TV Shows from the 2000 and 2010s - Discuss your favorite show from the 2000s and 2010s

[Ghostse]

Burn Notice- All you niggers disgust me for not recommending possibly the best 00's TV show. Michael Westen is a spy who is "burned" - cover blown, operational support withdrawn - and dumped in Miami, unable to leave. He tries to clear his name and return to being a spy. One of USA's Golden Age, the writers somehow managed to keep going more over the top without jumping the shark, and the series calls it quits when its still having fun. And It has Bruce Campbell in it as a supporting role, do I really need to say more?

The Wire- I avoided watching this show for a long time because everyone wanked about it, I didn't think it could live up to the hype. And it didn't of course, but it was close enough that I didn't care. A detective in Balitmore raises a stink when a case he put together falls apart in court because the witness was killed. He is given a taskforce of rejects and permission for a wiretap (the titular wire) to try to bust one a drug gang. The series follows the criminals they are trying to arrest as well as the cops. The other seasons deal with the fall out from season one.

Bosch- On Amazon Prime; Toes into the 20's but Really damn good show. Each season follows a case so its bingable. An AMC collab that AMC dropped but Amazon picked up and finished. So there's a gap. The later seasons Titus is a little too old for action in that Bruce Willis way where he can still do kinda do it for brief spurts. If you like detective fiction I recommend the books.

Psych- Another USA golden age show. Shawn Spencer is the son of a well-respected (retired) detective has a photographic memory and highly tuned deductive skills. He uses these skills to pretend to be psychic while solving cases as a PI consulting with the Santa Barbara police department (The setup is ridiculous and the show doesn't pretend its not).

The Killing- Another good show that AMC dropped and Netflix picked up. Cast is excellent, writing is good with some blemishes. Its based on a Danish show but set in Seattle and you have some issues where they clearly cribbed the plot from the Danes but it doesn't really work because its America, but its minor. The Final Season is a little bit of a mess, and lots of performances are phoned in, but it at least got a intentional ending even if it kinda kills some of the themes. Mainly they sort of ruin the vibe the two detectives have, where in a rare case of a male & female pairing they AREN'T romantically interested in each other, by implying a relationship

Californication- A product of Showtime trying to compete with HBO, and this gem slipped out. Comedy/Drama/Romance Mulder is an alcoholic writer in California who can't keep his dick in his pants. He has a daughter who keeps him interacting with his ex (the chick from Ronin). They aren't really over each other. Only issue I have with the show is at the end of each season, he repairs his relationship with his ex-wife, and at the start of each season he's fucked it up again, and it gets old by the time the show ends.

Battlestar Galactica. Never been a big fan of TV series in general, but that one was really good.

BSG was a gritty reboot that actually got it right.
They took the vocabulary of the original and, minus some genderswaps, didn't try to upend the story.
The last fucking half of the final episode is so fucking dumb that I never recommend the series.

Farscape was a good show that was mostly in the early 2000s

Farscape is very good, I second the recommendation.

The Invisible Man (decent)

The Invisible man was wasted potential. First season was still pretty good, after that they kind of lost focus a bit. It seemed like the writers ran out of ideas somehow.

Does Lexx (minus the final season) count?

Monk
Ex-police officer now private detective with severe OCD helps the police with solving really difficult crimes.
It's really funny and the crimes and ways in which Monk solves them are quite inventive.

Monk leans heavily on the "Oh my god he's acting so awkward can you believe it?" side of humor so was never my cup of tea, but if you aren't irritated by that, solid recommend. Great casting and performances. One of the "USA's Golden Area" shows.

Stargate SG1

Solid Recommend. The episodes have the usual "Scifi team goes exploring this week and something happens" variability in quality of episodes, and then they tried to milk the X-files conspirarcy thing in the middle of the run.

 

[Soup Sammiches]

I always wanted to meet Scrubs and black Scrubs.
But yeah I like Scrubs, it's probably my most liked show overall.

 

[Drag-on Knight 91873]

I have my problems with Battlestar Galactica remake, but god damn, it is Christopher Marlowe (I won't say it's Shakespeare) in comparison to modern shows.

 

[mlanguishi]

BSG was a gritty reboot that actually got it right.
They took the vocabulary of the original and, minus some genderswaps, didn't try to upend the story.
The last fucking half of the final episode is so fucking dumb that I never recommend the series.

It got the post 9/11 sentiment right in a way nothing else did. I don't mind a female Starbuck, she was fine. I'll go out on a limb and say I don't think the final episode was bad. I actually have an emotional reaction to when Baltar, short guy next to 6, says 'I know about farming'. I had a problem with their earlier eps of him being some kind of cult leader and that was a lot of wasted time. I can see why some don't like the last episode, but it didn't bother me really. I knew they'd end up on Earth and probably in the past to interbreed, and that's what happened.

