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The 50 Best TV Shows of the 2000s, According to Critics
From the sitcom resurgence to the beginning of Peak TV
The Best TV Shows of the 2000s, According to Critics
The first decade of the 21st century was an awkward one for TV, with the start of the Peak TV era changing the way the industry does business. Over the course of a single decade, we saw the TV business start to branch out from the standards it had operated by for 50 years, taking us from a world dominated by linear broadcast media at the start of the decade, to the dawn of the streaming era by the end of it. To 2000s was the decade that changed TV forever.
It's no surprise, then, that that decade produced some of the greatest shows we've ever seen, with creators able to tell stories they never would have been allowed to tell before, in ways that weren't previously possible thanks to changing perspectives and the loose rules of streaming. To look at a list of the best reviewed TV series of the '00s now is to examine the shows that changed an industry.
So that's exactly what we're going to do. Below you'll find the top 50 shows of the '00s, according to reviews posted to TV Guide's sister site Metacritic — though we cheated just a little bit to include a couple particularly influential long-running series that began airing in 1999, figuring that if the majority of a series' run was in the '00s, it's an '00s show.
As you go through the list you'll find plenty of shows you know and love, along with a bunch you probably have never heard of, since there are several series on this list that have never been on any streaming service or released on DVD. But that just means you'll be in for some interesting surprises, especially since these reviews were written in the moment, and don't have the benefit of hindsight. So this list doesn't reflect the current consensus — but that's why it's interesting. Let's dive in.
ALSO READ: The 50 best shows of the 1990s
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50. Gilmore Girls (The WB/The CW)
Metacritic score: 78
This fast-talking family dramedy about a mom and daughter (Lauren Graham and Alexis Bledel) who are just trying to get through another day ran for seven seasons on The WB and The CW. The series was created by Amy Sherman-Palladino, who's better known these days for the Emmy juggernaut The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel.
49. The West Wing (NBC)
Metacritic score: 78
This beloved political drama, about a fast-talking presidential administration that usually tries to do the right thing, might feel a little quaint after recent political firestorms. But there's a reason this show ran for seven seasons during the Bush years, through 9/11 and the Iraq War — it was quaint comfort food even when it first aired. Nothing wrong with that.
48. Veronica Mars (UPN/The CW)
Metacritic score: 78
A teenager who works for her dad's private detective agency in a small Southern California town tries to solve her best friend's murder, and ends up falling down quite the shocking rabbit hole. Veronica Mars ran for three seasons originally, and then was revived in 2019 on Hulu.
47. Gideon's Crossing (ABC)
Metacritic score: 78
This medical drama starred Andre Braugher, Reuben Blades, and Eric Dane, and despite earning plenty of acclaim from critics, was canceled before the first season ended. Fun fact: The Batman director Matt Reeves actually directed the pilot and executive produced the series.
46. Damages (FX)
Metacritic score: 78
Glenn Close and Rose Byrne star in this legal drama about a high-powered attorney and her ambitious protege that ran for five seasons. Close won the Emmy for Best Actress in a Drama Series twice for this series.
45. Arrested Development (Fox)
Metacritic score: 78
Arrested Development was a very different sort of sitcom when it first popped up in 2003, dumping the laugh track and taking a more deadpan approach to its comedy — more like Curb Your Enthusiasm on HBO, or The Office on the BBC, which at the time was pretty shocking for a network series. The show originally ran for three seasons on Fox, before being revived on Netflix for new seasons in 2013 and 2018.
44. Joan of Arcadia (CBS)
Metacritic score: 79
Joan of Arcadia, a title that's a play on "Joan of Arc," is all about a teenager (Amber Tamblyn) who is repeatedly tasked by God with helping out the people around her in ways that routinely surprise her. Despite critical acclaim and three Emmy nominations, including one for best drama series, Joan of Arcadia was canceled after two years, and these days it has no streaming home.
43. Project Greenlight (HBO/Bravo)
Metacritic score: 79
A group of aspiring filmmakers compete for the right to bring their movie idea to fruition, with judges Ben Affleck, Matt Damon, and other producers deciding the winner — and then we watched them make it, too. Project Greenlight was a one-of-a-kind reality series, and the movies that came out of it were actually pretty good, too.
