The 50 best HBO shows of all time
After a stellar series finale, see where True Detective ranks among the cable giant's greatest hits
TV Features HBO
Is Tony Soprano dead? You’ll never get an official answer to that question, at least not from The Sopranos creator David Chase, but pose it at a party and nearly everyone will know what you’re talking about, even if they don’t want to wade into that particular 15-year-old minefield. The Sopranos reached the kind of awareness and notoriety that only comes after being frequently cited as one of the greatest TV shows of all time.
While any other network would be happy to have one show of that caliber, HBO has amassed a veritable bounty of popular, adored programming. The cable giant and streaming platform is well-known for producing hits; it’s rare that one of its shows isn’t critically praised. And while not every series is a juggernaut like Game Of Thrones, even its less flashy offerings can make a huge impact—just look at Succession. Now, we’re taking a look at the 50 best shows in the network’s history.
This feature was originally published on October 25, 2022.
Looking for more rankings? Check out our list of the 50 best Netflix shows.
380 Comments
The Wire is not even close to The Sopranos. No show is. Idiotic to put a copaganda show with idiotic politics over the best TV show in history. Deadwood below crap like Game of Thrones? Cocksuckers.
I usually don’t take too much stock in the order of lists like this because generating controversy is part of the fun. But this is honestly one of the worst lists of anything I’ve ever seen. The Wire and The Sopranos being one and two is fine, but everything else is bonkers. How could Curb Your Enthusiasm not even make the top 25? It should be top five at minimum. Then there’s the fact that shows like Oz and Treme were left out completely and replaced by shows that are still airing like The Other Two, The Flight Attendant, and The White Lotus. The recency bias here is insane. Does no one over 25 work here anymore?
SATC, The Wire, Sopranos, Six Feet Under and Curb in the top 5. Veep, The Leftovers, Barry, Deadwood and Girls somewhere in the top 10. In any order.
Much more reasonable.
I’m at #49, Band of Brothers, and I can already tell this list is shit.
One of my people I see.
This list is Ar-liss
I don’t disagree with your list, however I wonder what they rated these shows on. If it’s impact on the pop-culture landscape, GoT’s would be up there with the Soprano’s, SaTC, Deadwood, and Six Feed Under.The issue with Girls is that it wouldn’t exist without SaTC, so I won’t touch that one. If they rated it on how well the shows were written, acted, and executed, Then yes, Veep, Curb, Barry, and The Leftovers deserve top 10 spost.
I agree that Hannah and Carrie are in the same vein. For me though, some of the episodes on Girls were really groundbreaking television that created a lot of space for the complicated character work we see now. But I also understand if someone would bump it in favour of another.And yes, GOT huge cultural impact with some great characters. It’s just hard to separate early seasons from how shit it went.
Girls? nah. Deadwood abso-friggin-lutely. Not every HBO series is genre-shaking, but they have more than enough to cover 10 spots.
GoT sitting at five bothers me in a bit unless you’re not considering the body of work. And not considering that when the source material ran out and HBO turned to the writers of X-Men Origins: Wolverine to see it through, then that happened.
Yes. and how big little lies is above SATC I do not understand, along with a whole of other higher rankings in here. Whole list is bonkers.
They also left out Carnivale. I loved True Blood but it’s a bad show! Which is part of what makes it enjoyable.
The problem with True Blood is that it simply hasn’t aged well. It was so delightfully campy when I first started watching it. After attempting to rewatch it, I can’t even watch the first few seasons.Even at the time though, I was aware how dull Sookie and Bill were becoming. The last few seasons I wish they had written them out of the show.
For me it stopped aging well when I was watching it when it aired at season 3. Alan Ball seemed to have taken a page from Ryan Murphy were if you jam enough convoluted plot in a season no one will notice the lack of character development from sheer exhaustion.
Agreed. Vampires, werewolves, werepanthers, shapeshifters, witches, religious cults…. there are only so many plots and people we can care about. Too much is just exhausting and unsustainable.
They also forgot Rome which was an amazing show
Carnivale has maybe the single most dissatisfying show ending I’ve ever seen. I know supposedly they were hoping they’d get renewed, so they wrote it so that it could continue if a miracle occurred, but damn is that ending rough.
Its such a tantalizing hook for a third season, and it never got it. Still pisses me off.
Right? Can’t believe Carnivale didn’t even make the list.
Carnivale is fantastic, but it is not complete. That is a crime, but I can justify keeping it off the list on that basis as well.
Carnivale was the first one I thought of. Didn’t want to reread the whole thing in case I missed it, so thanks for confirming…
It was a fine show and holds up well (despite not getting the number of seasons intended).
My biggest gripe is some of the absolute garbage on that list, meanwhile Dream On doesn’t even make top 50?
Surprised there’s even been 50 shows total.
Hell if they wanted to go really old school, I feel like mentioning HBO originals and not mentioning either “First and Ten” and “Not Necessarily the News” is odd. “First and Ten” was not what I would call a great show but it had its fans. NNTN is literally the show that spawned the Daily Show, Colbert, Last Week Tonight, etc
I’m guessing this is considered old school by the new AV staff, sadly. If they were younger they’d have had True Blood higher simply for the vampire porn and if they were older they’d have the mentioned shows.
Whenever I hear the HBO “TV Static” opening bumper, my mind immediately plays the “Dream On” theme
Does Dream On hold up though? I havent seen it in literally decades at this point.
Unlikely!
Whenever I hear someone mention Dream On I think about tits.
As you should!
I came here, just to say this. That is a major faux pas, plus no Not Necessarily the News either?
As someone pointed out this seems more like it should have been named ‘50 Best Shows Available on HBO Max’ since it feels like all they did was list the popular series list straight from the app and omitted a bunch of good shit from old HBO that you can’t watch on there, and god forbid they actually research anything outside of what they watch or do something that would take longer than 10 minutes of cut and paste despite having a byline with like 20 damn people on it.
Seriously, there is a severe lack of prime 80’s HBO programming that most deservedly belongs on this list. I get that the editors are young but do some research, man.
No one remembers Dream On but us. But, in a perfect world, it’d be top 25 for sure.
It absolutely feels like they had a rough idea for the top 5-10, and then the rest of the list was filled out by picking shows at random.
Personal taste is personal taste, but you gotta consider history when you’re making a list for a website like The AV Club that carries some amount of weight still.
The idea that Sex and the City is a better series than The Larry Sanders Show is so laughable that I didn’t bother reading any more of the list the moment I saw its placement.
I’d also agree with, well, all of the suggestions made in this thread, I would say that it’s a new low for the site, but then I find myself thinking that most days.
SATC is iconic even though it feels a little dusty now. Carrie is one of our first women on tv that feels messy and a bit of an asshole, but still worth caring for. It deserves a high ranking.
That’s the problem, though. It seems like they’re ranking shows according to different standards. Some are being ranked mostly according to artistic merit whereas others are getting a boost simply due to cultural significance. I would agree that Deadwood should be higher than SatC, but that’s based on artistic merit. SatC had a much bigger cultural impact. If we’re basing it on that, SatC should be higher. If memory serves, SatC was also decently well reviewed in its day, even if it hasn’t aged well. So how are they deciding what goes where on this list? Is it cultural impact? Is it critical response at the time? Is it how well the show has held up over time? The methodology is confusing and seems inconsistent.
Yeah….when I saw Band of Brothers was at 49 I almost just stopped reading. Band of Brothers is a top 10 show, flat out. I feel like limited series (1 season) should be excluded, but if you are including them, Band of Brothers top 10. Further, Rome isnt on here at all. I dont take this list seriously.
Agreed, the exclusion of Rome from the list is bonkers!
Rome not being on this list is so weird. I personally think it’s a top-tier HBO offering.
It is a top 10 drama for me of all time. I dont know how I would rank my own top 10, but for HBO, The Wire, Rome, Band of Brothers….then i have to put some thought into it. I like westworld far more than anyone else it seems. I find Sopranos and GoT insanely overated, especially GoT (even factoring out the last two seasons). I still think they are great (I think Sopranos peaked early in S2 and after S4 i really dont care…that show was driven by Gandolfini, Falco, and the actress who plays melfi), but i live in NJ and the way people talk about the sopranos….it was a great show but the wire shits all over it.
Completely agree, I am right there with you. I was truly surprised where Band of Brothers landed and thought, come on, not even top 25? And Rome, man, those first two seasons, like Deadwood, were really something.
In a on demand era, Rome would have been huge…it just came out a bit too early for that. Like on demand became a big deal for HBO right around that time, so first season ratings were poor (and that show was ridiculously expensive at the time…and that is considering it was a joint production with the BBC) but then it was a huge hit by word of mouth on demand….but by then they had been told they werent getting renewed past season 2 and had already taken down the sets (which were ridiculously expensive), and that is also why Season 2 is so condensed. There is an alternate tv history where it was a hit right away…S1 ends with Caesar’s death, S2 is the the politics with Anthony and the Senate, with Octavian leaving and not coming back that season, S3 is Octavian returning and the establishment of the third triumverate, S4 is the politics with Anthony and Octavian and ends with Anthony going to Egypt, S5 is the build up to the show down between Anthony and Octavian….then you are just done with what was condensed in S2 (and here is 2-5), at that point you could do Octavian and all the politics that went on with his wife Livia (she was a true snake) and her son Tiberius. I love roman history in general, the crazier stuff is all that happened in the waning days of the Republic (by the opening of Rome the show they had already gone through a series of dictators, the republic was just waiting for someone to take it out behind the shed).
