2023 TV Awards
I really fell off the TV train this year. Actually, no. I watched a fair amount of TV, I spent most of the year watching stuff I'd been meaning to catch up on for a long time, mostly because a lot of the new stuff simply wasn't interesting to me. I had a hard time filling my top ten this year firstly because I hadn't watched ten shows come mid November, and secondly because most of what I'd seen was kind of bad. But I made a desperate push to watch some stuff I thought I might enjoy and here we are, a half hearted list of some mediocre TV and a couple of standouts. Honestly 2023 was not the year for TV, but here's the best of what I watched.
#10 The Sex Lives of College Girls Season 2 (HBO)
I loved the first season of The Sex Lives of College Girls and I could not wait to see what Season Two had to offer. Unfortunately though a lot of what made Season One so great wasn't here for Season Two. Don't get me wrong, I still had a good time, the characters are still excellent, and the writing was still funny. But honestly it felt like it was living in the shadow of its predecessor the whole time. Fingers crossed that Season Three picks things up a bit.
#9 Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story (Netflix)
#9 Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story (Netflix)
Big Bridgerton fan here so of course I was going to go mad for Queen Charlotte, but much like The Sex Lives of College Girls, it felt like it never really hit its stride. The performances were strong, the storyline was tight, and the tea was most certainly spilled. But I don't know, it just lacked that spark that the first two seasons of the main Bridgerton show had. It was fine, enough to tide me over for Season Three next year, but I had hoped for more.
#8 Heartstopper Season 2 (Netflix)
I adored Season One of Heartstopper for so many reasons, and thankfully the majority of those reasons stayed in tact for Season Two. I still don't think it was quite as strong as Season One, but honestly it was still pretty great. I loved how we got to get more depth on Darcy (Kizzy Edgell) & Isaac (Tobie Donovan), and the complicated romances of Nick (Kit Connor) & Charlie (Joe Locke), and Tao (William Gao) & Elle (Yasmin Finney) became even more complicated. Heartstopper remains good fun, and an excellent LGBTQ+ show for younger audiences.
#7 Gen V (Prime Video)
#7 Gen V (Prime Video)
I've been kind of losing interest in The Boys, but Gen V changed that. Feeling something along the lines of a sadistic take on the X-Men, Gen V proved that The Boys could be about more than just gory deaths. It presented a great cast of new characters with interesting powers and deep internal conflicts. It does of course tie in nicely to The Boys universe, but it's kind of its own thing for the most part. Honestly, I'm more excited to return to Godolkin University than I am to see how The Seven are doing.
#6 Loki Season 2 (Disney+)
I was not a fan of the first season of Loki. It was way to complicated for its own good, and honestly kind of boring too. But it appears as though Season One did all the heavy lifting to Season Two could just be a great time. Whilst I still think the show as a whole was kind of a waste of time because they just put Loki (Tom Hiddleston) through the same character journey he had during the Thor films, it was the supporting cast that really make Loki Season Two a memorable and enjoyable experience; especially Ke Huy Quan as Ouroboros!
#5 Captain Laserhawk: A Blood Dragon Remix (Netflix)
#5 Captain Laserhawk: A Blood Dragon Remix (Netflix)
I love the Blood Dragon games from Ubisoft and their crude irreverent humour and throwbacks to classic eighties action films. This expansion into TV works brilliantly, and it's also great to see so many Ubisoft franchises brought together for this hilarious experiment. After Dolph Laserhawk (Nathaniel Curtis) is betrayed and left for dead, he is recruited into a special task force to stop the end of the world and get revenge on those that wronged him. It's all cheese, and it's utterly hilarious. A big dumb action show that anime fans are surely to go crazy for. Definitely worth a look.
#4 Scott Pilgrim Takes Off (Netflix)
#4 Scott Pilgrim Takes Off (Netflix)
Scott Pilgrim is one of my favourite films and I adore the graphic novels, so the excitement I had from the reveal that Scott Pilgrim Takes Off would bring the visual style of the graphic novels to life, whilst reuniting the cast of the film. Ecstatic doesn't even begin to describe it. But the show took a while to get me on board with its wildly different take on the source material, but come the final couple of episodes when the pieces fell into place, Takes Off really struck a chord. When Scott (Michael Cera) falls for the girl of his dreams, Ramona (Mary Elizabeth Winstead), things turn sour as Scott is killed by Ramona's evil exes. Refusing to believe he is dead, Ramona begins an investigation to find Scott; meanwhile Scott's friends and Romana's exes find themselves in trouble of their own.