42. Life on Mars (BBC)
Metacritic score: 79
The British drama Life on Mars follows a Manchester cop (John Simm) who travels in time back to the 1970s after a car accident and has to acclimate to his new life in the past. This series inspired a ton of adaptations in other countries, including a U.S. version that ran on ABC starting in 2008.
41. This American Life (Showtime)
Metacritic score: 79
Creator/host Ira Glass adapted his popular folksy radio series, in which regular Americans tell interesting true stories, for TV in this Showtime series. While it only ran for two seasons, the TV version of This American Life didn't end because it was a failure — the staff just found it too much work to make the TV show while still doing the radio show.
40. Gavin and Stacey (BBC)
Metacritic score: 79
Created by James Corden and Ruth Jones, this BBC sitcom tracks the relationship between the two title characters (Matthew Horne and Joanna Page), starting when they first meet and following them as they get closer, get married, and try to have kids. And with two additional Christmas specials in recent years, Gavin and Stacey has continued to be a gift for fans.
39. Sense & Sensibility (BBC)
Metacritic score: 79
This BBC series adapts Jane Austen's classic novel about the financial and social struggles of a widow and her daughter after the estate's heir decides not to give them any support. This adaptation features Janet McTeer as Mrs. Dashwood and David Morrissey as Colonel Brandon, with a breakout turn by Dominic Cooper as John Willoughby and one of Lucy Boynton's earliest roles as the youngest Dashwood sister, Margaret.
38. Archer (FX/FXX)
Metacritic score: 79
FX's beloved spy sitcom, featuring the vocal talents of H. Jon Benjamin as the title character, managed to last for 14 seasons largely because of its willingness to change up its own formula in dramatic ways from season to season without losing any of its sharp wit. Not many shows have been willing to experiment the way Archer did.
37. 24 (Fox)
Metacritic score: 79
24 was probably never truly a great show in an overall sense, as its seasonal storylines rarely tracked from beginning to end. (Remember the cougar?) But it made up for it with an incredible premise: Kiefer Sutherland plays government agent Jack Bauer, who has to do some crazy and outlandish things to save the world from terrorists, with each season taking place over the course of one day, in real time.
36. Five Days (HBO)
Metacritic score: 80
This crime drama, which starred David Oyelowo, Janet McTeer, and Edward Woodward in its first season, tracks an investigation over the course of several months, with each episode representing one of five pivotal days for the case during that span. It's structurally pretty similar to the Netflix blockbuster series Adolescence, but without the single-shot, realtime gimmick.
35. Being Human (BBC)
Metacritic score: 80
A trio of flatmates do their best to co-exist despite their unusually stark differences in this dramedy series. Sure, that sounds pretty bland, but it's only because I left out the hook — these three roommates are a vampire (Aidan Turner), a werewolf (Russell Tovey), and a ghost (Lenora Crichlow), and they've gotta work together in order to continue living relatively normal lives surrounded by regular humans.
34. Generation Kill (HBO)
Metacritic score: 80
From the creators of The Wire came this Iraq War drama about the experiences of a squad of marines during the very start of Operation Iraqi Freedom in 2003. The limited series earned three Emmy nominations for its frank depiction of a very controversial war. It also featured Alexander Skarsgård's first major role in English (he's Swedish) before he broke out on True Blood.
33. Men of a Certain Age (TNT)
Metacritic score: 81
This chill TNT dramedy followed a trio of life-long friends (played by Ray Romano, Andre Braugher, and Scott Bakula) who are going through their respective mid-life crises in very different ways. Men of a Certain Age drew raves for its frank and amusing observations — like if Curb Your Enthusiasm had a genuinely dramatic side.
32. The Good Wife (CBS)
Metacritic score: 81
After her husband, an Illinois state's attorney, is embroiled in both a sex scandal and a criminal investigation, a former lawyer-turned-stay-at-home-mom (Julianna Margulies) has to restart her legal career to pay the bills — while staying married to her unfaithful and possibly corrupt husband. The Good Wife was so compelling it made everybody wonder why CBS had largely been avoiding serialized dramas during the first decade of the new millennium.