Nicki Clyne as Cally getting killed off early due to her NXIVM cult membership was actually worse for me. Stupid girl ruined her life on that.

 

[Ghostse]

It got the post 9/11 sentiment right in a way nothing else did.

Agreed, a little too well. It was a little too bleak sometimes.

I knew they'd end up on Earth

That's part of the problem; they arrive on "earth" but its a nuclear waste land. So they find some OTHER planet and say that's earth.
It was very clear the creators/writers were borrowing from the JJ Abrams mystery box school of writing. Of course, when it came time to deliver on the mystery boxes, unlike JJ they weren't total hacks it was just unsatisfying instead of complete total bullshit.
But its pretty clear they had no fucking clue who the "final five" would be when they slipped that in, how they related to the other cylons, and had to asspull. Hard. No clue what to do on Kobol, or any of the other "mysteries" and just put them in because they'd seem cool.

There was so much build up, bait and switch, and other shit going on that just didn't make any sense.
Things like Baltar being a holy figure in the sex cult being one of them - clearly they just wanted to have a weird sex on-ship sex cult arc, and tried to get there with the materials they had on hand.

The main thing that ruined it for me was the time skip with the "Angels" and then the closing montage. I'm still mad about it, the dumbest fucking wrap up.
I was doing watch parties with friends for season 5, and when that part happened no one said anything for a couple minutes. We couldn't believe the absolute retarded shit we'd just watched.
Its still the low-bar we use to measure series endings against - not just bad, but so bad it retroactively ruins the series.

I don't mind a female Starbuck, she was fine.

Katie Sackhoff has been pretty solid in everything she's been in. It also helped a lot that they didn't write her as some perfect stronk woman need no man. She was just as big a fuck up as everyone else.

Nicki Clyne as Cally getting killed off early due to her NXIVM cult membership was actually worse for me. Stupid girl ruined her life on that.

She was supposed to die in the first episode she was in, after she bit off her rapist/attempted rapist's ear. But one of the guys at the top decided that doing that was too badass to kill her off.

 

[mlanguishi]

She was supposed to die in the first episode she was in, after she bit off her rapist/attempted rapist's ear. But one of the guys at the top decided that doing that was too badass to kill her off.

Well I loved Clyne, she was kinda of my ultimate cute/stronky of her time character. It's just a such a shame she's apparently living in a car now homeless. Had a real chance at something.

I didn't mind the 2 Earths thing, but it was clear they didn't have a 'plan' like they didn't have a Cylon 'plan' in the end. It's a weird mix of a very good show but could've been something of absolute greatness. Still my fav series in the last 20 years.

 

[Drag-on Knight 91873]

Cylon motivations were all over the place in BSG remake, even in good early seasons. First season, they nuke humanity for revenge. Okay, makes some sense. Then by season 2, it turns out they wanted to make human-cylon hybrids by breeding with humans. Well, don't nuke humanity if you're going to breed them! Katee Sackoff's womb isn't THAT special. And when they've got the ability to make Tricia Helfer and Grace Pak cylons, gathering sperm is REALLY easy. A third of Boomer's characterization is banging dudes and getting pregnant. Then Xena wants to find the Final Five and it's all actors that would be bored with their roles if they weren't Cylons and the result is that it gives the humans inexplicable plot armor from Cylons who do somehow know they are there before the human ones do.

At its core, it's a show that doesn't understand its religious basis, so characterization tends to fall apart.

And well, the last season got hit with a Writer's strike.

 

[Ghostse]

Cylon motivations were all over the place in BSG remake, even in good early seasons. First season, they nuke humanity for revenge. Okay, makes some sense. Then by season 2, it turns out they wanted to make human-cylon hybrids by breeding with humans. Well, don't nuke humanity if you're going to breed them! Katee Sackoff's womb isn't THAT special. And when they've got the ability to make Tricia Helfer and Grace Pak cylons, gathering sperm is REALLY easy. A third of Boomer's characterization is banging dudes and getting pregnant. Then Xena wants to find the Final Five and it's all actors that would be bored with their roles if they weren't Cylons and the result is that it gives the humans inexplicable plot armor from Cylons who do somehow know they are there before the human ones do.

At its core, it's a show that doesn't understand its religious basis, so characterization tends to fall apart.

And well, the last season got hit with a Writer's strike.

"Ok we just want to say we're sorry, nuking billions of people was a mistake and just we're going to leave humanity alone, k?"
FIVE MINUTES LATER
"LOL Psych! What I meant was we're going to be doing an extremely clumsy Iraq 'Who's the REAL terrorists?' metaphor cause its topical and the showrunners want them some Emmys."

