I have ranked the top 68 television shows of the '00s, and will be presenting them, one-by-one, starting with 68 and working down. The rankings are more or less based on the show's popularity, it's cult status, it's critical acclaim, and my personal liking of it, with a heavy dose of arbitrariness added in. If a show was a big enough phenomena, I'll keep it on the list - but if I don't like it, I may drop it some spots. One other caveat - these are primetime shows (I apologize if I put a cable show that wasn't, I thought they were all primetime shows - the main point of this is just that no talk shows, no Colbert and Daily show that would be on otherwise).

49: The Amazing Race

The Amazing Race has an (amazing) distinction in my mind amongst traditional (barely a tradition, I know - but I mean Survivor-style general interest contests - not profession specific contests, or shows where there's no winner) reality shows - it's the only one I'd ever really want to consider being on (maybe the short-lived Mole would be the other exception, maybe) and the only one that I'd really consider watching (without someone else having turned it on).

The first part is because it's essentially an old-style Race Around the World (a la It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World, Cannonball Run meets reality TV type of genre). There are certainly tough parts that ultimately I might not want to do - especially the particuarly outdoorsy things like going down cliffs, or the freakout Fear Factor-y things like walking through a temple of rats with no shoes on to find a clue. That said, overall it's a pretty amazing deal - you travel across the world to all sorts of crazy locations you'd probably never go to - both cities and scenic locales for free, and more than that they give you money before each leg. You get all sorts of culture, and the events that are not ones I wouldn't like are ones I would love - mapping activities, figuring out where places are in a city and the fastest way to get there, random challenges tailored to unique cultures - eating beatle larvae (I guess that could be considered on the gross out side, but real people eat it, so), following a series of clues written in Australian slang, or playing viking sports, and just straight out crazy things like riding an elephant - making the Amazing Race feel like some sort of bizarre real life combination version of a logic puzzle and an RPG.

The second part is because what normally makes reality TV go is the cattiness of the contestants, and their social interaction, sometimes working together, but more often in the negative planning and conniving against one another, as well as just screaming and yelling. Not that social interaction is devoid of any entertainment value, but the Amazing Race is about the challenges, and the sights - the same things I'd enjoy doing are interesting to watch. Half of the Amazing Race is liking watching a travel show, but with random people competing and a few tedious counting games (ie where contestants have to count some large number of some item, which seems to happen every once in a while). The random signs are fun to - Detours choose teams to pick one of two tasks to complete, and often their choice can be the difference between where they finish, and there is no voting, so the amount for the most part one team can negatively influence another is limited to signs like U-turn, with which one team forces another to do the other Detour option after they had already finished their chosen one. There's solid drama to be had as well from waiting and seeing who finishes in what order on the mat at the check point at the end of each episode, and if the episode will be one of the couple non-elimination legs in which the last team is safe.

That said, I probably still won't watch it, but it's no coincidence it has won every single Outstanding Reality Competition Program Emmy (I know, it's a ridiculous category, but still). Amazing Race has become a veritable institution amongst reality shows with Amazing Race 15 airing this fall.

I have ranked the top 68 television shows of the '00s, and will be presenting them, one-by-one, starting with 68 and working down. The rankings are more or less based on the show's popularity, it's cult status, it's critical acclaim, and my personal liking of it, with a heavy dose of arbitrariness added in. If a show was a big enough phenomena, I'll keep it on the list - but if I don't like it, I may drop it some spots. One other caveat - these are primetime shows (I apologize if I put a cable show that wasn't, I thought they were all primetime shows - the main point of this is just that no talk shows, no Colbert and Daily show that would be on otherwise).