31. The Nine (ABC)
Metacritic score: 81
Nine strangers are brought together when they're taken hostage during a bank robbery standoff that lasts for two days. But then it turns out that these folks have some surprising pre-existing connections with each other — and a lot more went down at the bank than most of them realize. Despite the excellent reviews, The Nine was canceled after airing just seven episodes, with the last six being streamed on ABC.com a year later. These days, the only way to watch this one is on a 240p playlist uploaded to YouTube 15 years ago by a Kim Raver fan.
30. Little Dorrit (BBC)
Metacritic score: 81
Matthew Macfadyen (Succession) and Claire Foy (in her first major role) star in this PBS and BBC adaptation of Charles Dickens' labyrinthine tale of generational wealth and debt. This is actually one of three 19th century adaptations written by Andrew Davies to make this list, along with Sense & Sensibility and Bleak House.
29. The Tick (Fox)
Metacritic score: 82
After an animated adaptation of The Tick comics in the 1990s did surprisingly well, we got this attempt at a live-action sitcom version of The Tick on Fox in 2001, which featured Patrick Warburton as the title character and Nestor Carbonell as fellow superhero Batmanuel. It lasted just nine episodes before being canceled — but this cult classic has only become more relevant now that we've survived Marvel's period of Hollywood dominance.
28. Friday Night Lights (NBC)
Metacritic score: 83
The pure insanity of high-level Texas high school football was the perfect topic for this drama series, created by filmmaker Peter Berg just two years after he directed a movie with the same title. While Kyle Chandler's Coach Taylor was the face of the series, Friday Night Lights also featured major roles for rising stars like Michael B. Jordan, Jesse Plemons, and Taylor Kitsch.
27. Extras (HBO)
Metacritic score: 83
Ricky Gervais stars as a background actor named Andy who tries to suck up to any celebrity he meets in hopes of getting real acting roles. The hook, though, was that these celebrities would be actual famous stars playing exaggerated versions of themselves — folks like Kate Winslet, Ben Stiller, Samuel L. Jackson, Patrick Stewart, and even David Bowie all popped up to play themselves.
26. Lost (ABC)
Metacritic score: 84
Lost may not have ever supplied any remotely satisfying answers for any of its major mysteries, but there was no wilder ride on network TV during the Aughts than this enthralling melodrama about a group of plane crash survivors forced to live on an enigmatic magical island. There's been very few other shows that embodied the cliché "it's about the journey, not the destination" as well as Lost did.
25. Monty Python: Almost the Truth (Lawyer's Cut) (BBC)
Metacritic score: 84
This six-episode documentary series chronicles the history of the Monty Python comedy troupe, starting before they'd joined together to create the original Flying Circus series in 1969 up through the death of Graham Chapman in 1989, and featuring extensive interviews with the surviving members. The series was certainly illuminating and hilarious, and among the many highlights were the striking new Monty Python-style animations that were made for the production.
24. Curb Your Enthusiasm (HBO)
Metacritic score: 84
Larry David plays a heightened version of himself in a series about his attempts to return to a regular life after Seinfeld, the juggernaut sitcom that he co-created, came to an end in the late 1990s. Considering how similar the humor on this series is to that of Seinfeld, Curb Your Enthusiasm pretty much works as a sequel series.
23. Wonderland (ABC)
Metacritic score: 85
A few years before filmmaker Peter Berg struck gold with Friday Night Lights on NBC, the first TV show he created was this unconventional medical drama on ABC that was set in a mental institution — a pretty fraught endeavor considering how complicated our collective cultural relationship with mental health is even now. Despite the unique hook and great reviews, Wonderland lasted just eight episodes.
22. Rescue Me (FX)
Metacritic score: 85
This crude drama, co-created by and starring Denis Leary, focuses on a group of brash New York firefighters trying to live their lives after 9/11. Rescue Me was not exactly the wokest show around, but that's largely because this is a show that loves piling flaws onto its ensemble of protagonists — Leary's character, Tommy, is both a heroic firefighter and a complete mess of a person with many self-destructive tendencies who can't help but drive away those closest to him.
21. Pushing Daisies (ABC)
Metacritic score: 85
A humble pie maker named Ned (Lee Pace) has the power to bring dead things to life with his touch — but if he touches them a second time, they go back to being dead forever. Naturally, he uses that ability to help a detective (Chi McBride) solve murders, but the central romantic hook is that he used it to bring back someone he's in love with but can now never touch (Anna Friel). The Bryan Fuller-created series only lasted two seasons, with the silver lining that Fuller's Hannibal series on NBC might never have happened otherwise.
