ILX’s Top 77 Television and Streaming Video Series of 2020

We bailed on Normal People after the first episode (if I'd watched a second, it could have been grounds for divorce - he really, really loathed it). But maybe it, er, took time to develop.

Nah it was all pretty draggy, albeit oddly watchable. I never grew to like the leads, particularly.

i was really impressed by the dude lead in normal people, he seemed like a real person in a way that most tv/movie performances don't

the woman lead was "good" too but in a more standard actory way

also it's really fun to go around saying "i just want to be normal people" in a terrible irish accent

i wanna live like normal people
i wanna do whatever normal people do

As the face and frontline of the gonzo YouTube channel All Gas No Brakes, presenter Andrew Callaghan deftly walks the razor-thin line between mocking, supporting and excoriating the insider-outsider subjects he and his team document. Whether at a NASCAR race, the launch of a NASA rocket, a Donald Trump Jr book launch or a furry festival, AGNB allows its subjects ample rope to hang themselves, leaning into the American tendency to talk beyond one’s means. And also to rap. Everyone wants to rap for some reason.

Following a much anticipated on-site video at the attempted Capitol coup, expect to see AGNB make the leap to television this year as an Abso Lutely / Tim and Eric-produced series.

https://i.imgur.com/qmISecP.jpg
#14 - All Gas No Brakes (YouTube) - 76 points, 8 votes, 5 top 5 votes
NB: Top YouTube, Top Unscripted
thread of youtubers whomst are not terrible

Las Vegas - January 29 2020
Minneapolis - May 30 2020
Marquette - July 18, 2020
Sturgis - September 4, 2020
Portland - October 3, 2020
Website
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2020/12/heroes-of-2020-all-gas-no-brakes/
https://news.avclub.com/all-gas-no-brakes-host-on-interviewing-conspiracy-theor-1844763234

Oh I voted for this. The only journalist

After a rocky start, Raphael Bob-Waksberg and Lisa Hanawalt’s “depressed cartoon horse show” became a critical darling and one of the best reviewed shows on television. Bojack Horseman ended in 2020 with an eight episode drop of the final half of the sixth season that explored its lead character’s post-fame life and struggle with self-immolation.

https://i.imgur.com/FMZZVXC.jpg
#13 - Bojack Horseman (Netflix) - 83 points, 11 votes, 1 #1 votes, 4 top 5 votes
NB: Top Animation
Let's talk about BoJack Horseman, the new Netflix animated series (starring Will Arnett, Alison Brie, Amy Sedaris, Aaron Paul, etc)

Trailer
Crew Conversation
Website
https://www.indiewire.com/2020/01/bojack-horseman-ending-review-season-6-finale-spoilers-1202207270/
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/01/opinion/bojack-horseman-final-season.html
https://time.com/5774893/bojack-horseman-finale-recap-review/
https://www.vulture.com/2020/01/bojack-horseman-series-finale-death-explained-analysis.html

I didn't think S6 ended that strong tbh

agree that the first half of s6 was better than the second, but it was still a satisfying ending with some beautiful moments

the bit where Herb disappears is pretty iconic maybe yeah

Bojack not at its peak is still better than most other TV, so I voted for this

i was really impressed by the dude lead in normal people, he seemed like a real person in a way that most tv/movie performances don't

― na (NA), Monday, 15 February 2021 15:14 (fifty-nine minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

This took off so strongly in the UK that it shocked me, and everything was focused around this guy's performance (and his sex appeal, which someone else will have to disect tbh)

I'll go back to why it taking off shocked me- he is absolutely sensational as a contemporary rural irish guy of that type (ok, itself a little idealised but nevertheless) gawky, confident, awkward outside his comfort zones. I really didnt expect a UK audience to appreciate it (and the feedback everywhere was for the details as well as his thighs in GAA shorts) but perhaps it translated only so far and it just didnt carry as far as the states?

I didnt even watch all of it (the story as a whole was a bit painful emo for me) but i tried to catch his highlights and imo there wasnt a better acting performance anywhere all year

/morbs

Id seen him on stage a few months before and he was good in a bad role so i had an eye out for him after

/morbs

his thighs in GAA shorts

Oscar-winning director Steve McQueen’s Amazon/BBC-produced five-part anthology series Small Axe has proven challenging for critics to pigeonhole. Though each is thematically connected and every episode’s story informs the other conceptually, they could just as easily be viewed as separate short or full-length films, which has led to the LA Film Critics Associations voting for the collective series as the best movie of the year. It’s rare praise and the only obvious analogue is Kieslowski’s Ten Commandments series The Dekalogue. Good company indeed.

https://i.imgur.com/g0AhyG2.jpg
#12 - Small Axe (Amazon, BBC) - 92 points, 11 votes, 3 #1 votes, 4 top 5 votes

Trailer
Preview
Steve McQueen Interview
US Website
UK Website
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/10/movies/small-axe-review-steve-mcqueen.html
https://www.vox.com/culture/21563837/small-axe-review-amazon-mangrove-lovers-rock-red-white-blue-mcqueen
https://www.npr.org/2020/12/10/944992387/steve-mcqueens-small-axe-tackles-the-personal-and-political
https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2020/nov/15/small-axe-review-steve-mcqueen-triumphs-with-tales-of-britains-caribbean-history
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/11/30/the-sensuality-and-brutality-of-steve-mcqueens-small-axe

xp well afaict from my twitter feed at the time, they p much did, like

My #1, primarily for "Education" and "Lover's Rock."

tv showrunners: "my tv show is actually a 10-hour movie"
movie directors: "my 6 movies are actually a tv show"

What really is a movie or a tv show when you think about it, an aesthetically-pleasing stamp collection could be either imvho

For the purposes of polls and lists, at least, I've given up on that line.