50: Weeds

So apparently, according to Wikipedia, anyway, the MILF phenomenon became popular due to American Pie, which came out in 1999. I'd say, though, that MILF has lasted long enough to mostly be a '00s thing. And no TV show is better representative of the trend than Mary Louise Parker in Weeds, both within the show and outside of it. In advertisements for this year's fifth season of Weeds, Parker was declared the "Hemptress" with photos of her seductively posed in front of a spiderweb, and on the show, the widowed Nancy Botwin (Parker's character) is all about sleeping with dudes, being far more sexualized than traditional (often married) "mom" characters on television, and obsessed over by her college age helper who is of course obviously gay (Maulik Pancholy - who it is absolutely worth nothing plays the EXACT same character on 30 Rock -a neurotic assistant eager to please and in love with his boss - did Tina Fey watch Weeds and determine that was exactly what she wanted? - please don't let this become a common role). Not to mention of course, that the marijuana she produced in the second season of the show was referred to as MILF weed.

MILF angle aside (or included, I suppose), Parker's character is a good one for the most part, and she's a good actress. Overall, however, my feelings on Weeds are quite mixed. I have self-selecting filter when I choose TV shows to watch by virtue of asking friends for recommendations and reading reviews, and thus normally most shows I watch I expect to be, and are, at the least, pretty good. If I had just randomly come across Weeds on TV, it wouldn't have been so bad, but based on the buzz I had heard about, I was rather disappointed in the show itself. It tries to be some sort of meaningful scathing commentary about modern suburbia which I don't think it succeeds it, and its entertainment value is questionable as well. It's not a bad show, it's just an okay show that I expected more from.

What additionally bothers me, is that approximately half the characters are useless. The
Also, I know I mentioned this before, but the satire doesn't really work - I don't need a show to be satire of course, but constantly trying and not working doesn't help. The children are completely annoying, and I never completely got Celia, Nancy's featured frienemy's role in the show.

I've only watched the first two seasons, and although since I'm a completionist, and it's a comedy and thus fast to watch, I will probably get around to watching the rest, but by the time I was getting into the second half of the second season, I really didn't feel like watching the rest, and had to kind of force myself, which is exactly the opposite reaction I expect myself to have towards a tv show that I really get into. And it wasn't a so-afraid-for-the-main-character's-sake fear of watching like in the second season of Dexter, or a funny-but-so-awkward-I'm-afraid-to-watch feeling like the second season of the British Office, but rather a simply, I am not particularly enjoying this show type of feeling, which was honestly very disappointing.

That said, a lot of people seem to like it - it's the most watched show ever on Showtime, and that's kind of an honor, anyway.

I have ranked the top 68 television shows of the '00s, and will be presenting them, one-by-one, starting with 68 and working down. The rankings are more or less based on the show's popularity, it's cult status, it's critical acclaim, and my personal liking of it, with a heavy dose of arbitrariness added in. If a show was a big enough phenomena, I'll keep it on the list - but if I don't like it, I may drop it some spots. One other caveat - these are primetime shows (I apologize if I put a cable show that wasn't, I thought they were all primetime shows - the main point of this is just that no talk shows, no Colbert and Daily show that would be on otherwise).

Last week was the busiest I have been in quite some time so not much an excuse but at least an explanation for my lack of posts in that time period. Anyway, onwards and upwards, and always twirling, twirling towards freedom.

51: Dexter

Sometimes, consciously or not, I put shows near each other on this list that have some relationship to one another. The only two Showtime shows on this list are back to back, and it starts with the one I prefer, but has probably made slightly less of a dent on the pop culture, landscape, Dexter. That said, Dexter has been critically acclaimed and has accrued a sizable cult audience, and for good reason.

Long before I started watching Dexter, which was while the second season was airing (though I didn't watch it as it aired, as I was still behind and didn't have Showtime), I saw ads for the show all over the subway and was intrigued when I found out the premise - it's one of those ideas that sound great for about a minute after you hear it, but usually seems incredibly stupid after that when you realize you need to make thirteen hour long episodes based on it - in this case, a serial killer who kills other serial killers - a serial killer you could root for. It's easy to see how it could get old and fast.

