm grateful for the show and Oldman's speech was a top 10 TV moment of the year. Okay, speaking of taking things for granted, I have to put White Lotus on my list.

[A]

Yeah, for sure.

[B]

Shout out to your favorite podcaster, Ezra Klein. Like, this is abundance. It is an abundance. It is a sign of abundance. If.

[A]

Did you just come up with that?

[B]

Yes. If we get White Lotus on our TV and everyone's just like, oh, it's not good enough, or nitpicking it, it's not. You know, it didn't land every single part of its storyline. Like the fact that this show not only exists but is now one of the more beloved and probably profitable franchises in modern TV is shocking to me. It's stunning to me. And I, you know, we, we could do a whole podcast and we did multiple podcasts of all the nits, one could pick with season three. And we could, if we did a ranking of the seasons, I don't know if this would be higher than 3, but the highs were remarkable. Whether it's Parker Posey, Jason Isaac's performance, the Walton Goggins renaissance that we saw, the Sam Rockwell speech, the Carrie Coon speech. But like, I think it is no small thing to have an All Star game basically every year of some of the best actors of our time, exploring the stuff that one interesting creative filmmaker wants to explore. And I found it. I enjoy this job of covering TV more when the White Lotus is on. I thought it was a really exciting season.

[A]

It's it is definitely. Regardless of whether I felt like this was a weaker season than the first two or not, it still has so much to think about and so much to talk about on every episode. Every. Every episode of the show has got something to. To really, like, consider. And if anything, I'm judging Mike White harshly because I'm like, I didn't necessarily know if the three. Three separate plot lines ever, like, kind of tied into a knot. I think it had interesting ideas in each one, but they tonally felt a little bit disparate for me in terms of previous seasons.

[B]

Yeah, I agree. And I'm very curious to see that he's returning to more comfortable ground. Literally. I think they're filming in the French, I don't know, south of France, but they're filming in France in a beautiful location. And there may, I think. Cause I think a lot of people bumped on the kind of exoticism 101 of, like, what it would mean to be in Thailand, which I enjoyed because it was a show about people who don't leave a resort in Thailand and get some spa treatments. So it'll be interesting if this upcoming season is considered a return to form or just kind of a retreat. But either way, the rumors that Helena Bonham Carter is the first person. Is that a rumor? The rumors that she's the first person cast in it. And it's just like, he doesn't miss with people who, like, if there was. If he just has, like a little, like, you know, Moneyball scout sheet of, like, the people who should be on the show. And like, what if I could recreate Jennifer Cool, as you see that video.

[A]

Of the guy who tried to recreate the Boyd Holbrook, he's like, we could sign this guy for $10 million or we could use Boyd Holbrooke. Recreate it in the aggregate.

[B]

Yeah, that's it. That's what I'm saying. All right.

[A]

Okay, so number three for you is White Lotus. Number three for me is a show that we did not really talk about this year, which is Blue Lights, a BBC show that you can watch on Britbox. And I just thought I would shout out, as prob, the best cop show going right now. The most running long running or running cop show going, not about cops who run, but just it's not a limited series.

[B]

Got it. How does it feel about athletic cops?

[A]

You know what? In Belfast, sometimes you gotta run.

[B]

Sometimes you do.

[A]

This is a show about three probationary officers navigating the current day, the present day of Belfast and the drugs the organized crime, the sectarianism that is still present in that day. I think it pairs very interestingly with say Nothing as a series to watch together. But this is from Declan Law and Adam Patterson each season. It's on its third season. This year is six episodes and it is incredibly digestible. Thrilling. I'd say it has a little bit of homicide, life in the streets, character study, observational qualities and a little bit of the more taught thriller British procedurals like Line of Duty.

[B]

Nice.

[A]

And so it's really great. You can watch it on BritBox. I highly recommend it. I think the third season is probably my favorite and I really wanted to highlight it in this list.

[B]

Okay. My next one would absolutely. These top two on my list would be on my top 10. Without doubt. I have to shout out the chair company. Tim Robinson and Zach Canan's absolutely unhinged. It's not even a comedy anymore. It's just a portal into a completely different upside down universe in which the most banal Midwestern mall developer, played by Tim Robinson, can just slide into a shadow world that is David Lynchian in the best possible way. No one else is making art or entertainment like Tim Robinson is right now. We spoke about it just a few weeks ago, so I don't wanna repeat myself. But it's so much more than let's just do another comedy series. It is absolutely a very, very odd, dramatic conspiracy thriller that is also minute to minute, one of the most surreal and funny things that's been on TV in a long time. And it makes me really happy that the show's been renewed. And it makes me happy that from everything I've gathered that the HBO team, whether it's Amy Gravett, who's head of comedy, or Casey, who's head of the network, understand that this isn't just like, let's take a flyer on a guy who's buzzy right now. Because we also like the 11 minute friendship outtakes.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

With Tim and. And Connor. This is them doing what HBO does best, which is we are going to invest in a very, very unique voice who is ready to level up.

[A]

Do you think that your affection for this show makes you reconsider your aversion to Nathan Fielder or do you consider them like completely different flavors?

