"I don't watch a lot of TV but..." could well become a catchphrase round these parts. Here's what's kept me glued to the idiot box this year...
15. Castle
Castle isn't great TV. It's formulaic as hell. The scripts rarely get beyond workmanlike. It has none of the sparkle of Moonlighting or even Remington Steel, which it so carefully models itself on. And yet, I can't stop watching it - for two great reasons. The main one being Nathan Fillion, who - after Firefly and Dr. Horrible - I have a heckuva lot of time for. He's one of those actors who can make even the corniest of lines raise a smile, and who has more charisma in his eyebrow than I have in my whole body. And then there's the improbably named Stana Katic who's grown beyond just another unbelievably pretty American TV cop to develop actual chemistry with her goofball co-star that often goes beyond what the scriptwriters can bother to deliver. They make an engaging pair... to the point where I'm also tempted to check out Ms. Katic's previous role...
...but I just know I'd be disappointed.
I've always been a sucker for quirky detective shows and now Monk has hung up his OCD mac (though we've still to see the final series in the UK), Castle fills that gap nicely.
14. La La Land
In which guerrilla comedian Marc Wootton takes his hideous creations Gary Garner (a wannabe Jason Statham), Brendan Allen (a kamikaze documentary maker with no ideas of his own) and Shirley Ghostman (a disgraced psychic) to Hollywood... where everyone takes him far too seriously.
13. Luther
Stringer Bell escapes Baltimore and comes home to London where Idris Elba's maverick cop teams up with a cold-as-ice murderer (an inspired, nutty-as-a-fruitcake turn from Ruth Wilson) and tries to keep his job while his best friend goes mental, his wife shacks up with a one time Doctor Who, and everyone wants his badge. This show got better the more extreme it became, leading to a genuinely exciting climax. Disappointing then that the Beeb seem to committed to only two new episodes next year.
12. True Blood
A curious show in which the main characters are also the least interesting and most annoying. If True Blood was just about Sookie and Bill, I'm not sure I'd still be bothered. Fortunately Season 2 brought other characters to the fore - notably Eric, Sam, Lafayette, Jessica and Jason. If they made Jason the star, I'd watch this show forever.
11. The Trip
Sending Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon off on a tour of the north's favourite poncey restaurants could easily have been a luvvie-fest of tedious proportions. Fortunately director Michael Winterbottom had other plans, playing with our expectations of both performers, letting them riff mercilessly, and revealing unexpectedly dark and touching aspects to their "characters" in the process. At times laugh-out-loud funny, at other times really quite sweet.
10. Nurse Jackie
Like ER's wicked step-sister, this is the show that proves everything you always suspected about hospitals. The staff are sicker than the patients. Edie Falco's philandering, pill-popping, mercy killing head nurse is scarier even than a Carry On matron.
9. Justified
When The Shield wrapped, it was a dark day for fans of Walton (Shane) Goggins. Apart from an amusing turn in the otherwise woeful Predators, where would we see our favourite bad boy again? Luckily he turned up as a thorn in Timothy Olyphant's side in Justified... then went and found God and got really messed up. Olyphant in a sheriff's hat is always good value, but it's Goggins who makes this show unmissable. Glad to see he'll be back for season two.
8. Sherlock
Everything that needs to be said has already been said, far more incisively, by others. Sherlock wasn't perfect (the middle episode sagged), but it really shouldn't have worked at all. Yet Benedict Cumberbatch's ADHD Holmes and (particularly) Martin Freeman's warm everyman Watson provided essential viewing, not to mention that sly but nail-biting Moriarty cliffhanger which left us all begging for more.
7. Fringe
This was the year that Fringe finally found its feet and stepped out of the knock-off X-Files box as alternate realities went to war, fake Olivia swapped places with real Olivia, Peter (Pacey) bedded fake Olivia by accident, and Walter Bishop - always the star of the show - offered his son some typically skewed words of comfort...
"In the seventies I innocently wandered in the wrong home and it was three days before I realized my mistake. And unlike Olivia, the woman I was sharing a bed with didn't look like my wife at all."
6. 24
For my full tribute to Jack Bauer, click the link.
5. Doctor Who
Finally, everything clicked with me and New Who. Mainly due to the departure of Russell T. Davies and the stepping up of Stephen Moffat, a writer who understands both sci fi and characterisation - and actually gets the possibilities of time travel too. Credit must also go to Matt Smith. Whereas Eccleston's Doctor was a little too reluctant and Tennant's occasionally over the top, Smith pitched it just right. And then there's Karen Gillen - the least annoying Doctor Who companion since Romana... and easiest on the eye since Peri Brown.
4. This Is England '86
Part hilarious nostalgia piece, part harrowing social drama... and featuring Flip and his gang of moped-riding goons: TV idiots of the year.
3. Mad Men
How could Mad Men top the assassination of JFK? Easy, by getting Don and Peggy to work through the night on a campaign while Don's world fell apart around him. Best single episode of any show this year - though the rest wasn't too shabby either.
RIP, Mrs. Blankenship.
2. Lost
It was never going to please everybody, but the Lost finale satisfied me, wrapping up enough of the mysteries, answering enough of the questions, and managing to give even long-dead characters a happy ending... of sorts. Plus, Sawyer got away. That'll do me.
1. House
House beat everything else for me this year, though admittedly I have been catching up. Season 6, starting with House in the loony bin, was the best yet... and while Season 7 (House in love!) isn't quite up to that standard, that's only because I'm scared that a happy House cannot last... and I care so much about this character, I really don't want to see him hurt any more.
Hugh Laurie is the highest paid TV star in the world? Hugh Laurie!?
Deservedly so.