Basically, in order for this premise to work over multiple seasons, a number of things have to all go right, and Dexter manages to pull them off. Most important, Dexter needs to be interesting - a boring and bad Dexter kills the show from day one (I realize you can say this for many main characters, but as much as any of them, Dexter's casting and character is important, particularly as his supporting cast tends to be less important than in many other shows and because the premise is so gimmicky) - and luckily Michael C. Hall is phenomenal and the character itself is relatively complex without being too emo, or chilling - someone you could believe as a serial killer, while also gaining your sympathy.

After each season, I have wondered - how will they go on from here? They've already introduced each of the couple of natural possibilities for Dexter over the course of a season - Dexter has friends, Dexter has enemies, Dexter struggles to maintain his normal life. Each season they've managed to put something together which made the season worth watching - in the third season, Jimmy Smits' character is the component that makes the show different but compelling.

Dexter doesn't really haven't the strongest supporting characters - not that they're bad as much as they're boring - they don't really do a lot - they're just kind of side pieces in the war between Dexter and the serial killer of the season or those trying to catch Dexter - those who are convinced that something's up with him, like Doakes, in the first two seasons, who don't know who Dexter is but are on to him, like Keith Carradine's character in season 2, or who are trying to use him, like Jimmy Smits' character in season 3.

Also, I couldn't write a piece on Dexter without at least mentioning how extremely weird it is for fans that the actors who played Dexter and his sister, Michael C. Hall and Jennifer Carpenter got married last year. Gross.

52: The Osbournes

Ozzy Osbourne was already famous in 2002. He was, of course, the vocalist for the legendary Black Sabbath and had numerous solo hits as well, particularly in the '80s and early '90s, and enhanced his fame amongst a younger generation in the '90s with Ozzfest, which became, I suppose (after apparently Lollapalooza would not allow Ozzy play - the joke was on them, as aside from the one-off revivals, Ozzfest lasted a lot longer and must have made a ton more money), the premier metal festival touring the country, and was incredibly financially successful. He wasn't just a one-hit wonder, or a moderately successful mediocre band, he was a full-fledged legend. And yet, for a certain generation, none of this is what he will be remembered for.

Ozzy already had a certain reputation when The Osbournes debuted. He was one of rock's legendary wildman - his biting off a bat's head, though it reminds unclear if it was alive or dead, is one of rock's craziest myth's that's really true, pissed on an Alamo tribute, getting him banned from San Antonio for about a decade and he got into many a drug-assisted fight, most notably attempting to kill his wife Sharon, which she apparently forgave him for. But a new Ozzy persona essentially came from the show. A softer, more mildly drug-addled Ozzy (he later claimed he refuses to watch episodes of the show because he was stoned the whole time, and though I'm not sure how those two things connect, I would say surely he was better off stoned than on other drugs from his past?) It was a more mature Ozzy who could father his two children (well, two with Sharon who were on the show - the third declined to participate and had to be creepily erased from their MTV lives - even blurred out of photos). His incredibly incoherent mumbling, his constant stream of curses, these have become the images of Ozzy we have now. He was mocked whether in good fun or not in outlets everywhere, as kind of the mumbling, crazy, but relatively safe character who you could laugh at and enjoy his dysfunctional family life vicariously from your own home.

The show was, perhaps improbably, big. It was MTV's highest rated program, and an instant sensation. How else could one explain Kelly Osbourne's inexplicable appearance on the Hot 100 (and #3 in Britain, who had even more love for Kelly's tunes than the US - a duet of her and her pop redoing Sabbath's "Changes" was Ozzy's first chart topper in the UK) with her cover of Papa Don't Preach. It propelled Sharon Osbourne to a short-lived talk show, and later to her current gig as a judge, alongside David Hasselhoff on America's Got Talent. Jack even got in on the act, starring in his own reality show, Jack Osbourne: Adrenaline Junkie, and making an appearance in the prestigious Olsen twins vehicle New York Minute. And of course, Ozzy got a prestigious spot on a World of Warcraft commercial, along with other WoW pitchmen like Stevie Van Zant and Mr. T.