[B]

I genuinely think that my. I think I need to get over my allergy to Nathan Fielder. Mostly because I just can't stand the fact that people have approached me in front of my children and asked for pictures with me. That does leave a mark. But that doesn't mean That I can't take responsibility for falling down on the job and not engaging with what Sam Esmail says is the best.

[A]

I have that problem. But it's Nate from landman.

[B]

They're like, 100%.

[A]

You seem like a great lawyer on Landman.

[B]

You seem like a great housebound lawyer.

[A]

My number two. Is that where we're up to?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

My number two is Death by Lightning, A show that we touched on earlier in the year is historical television done at the highest, highest level. And two central performances from Michael Shannon and Matthew McFadden that I thought were among the best of the year. This is another Netflix series. This one comes from Mike Makowski and is executive produced by Benioff and Weiss. The series is directed by Matt Ross. I thought that, you know, while some of the, you know, there are moments where I'm like, I know that this isn't, like, shot in Washington, D.C. or Philadelphia or whatever. You know what I mean? Like, there are some parts of it.

[B]

That feels shot in Budapest or something, wasn't it?

[A]

Yeah, there's. There's an Eastern European air to some.

[B]

Of it, like me.

[A]

But the performances and some of the ideas that they kick around and the idea of obsession and the idea of political ambition and the idea of using politics as this kind of stepping stone to fame. I think there's a bunch of shows this year that dealt with politics and tried to make commentary on our contemporary moment by using either genre or history. But I thought this one was probably the one that worked best for me. I think. I think I would recommend it to anyone who's even passingly curious about dad tv, just because it's not that big of a commitment. Just a few episodes.

[B]

Four episodes.

[A]

And an excellent act of adaptation.

[B]

Apparently too much for some dads. Because I loved the show. I still haven't finished it, which is probably the only reason it's not on my list. Also, I think we were trying not to step on each other's toes here, but I completely agree with you, and I think it is a remarkable blueprint for how to make period pieces feel electric.

[A]

Yeah. And I also, getting through the fourth episode, I was just like, I don't know how many shows need to be longer than this.

[B]

It's a lesson, isn't it?

[A]

Well, because when I'm watching Blue Lights, I'm like, this is perfect. These six episodes are perfect. I don't really have. I wasn't sitting there being like, really, what? Could have been eight?

[B]

I mean, it would be. If. It would be great to see a Move towards, broadly speaking, in television, an understanding by the various streamers and by the creators who for many reasons often want more episodes to get paid more. Of course, it's just such a. It's such a. I get it. The industry is much more difficult to navigate on a professional level now, so that does make sense. But it would be great if we could fix this up in the new year and let shows be what they need to be. Yeah.

[A]

It's interesting because like out of coming out of the merger talks and acquisition talks the last couple weeks, there's been a lot of emphasis on what the customer wants.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And I do sometimes think that that is not exactly right. You know, like, I think what it is is like you want more minutes spent on the platform.

[B]

Right.

[A]

And so the, you know, you might take a six episode show and be like, let's make it nine, let's make.

[B]

It 11, whatever, and we'll get to it. Nobody is like, the pit is too long. No, the pit was a perfect length. And that's 15 episodes.

[A]

We'll get to that. Your number one honorable mention.

[B]

So my number one honorable mention a few weeks ago I mentioned revisiting something that we had touched on briefly and really, really getting drawn into it. That show is Families Like Ours, which is Thomas Vinterberg, the Dogma Filmmakers television show. It was on Netflix, a very big international co production that filmed all over Europe. This would have probably crashed my top five or is in my personal top five. I found it so haunting, so compelling. I thought about it nonstop. For people who don't know what it's about or remember. Yeah, or remember. It is a Danish language original television series about a moment when Denmark has looked at the data, looked at the rising sea level and is like living in this peninsula nation is no longer sustainable. Thus we will be shutting down the country and everything that comes afterwards. And it is the most human dystopia I've seen in a long time. It is a horror show in which there is almost nothing surreal. I say almost because God damn it, Thomas Vinterberg, I know you're an auteur and I know you're a European auteur, but you got so close to making something without a magic boy who could see sadness in the future. Like, you got so close. But he couldn't resist. It was right there for him. Basically unsupernatural series about something that felt so plausible that it is deeply, deeply uncomfortable to watch at times. And I think that you watch the first two episodes and you see this like Perfect Scandinavian life. And the only hint that things are going wrong is the camera lingers on bodies of water sometimes. It never showcases. There is no like 2012 tsunami crashing. It's just that inevitably this is going to happen and they're trying to be responsive to it. It's engaging because even today we're like, well, the Scandinavians have it figured out. They're very reasonable. This is a problem that is not going to be reasonable. And I think the other thing, and making it a very, very human based family drama, which it is. It basically follows the extended members of one family as they try to make sense of this and then rebuild their lives in a diaspora of Danes. It is not an environmental catastrophe show. It is a immigration catastrophe show. And those two issues are very connected. But the idea of being stateless, of being paperless, of trying to be with the people that you love or even what it would mean to be from a place is extremely relevant to everyone. And the show can be clumsy at times, but I just really, really admired the swing and found it really, really engaging in a way to our actual lives in a way that a lot of what we watch to escape into does not manage to measure up to.

