What TVLine Is Thankful For (2017)
thankful-for-big-little-lies
Dave Nemetz Is Thankful for...
WOMEN TAKING CHARGE IN FRONT OF AND BEHIND THE CAMERA
2017 was TV's Year of the Woman, with the best and funniest shows putting female characters in the spotlight — and often with women writers and directors behind the scenes, too. Big Little Lies, The Handmaid's Tale, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, Insecure, the final season of Girls, Claws, FEUD: Bette and Joan... all of these portrayed women's struggles and triumphs with admirable nuance, and helped broaden TV's storytelling canvas in a way that was, frankly, long overdue.
thankful-for-elisabeth-moss
Dave Nemetz Is Thankful for...
ELISABETH MOSS GRACING MY TV
Most actresses would turn in a performance like Moss' riveting, soul-baring work as Offred in Hulu's The Handmaid's Tale — a role that won the Mad Men veteran her first Emmy — and then take a well-deserved vacation. But that wasn't enough for Moss: She was also stunning in her second go-around as Australian detective Robin Griffin in Sundance's taut miniseries sequel Top of the Lake: China Girl. This year, truly, Moss was boss.
Lovers Getaway
Ryan Schwartz Is Thankful for...
A LACKLUSTER FALL TV SEASON
#PeakTV can be overwhelming — even if you don't cover it for a living. But as someone who does, I'm eternally grateful to the broadcast networks this fall, who clearly came together and made the collective decision to give my already bloated DVR a rest by filling their airwaves with such dreck as 9JKL and Marvel's Inhumans.
thankful-for-riverdale
Vlada Gelman Is Thankful for...
RIVERDALE'S DARK TURN
Yes, yes, the CW drama was famously pitched as a dark take on the classic Archie comics, but it felt like the show was holding back in Season 1. Well, not anymore! In its sophomore run, the series has embraced an even darker mystery, upped the twisted family dynamics and finally given Archie a proper storyline, promoting Riverdale to the pantheon of truly addictive and engrossing teen dramas.
Late Night with Seth Meyers - Season 5
Ryan Schwartz Is Thankful for...
JON STEWART'S TRUE LATE-NIGHT HEIR
Sorry, Trevor Noah. Ever since Trump's inaugration, it's been Seth Meyers and his funny-yet-informative "Closer Look" segments that best resemble the caliber of work Stewart was doing on The Daily Show.
Si Vis Pacem, Para Bellum
Dave Nemetz Is Thankful for...
STELLAR DISCOVERY
The first Trek TV series in a dozen years had a lot to live up to. But somehow, CBS All Access' Star Trek: Discovery has soared so far, filling that Trek-sized void in my heart with an engaging mix of brainy science and gee-whiz space battles. There are still some storytelling kinks to work out — yes, the Klingons — but nine episodes in, Discovery's maiden voyage has surprised and delighted this lifelong Trekkie.
Timeless - Season 1
Vlada Gelman Is Thankful for...
TIMELESS' UNCANCELLATION
The highly entertaining NBC drama was the best of last season's many new time-travel offerings, yet the network pulled the plug on it after a wallop of a finale cliffhanger. Then just days later, like a plot out of the time-hopping series, the top brass rewrote history and renewed the show for a second season. And thank goodness they did, because I was looking into acquiring a real time machine to right some network wrongs.
American Ninja Warrior - Season 9
Vlada Gelman Is Thankful for...
THE NINJA WARRIOR FRANCHISE
I've become somewhat desensitized to scripted plot twists, but I gasp and yell at my TV on the regular while watching American Ninja Warrior and its offshoots. The reality competition programs feature some of the best shocks and "OMG!" moments on television, because you never know how the difficult course will treat even the most experienced athletes. But more than the element of surprise, it's the competitors' camaraderie, emotional stories and pure love of the sport that keeps me coming back for one of TV's most fun, feel-good hours.
thankful-for-sweet-vicious
Vlada Gelman Is Thankful for...
SWEET/VICIOUS' EXISTENCE (BRIEF AS IT WAS)
Imagine if this ballsy MTV series about two female college students who become vigilantes against sexual assaulters had premiered in the past month. Oh, how different the show's future might have been... Alas, it was cancelled in April after just one short season. But the brave, emotional and darkly comedic story of rape survivor Jules and her partner-in-takedowns Ophelia left an indelible impression for which I will forever be grateful.
thankful-for-exorcist
Kim Roots Is Thankful for...
