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What Are the Best-Written TV Series of All Time? And Which Shows Got Snubbed?

Jun 3, 2013  •  Post A Comment

The Writers Guild of America and its sponsor TV Guide revealed their list of the 101 Best Written TV Shows of All Time, and it appears to be one based on "some very short memories," reports Pete Hammond at Deadline.com.

The list, voted on in May 2012, doesn’t have any embarrassments, but "there are a number of ridiculously shocking omissions" since only one show from the Golden Era of TV– the 1950s and 1960s — was included in the top 10, the piece notes.

That show is Rod Serling’s "The Twilight Zone." The rest of the top 10 was represented by shows from the 1970s and later. Out of the entire list, only 12 are shows in black and white, while just seven shows are from the 1950s. Classics such as "The Untouchables" and "The Naked City" didn’t make the list.

Another perplexing move was the inclusion of "Late Night with David Letterman" when the list left off the most influential late-night show of all, "The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson," the story adds.

Here are the top 10:

1. "The Sopranos," HBO

2. "Seinfeld," NBC

3. "The Twilight Zone," CBS

4. "All in the Family," CBS

5. "M.A.S.H.," CBS

6. "The Mary Tyler Moore Show," CBS

7. "Mad Men," AMC

8. "Cheers," NBC

9. "The Wire," HBO

10. "The West Wing," NBC

3 Comments

  1. Oh isn’t that interesting… they are all American. It must be the World Series of Television writing.

  2. No Millennium – a travesty.

  3. No, it isn’t. MILLENNIUM had some brilliant individual episodes but the series overall was kind of a trainwreck.
    Bullshit lists like there are what happen when you turn the entire business over to people who weren’t even born when SHOGUN aired.

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