Top Ten TV Shows of 2018

“What the hell is he doing?  This is a FOOD blog!”
“Ostensibly.”

Folks, I’m a nerd.  I already warned you I love movies, television, music, comedy, comics.  The name of my blog, The Saboscrivner, is even taken from the Chew comic book series.  It refers to a character who is a food writer, whose readers can literally taste everything she writes about, due to her vivid mastery of language.

So at the end of every year, I make lists of my favorite things, and the longest list is always my Top Ten TV Shows.  If my constant readers aren’t TV watchers, feel free to skip over it.  If not, bask in my excellent taste as I bring you:

THE SABOSCRIVNER’S TOP TEN TV SHOWS OF 2018!

10. The Venture Bros. (Season 7) — I’ve been watching and loving this show since it debuted in 2004. Since then, it has moved away from being a Jonny Quest parody and a “show about failure.” Instead, it has delved deeper into its complicated mythology that mines some deep cuts from throughout geek culture, developing the main characters into three-dimensional people that grow, change, screw up (a lot), and feel fully realized, despite being a crazy cartoon. Creators Jackson Publick and Doc Hammer have never been afraid to shake up its status quo, which always impresses me. With multi-year gaps between its short seasons, there are a lot of details to keep track of, and I know I’ve forgotten a lot, even after reading their gargantuan behind-the-scenes book that also came out this year. But if you have Hulu, all the early seasons are currently available to stream, so it’s never too late to catch up.

9. Sharp Objects (Season 1) — Set in depressing small-town Missouri (more like Misery, am I right?), it was part neo-noir murder mystery and part Southern gothic family drama. Amy Adams (one of my favorite actresses) did most of her acting in this by reacting, as an alcoholic and former cutter with severe PSTD, returning to her hometown and terrible family as a reporter, investigating the murders of two local girls. But nothing will prepare you for the almost campy evil of her mother, played by Patricia Clarkson, or the off-putting banality of evil that Adams’ character encounters from everyone else trapped in Wind Gap. I hate awards shows, but these two women deserve the G.D. Emmys right now.

8. Big Mouth (Season 2) — The only other cartoon on my list, this Netflix show can be raunchy, perverted, and gross, but it’s also hearfelt, warm, and true. Puberty was a horrific time for pretty much all of us, and these writers haven’t forgotten what it felt like. It’s also probably the funniest show around right now, with so many tightly-packed jokes per minute that my wife and I laughed nonstop, binging through the ten new episodes in two days and feeling sad afterwards. I never cared for Nick Kroll unless he collaborates with John Mulaney (my favorite stand-up comedian), but both of them are in great form here, providing voices along with the hilarious Jenny Slate, Jessi Klein, and Maya Rudolph, among others. Don’t let the stylized (okay, UGLY) animation put you off — if you’re not a complete prude, there’s nothing funnier you can stream right now.

7. Better Call Saul (Season 4) — A slower season where ultimately not a lot happened, but still a tour de force for heartbreaking writing, brilliant editing and music selections for montages, and some of the best acting on television from Bob Odenkirk, Jonathan Banks, and especially the great Rhea Seehorn as patient, kind, competent, probably-doomed Kim Wexler. As a prequel to Breaking Bad, Better Call Saul is using more Breaking Bad “fanservice” than ever before, and at this point, I can’t imagine watching Saul without having seen Breaking Bad first. But unless it completely screws up its final seasons (which I doubt), I think this is going to end up being the superior show.

6. The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel (Season 2) — A charming, funny, and well-made show that only starts to fall apart when I think about it too deeply. It won all the awards for its first season and deserved many of them, but it hit so many buttons for me, about the mid-century New York Jewish experience and the history of stand-up comedy. Rachel Brosnahan is truly a superstar as “Midge” Maisel. She lights up the screen and pulls off the largely improvisational-feeling stand-up routines, which are generally hysterical. You can see why her character is dazzling late-’50s audiences, even if it seems like she time-traveled there directly from 2018. The show would be a worthless piece of crap if Brosnahan and the writers couldn’t make that happen. But Midge is surrounded by far too many characters who aren’t interesting or likable (especially her snobby, elitist parents), and she had far more unlikable moments herself this season, where she treated her burgeoning comedy career like one more disposable hobby for a dilettante to dabble in. It also lost points due to an interminable three-episode arc set in a Catskills mountain resort, which seems like the absolute worst vacation ever.