[A]

I thought it was a wonder. Again, we decided no same picks, but it probably would have been on mine. My number one is Shorzy fourth season of Jared Kiso's honestly hysterical hockey comedy. I've talked about it in the past. Mantzoukas has come on to talk about it. This is about the titular character, Shorzy, trying to figure out his life off the ice. The first three seasons of this series captured the kind of fall and rise of a small, a semi professional Sudbury, Canada hockey team and follows a sports movie script pretty well and would be an excellent long sports film. This has all of the deadpan comedy that Letterkenny had, but it is much more, much more of a like journey than Letterkenny sometimes seem frozen in time. And I went and saw the cast of SH play hockey against a bunch of retired LA Kings for charity yesterday at the, at the Crypto Arena.

[B]

Wild to me.

[A]

And there were 7, 500 people there.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

On a Sunday afternoon.

[B]

You were all wearing vests.

[A]

Most of us were wearing. Well, most people were wearing Shoresy jerseys.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

Or shortsy sweatshirts. But I was really, really struck by like, I don't think I've ever done anything like that outside of like a comic con where I've like gone to an event where just like fans are there. And there is also this weird, uncanny valley where like the cast is playing. They're just playing hockey, like pretty well.

[B]

I mean, I'll take your word for it.

[A]

But it was, I was just like, you get, you start to lose. Like, I know it's a TV show, but it almost seemed like this team from Canada was like barnstorming kind of, and they did a couple of bits, but it was just really a really fun event. And I don't think I've ever seen anything like that. And I've never really quite seen anything. Like every time I say shorzy on this podcast, people DM me set the tone.

[B]

This is so sweet. Yeah. This is the closest I've ever seen you to being a Disney adult for something.

[A]

Yeah, for hockey.

[B]

You keep it pretty 100. Like you never get too high or too low, but you're pretty into this.

[A]

This episode is brought to you by Salty Cheesy Cheez It Crackers. Should this whole podcast just be me eating Cheez It? That would be a top notch podcast. You could hear them crunching in my mouth. You could think about. About how salty and savory and delicious they are. You can just get Cheez it on the brain. Oh, man, those Cheez it cravings, they get you. Anyway, what was I talking about?

[B]

Oh, yeah.

[A]

Oh, Cheez It. Yeah, Cheez It Crackers. Go check them out. Hi, it's Eva Longoria and let's be real. After 40, we should ask for more from our skincare.

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[A]

So that's our fives.

[B]

Right.

[A]

Okay, let's start with 10 here. And we'll try and move briefly through some of these because we've talked about these shows. We've talked about these a lot. But. But at number 10, I had us with Department Q. Yep. This is Scott Frank's detective series that debuted on Netflix. I don't know whether it's gonna have a second season.

[B]

It is having a second season. It does. Weirdly it. And I'm sure Scott is nothing if not forthcoming with us. He can explain why it took so long. But, yes, it was officially renewed.

[A]

Okay, so Department Q is the detective show set in Scotland, starring Matthew Good as an English detective living in Scotland who gets his own department in a Scottish police department to do cold cases. It is what Scott does best, which is take tropes and cliches and stories and push on through to the other side with them. So you have your complicated detective who must heal thyself. He, in and of itself has got, like, he's Sherlock. He has his Watson. He has his group of people working with him. There is, you know, a missing woman who would normally be just off screen in. In most detective shows that she is given almost to a sort of maybe too much painful amount. Yeah, she's given a lot of screen time. What did you. What did you think of Department Q in retrospect?

[B]

I mean, I think it's a fantastic watch. I think it is exceptional and like a hallmark of this era where we can have a certain type of entertainment which is a scandinair of which there are dozens, both in their native languages. This is based on a very popular Danish book series, but also like Britbox and Acorn, like, that's what they do. But then to have one of our great screenwriters and filmmakers like, you know, who we obviously stand for, these guys. These are our guys. But this generation, and they're all friends, I believe, of, like Scott Frank, Tony Gilroy, who we'll talk about in a second, Steve Zaillian, who came up as the preeminent screenwriter under William Goldman.

[A]

Kind of. Yeah.

[B]

And then. Yes. And the direct line. And then have started directing and. And of all of them, I mean, I think you can make the case that Scott has become one of the better directors as well.

[A]

Sure.

[B]

And seeing him take a turn on something that is established and being like, I love this. I'm not going to mess it up. I'm going to do my version of it is thrilling. I think the case against Department Q, which makes it fun to talk about, is what we were just saying a moment ago about let things be the right size, let them be what they the best version of themselves in this bifurcated, stratified, challenging streaming economy. Department Q should be already. We should already have a trailer for season two.

[A]

Sure.

[B]

The best version of Department Q is a detective series version of the Pit that's on Netflix, and Netflix is grinding them. And we're thrilled because there's tons of books. But it is also an auteurish type show.

[A]

He likes telling his stories. Yeah.

