The 20 Best TV Shows of the Decade (2000-2009)

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11. Curb Your Enthusiasm (2000-present)
Creator: Larry David
Stars: Larry David, Cheryl Hines, Jeff Garlin, Susie Essman


Network: HBO
Curb Your Enthusiasm spreads its cringe-worthy neuroticism like a contagious disease, infecting us with horror and laughter alike. Currently in his seventh season, perpetually farklempt writer, producer and star Larry David still hasn’t run out of that vintage arrogance that skewers every race, color and creed with undiluted misanthropy. Riding strong off constantly clever writing and a recent Seinfeld cast reunion, there isn’t much to complain about—we’ll leave that to the professionals on this show. Sean Edgar

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10. Mad Men (2007-present)
Creator: Matthew Weiner
Stars: Jon Hamm, Elisabeth Moss, Vincent Kartheiser, January Jones, Christina Hendricks, Bryan Batt, Michael Gladis, Aaron Staton, Rich Sommer, Robert Morse, John Slattery

Network: AMC


Unless you worked on Madison Avenue in the early 1960s, AMC’s first foray into original drama has all the otherworldliness of a foreign film. It’s easy to covet a time when working in an office meant sharp suits, free-flowing liquor and nary a computer screen or Blackberry to tie you down. It’s also easy to feel superior to the characters’ rampant racism and misogyny. But there’s something all too familiar at the heart of Mad Men—the failings of the powerful and petty never go out of style. Josh Jackson



9. Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997-2003)
Creator: Joss Whedon
Stars: Sarah Michelle Gellar, Nicholas Brendon, Alyson Hannigan, Charisma Carpenter, David Boreanaz, Seth Green, Marc Blucas, Emma Caulfield, Michelle Trachtenberg, Amber Benson, James Marsters, Anthony Stewart Head
Networks: The WB, UPN
Buffy the Vampire Slayer had it all: Romance, drama, tragedy, suspense. The show took the teen-soap formula and elevated it to an art. It was a unique combination of tragic romance, apocalyptic fantasy and the clincher—emotional realism. It also featured the most serious and realistic depiction of human loss ever witnessed on the small screen (in “The Body,” dealing with the death of Buffy’s mom by natural causes). Humor? The writers understood the campy sheen that must accompany any show named Buffy. They also knew how to use snappy dialogue and uncomfortable situations to full effect. Complex characters? You’d be hard pressed to find another program that had the same range and consistency of character development. Everyone matured (or devolved) at his or her own realistic rate. As some feminist writers have argued, TV had never before seen the complexity of relationships among women that you saw with the likes of Buffy, Willow, Joyce and Dawn. Plot? The writers employed elaborate multi-episode, multi-season story arcs. People and events of the past always had a way of popping back up, the way they do in real life. Philosophy? Series creator Joss Whedon was all about the “meta”—the ideas and story behind the story. Each season had a driving concept, and he explored an astonishingly wide range of topics. Quick asides referencing Sartre or Aquinas were as at home as the pop-culture references. The show spawned an active academic community around it (see “Buffy studies” at Wikipedia.org). Whedon wanted his heroine to be iconic. As he put it, “I wanted people to embrace it in a way that exists beyond, ‘Oh, that was a wonderful show about lawyers; let’s have dinner.’” He succeeded, creating a WB/UPN show that bears closer resemblance to the works of Dostoevsky and Kafka than 90210 or Dawson’s Creek. Tim Regan-Porter

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8. Battlestar Galactica (2004-2009)
Creators: Glen A. Larson (original), Ronald D. Moore, David Eick
Stars: Edward James Olmos, Mary McDonnell, Katee Sackhoff, Jamie Bamber, James Callis, Michael Hogan, Aaron Douglas, Tricia Heifer, Grace Park, Tahmoh Penikett
Network: Sci-Fi (SyFy)
Ronald D. Moore turned a cheesy ’70s show into a gritty, unflinching look at what it means to be human, and ended up with one of the best sci-fi series of all time. With the crew of Galactica encountering no aliens during its exodus, the show was free to pit religion against science, freedom against security and family against conscience—tensions with no easy answers. It’s an epic tale with few villains and fewer heroes—just flawed people fighting for survival. Josh Jackson