Schitt’s Creek’s transition from obscure Canadian comedy to Netflix hit is due to equal parts greater audience exposure, a willingness to embrace more complex and humanistic stories, and a deft hand at inserting modern sexuality into sitcom tropes without apology. The series closed on an up note in 2020, winning seven Emmys, leaving Eugene Levy and Catherine O’Hara in their third (fourth?) act as international stars and Dan Levy as a gay icon.

https://i.imgur.com/jzO1PTE.jpg
#11 - Schitt’s Creek (Netflix) - 100 points, 12 votes, 6 top 5 votes
best Schitt's Creek character

Trailer
Cast Conversation
Website
https://www.theatlantic.com/culture/archive/2020/01/schitts-creek-season-6-is-an-ode-to-unexpected-love/605245/
https://www.vulture.com/2020/04/schitts-creek-series-finale-recap-season-6-episode-14-happy-ending.html
https://www.advocate.com/television/2020/3/25/threesomes-marriage-kids-schitts-creek-depicts-modern-gay-couple

So overrated, likable performances and flashes of wit aside. Mostly quite badly written, and really schmaltzy. My OH loves it though.

Nah, not overrated at all. I was very very skeptical, but it was such a balm to have a sweet at heart show that was a great antidote to all the grimdark prestige bullshit. Also, killer ensemble cast.

I have some other work to do so we’re going to finish up our top 10 tomorrow.

First though, I’d like to introduce our poll runners-up. Each of the following six shows received four votes and 14 points. An additional single vote (even a last place vote!) would’ve been enough to bump any one of these into the mid-60s of our poll. With that in mind, before we hit the home stretch, here are a few misfit toys that come broadly, if perhaps somewhat less enthusiastically, recommended.

The pitch-black surrealist workplace satire Corporate started on Comedy Central at exactly the wrong moment: before CC's HBO acquisition and just after the streaming revolution, when a show without an easy VOD option simply couldn’t develop an audience. Corporate absolutely deserved better; it made the most of a stellar ensemble cast (is there a more underrated comic actor than Lance Reddick?) doing great work with subversive comedy writing and nuanced direction. Underneath the show’s veneer of loudly-professed cynical nihilism, there beat a surprisingly soft and sweet heart. The lead characters' inner struggles with depression, desire and aspiration often cut all too close. I mourn the show’s cancellation and look forward to its eventual rediscovery as a time-capsule of late 2010’s office angst.

https://i.imgur.com/0UYczsg.jpeg
RUNNER UP: Corporate (Comedy Central) - 4 votes, 14 points

Trailer
Sample Clip
Website
https://observer.com/2020/07/jake-weisman-interview-corporate-season-3-comedy-central/
https://www.indiewire.com/2020/08/corporate-comedy-cental-ending-season-3-1234582130/
https://ew.com/tv/corporate-series-finale-memorial/

In no way is Schitt's Creek (#2 on my ballot) overrated. We just discovered it last year after being stupidly put off by the (admittedly still kinda off-putting) title for way too long. And my gf is now running through it a second time, and what I've rewatched confirms that it holds up. It's definitely in my all-time pantheon of sitcoms which are both legitimately funny and legitimately emotionally involving (alongside Parks & Rec and the first five or so seasons of Roseanne).

At its peak, The Eric Andre Show was the best thing on television. Its final season was mostly a recycling of gags from earlier seasons and outtakes from Andre’s once-bootlegged and soon-to-be-re released film Bad Trip. Perhaps it’s no surprise that after seven or so hours of deathless art and nearly ten years as a GG Allin provocateur, Andre - now an honest-to-god Disney star - wasn’t entirely sure where to go from here. How do you continue to surprise your celebrity guests with dada outbursts when it’s what you’re known for? How do you produce the unexpected when that's all that anyone expects out of you? The answer, this presumably final time around, is that you don’t. You present a surprisingly maudlin victory lap where I trust everyone was well paid for their time.

https://i.imgur.com/Eb7RP1V.jpeg
RUNNER UP: The Eric Andre Show (Adult Swim) - 4 votes, 14 points

Trailer
The Finale
Making of Season 5
Website
https://www.indiewire.com/2020/10/eric-andre-show-season-5-interview-1234595546/
https://filmschoolrejects.com/the-eric-andre-show-and-the-mortifying-ordeal-of-being-known/

i love corporate so much

i guess if i had actually voted it would've placed, oops

It's not that any particular aspect of Normal People is all that unique, just that giving a season's worth of episodes over to an intimate portrayal of people having a regular old ups and downs relationship, free of any other gimmick, feels refreshingly low concept in the age of prestige tv, high concept absurdist dramas, comedies, sci-fi fantasies. It pops because it's not an exciting elevator pitch. Add to that, short episodes. In that way I do think it's one way forward as a reaction to all that noise of the content overlead, maybe setting the stage for more shows just zoning in on people's 'normal' complicated lives.