[B]

And it takes time for him to get it right. And he figures it out on set. As he told us in interviews on the pod, he likes to figure it out in the edit. It's not wired that way. So I totally get it if there are people who are like. That didn't click for me because reasons. Because it was too heady, it was too cerebral. It went too far into literally into the chamber of secrets, if you will, or because I want pressurized. But it's a really interesting case study in what TV was for the last 10 years and what it might be again. And ultimately it's successful because of Matthew Goode's performance and Kelly McDonald's performance and especially Shout Out Alexey Manvillov, who plays Akram, who's one of the. If we were doing like a new character draft, he would be in the running for the show.

[A]

Yeah, absolutely. Let's go up to our number nine, the studio. So this is our second Seth Rogen Shout Out. He has got a case for being one of the most important producers of television of this decade.

[B]

I think you're still caping up for.

[A]

Preacher, but between the boys and the several Apple shows that he's made. But. But man, the studio winds up being a fantasy and a cringe comedy and a seat of your pants drama. And I think there are different fans of different parts of this show. But as the series went on and we got into the last four episodes, I think it really kind of. I personally really love the pilot in the second episode, but I don't know if that would have been sustainable if the Matt character who Seth Rogen plays was just constantly on the verge of absolutely destroying his production. And you could make the argument that he was still like that. But I thought as it kind of opened the aperture, spent more time with the ensemble. Some very obviously delightful cameos and just an amazing snapshot of this city and this industry. Even if it was satirized and even if it was like, well, we're gonna turn this up to 11. Shout out to Rob Reiner and Spinal Tap to kind of. To kind of make the joke work a little bit better. So what do you want to say?

[B]

I just think I love the show for all the reasons you said for its criticism, but melancholic love of an industry that is in transition for the deep Rolodex of celebrities willing to have fun with themselves and play amplified versions of themselves like Zoe Kravitz or Dave Franco or Bryan Cranston. Second number two in the new character draft, Matt Bellamy. Playing Matt Bellamy. This show is on my list no matter what because of just the sheer joy of its creation. From the fact that Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg created it with a bunch of people, all of whom got created by credit, all of whom shared in the success of the show at the Emmys in a really lovely way, but also the fact that aesthetically, they directed every episode. They just went for it. They wanted to make a noir. They wanted to make an entire episode that was a oner. The score, the style, the pleated, the editing by old school Hollywood Buffet. It was a joyful act of creation that translated to the audience.

[A]

Yeah, our number eight is the Eternaut. Hell yeah, dog, you cook on this one. We got. This is Bruno Stagnaro's adaptation of the acclaimed Argentinian graphic novel.

[B]

Yeah, look, sometimes things just fall from the sky, and sometimes it's poison snow that wipes out most of the globe. Other times, it is a six episode adaptation of a beloved Argentine graphic novel that you and I had absolutely no fucking prior knowledge of. And this show was just sick. It was. It hit at the right time for us when there was, like, a little bit of a soft period in the schedule. And it just was incredibly compelling, incredibly entertaining. Very, very surprising. I would say the weakest moment of an incredibly strong first season was the moment that it tipped the most into, like, sci fi genre and had to, like, put alien bugs on screen.

[A]

Okay, so that was, like, sort of more midway through the season. Not the end of the season.

[B]

No, no, no. By the end, I was like, this show just knows what it is. And it has such an incredible performance. Starring performance by Ricardo Darin. We love shit like this. We love to be surprised. We love to be entertained, and we love when Planet Earth reflects something back to us and be like, we have our own stories here. And Netflix, again, to its credit, was like, we will empower Argentine filmmakers And actors to tell this story. Yeah. Great show.

[A]

And felt so lived in. And it's, you know, one of the great things about the last 10 years of television for me and just over the course of doing this podcast, the emergence of international TV and our accessibility to it is it's cheap travel. You know, it is basically places. Yeah. I've never been to Buenos Aires, but I. Tremendous amount of fascination.

[B]

Bring an umbrella and a gas mask.

[A]

Well, I have a tremendous amount of fascination for the culture there, especially because of my interest in football and like, I think just getting those first opening episodes and especially that first episode of the Night of the Blackout and those guys sitting around playing cards and the stores and the bicycles and just the way the city is sort of laid out, you really just do get a sense of place in this show that is unrivaled in a lot of ways in which you never would have gotten this in the early 2000s. You never would have been able to see something like this. I love the U turn on.

[B]

And they did it at a price point like by necessity, but it was a reminder that if you want to try to get lost vibes, you don't need to spend hundreds of millions of dollars like three Body Problem ended up doing. I mean, obviously it's apples to oranges, but it is Netflix and. And I really like when they turn up gems like this.

[A]

Me too. Number seven is another international show and I on a personal. Might have been pretty high for me. This is Eastern Gate, which is my thriller of the year. My thriller of the year.

[B]

And I. HBO Max.

[A]

Yeah, HBO Max is a Polish spy show about a spy played by Eva, played by an actress named Lena Gora, who like, it was one of my favorite performances of the year. Somewhere between. God, I mean, like, who are the. Who are her. Like I'm trying to think of, like, who her. I mean, it's like half Jason Bourne and then half Carrie Matheson. This is about a Polish spy working in the. The Poland. Poland's embassy in Belarus trying to root out a mole working in.

