Insane list. Look at the IMDB Top 250 filtered by “after 2000” and you’ll notice the obvious omissions:
- Avatar: The Last Airbender at number 6
- Attack on Titan at number 16
- Firefly at number 39
- Taskmaster at number 43
These are just a couple examples in different categories. Anime fans immediately noticed that no anime made the list at all, despite 10 being in the IMDB top 100. Western animation fans might have seen that Bojack Horseman made the list, but Avatar didn’t (or if the editor filtered for “adult animation”, Rick and Morty (#22) didn’t). There’s really no excuse for these, there is no consistent rule that would exclude any of these shows. NYT readers must live in the dark timeline where fun is outlawed and Taskmaster was cancelled after one series.
I don’t get why would they skip Avatar on this list.
Animation isn’t respected in the snobby “film” crowd. These are the same sorts of people that refuse to take Citizen Kane out of the number 1 movie slot. If movies peaked in 1941, what’s the point?
I started to think their list was implicitly live action-only, but then Bojack Horseman? This list is fully ad-hoc one person’s perspective, no objectivity or consensus attempted.
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This is a pretty good list, that I largely agree with. IF it were unordered. Ordered the way it is, it is an abomination.
The best TV show IN ENGLISH… plenty of better TV show in other languages… just saying.
Any recommendations?
Dark
One show on the list is actually not in English: The Bureau (original title: Le bureau des légendes)
Excellent spy and geo political drama/thriller following agents of the French DGSE.
This is certainly a top-quality shitpost. I’ll give you my upvote for that.
I’m upset because (my favorite show) is not in the top (insert arbitrary number)
A lot these comments are more like
I’m upset because (my favorite 20th century show) is not in the top (insert arbitrary number)
I’ll quote myself from the other post about this:
Why the fuck would I care what the NYT thinks about TV shows?
It’s really weird that basically nothing made out of the anglosphere is there. Squid game got squeezed in, but not a single anime for example is really weird. There is stuff like AoT and Death Note and neither is on there.
It’s completely US-centered with a couple of British shows sprinkled on top. Even if your focus was just the anglosphere, UK TV punches way above its weight.
It’s funny how many British shows run for 8 episodes and an ending, then gets remade in America with 8 seasons
Biased mainstream media REFUSING to acknowledge the cultural significance of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic 😤.
Unironically. I’m sure Parks&Rec was a fun show, but did it fill convention centers around the world with hundreds of thousands fans? Did it kickstart the careers of animators, illustrators and musicians?
There’s a couple more “children’s cartoons” that I’d put in the top 100 over some high-popularity-but-low-cultural-impact shows from this list. I think if you look at the current animation industry, all of them will name the same shows that inspired them as children and still influence their work to this day: Avatar: the Last Airbender (2005), Gravity Falls (2012), Adventure Time (2010), etc.
IMO it’s rather that ‘Adventure Time’ and other cartoons were inspired by Don Hertzfeldt. Afaik Pendleton Ward was in CalArts right when Hertzfeldt’s shorts came out. ‘Adventure Time’ ran at pretty much the same time as ‘Regular Show’, and they had similar style and mood — not surprisingly, since Ward befriended J. G. Quintel (and Alex Hirsch) at CalArts. These three worked on ‘The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack’ together before launching their separate series.
This list is not muffin approved.

No Pushing Daisies?
So, so many poorly placed on the list. Band of Brothers is my personal number 1, but I’d accept it anywhere in the top 5; begrudgingly accept it in the top 10. But 28? GTFO.
I got a chuckle out of BoB being right before Key & Peele. Like I love both shows, but sorry K&P, to keep it real, your show is not “almost as good as” Band of Brothers
I’m sirprised Scrubs, Monk, Lucifer, Dark etc. didnt’t make the list but allegedly a TV show called PEN15 did?
Honestly from what I’ve seen of PEN15 it does belong on the list.
Pen15 should be higher what the fuck are you on?!
I think these are as good as any on this list as well. My faves.
Black Sails
Arcane
Letterkenny
Norsemen
Corner Gas
A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms
Corner Gas mentioned?! Let’s go!!!
Ferdaaaa
Arcane doesn’t belong but you are right on black sails
Andor not in the top ten is clown dookie
I wonder when the list was created
True Detectives (SEASON ONE)
lol the people behind season 2 must be fuming…
Also, if they can just, randomly specify seasons of a show, why aren’t they excluding the last season of GoT? or the finale of Lost (haven’t seen, but come to believe that the finale was considered one of the worst ever)?
Because Season 1 was some of the greatest television ever written, probably because it was plagiarized, and the rest of it was piss in a sock.
The Expanse. Where’s the fucking Expanse?