You don't get to be on equal footing with Mr. T and not earn a spot on the list.

53: Heroes

You don't see all that many breakout hits on TV every year. If you're lucky as a network maybe you get one or two and you find a couple of new shows that did just well enough you can keep them around another year and develop a following. At least as often as not, the one hit is one of a couple shows you could have guessed it would come from. And maybe that was the case for Heroes, and I just didn't realize it - but when Heroes garnered ridiculous ratings right from the get go in the fall of 2006, it came out of nowhere to me. Heroes became no less than a phenomenon, becoming the highest ranked new NBC drama in five years, and sparking the minds of serial TV fans everywhere with the possibility for a whole world of theories based on Heroes' mythology.

The Heroes were a bunch of normal people who discovered they had some crazy powers, from the ability to fly, to the ability to read minds, to stop time, to be pretty much invincible, and lots of others. These Heroes were faced with a few intriguing villains, from Sylar, a sociopath who had the power to steal other Heroes' powers after killing them, a mysterious organization in which the man with the Horn Rimmed Glasses who turned out later on to be the not evil and the best character Mr. Bennett and a mysterious organized crime leader known as Linderman who turned out to be later played by Malcolm McDowell. Along with all this, were suggestions of webs of intrigue that the show had in-store - the parents of several of the Heroes had been involved in some type of organization in the past, and each of the mysterious organizations good and evil seemed to have lots of secrets which would slowly spill out as the seasons went on. And it was good.

And then, well, it wasn't. Heroes basically said fuck you to all the promise it had, and started doing stupid things with all the characters, and ruining any intrigue and mystery it had built up - anything that was revealed was anticlimactic - what seemed like a giant mysterious organization for which Mr. Benett worked turned out to be basically run by Stephen Tobolowsky and maybe three others people. Linderman, who could have been a mysterious character carried on through a couple of seasons, was revealed, thoroughly boring, and killed off in a boring manner, while Sylar, who was a great temporary villain, in that, while he was intriguing, there was a limit to the amount he could do without either getting boring and repetitive and/or overpowered, was allowed to keep going, even when he, sensically appeared to be dead. Then of course, there was time travel, which at least as often as not is a sign a show is going downhill (look out, Lost). Every time a character decision was made, you wish it had gone the other way. The second season was terrible, and while sometimes I'm alone on thoughts like this, it was pretty universal in this case - the ratings went down, and fans and critics alike trashed the new direction.

There are very, very few shows I start watching, watch at least a season, and then stop watching the show entirely. I'm a completist and I hate watching something halfway and not finishing it. That said, it was not lightly that I made the decision to stop watching Heroes, starting with the third season. I'm not saying I need to agree with every creative decision made on a show - but if I hate every single one made, it's probably a good idea not to watch anymore. Apparently fans again agreed with me, as the ratings continued to slip further. Heroes was still renewed on the basis of its decent 18-49 numbers, but without an uptick next year, its time may be fading and with good reason.

It's just a sad episode in what could have been, but during that first season alone it earned its place.

54: Friday Night Lights

Okay, so it's not particularly popular - in fact it's come perilously close to cancellation after just about every season that has aired, and not without cause - no one has watched it, though not helped by its constantly moving time slots and relative lack of promotion. And it certainly has a cult, but not a cult like, say Battlestar Galactica. That said, it's been incredibly critically well reviewed, falling all over critics top ten lists after its first season, still its best, and hell, I like it a lot, and it could still desperately use the promotion as it's somehow still on the air, albeit in an incredibly bizarre airing first on DirecTV, and then re-airing on NBC later fashion, so it's here.

The show is loosely based on a movie, which is based on a book, by Buzz Bissinger (I mention his name because if you haven't seen him make a fool out of himself in this episode of Bob Costas Now where he irrationally bashes blogs - also if you watch this - ask yourself why is Braylan Edwards there?). While I have yet to read the book, the movie is not bad, but far inferior to the television show, which pretty much starts at the premise of the movie - football crazed Texas town where the star player - quarterback in the television show, running back in the movie, gets critically injured, ending their respective careers, and there is lots of pressure on the coach to win now even without his star, or risk both the harassment of his family and losing his job.

