The past seemed to be repeating itself throughout 2017. It began with a jokey supposition you had heard in vape-clouded dorm rooms andSimpsonsepisodes before - imagine ifDonald Trumpwas president - and ended with a grizzled and grumpy Luke Skywalker coming back to fight one last battle for the Resistance. The ludicrous GOP tax bill brought back the fallacies of trickle-down economics, which will only cause the next Great Depression and a few million deaths if we’re lucky, and the well-known “rumors” aboutHarvey Weinstein,Kevin Spacey, and their ilk that had floated around Hollywood and New York for years came back to bite everyone on the ass. Just you try to enjoy a cozy night in withSevennow!
The same thing happened on TV, but it’s not like it’s a new thing.Fuller Housewill likely roll cameras on a fourth season later this year and there’s already talk of another order of that ghastlyWill & Gracereunion, and that’s not even getting into thatGilmore Girlsmess. And yet, the best TV series of the year came from similar returns, whether itsDavid Lynch’s triumphant return to the town of Twin Peaks orSpike Lee’s abstracted, unfathomably generous revision of his knockout debut,She’s Gotta Have It.Friends from Collegemined much of its humor from an inability to grow up and stop making the same old mistakes. The not-so-buried feuds between brothers paints the hubbub that becomes a statewide catastrophe inFargo’s diabolical third season.
Meanwhile, an obsession with repeating what worked in the past seemed to hold entertainments likeThe Flash,Game of Thrones,This is Us,Ray Donovan, andShamelessin a cyclical rut. That’s true of many of their narrative decisions but also in form and storytelling. The era of allowing one looming dramatic arc to dictate nearly all the action in a season is still upon us and has reduced plenty of otherwise promising shows into safe and mundane serials, only elevated in rare respects by the strength of the cast in question. The best TV of 2017 didn’t just return to old ideas, characters, or predicaments; they also confronted them and revealed why those elements must change or become irrelevant. To progress, one must often let go of what they once loved and travel into the unknown, and if that doesn’t sum up 2017, I honestly don’t know what would.
For more of the Best of 2017, check out Allison Keene’stop 25 TV showsof the year, Dave Trumbore’s list of thebest new animated series, Emma Fraser’s look atthe best songs on TV, and Evan Valentine’s ranking of the year’ssuperhero TV.
An existential and surreal noir played out on the edge of America,Fargo’s third season hinged on a fight between unchecked consumption and endless empathy. In one corner,David Thewlis' malevolent, sickening Varga, an agent of corrosive greed who sets his sights on the meager fortune of Minnesota’s Stussy brothers, both played with ample comic verve byEwan McGregor. In the other corner, erstwhile police captain Gloria Burgle (the indispensableCarrie Coon), looking for the man behind the unjust slaying of her son’s grandfather. Detours include a soulful, caustic journey to Los Angeles, an animated trip into a tragic future, and a dreamy ode toPeter and the Wolf. The entire contraption fits together seamlessly - almost too much so - but few shows offered up such consistent delights, insights, and meaty roles for a generous cast.
24) Friends from College
This eight-episode comedy series from Netflix was largely dismissed when it was released earlier this year and I have yet to hear a convincing criticism. The fact thatFriends from Collegeis set mainly amongst pretty affluent people, fromKeegan-Michael Key’s budding author toNat Faxon’s retired millionaire, could be seen as a detriment but then, the entire show undermines the seriousness which that sort of affluence (and most adult accomplishments) are given. As co-creatorsNicholas StollerandFrancesca Delblancoenvision it, most of adulthood involves constructing a complex character for one’s self that can crumble into the bedlam of juvenilia with one fail swoop, and Key, Faxon,Fred Savage,Cobie Smulders, Jae Suh Park, andAnnie Parissebring that precarious state into glaring relief.
23) Rick and Morty
Though the past two seasons have proven to be more emotionally exhausting than anyone expected, what makesRick and Morty’s third season work so well is the same thing that made its first episodes so special. That would be the sense of invention and criticism that goes into each episode, whether Pickle Rick is going on an adventure or the titular duo are stuck in a land not unlike that ofMad Max: Fury Road. The show’s dedication to a caustic tone, anchored to a perpetually inebriated mad scientist and sociopath who is legitimately smarter than everyone else, is honestly breathtaking and if there was any doubt that a large portion of its fanbase still doesn’t get the joke, the infamous Szechuan Sauce event of 2017 should clear that up nice and well. Three seasons in,Dan HarmonandJustin Roiland’s wildly imaginative and unwaveringly misanthropic cartoon remains the cherry bomb in the toilet and the burning sack of dogshit on your neighbor’s porch.
22) Neo Yokio
I’m merely a casual fan of anime, so I don’t get all the references inNeo Yokio,Netflix’s best new animated series. That doesn’t hinder the the delight of watching the show anymore than not having a working understanding of how a small restaurant works would hinder your enjoyment ofBob’s Burgers. As a sheer feat of comic world-building,Neo Yokio, which castsJaden Smithas the voice of Kaz, a new-money playboy and part-time demon hunter, is a thing of beauty, featuring some uproarious vocal work from the likes ofJude Law,Susan Sarandon, andJason Schwartzman. Beyond that, the lovingly designed series, the brainchild of Vampire Weekend frontmanEzra Koenig, functions as a satirical critique of class and the utility of fashion or really any art, going as far as to make an extended joke about an uglyDamien Hirstpiece. Indeed, much like Koenig’s other project,Neo Yokioconveys the strangeness and pettiness of the upper class while also openly admitting the comforts and pleasures that such a station in life affords.