It’s at 49 so you’re forced to click through the rest of the list to satiate your contempt for the rest of the ordering. That’s exactly what I did. I’m betting AV Club is banking on our collective righteous indignation for page views.
The recency bias here is insane. Does no one over 25 work here anymore?That’s got to be it. It’s really hammered home to leave out some great older series (Oz, Dream On) and state repeatedly that someone gave the best performance of their career.
That doesn’t explain The Righteous Gemstones being so low. Even the AV Club’s reviews of that show were nearly perfect.
Yeah, I sort of feel like Dream On — for historical context — needs to be on the list. Without it, we don’t get a loooooooooooot of the current state of comedy types in modern TV…
I mean leaving out Oz–the show that kicked off HBO’s golden age, and one that’s still remarkably relevant–is fundamentally disqualifying. They also need to distinguish between HBO-Max and HBO proper. That alone will get a lot of the junk off this list.
Agreed, though Harley Quinn is fantastic in its own right and should be on this list if it was an HBO and not Max.
Yeah. And I get wanting to not adhere to the same stale classics or canon (although, Wire and Sopranos are still at the top) but most of this order is kinda silly.
Agree. Also, Tales From The Crypt and Dream On aren’t on here, but Our Flag Means Death and House of the Dragon, which just finished their first seasons are?
I checked out when Band of Brothers was 49.
See my comments above. Might be the single best limited series i have seen. Cherynoble was too low (I liked Watchmen a lot, but those two should be swapped). I just kept reading but couldnt take it seriously.
Oz isn’t on here? Out of the top 50?? Trash list.
I loved the early seasons of Curb, but I gave up at some point because it just seemed to be going downhill. They probably should have been done after Season 8 or 9. I would rank it higher if it hadn’t dragged on so long.
I’ve enjoyed every season. Though I didn’t watch the first several when they originally aired.
SEARCH PARTY.. while the first 2 seasons were good this shouldnt be on this list at all.
I like Search Party a lot, but I don’t consider it an HBO show.
The omission of both Oz and Tales From The Crypt is ridiculous. They’re both pioneering shows for HBO and remain excellent watches.
And Tales from the Crypt I mean CMON
For real. Though, to be fair, you can’t actually watch the damn thing anywhere.
At least they acknowledged The Comeback
These lists always start with the basic problem of it not being clear what theyre actually comparing. Highest highs? Average quality? Ambition? Influence? How does a low stakes show with modest goals executed perfectly compare to a huge, complex epic that shoots for the moon and falls short? How do you compare Chernobyl’s near perfectly executed five episodes to Game of Thrones’ huge project that loses its way a bit at the end? How do you compare any of that to a weekly nonfiction piece of longform journalism/comedy show that’s been on for nine years? It’s like saying that Lil Nas X is better than bleu cheese dressing, in that it never feels like there’s any internal logic to these choices or consistency in how attributes are rated.
I would also argue that they seem to be ranking Sex and the City based on historical significance over actual show quality. That show has NOT aged well. It seems like they’re using an inconsistent set of ranking standards. Some seem to be based on artistic merits (e.g. The Wire, Deadwood, Barry) whereas others seem more like they’re based on how culturally significant the show was in the moment (e.g. Sex in the City, Game of Thrones). Some are a combo of the two, like The Sopranos. Not helpful.
Side note: I was one of the many children when Oz aired that discovered it was not about the Wizard of Oz by watching it. I supposed that was I get for watching while my parents went out to dinner. I don’t think I can ever like it for that. lol
Come on. The token nod to Band of Brothers meant that someone at least texted their dad.
Dumping Band of Brothers at 49th place is a sin so egregious that the remainder of the list is rendered DOA.
Band of Brothers at 49?
Does no one over 25 work here anymore?The A.V. Club
They suckered you in anyway, didn’t they! 🙂
i realize that season 2 put a giant stink on things, but true detective season 1 was perfect. it alone should be considered for top 3 with the wire and the sopranos.
Also the fact that this is supposed to be a list of the top 50 greatest HBO shows of all time but assumes HBO started in the late 90’s/2000 with the exception of The Kids in the Hall.
America UndercoverNot Necessarily the NewsThe HitchhikerFraggle RockThe Ray Bradbury TheaterTales from the Crypt
“Does no one over 25 work here anymore?”
I’m not sure whether to just say “no”, or to go further and doubt that anything being done on this site could realistically constitute “work”.
Yup. And Larry Sanders barely cracking the top 20? It’s top 10 at least, if not top 5. Hell, I really like “the Other Two” and I think I’m the only person who’s actually seen it, but there’s no way it (or Girls) rate higher than Sanders. The jury is still out on Barry, as it’s had some good seasons and some less than good seasons, but it’s rank is way too high. “Big Little Lies” – also way too high, especially considering that second season.Should we even count “Search Party” since it wasn’t originally an HBO show? And, of course, Game of Thrones needs to be at the bottom of the list (sure, still top 50, but way down there) because the last season is one of the worst seasons of any show they ever aired. And no matter how good a show is for a while, when you tank the ending that hard, you obliterate the legacy of the show. Lots of fucked up choices here (as is typical for these “lists.”)
“Insecure, The Other Two and Girls should all rank higher than Curb and Larry Sanders” said no sentient human being anywhere, ever.
AHHHHHMEEEEEEEEN
“The recency bias here is insane”- The AV Club
Nah, Curb is dogshit.
Six Feet Under is at least top 5. Brenda is a fucking HBO legend. Those characters all feel like the could exist in The Leftovers.Big Little Lies, despite Nicole Kidman crushing it, was always a bit of a stinker. Enlightened I revisit a lot, some of the writing in the intro/exit monologues is just so damn beautiful.Industry I actually think understands the culture of excess more than Succession (also great), I hope it gets another season.
It’s been a long time since I’ve watched Six Feet Under but I remember it having one of the silliest plot twist murders I’ve ever seen on a show.
I’m struggling to think who gets murdered on Six Feet Under…?
Nate’s girlfriend Lisa.
Oh duh, thank you.
Honestly, I couldn’t stand most of SFU, except for the GOAT finale. And I love MCH.Every single episode seemed like it was unlikable characters whining. Unpleasant show to watch.The Leftovers was much better in executing its depressing subject matter IMHO.
I hope the popularity of Lotus gets people to go back to Enlightened. It seems like nobody watched that when it aired, but it was really well done.
Six Feet Under is a great example of how well an amazing finale can elevate a show. I would probably agree with its place on this list (more or less), but I think that finale probably boosts its position 5-10 spots. With just a decent finale, it would be maybe #20.By contrast, I am super surprised they placed GoT as highly. Sure it had a great start and strong first 3/4 of a run, but the last couple seasons, especially the last were a hot mess. And that finale… woof. I would argue that such their magnificent failure to stick the landing should have knocked it out of the top 10, at the very least. (I will also admit I am biased. While I enjoyed the show and watched to the end, I was never in love with it.)
I would argue that Game of Thrones was only consistently great for 2-3 seasons. The end of season 3 felt slightly lackluster to me, although that may be because I had read all the books between seasons 2 and 3 and I feel that the show adapted the earlier big moments of A Storm of Swords far better than the Red Wedding. Season 4 starts fairly strong but goes downhill in my opinion, with a brief return to excellence portraying the Mountain vs. the Viper, and ends pretty mediocre.From there the quality continues to drop, albeit with a few highlights (Battle of the Bastards, Hold the door to name a couple), before ending truly awfully.
SFU is top 5 for the ending alone. People can debate great endings from Cheers to Breaking Bad, but SFU always seems to be considered the best and I cannot argue with that.
Big Little Lies is utterly terrible. It’s one of those shows you think might be good because why else would so many big name actresses be signing up for it, but it absolutely sucks.
I realize that courtroom dramas generally have to play a little loose with the realities of the legal system in order to work as fiction. If you go on the Law & Crime Network YouTube and watch a real trial, even a real murder trial, it’s going to be pretty boring.So you compress the time frame. You have lawyers do things that would never be allowed in most modern-day trials, like have them pace in front of the jury box. They interrupt the opposing counsel way too much without the judge stepping in to put an end to it. You even have evidence introduced at the last second in a manner that would never be allowed in any competent courtroom.Even given all that, the legal custody battle in season 2 of Big Little Lies is notable for how fucking terrible it is. It is spectacularly cringeworthy. David E. Kelley should be disbarred for having been involved with this show.
This list is just annoying. Sex and the City and John Oliver over Mr. Show with Bob and David or Eastbound and Down is just a dumb opinion.
