There is a groove on my couch that I think about every time I think of you.
It’s not a small groove. It’s gotten bigger over time. (My age is none of your business, but, suffice to say, that groove isn’t new.)
Memories have happened in that groove. Perspectives have changed in that groove. Excellence has been watched in that groove. And so has such badness.
But I think about that groove every time I tell you to watch something good. That groove is a responsibility.
Life happens while you’re watching TV, which is the silly thing I’m trying to say while trying to be writerly above. We all watch TV while our lives are happening; sometimes TV motivates us to change our lives.
I don’t know if what I’ve selected as my favorite TV shows of the year will accomplish all of that, but I do know that, if you’re like me, pop culture moves you, and, in doing so, moves you to think differently about the world around you.
At the risk of being presumptuous, I think we could all use a reason to think about the world around us a little bit differently today.
Here are my Top 15 TV Shows of the Year, in alphabetical order.
Abbott Elementary
I’m so old that I remember when TV shows ran for years, produced 20+ episodes a season, and found a sharper sense of themselves and got funnier as they went on. It’s a rarity these days, in the era of short seasons and early cancellations. I’m so thankful for Abbott Elementary, which gets funnier and funnier as it goes on, and, even more so, has figured out exactly how to spotlight its amazing supporting cast and all their characters’ quirks.
Adolescence
It was awkward when Adolescence launched on Netflix. I screamed at everyone I knew that they should watch this show, but I also knew that it was so traumatizing and upsetting. So it was like, “Hey, friend; “Hey, mom;” “You have to do this thing that will make you so sad.” Adolescence was not only a narratively gripping series, but the way it was made—four episodes all filmed in single takes—was one of the most thrilling storytelling devices I’ve ever seen, somehow transcending gimmickry to be utterly brilliant.
Alien: Earth
TV mastermind Noah Hawley reinvented both Fargo and X-Men. He’s the genius of “who would have thought there was another way to tell this already brilliant story.” Hawley turned his attention to the Alien franchise, and the result was one of the most gripping, inventive, and visually arresting sci-fi series television has ever seen.
Dying for Sex
If the stock price of Kleenex spiked in April, the brilliant limited series Dying for Sex is to blame. Not blame, though. To be cherished. Because it was also so hilarious, and spiritual, and affirming, and silly, and profound. I will forever be grateful for Michelle Williams and Jenny Slate’s performances in this, for proving that the love of a friendship is as deep as any familial connection, and for showing how powerful that love can be.
Elsbeth
I can’t believe Elsbeth exists; a kooky side character from a serious drama that premiered 16 years ago (The Good Wife) is now the lead of a CBS procedural that is as wacky as it is grim. It’s like Law & Order through a funhouse mirror, which, frankly, is what real life is. That it’s become so popular is so encouraging: We just want good storytelling. And the murder mysteries that unfold each week on Elsbeth are told better than any other series on TV.
Hacks
Hacks heroine Deborah Vance is a marvel of longevity, a testament to what it takes to reinvent yourself, with quality, to maintain a long showbiz career. So it’s fitting that Hacks outlasted being the buzzy new streaming show on the block, and is now a comedy behemoth. The acting on this series, from Jean Hacks, Hannah Einbinder, Paul W. Downs, and Meg Stalter, is unmatched. And the ingenuity with which new—and entirely organic—challenges are introduced to keep us gripped as we laugh out loud…this show is the epitome of excellence.
Heated Rivalry
If you need me in 2026, I’ll just be at the cottage. What started as a viral sensation for its sex scenes became one of TV’s most exquisite depictions of romance. Heated Rivalry skated through queer tropes that have been mined to exhaustion—being closeted, coming out, tokenizing gay heroism—but hit them with a specificity that is rarely poked at, let alone blown up in such a sensationally emotional way, a way that was amplified because we got to see the erotic attraction between the characters. Heated Rivalry finished out 2025 as the most talked-about TV show of the year, and it’s the loveliest gift this cynic could have received.
Matlock
So many people joke about how their “comfort watch” is Law & Order: SVU, hinting that there is something about the procedural drama format that we almost physiologically gravitate towards. So it’s a thrill when a series comes along that elevates the genre. Matlock has a sophisticated handle on the “case of the week” format, and, as a sweetener, floats a continuing storyline across the episodes that would be substantial enough for its own series. That Kathy Bates (!!!) is acting it all out? Heaven.
Overcompensating
I grew up with Stockard Channing playing Rizzo in Grease. With Gabrielle Carteris on Beverly Hills: 90210. If you are in your fifties playing a teenager, I don’t care, as long as the material is good. And the writing on Overcompensating—in which (a person of my age) Benito Skinner plays a millennial coming out as a freshman in college—is so, so good. The jokes flew at a pace that almost made me dizzy (how is Holmes not winning every supporting actress award???), but it was all rooted in a genuine emotion and anxiety that, again, as a millennial, I remember so viscerally. I’m so glad it’s coming back for a second season.
The Pitt
There is something so poetic about the fact that ER, over 30 years ago, transformed television and set the standard for the medical drama. To, after those decades, there be a new show that somehow finds a way to reinvent it again—and within the same genuine commitment to the human condition—is astounding. For it to feature an ER alum, the phenomenal Noah Wyle, at the helm? All of that trivia is one thing. But the fact that the filmmaking and the acting are so spectacular is another.
Pluribus
It’s been a year where we all feel like we’ve been dealing with pod people determining our future. So Pluribus could not be more relevant. But Vince Gilligan’s new series isn’t political or topical or issue-y. It’s a fascinating, unmissable portrait of loneliness, fury, resignation, and revenge, all packed in a grenade that protagonist Carol (Rhea Seehorn) might ask the hivemind for, and then regret. This is an amazing series that sets up what is usually the climax—the aliens take over the world—and use it as the starting point for the universe’s most complicated question: Now what?
The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City
The reality TV genre reached its peak form when The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City premiered. Bravo found an ideal playground for its outlandish anthropological magnifying glass—a traditionally Mormon community with Girls Gone Wild citizens—and unearthed some of the most ridiculous drama, sure, but also some of the most captivating and deeply human journeys the genre has explored. That the show so deftly juggles such wild extremes is a wonder.
The Studio
The thing about writing about movies and TV right now is that everything suckkkkssssss. The Studio leaped onto that sentiment and exploded it into something that managed to be an astute observation of everything wrong with the filmmaking process while also sort of celebrating it? It’s a meta, brilliant piece of writing, with exceptional one-take directing, buoyed by some of my favorite performances of the year from Seth Rogen, Ike Barinholtz, Kathryn Hahn, and Chase Sui Wonders.
Task
If I was ranking series, this would be my Number 1. Sure, it’s a pseudo-sibling to Mare of Eastown. But also, why wouldn’t we want that? It took themes the country is dealing with—addiction, poverty, self-worth—and presented them in a swirl, and then drove a spike in them with this murder-mystery-that-is-not-really-a-mystery. We tuned in to find how out it all unfolded, but also because we cared so much about everyone involved.
Carrie Coon’s White Lotus Monologue
It’s the Carrie Coon Conundrum: Which of her very good, but, let’s face it, like, not…great TV shows do you put on this list simply because her performance is so impressive that it would be criminal not to mention it?
With all due respect to The Gilded Age, which I love (Clock Twink 4ever), it has to be The White Lotus. The series was both a little slow and a little all over the place this season. But that range came into crystal focus when Coon delivered her season finale “time gives it meaning” monologue.
Not only did she deliver it exquisitely, but it was as if she were gifting it to us, viewers— a validating message soaked with emotion and past and wounds and healing—everything we needed to hear, spoken in just that way.