[B]

In this embassy and set hyper specifically at a moment when all the chatter and also international, you know, performance basically in the geopolitical theater is suggesting that Russia is going to make a move on something, is going to make a statement by reclaiming something that it feels belongs to Russia. And in the moment of the show, it could be Ukraine or it could be a disputed portion of Poland called the Suelki Gap.

[A]

Yes, Suwaku Gap. And it's an incredible solve for making a show of the moment, but not wanting headlines to eclipse the show by the time it gets out. So you basically do recent history. I thought that the thing I love about this and one of the reasons why I'm so fascinated by Spies is because it's fictional. Spies is because you watch people have to put on these masks and this character literally does not like a mask, like Jim Carrey mask, but changes her eyes, changes her hair, changes the way she dresses and changes the way she behaves and acts depending on who she's pretending to be and who she's with, whether it's her lover, whether she's working in the embassy, pretending to be a consulate, whether she's pretending to be somebody's consort, whether she's hanging out with her sister. She's completely different person. Lena Gore gives an astonishing performance. I thought this was the most gripping, tense piece of TV I saw this year in some ways. And has a phenomenal conclusion. I don't know if they're gonna do another season of this. I think they are. But Eastern Gate was awesome.

[B]

We love spies always. It's one of our favorite genres of storytelling and we continue to reference Le Carre all the time in the classic kind of Cold War spycraft or shows that are like, ah, in this fallen world. Post Le Carre Cold War spycraft, of which Licari wrote quite brilliantly. Eastern Gate coupled with an author you put me onto, Oliver Harris, who's written three absolutely eye meltingly good contemporary spy books.

[A]

Did you read the third one yet?

[B]

I'm halfway through. Okay, point towards what this genre can be in the world we have now. It is so contemporary and so bracing and exciting and horrifying in a way that you know to be our age and fall in love with, like the Spy who Came in from the Cold is a little bit of. It's a period. I mean, it's literally a period piece. But also one's emotions are measured by the fact that it is of a different world. Yeah, Eastern Gate and I don't need to pair them, but I do want to shout out those books again. A Shadow Intelligence is the first of those. And no gatekeeping. You put me onto those. I think Zach, our buddy Zack Baron read them first.

[A]

Yeah, Zack gets the credit.

[B]

Ascension, the second one is mind blowing. Like these are not bloodless espionage entertainments. They are terrifying but incredibly entertaining as well.

[A]

Yes, we'll have a lot of book recommendations for folks in our mailbag at.

[B]

The end of the year.

[A]

For number six, I have the lowdown.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

I think you had the lowdown a.

[B]

Little bit higher, but I'll allow it.

[A]

But we can debate it a little bit as we go further. This is Sterling Harjo's love letter to Tulsa and Robert Altman's adaptation of Raymond Chandler's the Long Goodbye. And it's a shaggy mystery that kind of feels like it's like written left handed by a right hander, you know what I mean? Like, it has like a kind of looseness and curiosity that shows don't often have. And it's about vaping and coffee shops and junior kimberough records and being a girl dad and used bookstores and being a girl dad and femme fatales. And you know, it is.

[B]

And ultimately what we owe each other and what we've inherited and what we need to reject. I mean, it is. Look, all capital letters. This is extremely our shit. I feel really lucky that we got this season. I think you and I were both, because of the age that we are in the world that we live in. We were like dayenu a little bit. Like, I can't believe he got to make this. I feel pretty confident that there's gonna be more, which is really exciting. Yeah, it's really cool. Cool. It's, it's.

[A]

Unless Ethan Hawke gets elected president because the run he's on right now.

[B]

Did you listen to him on Fresh Air?

[A]

I was like, did you see him on Rogan?

[B]

No, he went on Rogan.

[A]

He had Rogan kind of like eating out of the palm of his hand. Wow. It was pretty amazing.

[B]

In terms of Spotify podcasts, he did us first.

[A]

Sure.

[B]

So that's good to know for my next renegotiate. But this show is a celebration of filmmaking in the classic sense of Sterlin being a great, not just a great writer and great director, but being a great reader and a great watcher and a great fan of Jim Thompson books and as you said, Altman movies and shaggy dog stuff from the 70s, like the great Gene Hackman film Night Moves, but also of actors, one of the all time great cast and just giving these beautiful opportunities, not just to Ethan Hawke, but to Keith David and Kyle McLaughlin and our buddy Tracy, Letter killer Mike, Josh Fathom, like these people who are his friends in real life who show up and populate this world. Macon Blair, who's phenomenal in these small little moments of the show. I don't want to overstate it because it's, you know, I think it's correctly ranked in terms of our big picture top 10. But this is why we get up in the morning sure is to have stuff like this.

[A]

Extraordinary stuff. Extraordinary stuff.

[B]

Good job.

[A]

Okay, so you would have had the lowdown a little higher, I think, in your personal preference. Agree. So that was six. Do you have Task at five?