 

[Drag-on Knight 91873]

"Ok we just want to say we're sorry, nuking billions of people was a mistake and just we're going to leave humanity alone, k?"
FIVE MINUTES LATER
"LOL Psych! What I meant was we're going to be doing an extremely clumsy Iraq 'Who's the REAL terrorists?' metaphor cause its topical and the showrunners want them some Emmys."

IKR? Baltar running a Vichy government publicly makes him a traitor and human secret police is stupid when they got human cylons running around.

The Cylons actually made more sense as Saturday Morning cartoon villains led by Kor and Lucifer Bot.

 

[mlanguishi]

"Ok we just want to say we're sorry, nuking billions of people was a mistake and just we're going to leave humanity alone, k?"
FIVE MINUTES LATER
"LOL Psych! What I meant was we're going to be doing an extremely clumsy Iraq 'Who's the REAL terrorists?' metaphor cause its topical and the showrunners want them some Emmys."

It's a bitch to like overall, but the Pilot, 33, and most of season 1/2 were so amazing. Really as good as it gets on a series, and it did it DARK and I loved it after 9/11 and I felt dark. It resonated with me unlike anything else. Season 3 was good too, but then 3.5 got a bit weak. But then 4 and 4.5 had a mx of brilliance and weak. I'm not sure what Moore was doing on all this. The the side shows like Razor, pretty good, but forgettable. The Plan, well.. Just nuked them as we saw, nothing much new. And then the web shows and all. Whatever else I missed, they didn't factor much compared to those first 2 seasons, which were a lot of eps (and pilot) and spread over a long time of production compared to now.

 

[Shart Attack]

Scrubs was pretty great. It had a nice blend of comedy and drama and occasionally did some interesting shit, like the musical episode or the one where Dr. Cox's buddy dies. Though it did go on a little too long. I vaguely remember that the quality dropped off a cliff by the end of season 5 or so. By the later seasons, characterization was never consistent from episode to episode. JD would be a retarded child in one episode and a jaded mentor figure in the next, whatever was required to set up a plotline.

Psych and Monk are the only mystery shows I've ever really liked. I've been watching Psych reruns lately, and it surprises me how well the show holds up despite how much of the dialogue is dumb reference humor. It helps that the main cast had great chemistry.

Early Mythbusters was pretty good, too, until they ran out of good urban legends to talk about and started "debunking" idiomatic expressions. Is it really easy to shoot fish in a barrel? Who gives a shit? It's just an expression, you autists. It was the scientific equivalent of junk food, but at least it was entertaining.

Sorry to derail the Battlestar Galactica thread, I guess.

 

[ZMOT]

Monk leans heavily on the "Oh my god he's acting so awkward can you believe it?" side of humor so was never my cup of tea, but if you aren't irritated by that, solid recommend. Great casting and performances. One of the "USA's Golden Area" shows.

it's why it never worked for me, same as psych.

something like leverage or burn notice was always more interesting to me.

there were also all those 1-2 season "one hit wonders" I kinda miss, at least then they tried (and if it was on fox you could pretty much assume it was gonna get killed off anyway).

EDIT:
speaking of...

season 1 was perfect, then they ruined it to "broaden the appeal"...

 

[Screamer_2]

Stargate SG-1 was so good. Atlantis was good until the final season, and I cannot stand Universe.

I thought SGU started decently but within a few episodes was not good. After the mid-season break it became decent and season two was good. Unfortunately, it never recovered from losing the audience during the airing of the first half of season one.

I would like to rewatch shows like Burn Notice, but it's weird now that long seasoned shows seem like a chore to rewatch.

Plenty of good shows mentioned. So I'll add in another.

Chuck.

It was such an enjoyable show. I have rewatched it a few times over the years. The final two seasons have a dip in quality, but the characters help elevate it and still make it enjoyable.

 

[Ghostse]

For people like me who still watch cartoons for children, Megas XLR was excellent.

I should probably go and watch Scrubs. I caught a couple episodes on re-run while channel surfing and it was funny but I think because I wasn't watching regularly I couldn't get invested. And I think I picked up on some of the "zero continuity, just archetypes interacting" mentioned.

I've heard good things about Parks and Recreation as well, once they stopped trying to be store-brand The Office, but haven't felt like suffering through 1.5 seasons of meh for something that might or might not be good, since from what I've seen even after it 'gets good' they still like to do the "A misunderstanding? LOL SO AWKWARD!" while yammering over each other.

I would like to rewatch shows like Burn Notice, but it's weird now that long seasoned shows seem like a chore to rewatch.