5. Killing Eve (Season 1) — A gripping, clever, and often hilarious cat-and-mouse thriller between a sociopathic (yet whimsical) assassin and a bored, underutilized analyst who first discovers her global trail of death, this was a brilliant show about two strong, smart, capable women who become obsessed with each other. Excellent acting from Sandra Oh and Jodie Comer as Eve, the analyst, and Villanelle, the killer. It reminded me of one of my favorite shows ever, Hannibal, with its depiction of the complicated relationship between a murderer and the one person who understands him enough to possibly take him down, but develops an emotional attachment along the way.

4. The Americans (Season 6) — A show I’ve stuck with since the beginning, it never made a huge pop culture impact due to being a character-driven drama about Soviet spies living deep undercover in the Washington D.C. suburbs in the ’80s. It’s always well-written and excellently-acted, but tends to get overshadowed a lot. Well, this was the final season, and it was one of the best. The series finale was damn near perfect, with a climactic scene in a garage featuring some of the best acting I’ve ever seen from Keri Russell, Matthew Rhys, and Noah Emmerich. If it took seven years to build up to that confrontation, it was totally worth it.

3. Daredevil (Season 3) — What can I say? Daredevil is my favorite Marvel superhero, it was the best of the Marvel Netflix shows, Season 3 was a return to greatness after the just-okay Season 2, and now it’s canceled, along with Luke Cage and Iron Fist. Daredevil was so perfectly suited for a serialized TV show, with so many decades of great stories by brilliant writers to draw from, blending crime-noir, brutally choreographed fight scenes, and legal drama. But due to behind-the-scenes drama between Marvel, Disney, and Netflix, this is why we can’t have nice things. This summer I wrote a law review article about Daredevil (mostly the comics, but also the show) and the lessons they teach non-lawyers about heroic lawyers and the legal system. It will be published in 2019, and unfortunately, one of my main arguments was that the show WILL continue to adapt comic book storylines and get people thinking more about the law and how good lawyers can make a difference. But we still got three seasons, there are still plenty of amazing Daredevil comics to read (seek out writers Miller, Bendis, Brubaker, Waid, and Soule, or ask me for “greatest hits” recommendations), and at least my article is still coming out… for now.

2. The Good Place (Seasons 2 and 3) — Okay, maybe THIS is the funniest show currently on television, but it’s so much more than just a network sitcom. If I had to compare it to another show, the closest would be Lost, with regular, not-so-special people thrust together into weird, fantastical, metaphysical circumstances beyond their understanding, their destinies now bound. It’s a smart show that has taught me more about philosophy and ethics than I ever dreamed possible, and a fearless show that packs more plot development into a single episode than others do in entire seasons, then completely shake up the status quo, writes itself into corners, and flawlessly figures new ways out. The stakes are high, and there are twists and turns galore to thrill you when you aren’t cracking up. If you haven’t seen this yet, the first two seasons are on Netflix. Give it two or three episodes in case you aren’t hooked immediately. They’re short, and midway through Season 1, you’ll probably be obsessed, like we were when we binged the whole series this year.

1. Atlanta (Season 2) — What can I say that critics and other fans haven’t already said? The multi-talented Donald Glover can do no wrong. With director Hiro Murai as his right-hand man, a hip and woke writers’ room, and excellent co-stars in Brian Tyree Henry, Lakeith Stanfield, and Zazie Beetz, Atlanta is almost a whole new show every week. You never know what you’re going to get, if an episode will be hysterically funny, like one man’s wasted day when all he wants is a haircut from the flakiest barber ever, or if it will be a harrowing nightmare, like a violent armed robbery, a chase through the woods, or a trip to a madman’s mansion. You might have heard something about “Teddy Perkins,” which is probably the most memorable and singular episode of television to air in 2018. You can watch it out of context even if you’ve never seen Atlanta before, and I guarantee you won’t forget it anytime soon.