Top 10 TV Shows of the Decade

1. Arrested Development

Smart and funny, Arrested Development is the best show of the decade. When Bluth patriarch George Sr. is arrested for fraud, son Michael is forced to keep the wealthy family under control as they face bankruptcy.

Filled with jokes with callbacks, gags, forshadowing and the just plain absurd, the writers and actors of Arrested Development revel in the reflexive and postmodern. Never before did a show reward a regular viewer with such rich looping jokes and near-catchphrases as AD.

The characters are equally as absurd. Michael's brother GOB(George Oscar Bluth) is a self-absorbed magician illusionist who sometimes employs the use of a racist puppet named Franklin Delano Bluth(a parody of Roosevelt Franklin). Tobias Funke(pronounce "fyoon-kay"), Michael's brother-in-law, is a therapist-turned-failed actor who has a rare fear of being naked in front of anyone(he wears cut-offs underneath his clothing) and is oblivious to his own homosexual tendencies and malapropisms.

Above all else, Arrested Development was a show that respected it's audience, no matter how many of them were watching. It's a miracle in and of itself that it made it through three seasons.

It was the story of a wealthy family and the one son who had no choice but to keep them all together.

That's Arrested Development.

2. The Wire

Baltimore is a big city, seemingly separated by many facets of the town. What began as a fair depiction of the drug trade in the first season, The Wire slowly expanded, each season showcasing another chapter of Baltimore's institutions. The school system, the newspaper, the unions, even the drug dealers all dealing with how the corrupt and immoral prey upon the smallest of the small.

In The Wire, there is rarely a happy ending. Characters you come to know and respect and sympathize with get murdered in cold blood. For the most part, the show is like a modern Greek tragedy(with the occasional addition of very, very dark humor). Each part of the city will end up faltering due to corruption and these characters are forced to deal with their own lot in life.

Rooted in redemption, The Wire treats us to a realistic look at urban life, sociopolitical themes and the human condition of the both the immoral and the quiet heroes who always try to make a difference

3. Mad Men

There is not much to say with these shows higher up that everyone hasn't already said, but I'm gonna try anyways.

Mad Men is a period piece. It's the story of an ad agency in the 1960s and of adman Don Draper's life in and out of the office. While most period pieces only use the time as a basis for "hey, remember when this happened?" moments, Mad Men simply treats the time as a background. An age where men could smoke at work and the only women in the office were secretaries. The characters of Mad Men are simply riding the time, unaware of the storm of change about to come crashing down on them.

One of the great things about Mad Men is how the show plays out like a film of that era. Long tense silences appear throughout episodes, cameras pan and will hold on a single shot forever. All this only makes the show feel more like something legitimately coming from the era.

So many shows paint the '60s as the mystical era where hippies ruled the land, but there were real people, facing the sudden changes around them. Still clueless of what's to come.

4. 30 Rock

Sometimes life is unfair, sometimes Arrested Developments will always be cancelled and replaced with a reality show. Sometimes, though, life can be great. Back when it started, Tina Fey's 30 Rock, a show about a behind-the-scenes look at a sketch comedy show on NBC, was thought to fail when against Aaron Sorkin's Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, a show about a behind-the-scenes look at a sketch comedy show on NBC.

Thankfully, Studio 60 will probably end up lost in this decade and the three-time Best Comedy award winner 30 Rock is in the middle of it's fourth awesome season. Unlike Futurama or Arrested Development, there aren't a bunch of callback or loop around jokes, it's a one-stop sight gag and joke factory(ie. a line about intelligent writing segues into a joke about a robot with "too many farts in it"). The amount of gags come fast through each episode as Fey's Liz Lemon tries to keep control of the show's delusional stars, deal with her overbearing boss and make sense of the friendly, Southern NBC page.

Also there's a man named Dr. Spaceman.

5. Futurama

"Space: it seems to go on and on forever and then you get to the end and the gorilla starts throwing barrels at you."

The first words spoken in Futurama reflect the entirety of the show: awe-inspiring sci-fi dialogue broken apart by humor. When pizza delivery boy Fry gets accidentally cryogenically frozen, he ends up in the year 3000. There, he makes friends with an alcoholic robot and a one-eyed alien and ends up working for his(great-great-etc.) nephew's universal delivery service.

Most science-fiction shows either present a utopia or a dystopia, Futurama gave us the city of New New York. Built on top of Old New York, NNY is just a slightly more futuristic. Sure, there are pneumatic tubes, rocketships, robots and suicide booths, but there's still weirdos roaming the streets(although now its just aliens), there's still a pest problems(owls now instead of pigeons or rats). New New York is barely new.

Futurama, as a science-fiction show, always had it's share of scientific and mathematic references, but they never hold it above the audience's heads. Even if they do, jokes about the sum of two cubes frequently share space with slapstick and lowbrow humor. Futurama isn't just about comedy, the depth of the writing is so deep that number of major events culminated in the episode "The Why of Fry," where multiple episodes get called back and it becomes revealed that Fry's freezing was not an accident.

Oh, they also made some sad episodes that were really sad.