What it is essentially is kind of a football soap, with, with the glaring exception of a second season plot of a character accidentally murdering (can it still be murder if it's accidental? I don't remember from criminal law, though I suppose I should) someone, most things being within the realm of realism - hard to believe all of these things would happen to the same people over the course of a year, but any one of them could and it wouldn't be too far fetched, or at least I assume not in Texas, since a character would definitely not drop out of high school to travel the rodeo circuit with a boy up north. Characters get together, break up and make up, and Coach Taylor has to deal with every possible scandal a high school coach could possibly deal with - steroids, ineligibility, quarterback controversies, a racist remark by an assistant head coach and many more, all while, along with his wife, just about managing to be the perfect parent.

I wrote a bunch of my opinions about FNL after finishing it (well, catching up to where it is now) so in the spirit of not repeating too much from it, I'll say that as cheesy and just TV as the show is (Coach Taylor seems to have just the right words to say at a critical point in every episode - whether to motivate his wife, drive his players, or apologize to his daughter), it does work because the characters are good, and the actors portraying them do a good job, generally, and I suppose you get that warm tingly exciting feeling when say, Matt and Julie are getting back together, which is why you need TV sometimes I suppose, cause if it were The Wire, Matt would get killed and Julie would be addicted to heroin.

But do do the show a favor and actually watch it, it needs as many viewers as it can get.

55: The Hills

There is no show on this list whose demographic is more opposite my won than the Hills. It's aimed at I don't know, I assume teenage to twenty something girls, but even the girls who it's aimed at aren't the ones with whom I usually associate (I don't say that as a judgment - I've watched plenty of bad TV, just an observation). I can't think of anyone I know who watches The Hills, or has even watched it at all, as far as I know. Yet, it seems to have a been a bit of a big deal, and I feel I'd be remiss not to give it a shout out, to its demographic as well (Yeah, Laguna Beach is counting in this entry as well - one's a spin off of their other, and even if they were big enough to deserve two entries, which I'm not sold on, I definitely wouldn't have enough to say about both of them).

The only thing I know about The Hills without looking it up is the names of the girls (or at least some of them) - Lauren Conrad, Heidi, Whitney, Audrina whose names I suppose have just showed up too many places for me to avoid. That, and they live somewhere in southern california and at least one of them works in fashion and I think one has a boyfriend named Spencer.

I honestly have as little to say about this as I do about anything else on this list. I suppose I should view at least one episode before I say this (maybe it's creepily addictive - it's happened before) but it doesn't seem like the type of show I'd normally watch and I don't really understand the appeal (I don't mean this in an old-person-luddite I don't understand people and their technology these days - I'm not saying it as a putdown or in a sarcastic manner - I really would like to know what people like about it and what makes it a big hit). I once had a drunken conversation with a girl at a bar somewhere and at some point she started talking about Laguna Beach and I realized I had nothing to say on the matter (a rarity with me on TV, clearly).

What I will say, is, and this is true about a lot of what's on TV, but perhaps none more than this one on this list - The Hills straddles that strange line between what is really "reality" in reality TV. There's actually a whole section of their wikipedia page devoted to how "real" the show is (I know I keep using it in quotes, but I feel like it's apt that way - it's obviously real without quotes in that it exists and is not imaginary). It's more real than scripted TV, in that, well, there's no script, but it's not entirely real either, even more so than just by employing selective editing - while the dialogue is not written out beforehand, scenes are planned out and set up by MTV, and Heidi's wedding was merely symbolic and didn't actually happen. Real life is clearly too boring to be in TV, but I suppose it's cheaper to have people play themselves, or they're just not good enough actors, or I don't even know.

But yeah, it's kind of a big deal. So here it is.