Ok right off the bat this list is questionable. Band of Brothers as 49? You have that behind the Righteous Gemstones or Industry???? House of Dragons is better… really? Flight Attendant at 30? Maybe it’s a generational thing or something. The top 10 reads like a standard critics list mostly. Hacks is good, but overrated because Jean Smart is so good. The rest of the show is a trope for queer dating (the assistant guy is awesome. I hope he ends up doing more stuff) and 20 something gen z’s struggling with adulting. Going back to Band of Brothers I think this is an issue of it’s age (20 years) and it’s subject. This 10 years ago would have this in the top 20 or possibly top 10. Granted HBO has been pumping out great stuff in the past 20 years, but BoB is still one of it’s most popular properties and holds up as one of the best war films/tv productions in history. Unfortunately the real lesson here is top # of x of all time lists suck me every time and I get burned by them. Another lesson I’ll learn and promptly forget the next time I see a list like this and click on it.
Band of Brother is just greatest generation porno. I didn’t find Tom Hanks greatest generation fetish to be that interesting. I just can’t find shows and movies like Band of Brothers interesting after watching true masterpieces like Full Metal Jacket and Apocalypse Now.
You make a good point, but all of these marque shows are just porno for some group. Sex in the City is just gen x/millennial girl living in NYC porn, Sopranos is just people that love Goodfellas porn, Six Feet Under is people that secretly wish their life was a Jonathan Franzen novel porno. This is what HBO does… taps into that need for this shit and then does it as artsy porn. Now all that being said BoB as greatest generation/boomer porny as it is, is still one of the best of its genre and still holds up 20 years later in most parts. It’s an achievement by a company like HBO if nothing else. 10 to 15 things on this list after it aren’t better.
Sopranos is deeper than every other show on this list so I disagree with you there. Might have started as Goodfellas porno but by the time they get to Season 3 they were doing amazing things on that show that no other show has even come close to. I agree 100% about those other shows though. I would also say Band of Brothers is a better show than Sex and the City or Six Feet Under. Sex and the City especially was a terrible show when you compare it to something like Girls. No way is Sex and the City a top 50 show. The only people I’ve ever met who enjoyed Sex and the City were complete idiots. The only thing they seemed to get from that show was product placement.
I didn’t mean to be flippant about the Sopranos. Just using it as an example. My point was that each show had it’s target audience and those were the diehards through out their runs. The Sopranos cleared the way for the anti hero character (Shield, Mad Men, Breaking Bad, etc) that dominated the next 20 years of TV. One of my favorites of all time and I do a rewatch every few years.
Rome isn’t even a top 50 show? It’s annoying how bad this list is.
Deadwood several spots below GoT? That’s gonna rile up some hoopleheads.
A huge chunk of Game of Thrones is terrible. The show shouldn’t even be in the top 50 after having some of the worst seasons in television history. Putting it above Deadwood is a joke. Hearst is a more terrifying villain than anything Game of Thrones came up with.
Yeah, id say it should be in the top 50, and you could probably put one of its best seasons in a top 10 best seasons of hbo shows list, but that show has always been ridiculously over rated (and I like the first 5 seasons).
Everything that follows the book is good. Everything else is idiotic garbage that detracts from the better stuff that came before. Nothing that was set up in the books/early seasons had a satisfying payoff on the show. Look how they massacred my boy Jamie.
Hell, I’d even argue it should be top 20, but the severe decline in quality in the last couple seasons combined with that absolute mess of an ending should definitely have knocked it out of the top 10.
Ranking it where they have implies they liked(???) the last couple seasons or that they think the first 2/3 of the show was basically #1 by a wide margin, and it was only the low quality of the end seasons that force them to knock it down lower.
GoT was one of the absolute greatest pieces of television until D&D ran out of source material. And man, what a noticeable decline it was when that happened.I agree, to have flubbed the ending season(s) should disqualify a show from ATG status. As great as the rest of the series was.
The greatness of the earlier seasons relies on having a satisfying ending. The early stuff just isn’t as good anymore when you know their will be no payoff.
I would mostly agree. While what made the earlier parts of a work great doesn’t change, it’s hard not to think about the whole of the piece, especially when you’re not able to get a complete story with just the earlier parts that happen to be good. Choosing to ignore the crap parts means you have a story with gaps or no conclusion, which is also unsatisfying. There is no winning.I feel the same about the Star Wars sequel trilogy. (No, I am not looking to debate the merits of the various SW movies. This is merely to illustrate my point.) I don’t think The Force Awakens is great, but I enjoy it more than the prequels. I am one of the people who really loved The Last Jedi. But then Lucasfilm let fan response to it dictate how they made The Rise of Skywalker, which turned out to be a hot mess that no one liked, regardless of how they’d felt about The Last Jedi. As a result, I either have a trilogy with a shit ending I hate or an incomplete trilogy that never put out a third movie. Either way, I am left unsatisfied, which affects my feelings about the sequel trilogy as a whole. And while I can still enjoy The Last Jedi, it’ll always be as part of a larger story that I’ll never get a good ending to.
Supposedly (and this is 100% hearsay, so take it with a grain of salt), part of the problem (amongst many) was that D&D were trying to stay ahead of fan speculation, especially once they got out of the adapted material. When fans guessed something right about what they had planned for the show, they would pivot and change the plan. It was a stupid way of writing. As one critic pointed out, the reason people correctly guessed what you had planned is because you had laid the groundwork for it properly. To change direction negates all that work you’ve done and makes the new direction you’ve chosen feel unearned.
A huge chunk? Nope.
I honestly thought Game of Thrones (and the spin off) would be higher. Not because they are good (I have never watched an episode since I don’t really care for fake medieval fantasy wizard stuff) but because AV Club never stops talking about it. With the amount of coverage it gets you would think beat show ever.
The main appeal of the show isn’t really the fantasy wizard stuff. It’s all about the political machinations. It resembles Succession more than it does Lord of the Rings.
Yeah, The Sopranos should be #1. The Wire was a critic’s show. Everyone loved The Sopranos. Because it was better, all in all.
The Wire is already dated copaganda. The Sopranos is the gold standard of television.
…no. Not even close. Sopranos had some great performances, but it also had dangling threads, some piss poor or non existent character development for multiple characters. That show is largely carried on the strength of Tony, Melfi, and Carmella. The wire has career performances from just….everybody.
The Wire is dated copaganda. The Sopranos is the Goat. The Wire is a show that pretends racist, sadistic, cops are good guys. It’s the prestige TV version of Hogan’s Heroes.
If you watched the wire and thought it painted cops as good guys, or was out to paint anyone as good or bad with any type of broad strokes then you have the intellectual depth of a thimble. It showed people and the situation as they were, the issues with race, class, where one grew up, the corruption in the system, the faults in the system, the stats obsession destroying police work. They had a whole season concerning how the police went from members of the community (community policing) to stats driven and it contributed to the destruction of neighborhoods. If anything, the show was extremely light on addressing the issues of wealth inequality that have been the biggest contributor to the change in America since Ronald Dbag Reagan cut the top tax rate from 70% to like 38% and then decided to tax social security benefits to pretend to offset the revenue windfall. But then almost all commercially viable media on any mainstream outlet dances around that issue.
Everyone loved The Sopranos because yes, it was good, but it was also about the Italian mob, following a long tradition of beloved films of the same ilk. It was popular by doing a well-executed twist on the familiar. A predominantly Black show was never going to be as popular, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t better.
After revisiting, the writing on The Wire just isn’t as good as Sopranos. Plus, many points deducted for The Wire’s awful final season. There has to be consequences for that one.
I didn’t love it. It was a solid show, and maybe I was taking it out of context bingeing it after the series had ended (it was a pioneer), but I’ve found it to be vastly overrated.The Wire is absolutely fantastic on every level. I’d put Deadwood over the Sopranos any day of the week.
The Wire doesn’t even hold up anymore. It’s copaganda. We have all learned what cops are like. They are not a bunch of Bunks and Lesters. They aren’t even Hercs. They are murdering racists who protect each other and no one else. If The Wire wanted to be great they should have shown that. Sopranos does hold up because that’s what Americans are like. Deadwood holds up because Hearst is what a rich guy is like. They are far better shows than The Wire.
“We have all learned what cops are like. They are not a bunch of Bunks and Lesters.”Its not supposed to be a pure documentary—-none of the people in the show actually existed. It is, however, a commentary on how flawed the justice system is in real life, with dramatic twists.But its not realistic. Sure, there were some similar instances the narrative was based on, but there are no “flawed superheroes” like McNulty.
It’s not flawed. It’s a lie. Cops are not like that. They don’t solve crimes. They are racist sadistic oppressors. The Wire pretends cops care about helping people. They do not. George Floyd proved that. Cops are evil in real life but on The Wire they are all wonderful people with hearts of gold. I liked The Wire when it came out too but now The Wire is closer to Sons of Anarchy than The Sopranos. The Wire and Sons of Anarchy pretend bad people are actually good guys deep down inside. The Sopranos shows you exactly what a mafioso is. That’s why it is The GOAT.