6. Freaks and Geeks

Judd Apatow's reign of benevolence as Hollywood's King of Comedy began here. Creator Paul Feig devised a show based on his own experience as a nerd in high school back in the early 80s and with it came the greatest teen drama to ever take itself halfway seriously.

A show featuring "what high school was like for the rest of us," it focused on the titular freaks and geeks of McKinley High School in Michigan, primarily told through Sam Weir(a geek) and his older sister, Lindsay(a freak, formerly a "mathlete" geek). Setting it in the early 80s gave way to an excellent soundtrack putting it in its classic rock time period as well as getting rid of the problems of trying to write for modern teenagers. Imagine people in their early 30s getting to accurately write what its like to be a teen! In its one and only season, Freaks and Geeks managed to capture the tribulations of being a teenager in that or any time.

7. Metalocalypse/The Venture Bros./Tim and Eric Awesome Show Great Job!
The world's most popular metal band, a bitter boy adventurer and his sons, a cast of freakish characters, usually played by the same two people. There's nothing too similar between these three things, but Adult Swim's three best shows prove that late night, non-Comedy Central programming can be excellent.

Metalocalypse concerns Dethklok, the world's most popular metal band. So popular that the world's economy pretty much depends on them. Each member of the band is childish, obnoxious and obsessed with anything and everything "brutal." Many of their concerts end in an array of violence and destruction, caused usually by their own ineptitude. Past the incredible violence comes excellent comedic writing as the five members constantly bicker or generally act like dildos, completely unaware of the secret government facility monitoring them, afraid they will fulfill the ancient prophecy of the "Metalocalypse."

Rusty Venture was once a great boy adventurer, following his father Jonas Venture on his amazing adventures. Today, however, he is a bitter super-scientist living in his father's shadow and having to deal with a butterfly-themed arch-nemesis while his two sons try to solve mysteries or live the life of boy adventurers. For a show that airs on basic cable at midnight, The Venture Brothers is one of the most expertly crafted shows currently on television. Episodes mocking animated action shows from the 60s, references to 80s new wave bands, as well characters that include a hydrocephalic midget quiz champion, a dictator with a metal bottom jaw and a homosexual Sean Connery-alike all bound about in this masterful animated tribute to sadness and failure.

Tim and Eric love making you feel awkward. They achieve this via a sketch comedy show filled with public TV mockeries. Characters like squealy enzyme-ridden Casey Tatum, dazed news reporter Dr. Steve Brule(played by John C. Reilly) and Tim and Eric themselves present some strange world where hilariously poor editing and(sometimes) intentionally poor acting hide a brilliantly odd sense of surrealist humor that frequently cross the realm of what should and shouldn't be funny.

8. The Office (UK/US)

The show that made it okay for humor to be dangerously awkward, both versions of The Office present life in a small paper company, shown through the eyes of a documentary crew. The boss is an insufferable goofball who would rather be friends with everyone there than be a decent leader. His second-in-command is a sycophantic salesman with delusions of grandeur. Another salesman and the office receptionist are partners-in-crime, plotting pranks on the humorless pencil pusher and frequently facing romantic tension.

Focusing in on the humiliating, awkward and tense, The Office found a way to make you squirm in your seat while laughing at the white-collar boredom and frustration boiling to the surface of the mid-level business. It would almost seem tragic if it wasn't so damn funny.

9. Curb Your Enthusiasm

In real life, Larry David is a slightly neurotic comedy writer, co-creating the beloved 90s sitcom Seinfeld and helming this HBO gem.

In the realm of Curb Your Enthusiasm, Larry David is a terrible man. A crotchety, obnoxious comedy writer who co-created Seinfeld. It's not just about that man who's driven by his own low self-esteem and overinflated ego. His wife, his agent and best friend, his agent's wife all must suffer with this bag of neuroses. Even his Hollywood friends, who are almost as selfish as he is, can't stand him.

Larry David is a rotten prick who we want to punch in the face. And he's the guy we're supposed to be rooting for.

10. Yo Gabba Gabba!

Sometime in the late 90s, children's television had this weird boom. Bland, educational television soon turned into brightly colored, wild shows that happened to appeal to children. Average art or characters turned into avant-garde art that would, on occasion, appear really freaky. While shows like Spongebob Squarepants started the trend and shows like Flapjack keep it going, Yo Gabba Gabba! perfected the absurd blend of insane and educational.

Created by Christian Jacobs, lead singer of superhero ska band, The Aquabats, Yo Gabba Gabba! is a candyland of pastels used to draw children in and crazy characters to keep them in. Strange full bodied costumed characters jump around and sing about standard edutainment fare like sharing and crap like that, but considering the show's creator is a musician, many of the songs are catchy and fun to listen to.

The show has a following not only among young kids, but many college-age students watch and enjoy as well. Well beyond the trippy visuals, the show is a hotbed of indie appeal. The Shins, Shiny Toy Guns and Of Montreal have all performed on the show. Biz Markie teaches kids to beatbox. Mark Mothersbaugh of Devo teaches kids how to draw various items. "Milk and Cheese" creator Evan Dorkin designed the animated segment "Super Martian Robot Girl." Looking back on the decade there is no show stranger than Yo Gabba Gabba! And this show was for kids.