20. Deadwood (HBO)
Metacritic score: 85
This gritty and delightfully crude Western is best remembered these days for its incredible ensemble cast, which included Ian McShane, Timothy Olyphant, Molly Parker, John Hawkes, Keith Carradine, Powers Boothe, Anna Gunn, and many others. With all due respect to Taylor Sheridan, Deadwood remains the standard for TV westerns.
19. Undeclared (Fox)
Metacritic score: 85
After cult classic series Freaks & Geeks lasted just one season, creator Judd Apatow gave it another shot with this comedy series about a group of college freshmen. Undeclared, which starred Jay Baruchel, Seth Rogen, Carla Gallo, and Charlie Hunnam, was just as doomed as its predecessor and also lasted only one season. But Apatow's ill-fated TV adventures led him to try his hand at the movie business, where he produced and directed piles of hits like Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy and The 40 Year Old Virgin.
18. Mad Men (AMC)
Metacritic score: 86
Jon Hamm stars in this smoke-filled drama about Manhattan ad executives in the 1960s who spend all their time drinking and saying offensive things. OK, it's a lot more than just that. Mad Men won the Emmy for Best Drama Series four times, and earned 116 Emmy nominations over the course of its run.
17. Band of Brothers (HBO)
Metacritic score: 87
This enthralling World War II limited series co-created by Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks follows Easy Company, a regiment of paratroopers, from boot camp through their battles in Europe until the end of the war. Armed with a blockbuster movie-sized budget, Band of Brothers was like a longer and much more fleshed out Saving Private Ryan — it's no mystery why this one is still so beloved.
16. Modern Family (ABC)
Metacritic score: 87
This Emmy-dominating sitcom, which premiered in 2009, successfully went beyond the traditional family comedy by focusing on a multi-generational extended family that consisted of a patriarch who recently married a woman his kids' age, a straight son with a wife and three kids, and a gay son with a loving husband and adopted children. Modern Family ran for 11 seasons and was TV's most popular sitcom for many of those years.
15. Breaking Bad (AMC)
Metacritic score: 87
A high school chemistry teacher (Bryan Cranston) is diagnosed with terminal cancer and gets into the meth-making business in order to make sure his family has some money after he dies. And then things get far weirder and more complicated (and entertaining) than he ever could have imagined. Breaking Bad and its prequel series Better Call Saul have had such an intense impact on pop culture that everybody thinks of Giancarlo Esposito — who's been in approximately 9,000 movies and shows over the past four decades and change — mainly as Breaking Bad villain Gus Fring.
14. City of Men (Globo)
Metacritic score: 87
Crime drama City of God (2002) is one of the best Brazilian films ever, and the film's co-directors Fernando Mereilles and Katia Lund reunited after its release to put together this somewhat more lighthearted TV series sequel, which follows a small group of teens as they grow up in a favela over the course of four seasons. This is the only show to make the list that has never been distributed in the US.
13. Ed (NBC)
Metacritic score: 87
A high-powered attorney loses his job the same day his wife cheats on him with the mailman, so he moves back home to Ohio, buys a bowling alley, and opens his own law practice in this hour-long ensemble comedy starring Tom Cavanaugh, Julie Bowen, and Michael Ian Black. Despite running for four seasons, this one has been pretty much scrubbed from existence — it's never been available on any streaming service or as a digital purchase, and it never got a DVD release.
12. Malcolm in the Middle (Fox)
Metacritic score: 88
This sitcom, about a relatively normal kid trying to grow up in the middle of an unnecessarily chaotic family, is probably best remembered primarily for springboarding Bryan Cranston toward bankable stardom. But even two decades later, Malcolm in the Middle is a pretty unique show that hasn't had many quality imitators.
11. Everybody Hates Chris (UPN/The CW)
Metacritic score: 88
Chris Rock created and ran this sitcom that was loosely based on his own teen years in Brooklyn in the early 1980s — and, yes, the title is an Everybody Loves Raymond joke. Starring Tyler James Williams as young Chris Rock, Everybody Hates Chris ran for four seasons, and only stopped because Chris Rock thought they'd reached a great ending point.