“It’s not flawed. It’s a lie. Cops are not like that.”Its not supposed to be an exact replication of real life. Anybody watching 5 seconds of the show would know a cop like McNulty doesn’t exist.
It is copaganda. It’s a show that lies about cops and makes them look better so they can keep being racist, sadistic, murderers. It’s like watching Hogan Heroes. Fun to watch and well made but you better not think about it too much if you actually care about other human beings.
“ It’s a show that lies about cops and makes them look better so they can keep being racist, sadistic, murderers.”No, it isn’t. It shows a small group of cops who don’t actually exist in real life, doing good for dramatic purposes. If anybody takes it to mean thats how real life cops operate, I can’t help you there.The majority of the police department and justice system is shown to be hapless.Should we dismiss the greatness of The Shield since Vic Mackey couldn’t actually exist in real life?
The Shield is copaganda too. Cops shows are always copaganda because they need people to like the cops the show is about so they keep watching. That’s why shows about cops can’t be GOATs. At best they are always going to be good shows with shitty politics.
Are you kidding me? Other than Claudette, not one of those cops in the barn isn’t corrupt or highly flawed on some level. Even Dutch is a malignant narcissist.Not even remotely copaganda.
lol Do you even think about what you say? You don’t know what copaganda is. Try reading and researching a little before responding. Just think about the connection between St. Claudette and why I call it copganda. Doofus.
LMFAO…she’s the only redeemable main character cop on the entire damned show. And even she is flawed.Lem was the ‘conscience’ of the strike team, and even he was corrupt as hell.The whole show is about deep seeded corruption in the department, to the point where the people trying to catch the corrupted cops are even more corrupted or become more corrupted in the pursuit of nailing those corrupt cops.You don’t like cop shows, fine. But The Shield as copaganda??? Did you see the ending of betrayal? No cop comes out of that looking good.Heck, you can even make a case for SWAT (another Shawn Ryan show) being copaganda, but The Shield?
You obviously don’t know what copaganda is. Redeemable cops who effectively fight crime is copaganda.
No, copaganda is believable police characters all or mostly being far more successful and honorable than in reality.Neither The Wire nor The Shield paints cops in general as either one of those things.
The Wire is copganda because it shows cops that care catching kingpins and doing their best to help people all while being sexy, funny, and brave. You are incapable of spotting copaganda.
But if copaganda portrays redeemable cops who effectively fight crime, wouldn’t The Wire be disqualified? They don’t effectively fight crime at all, and their involvement mostly just leads to the decent low-level people getting killed before they get a chance to turn their lives around (D’Angelo, Wallace, Sobotka…).
When your argument is “any show about cops equals copaganda”, you’re going to do what you can to make sure the evidence fits.
If you think The Shield and The Wire painted cops in some good light in any way, shape, or form you’re frankly thick as pig shit. No pun intended. You need to take a break from The Root and get back to reality. Doofus.
“Try reading and researching” Try talking to a therapist. All cops arent racist, even if it is the majority (which I dont concede, though that would likely depend on the state you are in too), it isnt all of them. Your whole premise seems to be that cops need to be depicted as racists oppressors all the time or it is violation of humanity.
Again, do your own research and read the books the series the show is based upon. Non-fiction. I’m ACAB all the way, but maybe you’ll find some things that give you a slightly different perspective. Worked for me.
You take that back! Dutch Man was doing his best!
I agree. He went after suspects like he was hungry like the wolf.
Hey, pussy said “yes” plenty of times!
I get the hatred of police, but you’re absolutely being disingenuous to make a point. Poor form.
….the wire was written by a former cop and a former crime desk reporter. Its a pretty accurate look of how policing goes on the burecratic side, how poverty traps work in the inner city, how policing works in the inner city, how corruption works, how economic policies have hollowed out the port in baltimore, how federal and state education funding being based on standardized test scores have fucked over the education system, and it was way ahead on what most people didnt realize was happening to print media until it was too late. It doesnt white wash cops or paint them as heroes. The point of McNulty is he broke rules to do what he thought was good police work, which ultimately didnt matter, the point of Bunk and Lester is showing that if there were good police work, it would still ultimately not matter. The game is the game, not just the drug game, but the policing system based on juking stats, to be able to post numbers that city hall can market to make politicians look good, to let them continue on doing what they are doing. At no point does it portray cops as heroes, the cops act like they are, but if that is your takeaway you completely missed the point.Sopranos is insanely overated. Its not supposed to be an accurate depiction of the mafia. hell I live in NJ and it gets multiple things clearly wrong just about geography in the state (and this state is like the third smallest). Hell it doesnt even get known facts about the mafia in NJ right. Its about the diagnosis that Melfi gives Tony, that he denies himself nothing and that he is a destructive force to all of those around him. It portrays the mafia as thugs and con men, which that part is probably accurate, but what it should have shown is how the russian mob has gutted the mafia in NYC, how drugs were dominated by dominican, columbian, and now mexican cartels and their dominance has just eaten into the mafia’s ability to function in a meaningful way. Tony says in the first episode that he feels like the best days of his business are behind him…and he is right. But that show had so many dangling plot threads, plenty of characters with little to now character growth, arcs or development. That show should have been 3 or 4 seasons, tops.
yes, all of them are
If you read the books the series is based on, you’d know that Homicide cops are not of the same ilk as street cops. It takes a certain sensibility to even make it to that department. I’m not a cop, don’t care for them. The books to read: Homicide: Life on the Killing Streets and The Corner. Also the NBC series, Homicide: Life on the Street.
Is it? I didn’t like the cops at all in The Wire. Especially fucking McNulty. I thought it made cops (fairly) look awful.
Your opinion is insane. There are no cops on Earth like Bunny Colvin.
There might be exactly 1. But my opinion’s not insane just because it’s different from yours. The impression I got was that the institution of policing in Baltimore was corrupt and rotten, despite the existence of 1 or 2 good cops. Which matches my general impression of policing in real life. The problem with policing in real life isn’t that every single solitary cop is rotten. That’s factually not true. The problem is that the institution is rotten, which can eventually cause them all to become rotten, and kind of encourages rottenness. I don’t like cops and I don’t trust any of them, because I don’t know which ones are still good and which ones started out or have turned rotten. And I also know that even if one of the good ones makes a mistake that harms me, the rotten ones will cover it up.You don’t have to believe that zero decent cops exist to know that ACAB and that no cop can be trusted. It can all be true.
You pretend to not like cops but don’t seem to realize how despite the BPD being corrupt and rotten they still manage to catch kingpins and put murderers in jail because of the good cops that care and are smart on The Wire. That is not reality. The corrupt rotten cops don’t catch murderers and kingpins. They oppress and murder innocent people like Freddie Gray. If they showed that then I would agree with you. Instead they show cops solving crimes, being likable, trying new ideas to help the community, and caring about the victims of crime. That’s copaganda.
Sopranos shows mafioso as scum that kill and destroy anything they touch. That’s the truth. The Wire only had 5 seasons with the final season being very middling. The Sopranos improved in quality with every season which resulted in the greatest ending in television history. No one talks about the montage that ended The Wire. Everyone talks about how The Sopranos ended. The Sopranos = GOAT.
I pretend? I’m a Black person living in the South, son. You don’t tell me about the danger my family and I face on the regular. You don’t get to tell me how I feel when I get pulled over. So fuck you, first of all.And the BPD as represented on the Wire don’t just put drug dealers and murders away because they are “good” and “smart.” Sometimes they put them away because they did corrupt shit. That is reality. Sometimes the reality is that bad folks are put away due to good police work. Sometimes bad folks are put away due to corrupt police work. Sometimes good folks are put away due to corrupt police work. Corrupt cops catch murderers and kingpins AND they murder innocent people. All that happens.
“If they showed that then I would agree with you.”I don’t give a shit if you agree with me. Don’t. I’ll be okay.“Instead they show cops solving crimes, being likable, trying new ideas to help the community, and caring about the victims of crime.”They also showed cops being corrupt and shitty. And as I already told you, I didn’t find the cops likable. “The Sopranos = GOAT.”Is that all this is about? You thinking The Sopranos is better? lol I mean okay? I didn’t like The Sopranos at all. A bunch of white folks getting away with crimes is not really my thing but I’m glad you enjoyed it. I think the Wire was better, but I wouldn’t put either show in the top 10. I would put The Sopranos in the top 50.Fuck you still, though.
I mean the creators recently made “We Own this City” to shine a light on the corruption in the police force.
Metal Fingers’s response is like the worst possible result of misunderstanding current left wing sloganeering. Don’t get me wrong, I agree with the ideas behind the slogans, but they don’t really convey their meanings well.ACAB doesn’t mean that all cops are actually bastards, but that the institution is so rotten that it’s impossible to do net good by being a part of it.Defund the police actually means reallocating funds to different municipal services to offset the need for police response in situations where they’re not qualified.This guy even agrees with it. Think what some right wing chud will believe.