7. Lost (2004-present)
Creator: J.J. Abrams, Jeffrey Lieber, Damon Lindelof
Stars: Matthew Fox, Evangeline Lilly, Naveen Andrews, Michael Emerson, Terry O’Quinn, Josh Holloway, Jorge Garcia, Yunjin Kim, Daniel Dae Kim
Network: ABC
When J.J. Abrams first marooned his plane-crash survivors on a remote island, no one realized the show’s name was a double entendre: It took crowd-sourced blogs to make sense of all the hidden clues, relevant connections, time shifts and intertwined storylines, and each season has given us far more questions than answers. But there’s something refreshing about a network TV show that trusts the mental rigor of its audience instead of dumbing everything down to the lowest common denominator. Sometimes it’s good to be a little lost. Josh Jackson

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6. The Sopranos (1999-2007)
Creator: David Chase
Stars: James Gandolfini, Lorraine Bracco, Edie Falco, Michael Imperioli, Dominic Chianese, Steven Van Zandt, Tony Sirico, Robert Iler
Network: HBO


For eight years, James Gandolfini crawled deep inside the complexities of Tony Soprano—loving father, son and husband, goodhearted friend, master of sardonic one-liners (“How do you vandalize a pool?”), troubled psych patient, serial adulterer, mob boss and brutal, remorseless ****er—inspiring as much dumbfounded loathing and shuddering sympathy as any character in TV history. ******ers aren’t one-dimensional; they have feelings, aspirations, justifications, families. The Sopranos brilliantly and believably explored this dynamic, turning the crime-drama on its head and taking dysfunction to the extreme in the process. As unfathomable as their world was, the characters of this tragic, beautifully arcing modern epic were so real that they became like family to us, too. Steve LaBate



5. The Office BBC (2001-2003); NBC (2005-present)
Creators: Ricky Gervais, Stephen Merchant
Stars: BBC: Ricky Gervais, Martin Freeman, Mackenzie Crook, Lucy Davis, Oliver Chris, Patrick Baladi, Stacey Roca, Ralph Ineson, Stirling Gallacher; NBC: Steve Carell


John Krasinski, Rainn Wilson, Jenna Fischer, B. J. Novak, Oscar Nunez, Brian Baumgartner, Angela Kinsey, Ed Helms, Creed Bratton, Phyllis Smith, Leslie David Baker, Kate Flannery, Mindy Kaling, Paul Lieberstein
Ricky Gervais’ immortal Britcom deserves full marks for establishing this comedy franchise that ****ed the laugh track and introduced us to a hilarious bunch of paper-pushing mopes. Defying expectations that it would pale in comparison, NBC’s Office has become an institution unto itself. At its best, the American version is just as awkward as its predecessor, while showing a lot more heart than the gang could muster in sooty old England. Nick Marino

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4. The Daily Show with Jon Stewart (1996-present)
Creators: Madeleine Smithberg, Lizz Winstead

Stars: Jon Stewart, Samantha Bee, Jason Jones, John Hodgman, John Oliver, Steve Carell, Stephen Colbert, Rob Corddry, Ed Helms

Network: Comedy Central
Amidst the madness and absurdity of the post-9/11 world, as the old-standby TV-news anchors retired or passed away, young America was looking for its new Cronkite, Rather, Jennings or Brokaw. Into this void, improbably, stepped comedian Jon Stewart and his band of brilliantly deadpan correspondents. While The Daily Show never really claimed to be more than a satirical faux-news show, it is so much more, offering the smartest, most unflinching social commentary on television. Steve LaBate