“Your life is your own,” says Rhea Sheehorn’s misanthropic Carol in Pluribus in what may be the small-screen line if the year, in more ways than one.
Certainly in 2025 in more ways than one control over our own lives was a major theme on and off the screen, as Vince Gilligan’s already acclaimed post-apocalyptic dramedy on Apple TV has made clear week after week since its November 7 debut. To that, if Donald Trump 2.0 was the worst thing on and off TV this year, there was a surfeit of excellence too.
Some, like Netflix’s Adolescence, have proved both cultural flashpoints and award winners. Others, like Prime Video’s Clean Slate, proved to be one and done with no renewal to cap its ambition and execution. Some, like Apple TV’s Down Cemetery Road and Paramount+’s MobLand, come fully loaded with trophy-cabinet thespians deluxe.
While not new this time round, let’s also give a shout-out to a couple of top-tier second seasons in Paramount+ and Taylor Sheridan’s Landman and Netflix and Mo Amer’s Mo – both eclipsed their impressive first-season runs.
Below, in no particular order, are my picks for the best new TV shows of the past year. Do you agree? Who did I miss? Why am I so totally wrong? Tell us in the comments if you have time between wrapping gifts or trying to make it to the airport.
Death By Lightning (Netflix)
Image Credit: Netflix
The only thing lacking in the Mike Makowsky-created Netflix series based on Candice Millard’s 2011 book Destiny of the Republic is that the limited series starring Michael Shannon and Matthew Macfadyen limited series needed to be longer. Simply put, four episodes on the real-life rise and death of President James Garfield (Shannon) and the crash and burn of the man who shot him (Macfadyen’s Charles Guiteau) was not enough. So, if Betty Gilpin, the amazing Nick Offerman (a drunk Chester A. Arthur is the best 20th VPOTUS ever), Shea Wigham and Bradley Whitford are available, Mr. Sarandos — can we have some more?
Down Cemetery Road (Apple TV)
Image Credit: Apple TV
Less is often more, so here it is, kinda: Emma Thompson and Ruth Wilson together in Morwenna Banks’ adaptation of Slow Horses creator Mick Herron’s 2003 novel was the opposites-attract buddy thriller we all truly needed this year. And now, there’s going to be more with Apple TV’s recently revealed renewal. Nice.
MobLand (Paramount+)
Image Credit: Sophie Mutevelian/Paramount+
What starts with a London nepo-mobster’s killing and ends with a former James Bond being cheered on by convicts to the Rolling Stones’ “Sympathy For the Devil” is a great example of journey and destination. A very evil mob queenpin played by Helen Mirren, some Tom Hardy trying to fix everything and nothing, and Pierce Brosnan unleashed showed that 101 Studio is a lot more than the home of Taylor Sheridan.
Pluribus (Apple TV)
Image Credit: Apple TV
Often in science, the first time something occurs could be an accident, the second time could be a coincidence, but the third time it becomes fact. With Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul, and now the beehive power struggle of Pluribus, Vince Gilligan has vanquished almost all rivals as the master of unmissible disaster, in the best way. Plus, reunited with BCS’s Rhea Seehorn, Gilligan has absolutely stuck the landing of revamping the dystopian saga with one of the most pernicious characters even seen on TV in Seehorn’s bestselling author Carol Sturka and her battle for individuality. Hell, there’s all that, and Pluribus‘ Season 1 finale doesn’t even hit the streamer until Christmas Eve.
Adolescence (Netflix)
Image Credit: Netflix
All these months after the Jack Throre- and Stephen Graham-created drama launched March 13, I am still deeply haunted by Adolescence. Helmed in a single shot by Philip Barantini for each of its four episodes, the Emmy-winning limited series about a 13-year-old boy (Owen Cooper) from Yorkshire, UK, arrested for the murder of a girl from his school was masterful storytelling fueled by masterful direction and performances with a universal gut-punch embedded in it all. Amazing.
Clean Slate (Prime Video)
Image Credit: Sony TV
The Laverne Cox and George Wallace series about an offspring’s return to her Southern roots and father after some very big changes was deep-sixed by Prime Video a couple months after the launch of its first and only season. The decison was a real drag for the gender transition-themed series, but the Norman Lear-EP’d Clean Slate lost none of its luster, punch and sheer good times in the process. In fact, the show created by Cox, Wallace and Dan Ewen will surely only become richer over time with its simultaneously very specific and very universal tale.
The Celebrity Traitors (BBC)
Image Credit: BBC
It doesn’t really matter if you know or care who Jonathan Ross, Alan Carr or Charlotte Church are. All you need to know is that in the rare competition show where the stakes actually matter thanks to the egos of the camera-ready UK B-listers, the BBC’s Celebrity Traitors was TV gold that truly twinkled like falling stars in the sky.
Deli Boys (Hulu)
Image Credit: Hulu
Nothing is as it seems at first in Deli Boys as two brothers played by Asif Ali and Saagar Shaikh believe they have inherited their father’s convienance store empire — but what they got was a drug ring and a crime boss named Lucky Auntie, played by Poorna Jagannathan. What is obvious is how funny and rollar coaster the Abdullah Saeed-created Hulu series was in its first season. There’s more of that to come, as Deli Boys was renewed in August.
North of North (CBC/Netflix)
Image Credit: Netflix
Lots of funny things and funny people have come from Canada over the years, just ask Jellied Moose Nose eaters or fans of Catherine O’Hara, John Candy and Russell Peters. However, this CBC comedy about an Inuk mother doing everything she can to live her best life is not only one of the best, but one of the most original from the self-proclaimed True North. All eight episodes of North of North are on Netflix, so catch up before Season 2 comes our way.
The American Revolution (PBS)
Image Credit: PBS
Honestly, I’m just going to cut to the chase here and lift a line or two from my Van Halen-tinged review of Ken Burns’ The American Revolution: “Regardless of where you stand on the political spectrum or regarding Flat Earthers, there is no denying the inviolable sense of time and place in American Revolution. It’s as if Eddie Van Halen, without telling anyone, added an extra two strings on his guitar to reverberate through his Marshall stack, and the ages.”
“This is not the kind of American history MAGA loyalists like, and not just for the reasons you might think. To that, with the almost last breath of the Van Halen analogy, part of the success of The American Revolution is how it is loud and proud in a quiet way.”
You see what I’m saying here, right?