The Writers based all of this on real stuff they saw first-hand. Look up David Simon and Ed Burns. And it doesn’t make cops nor politicians look good at all! There plenty of Cops and Commanders in the show who are incompetent and corrupt. The couple cops who try to do honest police work are constantly derailed by bureaucracy. You may not believe it but Cops like Bunny and Bunk do exist.
None? Fuck off. Im really critical of cops, but no cops solve crimes? So every single murder conviction is fraudulent? Every single drug prosecution?
you seem fun
You do realize your double standard here, right? You rail against copaganda while extolling the excellence of two other shows that glorify and humanize criminals and their activities. You should be just as appalled by a show that portrays organized crime, including murder, in such a sympathetic light. It’s not like they’re criminals only because the law is unjust or some shit. They’re not Robin Hood. They’re in the crime for the profit. They kill people who get in their way. Their ethical standards are low.
I’m not saying you’re wrong about The Wire being some degree of copaganda. I think that’s the case for pretty much any entertainment that makes police “the good guys” (or at the very least protagonists). But you’re also displaying a whole load of hypocrisy by not also acknowledging the ways in which The Sopranos and Deadwood also glorify truly awful people and behaviors. They are in no way above The Wire in that regard.If you like The Sopranos and Deadwood more than The Wire, that’s fine. Personally, I love Deadwood, I like The Wire, and I couldn’t watch more than two episodes of The Sopranos because it wasn’t my thing. But I’m not going to sit and rail about how “terrible” The Sopranos is because it glorifies mob violence as a way of justifying my belief that it’s not as good as Deadwood, which was ranked lower in the list, and which also contains plenty of criminal protagonists that the audience is supposed to root for.
None of you white idiots know what copaganda is and why it is much more destructive and dishonest than a show like the Sopranos or Deadwood.
Wasn’t Copaganda that club Henry Hill went to in Goodfellas where he goes in the back door in that amazing single take?
Wow the projection is strong with this one.I have no idea if you’re white but you’re clearly an idiot. Generalization is not a good look. In general.You can’t fight bigotry with bigotry. Doofus.
I think it holds up, but look up the real Bunk now and it’s so much worse.
Deadwood is #1 absolutely.
Same. I might be the only person in the world that still can’t get through season one of The Soprano’s.
Don’t get me wrong—I enjoyed the show and absolutely loved the ending, its just not in my “top shows” list.
Yeah. I mentioned before in this thread, but it bears repeating. I’m not clear on whether the author ranked this list based on the impact it has on pop-culture, or based on the writing, acting, and execution. It would make a difference in understanding it.
Season 1 of the Sopranos was great. Then it goes steadily downhill from there.
Ive never gotten to Deadwood. I always thought Sopranos was over rated. At the time, first two three seasons it was head and shoulders above most dramas at the time, but the Wire….so fn good. A man has got to have a code. When Avon is talking to Dee, be one second slow, one second late…I mean man how you never going to be late, never going to be a little slow. 5th season was the weakest by a step, but then it concludes so fittingly. I didnt get to the wire till maybe 3 years ago….now when i think of GoT…I see Little Finger and I just think Carcetti. Not sure if you game, but actor who plays Daniels….is Sylens in the game, and they used him for motion capture…so he looks and sounds like Daniels.
I liked The Wire way better than The Sopranos. I actually never even finished Sopranos.
Did you actually watch The Wire? I’ve honestly never heard anyone dismiss it who’s taken the whole thing in. I’ve watched it front to back at least a few times and I discover something new each time. It’s incredible.
Everyone did not love The Sopranos. It was definitely more popular than The Wire, that I will certainly grant you. However, I was never able to get into The Sopranos while I thought The Wire was excellent. I watched all of it. I will further note that I don’t love The Wire. I recognize its artistic excellence, but it’s not a show I can love. But I was at least able to motivate myself to watch all of it and enjoyed doing so, which is far more than I can say for The Sopranos.I’m not arguing that its position on this list is wrong. I expected it to be top 5, and I would never argue it should be lower. Just because I didn’t like it doesn’t make it bad. I’m merely pointing out that your argument that “everyone loved The Sopranos” is downright incorrect.
I loved The Wire, but it feels difficult to slot any show at number one that produced a season as downright boring as Season 2.
The Sopranos has a couple of fantastic seasons, and a couple of meandering ones. It’s never bad, but it’s not uniformly good. The Wire, on the other hand, is uniformly good.
Wrong take.
hello, ladiesi wish i could have seen 1st & 10 and not necessarily the news back in the day…
You may want to revise your opening sentence. Chase confirmed last year that Tony died. The AV Club even covered that story.Also Band of Brothers at 49 only beating out True Blood is insane.
Band of Brothers is a great show. Everyone should want to watch Tom Hanks suck his grandpa’s dick for 10 episodes.
No. Band of Brothers being 49 and not in the top 10 is insane.
It’s my personal #1, but overall, it should still be ranked top 10. We’ll never get another show like it.
Chase did no such thing, he only acknowledged it was an option. And Tony most certainly does not die onscreen.
AV Club reported that Chase said Tony died.https://www.avclub.com/david-chase-has-finally-revealed-tony-sopranos-fate-in-1847995668/amp
They did, but if you read what he actually said he didn’t actually confirm it.
I read the article. He talks about how he wanted Tony to be killed driving into NY, then while driving by a diner he says “Tony should get it in a place like that”. “Get it” didn’t mean get a milkshake. And regardless of how cryptic his statement was, AV Club reported that Chase said Tony was killed. So it would be nice if they didn’t contradict their own reporting.
Right. Should get it, not did get it. Agree with you about the AV club
Deadwood is the best show I have ever seen. More than that, I can think of no show more relevant today than that one. The whole premise of the show is that we are all one body, completely dependent on each other for growth and survival, and also dependent on the institutions that bind us together.In this era, there are a lot of forces that are intent on dividing people, isolating people. Deadwood is a fantastic reminder of how vital community is. I really think everyone should watch it. Plus, the writing and acting are off the charts fantastic.These lists always remind me of how many great shows HBO has made over the years. It is really pretty incredible.
Hearst is one of the most terrifying villains in television history. Game of Thrones had Euron Greyjoy.
When “Major Dad” was announced for that role, I remember thinking it was a big mistake. How completely wrong I was. You could not take your eyes off Hearst every time he was on screen. What a performance by Gerald McRaney.
“Elections cannot inconvenience me. They ratify my will or I neuter them” might be my favorite villain quote ever.
“Mr. Mom is not Batman!” — 1988
Boy, that was another huge swing a miss by me. Keaton was great in that, and my brother and I absolutely wore out our VHS copy of the movie (and the Elfman soundtrack on tape) after seeing it multiple times in the theater. Younger me should have just let casting directors do their jobs………..
Similar thing happened when Daniel Craig took over as Bond. Almost 2 decades later, nobody even questions that decision anymore.
Strongly agree. I wasn’t thrilled when I first saw him, but holy fuck was he fantastic.
Euron Greyjoy doesn’t deserve a mention. His character was a cartoon that was only in a few episodes and contributed nothing to the plot. He’s not worth a mention. Try again with someone more capable and complex. Tywin Lannister for example.
Thank you for reminding me of one of my favorite things that GoT inspired:https://uproxx.com/tv/game-of-thrones-euron-greyjoy-looks-like/
This. I’d rank it #2 overall behind The Wire, mainly because of that suddenly shortened 3rd season that just…ends. Of course, we have the movie now, but its still a disjointed original run. Not their fault though for HBO cancelling it.
Deadwood is my favorite show, but there is a more than compelling argument that the Wire should be #1. If I were king of these lists, I would have those two 1 or 2 in any order, and the Sopranos third. YMMV of course.
I don’t think Succession has done enough to supplant The Wire, The Sopranos and Deadwood as HBO’s holy trinity yet.
Unless I missed it you left out Carnivale which one of the best shows ever!
A true tragedy, the HBO version of Twin Peaks, can’t ever watch a carnival film without thinking of it.
There is no way Barry is better than GOT.
It is, though.
Sure it is. Maybe GoT has Barry beat in terms of spectacle, I’ll give it that. But with regard to writing, thematic development, and acting performances, Barry is the superior show, hands down. In 24 episodes of Barry, I can think of at least 4 that are master classes in writing, direction or performance, and I’m not sure I could say the same about any of GoT’s 73 episodes. Plus, Barry has Stephen Root.
and it’s all accomplished in half hour episodes, no room for filler on Barry. from the newer shows, I am glad Barry is high on the list.
I mean, I could definitely name a dozen plus episodes of GoT that are better in every single way compared to the best episode of Barry.