THE EXORCIST'S SPOOKY-GOOD SEASON 2
Not a ton of you are watching Fox's frighteningly good supernatural drama, and that's a shame, because it means you're missing out on one of TV's best partnerships: Ben Daniels' Marcus and Alfonso Herrera's Tomas. The two holy men, first paired to vanquish the Rance family's demons in Season 1, are now on very unfamiliar ground: Journeyman exorcist Marcus is excommunicated and feeling abandoned by God, while talented neophyte Tomas opened the door to demons entering his mind and is having a really hard time closing it. They argue. They plot. They wield crucifixes and dodge projectile vomit as they race to free a foster family from a demon's influence. And, in a way the show is still exploring, Tomas and Marcus love each other deeply. In short, Herrera and Daniels are doing very interesting work, and you should watch. The power of TVLine compels you!
thankful-for-halt-and-catch-fire
Ryan Schwartz Is Thankful for...
HALT AND CATCH FIRE'S FINAL INSTALL
AMC would have been justified had it sentenced this gem to a Blue Screen of Death after any one of its first three low-rated seasons — and yet it was blessed with a proper farewell run. It culminated in a beautiful series finale focused not on the technology that the central quartet of Joe, Cameron, Donna and Gordon (R.I.P.!) had helped create, but how it allowed them to grow as people and build everlasting connections over the course of 40 remarkable episodes.
thankful-for-master-of-none
Ryan Schwartz Is Thankful for...
A MASTER-FUL ENCORE
My expectations for Season 2 of Master of None were unreasonably high — and Aziz Ansari exceeded all of them. The show took more risks in its return, such as an all black-and-white premiere inspired by the classic Italian film Bicycle Thieves, and an episode exploring New York's varied cultures. But best of all was the Emmy-winning "Thanksgiving," based on Lena Waithe's real-life coming-out experience, as told through her character Denise.
Midnight, Texas - Season 1
Kim Roots Is Thankful for...
MIDNIGHT SNACKS
Think back to Buffy the Vampire Slayer's first season, when the special effects were a little rough and the show wasn't quite what it would eventually become: What drew you in were the relationships among the Scoobies. I get a lot of the same feel from another genre show, NBC's Midnight Texas, which also chronicles a group of supernaturally enhanced friends on a mission to fight evil. Did the hellspawn that Manfred & Co. battled look impressive? Usually not. Did the show very clearly have to work around what was likely a dwindling FX budget as the freshman season progressed? Oh yeah, totally. But was I sucked into caring about Manfred, Fiji, Bobo, Olivia, Lem, Joe, Creek, the Rev. and even that sulky talking cat? You bet your Mr. Snuggly I was, thanks to the strong ensemble work put forth by the cast.
thankful-for-outlander
Kimberly Roots Is Thankful for...
OUTLANDER'S VERY MEANINGFUL MOMENT
I first read Voyager, the Diana Gabaldon novel in which Jamie and Claire Fraser reunite after decades apart, in the late 1990s. I have spent far too many waking moments since then imagining how that touching, complicated and — let's just say it — verra sexy moment would unfold on screen. Then, in this season of the Starz adaptation, it did. GLORIOUSLY. Nearly every expectation I had for Claire's homecoming was met, from Jamie's graceful fainting at the press to their afterglowy pillow talk. What a bonny treat for longtime fans, made by longtime fans.
thankful-for0teen-dramas
Andy Swift Is Thankful for...
NEVER-ENDING TEEN FRANCHISES
You'd think that after eight seasons of The Vampire Diaries, seven of Pretty Little Liars and six of Teen Wolf that I'd be ready to bid all three teen franchises adieu in 2017 — but you'd be wrong, which is why I flash a Grinch-like smile at any mention of a Hope-centric Originals spinoff, Freeform's upcoming Pretty Little Liars: The Perfectionists, and whatever Teen Wolf podcast nonsense MTV has cooking up.
thankful-for-flash
Matt Webb Mitovich Is Thankful for....
THE FLASH BEING FUN AGAIN
Throughout the battle with steely Savitar and knowing the grim (and often-revisited) fate that awaited Iris, Season 3 of the superhero drama got superdark. And while Season 4 perhaps is indulging in, say, 20 percent too much Ralph too fast, the lighter overall touch is greatly welcome, from "WestAllen" oversharing with the therapist to Cisco/Gypsy dating misadventures to hysterically malfunctioning speed suit upgrades.
thankful-for-tv-kids
Matt Webb Mitovich Is Thankful for...
WELL-CAST KIDS
Having suffered from 10 too many Leos-from-Smash and Zachs-from-The Strain in recent years, it's been a relief to welcome the generation of engaging, never-affected young actors currently populating series such as Stranger Things, This Is Us (in flashback roles as critical as the present timeline) and now Marvel's Runaways. One bad apple could ruin any of these bunches, and yet everyone is a peach.
thankful-for-wwhl
Andy Swift Is Thankful for...