10. The Shield (FX)
Metacritic score: 89
If you want somebody to blame for Walton Goggins being pretty much everywhere these days, look no further than Shawn Ryan's cop drama about a few bad apples in an embroiled LAPD precinct who have absolutely no idea that they're actually the bad guys. Despite now being considered one of the greatest cop shows ever, The Shield was only nominated for a total of six Emmys during its seven-season run.
9. Battlestar Galactica (Syfy)
Metacritic score: 89
A remake of the hokey sci-fi series from the late '70s, Ronald D. Moore's show about a small group of humans fleeing a race of robots that genocided the rest of humanity ended up being an incredibly poignant piece of commentary on the USA's so-called War on Terror even while it was happening. Battlestar Galactica was one of the dramas that defined that era of TV alongside The Sopranos and The Wire. Not bad for a show that aired on the Sci-Fi Channel.
8. Boomtown (NBC)
Metacritic score: 89
Boomtown was essentially a more cinematic version of Law & Order starring Donnie Wahlberg, Lana Parilla, Mykelti Williamson, and Neil McDonough. This novel take on the police procedural tackles the perspectives of everyone involved in the crime — but told non-linearly for extra dramatic effect. Despite the stellar reviews, Boomtown was canceled just two episodes into its second season.
7. The Corner (HBO)
Metacritic score: 90
Before there was The Wire, former crime reporter David Simon and former police detective Ed Burns adapted their own book about the comings and goings at one particular street corner in Baltimore over the course of a year. While this six-episode miniseries doesn't have the same cultural cachet as The Wire does, The Corner has served as Simon and Burns' blueprint for most of their shows (like Generation Kill, another series on this list, as well as Treme and We Own This City) since then.
6. The Wire (HBO)
Metacritic score: 91
The most brilliant thing about The Wire, a crime saga which tracked its stories from every available perspective, is that its creators David Simon and Ed Burns never tried to pander to its audience. They just told their incessantly heartbreaking story, informed with profound empathy by decades spent working the streets of Baltimore as a crime reporter and police detective, respectively. The result is a great modern work of American literature.
5. Samurai Jack (Cartoon Network)
Metacritic score: 93
This beloved toon from Genndy Tartakovsky channeled the old series Kung Fu and samurai cinema into a delightful adventure in which the title character has to defeat the demon who rules his homeland and exiled him to the future. Samurai Jack was so awesome and popular that it made Tartakovksy a perfect fit for Cartoon Network's Star Wars: Clone Wars series just two years after Samurai Jack premiered.
4. Bleak House (BBC)
Metacritic score: 93
Andrew Davies, who wrote both the Little Dorrit and Sense & Sensibility adaptations that also made this list, adapted the classic Charles Dickens novel about a bunch of potential heirs battling over an estate for so long that there's nothing left to inherit by the time they sort it out. It starred Gillian Anderson and Charles Dance and featured Carey Mulligan in one of her very first roles.
3. The Sopranos (HBO)
Metacritic score: 94
HBO's mob drama, a dollar store The Godfather focusing on the adventures of a New Jersey crime family and the oversized personality who runs it, will go down as a dividing line in TV history — the show that launched the Peak TV era and delivered one of TV's defining modern characters in Tony Soprano. The best thing about it is that it's actually as good as it is influential.
2. The Staircase (ABC)
Metacritic score: 95
This documentary series followed the trial of Michael Peterson, accused and eventually convicted of murdering his wife after he claimed she'd fallen down the stairs while drunk. For being such a unique series, and one that shined a genuine light on what the US legal system is actually like amidst a TV ecosystem that had long been dominated by dubious cop shows, The Staircase earned a Peabody Award.
1. The Office UK (BBC)
Metacritic score: 97
While the original version of The Office, a mockumentary-style sitcom about a bunch of normal office workers forced to work for a complete dunce, is often overshadowed by the American remake these days, that's largely because the U.S. version ran for 200 episodes across nine seasons versus the 12 episodes and a Christmas special that the original show went for. But that discrepancy is also probably why the U.K. version is the best reviewed series of the Aughts, and the American version isn't on this list at all — it's about quality over quantity.