I would not recommend marathoning Burn Notice. Burn notice is good, the plots are varied adn the writing is great, but the episodes format sticks to a fairly rigid Act 1/2/3 formula and if you try to iron man a season, you'll notice and the little quirks will start to grate. Burn notice works best when you watch one or two episodes every day/couple days/week with some time for your palette to get cleansed.

it's why it never worked for me, same as psych.

Psych worked for me (some episodes more than others) I think because everyone was in on the joke, its not just "here's a bunch people being uncomfortable in this situation as misunderstandings snowball". As @Shart Attack said, the actors mostly sold it, everyone seems to be having a good time on set and that was infectious to me.
But I also get that everyone's got a different flavor of wacky that does it for them, and because its wacky you either are down adn get it or you're not and its stupid and infuriating.

Like Curb Your Enthusiasm just wasn't for me. Larry David (building on his experience from Seinfeld) knew how to set up an awkward situation and then really deliver on it for the punchline, but CYE gave him too much time that I couldn't sit through the build up even if the payoff was usually pretty great. Its just so grueling to sit through the characters yammering back and forth for 60 minutes.
The same sort of thing killed Its Always Sunny in Philadelphia for me - Always Sunny clips are usally hilarious but I cannot sit through an episode.

It's a bitch to like overall, but the Pilot, 33, and most of season 1/2 were so amazing. Really as good as it gets on a series, and it did it DARK and I loved it after 9/11 and I felt dark. It resonated with me unlike anything else. Season 3 was good too, but then 3.5 got a bit weak. But then 4 and 4.5 had a mx of brilliance and weak. I'm not sure what Moore was doing on all this. The the side shows like Razor, pretty good, but forgettable. The Plan, well.. Just nuked them as we saw, nothing much new. And then the web shows and all. Whatever else I missed, they didn't factor much compared to those first 2 seasons, which were a lot of eps (and pilot) and spread over a long time of production compared to now.

They fucked up a lot of the long-term stuff due to just not having a plan thought out. They struck out on a lot of episodes, especially at the end when they had to start answering questions instead of asking them.
But when they connected, they knocked it out of the stadium and into the fucking parking lot.

One of the problems I had with (and it ties into the failure of long term planning) was just how fucking dark it was. If you really tried to connect continuity it was absolutely hopeless, and to try to keep things going they'd do stupid asspulls.

 

[Car Won't Crank]

Stargate SG-1 was so good. Atlantis was good until the final season, and I cannot stand Universe.

Best scene in SG1 is somewhere in season 5 where Amanda Tapping is seen driving a silver 1970s Volvo P1800 coupe. The producers back then knew how to write a classy lady with good automotive taste.

 

[Magicicada_septendecula]

Does Lexx (minus the final season) count?

Yes, Lexx was awesome in the beginning, but the whole thing with the "Fire and Water" planets was bad. If I remember correctly, this was also the season where they visit a planet closely resembling Earth and the writers were making some awkward attempt at satire of current events (complete with a president resembling Dubya), butchering the original mood of the show.

 

[Gravityqueen4life]

Anyone watched the show 24? was it ever good or just post 9/11 slop.

 

[ZMOT]

I would like to rewatch shows like Burn Notice, but it's weird now that long seasoned shows seem like a chore to rewatch.

unironically make it an event. what I mean don't just put it on to have something in the background or "to watch", put it on when you actually want to watch THIS, and then actually watch it without having your phone or tablet out to do shit on.
not limited to burn notice, but media in general.

 

[Stab You in the Back]

Anyone watched the show 24? was it ever good or just post 9/11 slop.

24 may be the best television show ever made. Its the only show from that era I return to, and I enjoy it just as much now as I did then.

The show features a character named Jack Bauer as he becomes increasingly deranged. Throughout the course of the series, Jack murders literally all of his friends, detonates multiple nuclear bombs, escapes both Chinese and Russian prisons, kidnaps three different Presidents of the United States, commits brazen acts of torture on women and children, kicks a heroin addiction in four hours, and basically runs around being a menace to anyone and everyone who is unlucky enough to cross his path.

When I think of a post-9/11 show, I think of something overly saccharine and patriotic. 24 feels very pre-9/11 because it features a very healthy (and occassionally unhealthy) distrust of the government.

I can't recommend the show enough. Season 1 is very grounded, but the wheels come off the bus starting from the very first episode of season 2.

 

[SteelPlatedHeart]

I’m in the midst of rewatching Psych. It’s good comedy/crime of the week show, and I really enjoy when they do particular episodes as an homage to something, like the Twin Peak-style episode.

Also didn’t realize they had three movies of it continuing the show after it ended.