[B]

In my personal preference, yes, but I had something that you have higher. Lower.

[A]

Oh, interesting.

[B]

Doesn't really matter.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

We love all these shows.

[A]

I have task at 5. We have task at 5. We talked extensively about Task this year. I think this was probably the show that hit me the hardest this year when I think about it on a personal level. But that I completely. I'm candid, I'm upfront about the fact that that has a lot to do with geography.

[B]

Sure.

[A]

But it also was the most sincere and vulnerable show that I think got made in America this year in some ways. And I say that specifically because I think there are international shows that might pop up later. But this is Brad Inglesby's follow up to Mayor of Easttown, starring Tom Pelfrey and Mark Ruffalo and an incredible ensemble working around them. Made in and around Philadelphia and Delaware county about essentially like a Heat style cop versus robber on a collision course. But then it kind of becomes about a lot of other things, about forgiveness and about God and about fatherhood again, and just an incredibly deep and meaningful show.

[B]

To me, I think that there's an argument to be made that this is the best show of the year. I think that we're at the point of our list where catch us on a certain day or a couple Yinglings.

[A]

Deep or catch us after a certain.

[B]

Episode or catch us after a 31 nothing overdue get right game against the Raiders. Like we might swing this higher. This is the most Philly show and Brad Inglesby is the most Philly creator. Not because of his deep knowledge of the Blue route and all the roads around Broomall, but because of the way the show effortlessly communicates the lingua franca of where we're from. Not in terms of accents and the performances of the accents Emilia Jones, especially unfucking real, but this very, I think, regionally unique mix of just heart on your sleeve emotion, deep, deep bruising culturally, economically, socially, psychologically, and then just a savage wit. Like the show is really funny and it doesn't work if it's not funny, just like it doesn't work if it's not pulling your heartstrings. And the performances in it are God tier. And I'm. I'm excited and curious where it's gonna go as an ongoing series for sure.

[A]

At number Four.

[B]

Yeah. For you. No, go on.

[A]

I have Pluribus.

[B]

See, I had Pluribus, like, at seven.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

On my list.

[A]

Interesting.

[B]

But I support you in your journey here.

[A]

Well, okay, so you had. Well, we can talk about it once we get done the task.

[B]

Lowdown in families like ours. Higher on my personal experience, but I do not. We are the collective here. We are all Zosia, and we agree with this.

[A]

I have noted with interest that there seems to be a more vocal contingent of Pluribus deniers.

[B]

Yes, I've noticed that, too.

[A]

I think that there is an interesting.

[B]

Frankly, they're starting to get to me, their campaign.

[A]

Well, it's an interesting conversation to be had about pacing and tempo in television shows and whether or not what entertainment looks like to any given person. And I think that there is. I kind of fully support people being like, I'm bored by this, because I don't think that there's any sort of privilege to, like, just because we have microphones. We don't know more about TV than anybody else. If you don't like the show, you don't like the show. I think it is a miracle. I think that what it's doing, in terms of asking a pretty addled society that probably watches a lot of TV with their phones in their hands or doing other things to watch someone do very simple things in a very complicated environment is one of the best tests I've had to take in a long time.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And I have fully come under its spell. You know, I. I was watching the most recent episode and thinking to myself, how much actual. How many pages was this?

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Because you could write the script to an episode of pluribus in probably 30 pages, but the episodes themselves are 55 minutes or something like that. So how does it. I hope we get to talk to Vince again about how that translates from the page to the visual execution and the performances.

[B]

And you can only do that in an operation that has been so successful for so long, an operation that is seamless in terms of, like, the writer's room and the realities of production. Whether they are in the Canary Islands where they film some of it, or they're in their beloved Albuquerque. Like, you can't start a show and pitch it and sell it and get into production and say, yeah, I know this is a pretty terse script, but don't worry, I'm going to deliver on a very gripping 55 minutes of television. You can't do it. Yes, only they can do this.

[A]

And it's kind of the reverse of another show that I think both of us were very affectionate about, called like paradise, where paradise is also about an apocalyptic level event that happens or a. A kind of world changing event that happens. And what paradise chooses to do is burn a season of story in every episode, you know, and it. And it's like going seven seconds or less the entire time. I don't think Pluribus is slow to watch, but I think it's taking its time getting where it's going and it's very intuitive and I think what it likes is revealing layers of this character Carol. And now I think this character Manusos, over the course of this season, observation about how they are feeling and thinking about what's going on through what they are doing about it.

[B]

I find it incredibly pleasurable to watch. And if there have been moments that have dragged or have been slow or I've doubted, I'm not doubting this creative team. Sure there were seasons of Better Call Saul where I was like, yeah, I don't know, me too. And I was wrong. Because cumulatively when you look back at for what has been built and the edifice that you're standing on and what you're on the precipice of is masterful. And I love that experience and I love the performances. I do think that it might be worth noting that I think some of the resistance to the show is the discomforting experience of watching something that exists separate and apart from the economy that we are all living in. And I don't mean like that somehow this production for Apple TV is like anti capitalist. That is not what I mean. I just mean that yesterday I went down to scenic downtown Los Angeles. A great place to hang out, great families.