That’s the thing with Thrones. It’s like Buffy. Even it’s worst season had standout episodes. Like season five’s Hardhome, or, season six’s Battle of the Bastards, and The Bells.
don’t tease us, type them up, come on
Girls, girls, you’re both pretty.You do realize this is all subjective, right? Even if I had watched every single show on this list (I definitely have not), I know my list would be ordered differently. Hell, even of the shows I have watched, I would probably rank them differently than the AV Club has.I haven’t watched Barry, but I have watched ALL of GoT, and I would most likely knock it out of the top 10 if I were writing this list. (Where Barry would be will have to remain a mystery for now.) There are certainly other shows I would rank above GoT (Deadwood, for one). But that is just my opinion because I value different things in my entertainment than others do. I’m not more right. It’s just my preference. (For example, in general, I am more likely to gravitate towards dramas over comedies. Some people are the reverse. Doesn’t make either of us “wrong.” Just different.)
The shows can’t be compared to each other. The list either needs to be broken down in categories. One for shows that had an enormous impact on pop-culture, and one for writing, acting, and execution.
Seeing that a few of these shows were picked up by HBO after other networks cancelled them, I am once again hoping (probably against hope) that HBO some day picks up Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance.
No ‘Dream On’, no dice.
I had the same exact response. I went through the list expecting to see it in the top 25, but somehow it isn’t there at all? I enjoyed that show, and it isn’t like it didn’t make the list because of the reviews because the critics liked it too.
real sex should have been number 1
Taxicab Confessions!
Tenacious D
I agree with, well, pretty much everyone else. This list is shit, with Curb outside the top 25 only the most egregious.
Yeah. I hate ragging on lists, but I don’t totally get what metric these shows are being judged by. Leftovers, Band of Brothers, and Curb should be top ten. SatC and Game of Thrones should be way further down. Euphoria shouldn’t even be on this list. Just confounding stuff.
For those uninterested in clicking through 50 slides:
50. True Blood
49. Band of Brothers
48. I’ll be gone in the Dark
47. Big Love
46. Industry
45. House of the Dragon
44. The Righteous Gemstones
43. Eastbound and Down
42. The Kids in the Hall
41. True Detective
40. Boardwalk Empire
39. Our Flag Means Death
38. The Rehearsal
37. Enlightened
36. Mr. Show
35. The Jinx
34. Search Party
33. Harley Quinn
32. Los Espookys
31. The Night of
30. The Flight Attendant
29. I May Destroy You
28. Mare of Easttown
27. Curb your Enthusiasm
26. Hacks
25. Flight of the Conchords
24. Euphoria
23. The Leftovers
22. Lovecraft Country
21. Station Eleven
20. Silicon Valley
19. The Larry Sanders Show
18. Insecure
17. Last Week Tonight w/ John Oliver
16. Chernobyl
15. The Other Two
14. Girls
13. Six Feet Under
12. Sex and the City
11. Watchmen
10. The White Lotus
9. Big Little Lies
8. Veep
7. Deadwood
6. The Comeback
5. Game of Thrones
4. Barry
3. Succession
2. The Sopranos
1. The Wire
You can also just click the button that says “List slides.”
Why do people post these? Just click “List Slides”
I always find it so funny that these list articles always have this comment, which has a fair amount of stars but is somehow buried at the very bottom. I wonder if a staffer has to manually bury each comment or if there is an algorithm that detects the full list being written out and buries it automatically.
A clarifying point on whether this is just HBO vs. what’s available on HBO Max would’ve been nice. No one in their right mind can confidently claim that The Other Two, hilarious though it is, is an HBO show – it was a Comedy Central show that got picked up by and is available on HBO Max – that is, if you’re watching the HBO channel on television, you will never, ever be able to see The Other Two.Beyond the network/streaming confusion bit, this list is bonkers. Band of Brothers – maybe the most acclaimed miniseries of all time – at 49? Lovecraft Country – a one season mess of ideas and bad cgi – ahead of The Leftovers? Wild.
And it puts a couple of shows that I would say were either flashes in the pan (Girls) or that haven’t aged particularly well (Sex and the City) ahead of masterworks like Chernobyl. Basically, Chernobyl not being the in the top ten is my major gripe, when you consider that White Lotus and Big Little Lies both squeaked in there. BLL had a good first season and an atrocious second season. If they had qualified the list and said BLL season 1 was top ten, I might agree. But taking it as a whole, that second season has to bump it into the 20s at least. And White Lotus hasn’t convinced me that it’s great rather than good yet. But Chernobyl is a near-perfect piece of television. The Leftovers should probably be in the top ten, also, and if I were writing the list The Righteous Gemstones would be somewhere in the top 25 at least—#45 is way too low. And maybe True Blood deserves more appreciation for embracing its campy trashiness. It never pretended it was something it wasn’t, and it never crawled up its own ass (here’s looking at you, True Detective).
And then there’s Oz not even making the list. NPR had a story on the history of “prestige TV” and HBO’s role in it, and the expert being interviewed said Oz was the greatest and most important HBO show ever.
I don’t know if it’s the greatest, but it might be the most important. It’s either that or The Sopranos. I’d give the edge to Sopranos, though. Just being the first isn’t enough. That’s why no one talks about Lillyhammer.
Yeah, following The Other Two logic, where’s Sesame Street on this list!?I demand Sesame Street be on this list with my Muppet arms flailing like this: Wha-aa Ah aHH!!Oh, shit. Fraggle Rock started on HBO, didn’t it?
Regardless of HBO vs. HBO Max (and the show aired for a few years on main HBO), it is generally regarded that Sesame Street’s glory days were on PBS/NET.
But the OP is making the point that a couple of shows here (Search Party and The Other Two) weren’t “HBO Shows” by any stretch. They were on other networks that migrated to HBO Max. Which really isn’t the same thing.
Fraggle Rock should be on the list for sure.
C’mon, Sesame Street doesn’t really count. It was on PBS for like 50 years before it went to HBO (which is still a tragedy btw).
I know, I was kidding. But Fraggle Rock? No one remembers, but that premiered way back in like HBO’s 4th year.
Yeah, I made it all the way to 49 on the slideshow and had to stop and check the comments.
Yeah, Lovecraft Country really shouldn’t be on here. It was a mediocre show at best.
What exactly happened with Boardwalk Empire? That show seemed to have pretty ambitious long-term plans, because the massive time jump seemed to be a sign they were unprepared to end the story even by the fifth season. I’ve always considered going back to rewatch it since I really enjoy period pieces, but then I remember how jarring and rushed that final season felt . Wasn’t it like a five-year jump?
I haven’t done a rewatch but remember feeling that it went downhill fast after Jimmy died.
That is wrong. The best season happened after Jimmy died. Bobby Cannavale knocked it out of the park.
You are correct, I just looked back and didn’t realize that Jimmy’s death was so early on. Bobby was amazing and Stephen Graham was pretty great too.
Love Gyp. That season is so awesome.
My guess is that HBO expected it to be their next hit on the level of The Sopranos – Organized crime! HBO! Marty Scrosese! – but it never delivered that audience, and eventually they couldn’t justify the costs. I enjoyed the hard-boiled crime stories plenty, but my favorite thing about Boardwalk was that it looked expensive. The costumes, props, sets, the extensive digital post-production work (The seasonal highlight reels that their VFX company released are staggering, and they barely scratch the surface of what they did); everything on-screen was lavish and they went all out to make it look like the 1920’s brought back to life in immaculate condition.
But it debuted to almost 5 million viewers and by the end of Season 4 it was pulling just shy of 2.2m. The show never caught fire the way the network clearly wanted it to, which is why I imagine we got that rushed finale (Which jumped nearly a full decade; they went from the height of Prohibition all the way to Nucky preparing for a post-Repeal future.)
It really feels like it got Romed. The showrunners expected more time and HBO said wrap it up now.
The biggest crime was Arnold Rothstein (favorite recurring character along with Mickey Doyle) vanishing in that time period.
Euphoria seems like one of those shows where half the fanbase loves the hot cast, and enjoys the show very much in spite of its writer/director. When a typical positive review is “Fuck Sam, but Zendaya ATE THAT,” it really doesn’t merit a placement on this list until everyone in their 30s is dead and buried. Like, think it over for a few years, TikTok, before you make your final decision on this show.
I mostly liked it for having such a visibile trans character. But then said actress kinda blew that good will with stupid statements about non binary people and now I don’t even know.
Seems like such a strange way to judge the quality of a show
No Tales From The Crypt, no Oz, no The Critic. Screw this list.
Seeing this list, it only now occurs to me how many of HBOs best shows can be summed up with “The American Dream is broken.”
Real Sports with Bryant Gumbal should be on the list. It’s been strong since the mid 90’s and consistently brings interesting stories related to sports.
Any show that gives space to Bernie Goldberg is complete shit. Unwatchable dreck. There are literally 1000 people on youtube who have more interesting things to say about sports than those boomer dorks.
The biggest tragedy is that the Wire was ignored by the Emmys.
Ask Saul Goodman and Kim Wexler about that.
Man, not what I would have gone with. White lotus and Barry are both about ten places too high. Larry Sanders way too low. Looks like big time recency bias.
The Leftover’s not being #1, or top five, or top ten is wild. Seriously, wild.
Captain Bart Mancuso is disappointed.
You say that about everything!
I really liked the first season of the Leftovers, but after that I was always bored. I was very surprised to realize that most fans of the show felt the exact opposite way.