WATCH WHAT HAPPENS LIVE
On what other late-night talk show can you commiserate over the state of our country with Joy Behar and Rosie O'Donnell one night, then watch host Andy Cohen judge a drag queen contest the next? (No, wait, that was the same night.)
KEVIN MCKIDD
Michael Ausiello Is Thankful for...
GREY'S ANATOMY GETTING OUT OF THE HOSPITAL
I have no idea how much it cost ABC to send the Grey's cast to Seattle this past August for a week's worth of on-location shooting, but, whatever the sum, it was money very well spent. The exteriors — which were spread throughout all eight of this fall's episodes — opened up the increasingly claustrophobic hospital drama while also reminding us of the series' sumptuous Pacific Northwest setting.
thankful-for-jimmy-kimmel
Michael Ausiello is Thankful for...
A SOCIALLY CONSCIOUS JIMMY KIMMEL
Whether appealing for affordable health care in the wake of his son's medical crisis or pleading for sensible gun control following the Las Vegas shooting, Kimmel used his powerful Jimmy Kimmel Live platform for good and made 2017 slightly less of a nightmare in the process.
thankful-for-prison-break
Matt Webb Mitovich Is Thankful for....
REVIVALS OVER REBOOTS
Because I will always take Wentworth Miller and Dominic Purcell staging another acceptably ridiculous Prison Break, Eric McCormack and Debra Messing cracking wise as Will & Grace and Gillian Anderson and David Duchovny diving back into The X-Files over any newfangled, millennial-ized reboot that slowly but surely wrecks my childhood. Always.
thankful-for-gifted
Matt Webb Mitovich Is Thankful for....
THE LITTLE THINGS
If I can get a bit granular and even "inside baseball" here, upgrades that have saved my withering sanity this TV season include a brand-new Sony Soundbar audio system (to better salvage muffled dialogue from my poorly-compressed CW feed and thus ease my closed-captioning crutch)... coughing up a few extra pennies for ad-free Hulu (making Quote of the Week screen grabs far, far less of a chore)... and a significant uptick in networks providing semi-regular screeners for shows such as Arrow, The Flash and The Gifted (and in doing so freeing up my evenings a bit).
thankful-for-amy-sedaris
Andy Swift Is Thankful for...
AT HOME WITH AMY SEDARIS
TruTV's twisted DIY show is the perfect remedy after digesting a week's worth of grim headlines. From Sedaris' ridiculous crafts (if you ever accidentally cut off your finger tips, simply replace them with the tops of peanut shells) to her A-plus guest stars (Colbert! Meloni! Dratch!), this show is a mindless-yet-brilliant delight.
thankful-for-roseanne
Michael Ausiello Is Thankful for...
ROSEANNE'S REVISIONIST HISTORY
I'm all for throwing continuity out the window when the details in question suck, so I was ecstatic to learn that ABC's forthcoming Roseanne revival would completely ignore all the dumb stuff (i.e. Dan's death, Jackie's coming out, the birth of Jerry Garcia, etc.) that happened in the series' creatively calamitous final seasons. I have no clue if these nine new episodes will be any good, but this welcome bit of canon-cleansing bodes very well.
thankful-for-will-grace-revival
Michael Ausiello Is Thankful for...
THESE FOUR GOOFBALLS
It's kind of amazing that Will & Grace got resurrected in the first place, but for the NBC comedy to return at the top of its game is nothing short of miraculous. Every new, uproarious episode feels like a gift from the TV Gods and for chrissakes I deserve some nice presents for a change.
The Good Place - Season 2
Dave Nemetz Is Thankful for...
NBC'S OLD-SCHOOL THURSDAY NIGHT COMEDY BLOCK
Who says Must-See TV is dead? For the first time in years, the Peacock network aired four solid sitcoms back-to-back on Thursdays this fall — Superstore, The Good Place, Will & Grace and Great News — and we were loving the throwback vibes. Special kudos go out to The Good Place, throwing big twists and bigger laughs at us in its sophomore season, and the criminally underrated Great News, with its whip-smart, 30 Rock-style banter.
thankful-for-ravens-home
Andy Swift Is Thankful for...
RAVEN'S HOME
Sure, there's a heavy nostalgia element to this spinoff/revival of Disney Channel's That's So Raven (2003–2007), but once you strip that away, you're left with a genuinely funny family comedy with lots of heart. And psychics. Let's not forget about all the psychics.