[A]

I was there too.

[B]

And we were at a hockey match. Yeah, I was just on the streets. I was on the streets spending $19 for a coffee. And there was like a, like a pop up bazaar of like shops and people with like vintage racks and stuff. And at the end of it there was a store that was just like the apotheosis of everything. It was a storefront with beautiful blonde wood. Inside of it was a vintage red BMW convertible taking up 80% of the store. And then there was a rack with five sweatshirts.

[A]

Sweatshirts or no sh. Sweatshirts.

[B]

Nope. And I was like, oh, this is the store where people who have rich dads work.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

But beyond that I was like, I don't even know how to engage with the storefront because I don't know what they're doing. They are not bound to the exigencies of, like, making a living or communicating a product or making rent, like it's beyond that. Sure. And thus I am confused and a little bit resentful by it. I don't feel that way about Pluribus because it's a beautiful show. But I do think that it's very challenging to rank Pluribus with other television shows that have come out of a more traditional 2020s development process and creative process, because Vince Gilligan makes TV shows in a completely unique way that seems like a beautifully successful kind humming machine. But you can't knock it for that. I'm not knocking it. I was suggesting that there may be some resistance to it because you're watching it and you're like, well, how are they getting away with this?

[A]

Yeah, Well, I think that the guy on Twitter with an anime avatar who's like, this shit is boring, is probably not knocking it because of, like the seamless development process and blank check he got.

[B]

Well, let's ask him because I think that he'll be very vocal in my mentions. Got him.

[A]

Come right outside. Number three. I have the Pit as our number three show.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

You agree with that?

[B]

I do.

[A]

Okay. Old school pleasures. New school package.

[B]

Nice.

[A]

And a show that is using the hook of a medical procedure and the tension of real time and also packing in two seasons worth of disasters and crises into one day of these peoples, these characters, these medical professionals, their lives. And makes it into an extraordinary portrait of an industry under immense pressure in a post Covid nation Central performance by Noah Wylie is phenomenal, but obviously an incredible ensemble. And also one of the great pleasures of TV is getting attached to a half a dozen characters and a half a dozen actors that you had no familiarity with before. And it, you know, it does everything that that other show did, the other John Wells hospital show did, while also just feeling very.

[B]

For legal reasons, you're not going to name it.

[A]

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. I just think. And the fact that it's three weeks away from coming out again goes to your point about, like, we gotta get back on the tracks here.

[B]

Yeah, it's important. I mean, it is an important show for its content, for the way that it's delivering the content, for what it's doing for jobs in Los Angeles, for the industry, for reminding viewers what television can and should be. I just think at this moment we are lucky with an abundance of riches of reasons to tune into television. We can be challenged, we can be provoked, we can be just kind of zero out with something. But really, one of the greatest things TVs ever been able to provide is love.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

To love people, to root for people. To feel connected to human struggle in ways that are. Shut up, Pluribus. Like communal and uplifting and joining and like gluing us together. And man, the pit just understands that in its bones. It was so. It's so great to have a show like this.

[A]

I still want the pit PM shift.

[B]

The night shift, the night shift of the Pit, the Hadasi pit, after pit pm.

[A]

I mean, look, it seems like it gets pretty weird at that hospital no matter what time of day it is. Number two, we arrived at this juncture and I think that there is actually like an interesting disagreement. So, you know, we've talked about both of these shows so much. Yeah, let's talk about them together.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

I have. My personal preference is number two is adolescence. Number one is andor. Okay, I think you have the reverse.

[B]

I do have the reverse, but only in the spirit of. I don't know, maybe I'm putting too much nobility into like, the structure of these lists. For me, andor season two is essentially flawless and one of the more incredible accomplishments in entertainment of our time. I think one of the reasons why it is so outstanding and feels so accomplished and feels so monumental and significant is because of the nature of it as a two season statement. Proof of what. What we can do with this medium. If we rewire our brains and we're not trying to just put Star wars on TV or we're not trying to.

[A]

Put a BMW in a storefront.

[B]

We're not trying to put a BMW in a storefront. But, like, what can we do that's different? What can we. And how can we accomplish it? And adolescence is. I mean, look, it's 1 in 1A regardless.

[A]

Yeah.

[B]

For me, adolescence is a singular statement of such incredible technical achievement, but also such emotional devastation and power because this one season is what we're getting and because it stands alone, to me, that went. That's the number one. Because that is the most definitive statement of incredibly talented people, you know, on both sides of the camera coming together to say, look what's possible. Yeah, look what's possible in a absolutely painfully relevant only right now type of way.

[A]

Yeah. It's also. It's challenging in the most. It's challenging in a way that I love. You know, it challenges you to have empathy for the villain of the show and it challenges you to have empathy and love for the man who raised that villain. And it has, you know, you cannot watch Owen Cooper and not be Like, I don't want this to be true. You know? And you watch Aaron Doherty act with him and you're like, I want her to fix him. You know, I want her to let him out of jail. I want her to see that he's okay. And I remember I have recall for adolescence in a way that I don't usually for TV shows. Like, I have a little bit of a. Like, onto the next one. And then if you're like, what happened in the third episode of White Lotus this year? I'd be like, no, no idea.