It doesn't quite have the same charm as the film, but Scott Pilgrim Takes Off is a brilliant reinvention of the Scott Pilgrim story that takes a deeper look at some of the story's more problematic elements.
#3 Black Mirror Season 6 (Netflix)
It doesn't quite have the same charm as the film, but Scott Pilgrim Takes Off is a brilliant reinvention of the Scott Pilgrim story that takes a deeper look at some of the story's more problematic elements.
#3 Black Mirror Season 6 (Netflix)
I love it when Black Mirror comes back. It's like Christmas for me, except it only happens once every few years. Series Six presented five new Black Mirror stories with varying degrees of success. Joan Is Awful explored streaming services and the dangers of AI generated content. Loch Henry was a thrilling murder mystery. Beyond the Sea was a thought provoking meditation on loneliness and jealousy. Mazey Day exposed the paparazzi as the monsters they are; and Demon 79 was a huge departure from Black Mirror into full blown spiritualistic horror.
Some episodes were really strong, Loch Henry & Demon 79 in particular, whereas some like Mazey Day are hanging about with the worst that Black Mirror has ever offered. But on the whole I had a great time with Series Six, but who knows how long I'll have to wait for Series Seven!
#2 Futurama Season 8 (Disney+)
Some episodes were really strong, Loch Henry & Demon 79 in particular, whereas some like Mazey Day are hanging about with the worst that Black Mirror has ever offered. But on the whole I had a great time with Series Six, but who knows how long I'll have to wait for Series Seven!
#2 Futurama Season 8 (Disney+)
Futurama is back from the dead...again! After a decade off the air the show has been revived once again, and just like every time before it has proved why it should never have been cancelled in the first place. With Fry (Billy West) and Leela (Katey Sagal) now in a proper relationship, the show starts to look back at storylines past and expand on them in meaningful ways, without ever losing that madcap humour the show is so beloved for. With a ninth season due next year, now has never been a better time to be a Futurama fan.
#1 The Last of Us (HBO)
#1 The Last of Us (HBO)
There really was only one TV event of the year in 2023, and that was HBO's adaptation of The Last of Us. I'm a huge fan of the games and so I was eager to see how it would fare being adapted into a non-interactive medium, and for the most part HBO's show did exactly what it set out to do. As a fan of the games there definitely some elements I didn't like as much, but there were others that I feel were done far better than the games ever did.
Twenty years after a fungal infection decimated humanity, Joel (Pedro Pascal) is a smuggler tasked with gettinga teenage girl, Ellie (Bella Ramsay), to a group of freedom fighters known as the Fireflies, as they believe she holds the cure to the deadly infection. Along the way Joel and Ellie see the worst humanity has to offer, all whilst Joel tries to teach Ellie the real meaning of humanity.
Episode Three 'Long Long Time' may be one of the greatest episodes of TV I have ever seen in my life, and even if you don't watch the whole show that one episode perfectly encapsulates the entirety of the story without actually being intrinsically connected to the rest of the show. If you watch any TV from 2023, it needs to be The Last of Us. There may not have been much in the way of great TV this year that I saw, but this was probably always going to be my number one.
Twenty years after a fungal infection decimated humanity, Joel (Pedro Pascal) is a smuggler tasked with gettinga teenage girl, Ellie (Bella Ramsay), to a group of freedom fighters known as the Fireflies, as they believe she holds the cure to the deadly infection. Along the way Joel and Ellie see the worst humanity has to offer, all whilst Joel tries to teach Ellie the real meaning of humanity.
Episode Three 'Long Long Time' may be one of the greatest episodes of TV I have ever seen in my life, and even if you don't watch the whole show that one episode perfectly encapsulates the entirety of the story without actually being intrinsically connected to the rest of the show. If you watch any TV from 2023, it needs to be The Last of Us. There may not have been much in the way of great TV this year that I saw, but this was probably always going to be my number one.