21) The Handmaid’s Tale
Can we thankMargaret Atwoodfor the recent reckoning against sexual assaulters and terrorizing of men in power? Even if she was the singular force behind it all, she’d never take the credit. It’s nevertheless difficult to not see the release of Hulu’s adaptation of herThe Handmaid’s Taleas the warning sign of what was to come, in the downfalls of Harvey Weinstein and his ilk as well as the draconian laws meant to control women’s bodies tucked away in the monstrous Republican tax bill.Elisabeth Mossproves to be a stirring Offred, and directorReed Moranomolded her aesthetic of a manicured suburban landscape to also reflect the ugly, horrific sex crimes that go on behind the front doors. Indeed, what’s consistently most terrifying about what Morano and Atwood made here is how normal they make true hell look and feel when no one’s getting raped, beaten, tasered, or killed directly on screen.
20) Legion
Where Netflix presented us with the most thematically rich Marvel adaptation to date withThe Punisher, FX went about making the most formally audacious Marvel adaptation withLegion.Noah Hawleychurns through a variety of visual gimmicks and popular techniques to reflect what life must be like for David (Dan Stevens), the most powerful mutant alive who often is chased, confined, or being tortured within his own mind. Aubrey Plaza nearly steals the entire show as Lenny, the best friend David might have accidentally killed or may have been hiding a powerful, evil, and once-dormant mutant named the Shadow King. The cerebral fireworks are a wonder to behold, which veils a dark, acidic study of the artist as an indecisive and guilt-ridden God, decked out in Millennial dress and fitted with the power to psychically tear you to shreds.
19) Top of the Lake: China Girl
Though not quite the eerie, devastating behemoth that its predecessor was,China Girlproved to be an equally intoxicating and unpredictable vision of femininity, motherhood, and identity as the first season ofTop of the Lake. The main plot, about a young woman’s body found stuffed into luggage off of Sydney’s shores, is gripping procedural but the insights come from Robin Griffin’s dealings with the daughter she never knew she had and the disturbing life her daughter has built for herself in her absence. With superb supporting turns fromGwendoline Christie,Nicole Kidman,Alice Englort, andDavid Dencik,China Girlstill evinces a dazzling world of crime and perversion, tended over by broken but dedicated people who might be able to get their shit together if they weren’t so busy trying to put other people’s lives back together, a task at which they often fail.
18) The Americans
It’s understandable that the fifth season ofThe Americanscouldn’t quite match the gripping, sublime heights of Season 4. After all, this season didn’t have the greatDylan Bakerhanging around as a CDC mole. Nevertheless, the latest season began to dig into what will likely be the final conflict of the series, that between the perspectives ofMatthew RhysandKerri Russel’s domesticated spies on what nationalism should entail. The programming of Paige suggested that there’s nothing too duplicitous for their mission, but even as that started, one could feel Philip getting uneasy and his partner getting all the more bold. This fluctuates in the season - to say anything about what happens after episode 3 seems like a spoiler - but the endgame isn’t pretty, as anyone who watched the last two episodes will attest. For whatever changes to the seasonal narrative,The Americanscontinues to be one of the best shot and acted dramas on TV and arguably the best thing FX has produced thus far.
I’ll be honest: I was in love withGLOWfrom the moment I heard Scandal and Patty Smyth’s “The Warrior” blaring over the opening credits. Most shows would not have paid off such a ludicrous early devotion butGLOWdid, thanks largely to a fantastic ensemble cast that setsAlison Brie’s Ruth Wilder as the two-timing anti-hero againstBetty Gilpin’s Debbie, the betrayed wife of the man Ruth’s been fucking on the low. They are the main figures in this detailing of the famous female wrestling organization of the title, but not unlikeOrange is the New Black, the show is made by its dedication to even the seemingly smallest characters, fromGayle Rankin’s She-Wolf toSydelle Noel’s Cherry Bang, and taking time to explore each of them as rounded-out, deeply endearing characters.Marc Maronalso has his best performance outside ofEasyhere, but the real surprise is just how fun the series ends up being for having a bedrock of disappointment, betrayal, infidelity, alienation, and poverty. Not unlike “The Warrior,” the enthusiasm that the cast and the creative team, fronted by Liz Flahive and Carly Mensch, have here carries the show even when the overall plot of the show becomes a bit repetitive.
16) Last Week Tonight with John Oliver
Though its host swerves more toward thePod Save Americacrowd than theChapo Trap Houseaudience,Last Week Tonight with John Oliverremains arguably the most populist repository for progressive ideas currently out there. PerhapsThe Daily Showis holding onto that title in reality but whereTrevor Noahhas recalibrated his show’s format for a generation that watches most TV online or through apps, John Oliver continues to do the same show he’s been doing since HBO let him loose. Whether dunking repeatedly onAlex Jonesor leading us through the purposefully complex world of gerrymandering, Oliver came equipped with a bevy of research, a loamy writers' room, and the confidence of a seasoned solo performer. He offered an often hilarious half-hour of news and humor weekly for most of the year but more importantly, he brandished the intelligence to know when its time to get angry about the Creamsicle in Chief trying to start World War III and when its time to hire someone to dress up like a talking squirrel to make a point about the dangers of coal mining.