This last season of Eric Andre Show mostly only suffers in comparison to the four previous stellar seasons. Maintaining those highs indefinitely would've been a tall order, so it's probably good that he's bowing out now. Especially since Hannibal called it quits. His absence was glaring.

It's not that any particular aspect of Normal People is all that unique, just that giving a season's worth of episodes over to an intimate portrayal of people having a regular old ups and downs relationship, free of any other gimmick, feels refreshingly low concept in the age of prestige tv, high concept absurdist dramas, comedies, sci-fi fantasies. It pops because it's not an exciting elevator pitch. Add to that, short episodes. In that way I do think it's one way forward as a reaction to all that noise of the content overlead, maybe setting the stage for more shows just zoning in on people's 'normal' complicated lives.

― abcfsk

I dunno, I feel many real life relationships are more complicated, messy, absurd, funny and interesting than the one portrayed in the story, which I largely found boring and one note. Though I did watch it all.

I started watching Schitt's Creek from Season 1 during the first UK lockdown. I'd been told that it gradually improves, and this is what kept me going through Seasons 1 & 2, where I might otherwise have bailed. I thought S1 and S2 were OK, but a long way from the masterpiece that I'd been promised it would become.

For me, things started turning around midway through S3, roughly at the point that David got work at the Blouse Barn. It was around then that I introduced the show to Kevin. As soon I started watching it together with him, it became markedly more entertaining. Funny, that.

S4 was fun, S5 was even better, and by the end of S5 I basically found the whole thing endlessly hilarious. Particularly the way Moira says "baby". Well, particularly the way she says anything, really.

I'm now two episodes into S6, and loving it more than ever before.

The whole premise of the show is very relatable in certain aspects (we used to be rich, we moved to a small town, we gradually integrated), which doubtless helps.

Philip Pullman’s 1990’s young adult fantasy novel trilogy His Dark Materials appears to have struck HBO execs as ripe for harvest as a potential Potter-esque gold mine. Now in the second of its third seasons, it appears to have shown up a bit late to the cultural zeitgeist.

https://i.imgur.com/NajZpvF.jpeg
RUNNER UP: His Dark Materials (HBO) - 4 votes, 14 points

Trailer
Preview Clip
Website
https://thatshelf.com/his-dark-materials-season-2-review/
https://filmschoolrejects.com/his-dark-materials-season-2/

I dunno, I feel many real life relationships are more complicated, messy, absurd, funny and interesting than the one portrayed in the story, which I largely found boring and one note. Though I did watch it all.

― chap, 15. februar 2021 18:39

That's fine, but regardless of how you rate the show, I think most would agree it stands out a bit among the big streaming hypes - it's a simpler premise, a simpler story. And I think that appealed to a lot of people.

Michelle McNamara’s well-publicized research for her nonfiction true-crime book I’ll Be Gone in the Dark drew a great deal of attention to the Original Night Stalker (aka the Golden State Killer) cold case and may have contributed to having the investigation reopened. McNamara died before she could finish the book but her husband, the comedian Patton Oswalt, worked with a pair of writers to bring it to completion. Since McNamara’s death, a former cop was identified and arrested as the Golden State Killer and I'll Be Gone was developed into an HBO miniseries.

https://i.imgur.com/bgWPnuO.jpeg
RUNNER UP: I’ll Be Gone in the Dark (HBO) - 4 votes, 14 points

Trailer
Patton on Colbert
Website
https://www.npr.org/2020/08/03/897686876/i-ll-be-gone-in-the-dark-sheds-light-on-both-justice-and-its-pursuers
https://www.lamag.com/culturefiles/patton-oswalt-ill-be-gone-in-the-dark/

Good series; surprised it wasn't more popular, since (I think?) some other true crime made the countdown.

I like that take abcsfk

I’m deeply tempted to write up a 1000-word explainer on the rules and ethos of Only Connect and just why watching at least two episodes of this show has become a nightly ritual for me over the past month. I would include at least a full paragraph of praise for the dryly erudite and warmly generous wit of Victoria Coren Mitchell, who keeps the whole enterprise moving, and a separate chapter of frustration for the painfully British and completely unguessable soccer / snooker / cricket / darts / local street names questions. Maybe later. For the moment, I’ll just say that an ilxor promised me that if I kept watching Only Connect, I would eventually start getting better at it. I couldn’t believe that could be true but, surprise, it is!

https://i.imgur.com/4MdzmsC.jpeg
RUNNER UP: Only Connect (BBC2) - 4 votes, 14 points

Season 16, Episode 1
Bootleg YouTube Channel with whole viewable seasons
Website
https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/tvandradioblog/2016/jan/19/only-connect-the-uneasy-appeal-of-britains-hardest-quiz-show