[B]

You're the Bill Belichick of Bing.

[A]

Like, where it gets like when you like throw a random game at LeBron and he's like, oh, yeah, of course. We were down 88, 94 and there was a timeout and then we ran horns and I got fouled and then we went on a 16, 0 run. Like, I kind of feel that way about adolescence. It's like seared in my memory. And that has to stand for something for me. Andor is a little bit of a recency pick because I rewatched the second half of the season pretty casually and I was like, there's nothing better than this.

[B]

Yeah, I think that's probably true.

[A]

I don't know what to say beyond that. I was rewatching things like Luthan and Lonnie on the bench, or Krennic and Partagaz's last interaction. Or Krennic and Dedra.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

And. Or when Cassian first appears in the second season and he's like taking. He's going to take the, the shuttle from the Imperial base. And he's like, yeah, he's like, you're coming home to yourself. We talked to Tony a couple of times for this. That was definitely a very rewarding and enlightening experience. But look, this allows me to be in touch with my six year old self. And also my guy went to college oneself. And that's really like a pretty special combination of things.

[B]

I don't. It's not even an argument. It's like if you take the third episode of Adolescence and you take welcome to the Rebellion late in the season of Andor, and you think about Genevieve O'Reilly's performance and you think about Stellan Skarsgrd's performance. And we are lucky to have these two hours and we are lucky that both of them are engaging with our most creative selves. Whether it's the way that that Adolescence episode is shot or the fact that Andor is in the Galactic Senate in a moment that the real dorks. And I say that with love and with looking in a mirror. That's a moment that people have probably thought about or understood it must have happened. And if you've watched the cartoons, it does happen in a different way. Or you catch the as they're escaping. But both of them are also deeply political and deeply moving to have experienced this year when you can hit that sweet spot of entertainment relevance and emotion. You are playing in rarefied air. And at this point of the list, I like all of these shows. Yeah, it's not an argument I want to make.

[A]

I think that 12 was in a really interesting argument. I think it's interesting that you probably had Lowdown higher and Pluribus low.

[B]

But again, at that point, it's just a question of like head versus heart. Right. And also I'm ranking Pluribus where I where it is. I have not finished the season. That's right. So. Which will finish this year. So it's relevant. It could move around a little bit.

[A]

But I wait till you see who Carol's lawyer is.

[B]

Is it Clea, who's actually Leia.

[A]

I'll recap here what we had. So for the watches top 10 of the year andor number one, adolescence. Number two, the pit. Number three, pluribus. Number four. But not I like their look at me.

[B]

I'm not. I'm not gonna yuck your yum here.

[A]

Task number five, the Lowdown number six, Eastern Gate number seven, the Eternaut number eight, the Studio number nine, Department Q number ten. Andy, what were your five honorable mentions?

[B]

One through five families like ours on Netflix. Chair Company on HBO. White Lotus on HBO. Platonic on Apple. English Teacher on FX.

[A]

I had Shorzy number one, it's on HUL. Death by Lightning. Number two on Netflix. Blue Lights, which is on BritBox. Number three, Slow Horses on Apple TV number four. And the Beast in Me, which is on Netflix is number five, Kaya. Are there any shows that we didn't talk about that you would like to just say a shout out to? I've been really enjoying. I love la. Yeah, I think it's really fun. And in the slew of TV shows that came out this year about people in their early to mid-20s, I think that one is the best. And I love to pit. There you go. I love LA and the pit. You can't. You can't pin her down.

[B]

You can't pin her down. I was going to say, like will Kai, will you hang with the cast of the Pit at the Golden Globes.

[A]

I really hope so.

[B]

I think just you and Dr. Robbie.

[A]

Yeah. I love you Noah Wylie. Let's end on that. I love you Noah Wy. I love you. Andy Greenwald. Thank you so much for doing the pod with me for another year. We have a couple more episodes in 25 pluribus finale Etc. Thank you to Kai and Kaya and John. We will be back on Thursday. Monster Energy Everybody knows White Monster, Zero Ultra, that's the og. It kicked off this whole zero Sugar energy drink thing, but Ultra is a whole lineup now. You've got Strawberry Dreams, Blue Hawaiian Sunrise and Vice Guava. And they all bring the Monster Energy punch. So if you've been living in the White can branch out. Ultra's got a flavor for every vibe and every single one is Zero Sugar. Tap the banner to learn more. Hey, Ryan Reynolds here for Mint Mobile. You know, one of the perks about having four kids that you know about is actually getting a direct line to the big man up north. And this year he wants you to know the best gift that you can give someone is the gift of Mint Mobile's Unlimited Wireless for 15amonth. Now you don't even need to wrap it. Give it a [e-mail] Switch upfront payment.

[C]

Of $45 for three month plan equivalent.

[A]

To $15 per month required new customer offer for first three months only. Speed slow after 35 gigabytes if network's busy. Taxes and fees extra. See mintmobile.com.