It’s been a while since I’ve disliked a show as much as I disliked The Leftovers. That said, like what you like.
It’s my favorite HBO series. Hands down.
Lists are so silly. Let me use this opportunity to assert that Mike White’s masterpiece is Enlightened & the White Lotus is simply FINE.
I agree about White Lotus. I watched the first season and don’t really care to watch season 2. I’ll admit that part of my mixed feelings are based on the fact that I went into it expecting a VERY different show than it actually was. Overall, I found its attempts at class satire to be a little unfocused and bloodless, and the show made a habit of centering the narrative around its least interesting/most annoying characters. It doesn’t help that Triangle of Sadness came out last year and basically did everything TWL wanted to do but a thousand times more effectively; having watched ToS before TWL, the latter felt woefully weak in comparison.
This is Arli$$ erasure and I won’t stand for it.
yesss!
When is Arli$$ on? Trick question – it’s always on!!!- Me, anytime I stayed in a hotel with free HBO
There, I fixed the order:
Band of Brothers
Barry
Big Little Lies
Big Love
Boardwalk Empire
Chernobyl
The Comeback
Curb your Enthusiasm
Deadwood
Eastbound and Down
Enlightened
Euphoria
The Flight Attendant
Flight of the Conchords
Game of Thrones
Girls
Hacks
Harley Quinn
House of the Dragon
I May Destroy You
I’ll Be Gone in the Dark
Industry
Insecure
The Jinx
The Kids in the Hall
The Larry Sanders Show
Last Week Tonight with John Oliver
The Leftovers
Los Espookys
Lovecraft Country
Mare of Easttown
Mr. Show
The Night Of
The Other Two
Our Flag Means Death
The Rehearsal
The Righteous Gemstones
Search Party
Sex and the City
Silicon Valley
Six Feet Under
The Sopranos
Station Eleven
Succession
True Blood
True Detective
Veep
Watchmen
The White Lotus
The Wire
You fixed the order…to alphabetical lol
Yes, because trying to rank something as subjective and varied as all these shows is a fool’s errand. Also The Wire would still end up on the last slide so it works out.
Band of Brothers just barely making the cut here is insane. It’s insane!!I cannot entertain the thought that every single show ahead of it on this list is better produced, better written, better acted, or otherwise more more significant, either culturally or even just in HBO’s own history.
I’m surprised John Adams or Olive Kitteridge didn’t make the list.
John Adams was marvelous! Paul Giamatti just killed it.
Someone’s obviously too young to have been down to Fraggle Rock.
Shouldn’t Sesame Street be on here? If we are including shows that started on TBS and Comedy Central?
Entourage. 8 seasons, 26 Emmy nominations (6 wins), Golden Globe nominations every season, and one of the greatest tv characters ever in Ari Gold (with three consecutive Emmy’s for Jeremy Piven as Outstanding Supporting Actor). Huge whiff Jen.
Yep. Not much else to say, as it was essentially HBO’s male counter-programming to Sex and the City. It did better than some people would like to admit. Maybe too distasteful for a Top 20, but certainly good enough to make a Top 50
Chase has confirmed what everyone should have already known; Tony died in the diner at the end of Made in America.
No Not Necessarily the News? Bah. It stands on its own, but beyond that there’s no Daily Show, Colbert Report, or Last Week Tonight (among others) without it.
Fraggle Rock is #1
Carnivale and Rome both getting the snub is a crime
Wome!
Justice for Ben Hawkins and Brother Justin!
I second this re: Carnivale, such a great weird show.
Yeah, I try not to quibble about the order of these things, but those are some crazy omissions. Add OZ to that, too. These shows were formational to the building of prestige television. You just can’t tell me that Carnivale has less cultural impact than Lovecraft Country. I don’t believe it. To this day, it still gets bandied about on every list of cancelled-too-soon or underappreciated lists and named as a favorite and an influence by showrunners of shows in basically every genre. And OZ was on for like a decade. It was wildly popular. Characters on other HBO shows watch OZ. And ROME remains every bit as powerful and fascinating today as it ever has been. They show it in history classes. Yeah, I don’t care about the order, but a list of HBO shows that is missing those three is a very incomplete list.
WHERE IS “DREAM ON” WITH BRIAN BENBEN
First question is – damn, how many have there been?
Second thought is – Boardwalk Empire is worse than Enlightened? Hahaha eat parts of my effluence.
Third though is – fine. Deadwood got it’s fuckin’ flowers. I’ll stop contributing to the “pending” section now.
Since some of the “you left out” shows have already been mentioned, aside from those… I personally would have put Luck in the top 50. Sure it’s a one-season cancellation but that first season is good and you see where it was going.
No Rome, Oz or Treme?
“The Pacific” is a much better series than “Band of Brothers”. It doesn’t flinch at the brutality of war and gives meaningful glimpses into the lives of those Marines both before and after the war. It’s a brutal watch that lacks the “Ra-Ra” tone of Steven Ambrose’s source material and much better for it.
The scene in the last episode where Sledge can’t shoot birds is about the most harrowing and moving thing.
It’s easy to understand why someone would prefer Band of Brothers to The Pacific (following a single group made it much easier for the creators to really sketch in all the characters, and it made it easier for the audience to pick up on the dynamics between the characters. The Pacific’s jumping around in space and time, particularly when it followed three main characters that have their own stories and side characters made it a lot more difficult to latch onto any particular group in the way you could in Band. It was a decidedly less focused series.)That being said, basing it on books written by guys who were there gave it a feeling of truth that BoB lacked (which ended up playing out in amusing ways, like following a soldier who got killed – despite the fact that the actual man lived through the war and died years later). Only the Basilone segments had a similarly hagiographic feeling to BoB, which is unsurprising given that his was the only story that was recorded by someone else.Couple that with the shooting style/color palette that gave The Pacific a vibrance that brought its storylines to life in a way that the muted footage from Band did not and I stand by my preference despite how scattershot it is.Of course, for rewatchability it’s kinda hard to top Generation Kill, as far as HBO war miniseries go. It’s not just a war story, it’s a blackly hilarious road trip comedy.
I think BoB being done in the wake of Saving Private Ryan and finished before 9/11 also gave it that “we love the greatest generation” feel where post 9/11 Pacific clearly doesn’t flinch at what we’re asking people to do when we send them to fight.As for re-watchability, the brutality of the Pacific makes it really hard to come back to
BoB is… fun? I mean, dark, hard, sad, but ultimately “hey! let’s go kick some Nazi ass!”. The Pacific was just brutal, but also fantastic, but it definitely exists in a morass of gray area.
No The Life & Times of Tim? Come on!
His Dark Materials not good enough?
I will always LOVE Dream ON and The Hitchhiker.The Hitchhiker had the best introduction music EVER.
Just going to leave this here for exhibit A on why Last Week Tonight deserves a top 10 spot, though I’m not sure what I would demote to make room. Probably Big Little Lies.
“Rome” and “From the Earth to the Moon” not on the list? Turn in your badge.
how the shit is Oz not on here?
First off, you need to make a distinction between limited series and shows. It’s ridiculous to compare an 8 episode story to something that played out over several seasons.
Second, I agree the recency bias is bananas. As noted in the summary, Mr. Show is one of the most important and influential comedy shows of the last 40 years, but it ranks below shows which exactly no one will be talking about in 5 years, like The Flight Attendant or shows we shouldn’t be evaluating because they’re only a season or two in (Station Eleven, White Lotus)?! Do better
Brain Games and Fraggle Rock were my fifth grade.
I’d have the Chris Rock Show on my list. It introduced Wanda Sykes to a larger audience; spawned the Pootie Tang skit which became a movie; and the skits, especially “How not to get your ass kicked by the police”, are still hilarious.
Tanner ‘88?
There must be two White Lotuses. The one I saw was crap.
Where are the other David Simon shows, Treme and The Corner?
The absence of “Oz” renders this list void.
I would rate Oz better than the Sopranos, but I realize almost nobody else shares that view.HOT TAKE
Totally agree.
Even if you take personal preference out of it. Without Oz kicking the door down in terms of of what you can show on TV then none of this list exists.
The fact that everyone says The Sopranos is the show that started the golden age of TV riles me to this day.
And man what a cast.
I agree, Oz is better than The Sopranos. Also, The Sopranos wouldn’t even exist without Oz.
Some of the reasons this list may be so controversial is that it doesn’t really seem like it was compiled/ranked according to any kind of consistent methodology. There are shows that are still ongoing and literally ended their first seasons less than a week ago mixed in with shows that have been off the air for 15 years and which have had time to show what kind of long term cultural impact they’ve had on the entertainment landscape. That cultural impact seems to have been factored in to how some of these shows were ranked, which can’t apply the same to very recent and even ongoing series. It’s also unclear what should have qualified to make this list. Band of Brothers is a limited series. In which case, why isn’t Chernobyl on here? (I would definitely rank it above some of the entries included.) Was there a minimum number of episodes to qualify? They can’t be only counting shows that started after 2000 because Sex and the City started in the late 90s. And it’s not like what they’ve left off is just the obscure or very old stuff. As many others have mentioned, Oz was one of the pioneer shows of prestige television, and there is no way it ranks below a lot of the other shows on this list. It may not be top 10 or even top half, but it should definitely appear in a top 50 list of HBO shows.
