The Best TV Shows of 2023
HONORABLE MENTIONS: DOCTOR WHO (Disney Plus), GEN V (Amazon Prime), MIRACLE WORKERS (TBS), MRS. DAVIS (PEACOCK), THE AFTERPARTY (APPLE TV), THE FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER (NETFLIX), THE OTHER TWO (MAX), WHAT WE DO IN THE SHADOWS (FX)
10. LOKI (Disney Plus)
In a year where the Marvel Cinematic Universe flopped for several reasons, creatively, financially, and even legally, the second season of Loki surprisingly shined, delivering an impressive season long plot gambit that a Doctor Who writer would be proud of. It had plenty of purposefully confusing time travel gimmicks, some of the best special effects and production design the MCU has seen in years, and a well-earned bittersweet ending that retroactively manages to give a character that’s existed across several MCU films an emotionally legible story arc. I give all credit to cult directors Justin Benson and Aaron Moorehead, who injected the show with their own sense of style and heavy sci-fi plotting, giving the show a strong identity that stood out among the more bland MCU television offerings.
9. SWARM (Amazon Prime)
Atmospheric and creepy, Swarm lived on Dominique Fishback’s performance as a serial killer stan as she travels across America to meet her idol. Produced by Donald Glover but written by Janine Nabers, the series has the vestigial atmospheric vibes of Glover’s Atlanta, but feels like its own separate, more thorny artistic project, especially with its unexpected ending.
8. THE CURSE (Showtime)
Benny Safdie and Nathan Fielder came together to make the cringe-filled dark comedy of my dreams, and even managed to get Emma Stone, one of our best working actresses right now, to star in it. In a time where HGTV’s popularity is still mindbogglingly high, The Curse rightfully points out the rancid gentrification at its dark heart with incisive, biting satire.
7. BARRY (HBO)
Barry nailed the landing with a beyond bleak last season that made sure every character got what they deserved (it mostly wasn’t pretty).
6. SCOTT PILGRIM TAKES OFF (Netflix)
An ingenious reimagining of the original Scott Pilgrim comic series, Scott Pilgrim Takes Off creatively re-tells its central story with the hindsight only its creator Bryan Lee O’Malley could have nearly two decades later, and allows for a richer, funnier, and more satisfying take on this world and characters.
5. TELEMARKETERS (HBO)
The most infuriating documentary of the year, Telemarketers came literally out of nowhere (co-director Sam Lipman-Stern stumbled upon the story while working at a New Jersey telemarketing firm as a teenager) and displayed the true arrogance and destructiveness of capitalism and how it comes together with the power of the state to routinely exploit everyday people. As hard as it is to watch people get scammed by telemarketers over decades, the number of people who come together to try to stop it and understand the extent of the crime is heartening, even if we’re still waiting on real life legal consequences.
4. HOW TO WITH JOHN WILSON (HBO)
John Wilson went out on a high note this year, getting more personal (in a shocking aside about middle school in one episode) and stranger (a good portion of the finale centers around an act of self castration) as he wound the show down to a conclusion that’s as weird and heartwarming as the show has ever been. How To with John Wilson’s unique view on humanity will sorely be missed in a television landscape full of television shows that aren’t a fraction as interesting as this show is.
3. POKER FACE (Peacock)
A common refrain I keep on saying that makes me sound old and annoying is “they don’t make ’em like this anymore!”. But in the case of Poker Face, they really don’t make ’em like this anymore, and that’s what makes it one of the best shows in a long time. More or less a Columbo remake with some details changed, Poker Face is refreshingly episodic, well-directed, and has a murderers row (pun not intended) of supporting actors facing off against lead actor Natasha Lyonne in the most charming role of her career. Its simple howcatchem formula and detective gimmick (she always knows when people are lying) exist alongside interesting, well-drawn stories that resemble the height of what crime procedurals could achieve back in the day. Who needs drawn out prestige TV when you can just watch a good actor solve crimes every week? We used to have real television in this country, etc etc.
2. SUCCESSION (HBO)
Mostly everything that needs to be said about Succession has already been said, but I’m still impressed by how corrosive and mean its final season was, up until a finale that gave the show a perfect ending befitting its characters and themes.
- THE BEAR (Hulu)
A pretty good show in its first season, The Bear matured into brilliant television in its second season, opening up the show to its very talented supporting cast, adopting an introspective episodic structure, and deepening the main characters in ways that made perfect sense. I’m not self centered enough to say the show is the ultimate younger millennial show, but I will say that Carmy is intensely relatable in his manic/depressive relationship to his work/passion and how outside factors (and his own anxieties) threaten to blow it all up, and how that feeling can feel all too real to people in their mid to late twenties. The central tension of the show is what makes it so thrilling: you can love to do something, and you can be good at it, but it can also be incredibly damaging as well. The push and pull of this dynamic elides all “is restaurant culture toxic?” thinkpiecing because the show knows it’s all terrible, but it also knows it’s worth it to try to make art in a broken system anyway, which is, of course, the story of most contemporary artists (the writers of the series themselves in particular, I’m sure). “Make good shit and try to leave things better than how you found them” may as well be the millennial motto. Like all great television shows, The Bear became a show about itself in its sophomore season and reached new heights because of it.
