My TV Of The Year 2020 Part 2: 40 to 21

 My TOP TV OF 2020 Part 2: 40 to 21

I've already run down the shows that, in my consideration, have Lost It, Never Had It, fall into the Hast Thou Got Crops In Jethro? category, as well as my Staples, Re-viewings, and the ones that are Bubbling Under the forty. Now the rundown begins. I haven't included films and, as is increasingly the case, I've found that my list tallies less than ever with other peoples' (The Guardian's Top 50 has 23 shows I've seen, 27 I haven't, for example). Here we go with mine... 

40) The Trial Of Christine Keeler (BBC) - In here largely because it was filmed in Bristol and Bath, and we recognised so many landmarks. Told the story well, but a year later it’s mostly the locations I remember.

39) Staged (BBC) - Suffering the curse of the one-word title, which dogs a lot of this year’s telly I’ve found - this is the one where they weren’t on a stage. It was Tennant and Sheen doing a laptop based thing for Lockdown. Very good, but you really had to be there to get it.

38) Quiz (ITV) - Another one-word title, but easier to recall, as it was the Who Wants To Be A Millionaire scandal, with Michael Sheen again, this time as Chris Tarrant. Did I mention I was once in the Cambridge Union debate against Major Charles Ingram? Whupped his ass, as it happens. Let’s just say I wouldn’t have cast handsome Matthew Macfadyen as the unassuming middle aged baldy Ingram.

37) The Boys (Amazon) - It didn’t quite lose it this year with its second season, but it lacked the appeal of the first season. And while a lot of the satire was very good, it kept shaking us off with its unimaginative swearing and blokiness.

36) Mandy (BBC) - Diane Morgan won us over, in the way the fellow stand-ups in self-starrers failed to this year (didn’t like Sara Pascoe and Katherine Ryan’s efforts, and didn’t watch the second series of Ricky Gervais’s). Slight, but short, and in places very funny.

35) Industry (BBC) - Another one-worder, this time it’s the one set in the bank. Jargon so dense it might as well be a foreign language is part of the charm of this otherwise slight drama. It’s made up for 2020’s lack of The Apprentice. New writers Mickey Down and Konrad Kay.

34) Urban Myths  (Sky Arts) - Sky Arts’ brilliant mini-biopic mini-series was more mini than usual this year, having to stop filming after only four episodes. But the stories about Les Dawson, Joan Rivers and Barbra Streisand, Hendrix and Handl, and Orson Welles in Norwich were corkers. A hidden treat.  

33) Us (BBC) - Worst culprit in the one-word-title wars of 2020. It not only shares its title with the biggest horror film of last year, but of half a dozen other books and films, a Peter Gabriel album, singles by artists including Celine Dion, Regina Spektor, and Jennifer Lopez, and a village in France. Worst title of the year, if you ever hoped to find it again online. Anyway, Tom Hollander and his family went to lots of locations and it was fun.

32) Des (ITV) - Again with the one-word-title, and again with ITV doing a biopic of a real life serial killer. They’ve done half a dozen of these, and are quite shameless about how easy it is to get great ratings with murder porn. You can look forward to a Yorkshire Ripper one next year, now he’s dead. Oh, this was David Tennant as Denis Neilsen, if you missed it.

31) Twin (BBC / NRK)  - The Norwegian TV series we stuck with and enjoyed. An ingenious drama about, as you guessed, twins. There’s a murder, a cover up, and it took its original twist premise and made just enough of it to remain engaging. I can see an English language remake working, though this was enough for us.

30=) The Twilight Zone (CBS) & Inside No 9 (BBC) - These tie for 30th place cos, in all honesty, I forgot about Inside No 9 until the last minute. But it’s apt to pair these two because, being anthologies, they vary in quality. Some of this year’s No9’s were their best yet, and the accompanying podcast was a weekly treat. As for Twilight Zone, we came to this series late, it having started in 2019. Two seasons in, it has highs and lows. But when its original sci fi / psychological / political / fantasy dramas are on form, they’re world beating. Definitely some of the most original fantasy and horror ideas I’ve seen done on screen in a while. Comparing No9 and Twilight, the 30 minute format works better for the twist-in-the-tale short story, and some Twilights have been stretched beyond their content.

29) The Secrets She Keeps (Network 10 Australia / BBC) - A very good psychological drama from Australia, that might not have got an airing over here had it not been for the pandemic programme shortage, it told its simple story well, keeping the viewer on tenterhooks. Would have been the best mother and baby psycho drama of the year had it not been for…

28) The Nest (BBC) - The mother and baby drama set in Glasgow, which largely served to have a nation realising that Martin Compston off of Line Of Fire is in fact Scottish. New writer Nicole Taylor. 

27) Better Call Saul (Netflix) - Season 4 maintained the excellent standard of one of the best written TV shows there is. Sometimes it feels like little happens, but the action was upped this season, leaving us on a good cliffhanger for the next season which should, I think, bring us back up to the start of Breaking Bad.

26) Avenue 5 (Sky Comedy) - A different writer every episode is a brave move for a brand new show finding its feet, and wrestling with a budget far bigger than it really warranted. Some episodes were, as a result, the funniest thing, and some got a little lost in their science fiction ambition. Not the best sci fi comedy of the year, in fact it’s the 4th best.

25) Space Force (Sky Comedy) - The third best sci fi comedy of the year also came from the fledgling Sky Comedy, who punched above their weight early on in the year then, for obvious reasons, ran out of new programmes. Steve Carell and John Malkovich in a TV comedy is a treat to begin with, and parts of this series were the greatest fun. It may be dissolving into soap when it returns, but for now “It’s good to be black on the moon”. 

24) Tiger King (Netflix) - You had to be there. You had to be in the first month of lockdown, a little dizzy from how the world was going mad around us, and desperate for escapist TV that came from a reality you couldn’t quite believe was real, for this to make sense. We were all of the above, so it did.

23) Killing Eve (BBC) - The 3rd season was a return to form, though some characters seemed to have changed personalities, a result of the odd decision to have a new show running writer for every season. It may have divided fans too far to survive into a 4th season, if they are able to film one at all.

 

22) Living With Yourself (Netflix) - The second best sci-fi comedy of the year saw Paul Rudd co starring with Aisling Bea, and himself. Very well executed, from a nifty concept we’ve seen variations on many times before. Now that no-one gives a second thought to whether the viewer will be impressed by someone playing themselves as two characters on screen (that ship has long sailed) the character comedy and drama takes centre stage. New writer Timothy Greenberg.

21) Unorthodox (Netflix) - An excellent miniseries following a woman escaping an ultra religious life in New York for a new life in Germany. The description doesn’t do it justice, the devil is in the splendid detail.

My TV Of The Year, Top Twenty continues here...

Kev F Sutherland, as well as writing and drawing for The Beano, Marvel, Doctor Who et al, runs Comic Art Masterclasses in schools, libraries & art centres - AND NOW ONLINE VIA ZOOM. email for details. His debut graphic novels Findlay Macbeth , The Prince Of Denmark Street and The Midsummer Night's Dream Team are available on Amazon. Follow Kev on Facebook, Twitter. Promo video here.