I agree with your overall premise, but Chernobyl is on the list. Number 16.
Oh, shit – my bad! Thanks for pointing that out. How did I miss it? I scanned through the list multiple times, too. OOPS.
What the fuck. No Carnivale? The only complaint is the show was canceled, I rewatched it and it holds up magnificently, with the best title sequence in TV history. I’ll definitely take it over House of the Dragon. Shame!
I just watched it for the first time last year. Holy shit, what a show!
I tried really hard to like Lovecraft Country and it started off OK. But in the end I just couldn’t. Two or three episodes were excellent but that Indiana Jones/Scavenger hunt episode just took me out of most of the rest of the series. It was one Deus Ex Machina after another.
Is John From Cincinnati on the list? I loved that show. I skipped to the top 5, Succession number 3, really? lol. Maybe number 10 or 9 but not 3.
There’s far too much to unpack here but immediate offenses:1) Mr. Show is better than Kids In The Hall?! I think not. 2) Curb in the middle of the pack? The recency bias on this list is mondo disappointing.
A bit too much love for recent shows. I’ll just say that Larry Sanders should be top 5. It holds up extremely well, and still doesn’t get enough credit for its single camera docu-style being massively influentially on the last 30 years of TV comedy. And VEEP should be top 5 too. Easily one of the top 10 comedy shows ever, and certainly HBO’s best.
No Dream On and no Not Necessarily the News? Wrongo!
No way The Leftovers is outside the top five. And John from Cincinnati is better than at least 10 of these entries.
Saw Leftovers in the 20s, cant take this seriously.
LOL to Band of Brothers barely cracking the top 50, with “Night Of” being well ahead of it.“Night of” had 0 cultural resonance, it basically doesn’t exist. There were a lot of great performances in it, but great performances in a show about nothing. That show had no point and was so overhyped. Everyone tried their best to will “Night Of” to be this really interesting, cool, subversive whodunit-meets-social commentary, but it did neither in any sort of particular way.
I just skimmed but… is Carnivale not on this list?
It is not. Bizarre.
No Tales From The Crypt? That was a flagship show for HBO.
Where are Treme, The Corner, The Deuce, Vinyl and Luck?
Band of Brothers deserves to be in the top 10 for sure.
His Dark Materials?
A+ trolling Putting Our Flag Means death above True Detective. They almost got me!
KitH and Larry Sanders should be in the top ten.Where are two of my early 1990s staples, Tales From the Crypt and Dream On?
Band of Brothers, ranked 49th? What the fuck. It’s one of the best mini-series of all time, period. It deserves top 10.
OZ, True Detective, Harley Quinn
very memorable
Two things:1) Where the hell is “Tales from the Crypt”?2) This list aside…seriously, where the hell is “Tales from the Crypt”? This show completely disappeared from our lives and I WANT IT BACK.
Me too! I vaguely remember a teaser trailer for a shitty-looking reboot a few years ago, with a zombie janitor or some malarkey
This.AMC/Shudder should be working on getting the rights to it and then create a new show like they did with Creepshow.
The guy who voiced the Crypt Keeper is still doing conventions, I’m sure he’d reprise that role.
Came here for this. That show was my Twilight Zone growing up and it has VANISHED. I’m sure there is some very complicated rights issue keeping anyone from streaming it.
I’m fairly certain M Night bought up the rights to it a while back in order to do his failed reboot series for TNT, and its now in a weird limbo period until he gives that shit up. I’d say bring it back to HBO, but with Zaslav in charge, now is really not a good time to had them ANYTHING.
Got to three and expected Rome and Carnivale to be the top two. What the actual fuck AVC?
Really? You expected 2 very niche shows (I’d personally never even heard of Rome before this thread, but TBF I didn’t have access to HBO at all until like 2 years ago) with 2 seasons each to be the top 2 and 3 shows in HBO history? Have you only watched 3 HBO shows??
I’m going to be a bit snarkey and say that they came out before a lot of the lists writers were born , and therefore are invalid.
The first 2 are the only ones they got right on here. Mr Show, The Night Of and the first season of True Detective are top 10 easily, same with Curb. And no mention of The Outsider? I really miss the Chicago AVClub writers.
Deadwood down at 7 told me all I needed to know about this list.
bored to death a glaring omission
Chernobyl is simply the greatest thing I’ve ever seen on television.
‘Luck’ would have been top 10 if those damn horses didn’t keep dying.
The Wire is totally overrated.
Barry, Station 11, Lovecraft Country, etc are all excellent shows and also none of them can hold Band of Brothers’ jock strap. this list is comical
Why is this just being put back up again and why hasn’t this been renamed “Top 5o HBO shows our 22 year old intern who makes these list has seen”I mean you missedTales from the CryptRomeCarnivaleAnd we aren’t even going back to the real original HBO shows like “First and Ten”
I have to think the only reason this has been posted at this time is because they need some year end clicks cause hoo boy is this all over the place wrong
You have so many shows in the bottom third that deserve to be closer to the top, I don’t know what to make of this.Also, any list of best HBO shows that doesn’t include the single season of LUCK is just dumb.
Curb Your Enthusiasm not even cracking the top half of the list is very questionable.
How does Watchmen even make this list let alone earn a #11?
Where the fuck is Rome?
Honorable Mention to the Newsroom because it was 80% great writing and acting and 20% cheesiness
Carnivale could easily find a home in the streaming landscape today. That final shot had me primed for season 3 and then they pulled the plug on it. Oz went downhill before it ended, but damn, how it kicked the crap out of the TV scene when it first appeared.
I have seen three of these (Kids in the Hall, John Oliver, and Game of Thrones). Of the remaining 47, I’ve never even heard of 1/2 of them. Apparently I live under a rock.
No Tales from the Crypt???
Band of Brothers at #49? I smell MILLENIALS!
Breaking news, entries #3-50 have just been removed from HBO Max forever.
I know we’re not supposed to like him because he’s “problematic” or whatever, but the idea that Bill Maher isn’t on this list is almost as ridiculous as having Band of Brothers at #49.
He’s not the best interviewer or moderator out there, but it’s about the only place left that you actually get opposing viewpoints treated with respect (or called out for being bullshit), to say nothing of calling out people that generally lean his own political direction.
Ummm, the Pacific?
Watchmen was better than it had any right to be. But it’s placement on this list is way too high. It was a good show, but it was far from an all-timer. If for no other reason than the whole Ozymandias-on-the-moon bullshit was absolutely terrible.
Not surprised but still sad to see no mention of Generation Kill, which I think only myself and about 5 other people watched.
Is there any crack left on the planet after you made this list?
Apparently my dad and I are the only ones who liked the Newsroom. I found it to be spot on again in 2016 and 2017. I could see it on this list for sure.
It was very difficult to even read this list when Band of Brothers was like #49 or #48.
Did you really not put Oz on this list?Jfc… & Carnivale??
this feels like your favorite shows, where is Oz? Treme? how the F is GoT so high when its universally hated for how it ended? Watchmen that high? its a good show but its 1 season same as many others on this list that I would argue should not be on here. mini series shouldn’t be part of this list.
Saw Band of Brothers at 49 and that was it for me. It’s in the top 50 shows of all time on any platform. Reading what else missed out throught the comments makes me glad I didn’t waste time going through the whole list. No Rome or Oz? I hope this was compiled by AI as it definitely wasn’t made by someone who has a working knowledge of HBO.
Arli$$ ! Dream on! Oh wait, this is the best of …. never mind.
No Carnivale, no The Newsroom, no Sharp Objects, no Looking.
mmmmm Harley Quinn the show is made up from original creatives of the BTAS in the 90s, with an audience who has grown up with it 30 years ago, it still hinges on that history for them to grow so fond of the characters.It’s a pretty bad list.
Spicy City was robbed!
which would I regularly rewatch? Harley Quinn
Would Our Flag Means Death’s second season have changed the rankings? Or the newer seasons of Harley Quinn?
Opens link… See Band of Brothers 49th. Closes link.
No ‘John from Cincinnati”, ‘Treme’, or ‘Oz’? But space for ‘The Flight Attendant’? this is not a list.
Sopranos was mid and so are you if you think it’s any better than mid.
“Treme” is better than half this list.
Obviously some great shows here. In 2024, Deadwood is still the best show I have ever seen. Probably because it is also the best acted and best written.Somehow I never watched The Wire until I was binging stuff during COVID (probably because the first season came out the year my oldest son was born), and I don’t know what the hell I was waiting for. That show is obviously a masterpiece.
Where is Rome???
No Rome? Or did I miss it?
The Righteous Gemstones should be much higher. Lovecraft Country only had 2 good episodes.
GTFO with a 50 slide slideshow….