The 20 Best TV “Scenes” of the Year might be more a more comprehensive of the year’s best TV, but this smaller list of Ten will still give you a great sampling of shows to try.
Runner-Up: Another Period is too easy to dismiss as a Comedy Central odd duck, but this series—-a mockumentary mix of Downton Abbey and The Kardashians—-was surprisingly good, especially in the episode “Pageant,” which featured hilarious send-ups of beauty standards, competition on physical appearance (the pageant also includes cabbages and babies), the rich buying their way into something meaningless while the poor can barely buy food, and Jack Black as a hilariously second-rate emcee.
Can’t Pick Just One Episode: South Park’s creatively revitalized last season had hilarious send-ups of avoiding reality (“Safespace” episode), obnoxiously sanctimonious PC culture (“Stunning and Brave” aka the only correct answer for what you think about Kaitlyn Jenner), hypocritical attitudes towards cops (“Naughty Ninjas”), fear mongering against immigrants (“Where My Country Gone?”), and a Matrix-esque recurring plot that finds advertisements taking the form of people. There’s just too many strong individual episodes to pick one, and that’s a great problem to have.
Can’t Pick Just One…Part Two: One of the most unjustly ignored series of 2015 was “Man Seeking Woman” which happens to be the most consistently inventive comedy on TV. The surrealistic, masterful standalone episodes involved Cupid hooking up our dork hero with Minka Kelly, a couple getting surgically attached at the hip, and a season finale that involves time traveling to prevent a break-up only to discover that getting back the one you want may be worse than not getting them back (Oscar Wilde may have been on to something).
10. Better Call Saul episode “Five-O” a.k.a the one where we finally learn the backstory for hitman Mike. The exact moment when this spin-off series transitioned from “good” to “great.”
9. Fargo episode “The Gift of the Magi” because it features Ronald Reagan’s visit at a time when a bloody mafia war between Big Business and a mom and pop crime outfit is piling up bodies, and hero cop Lou is letting the violence (and his wife’s cancer) get to him. The opening scene has Reagan giving a “heartfelt” speech about America that makes even Nick Offerman’s cynical conspiracy theorist cry. But when Lou asks Reagan for guidance in dealing with his wife’s cancer, he gives him phony “inspiration” that rings hollow. It’s a perfect allegory for 1979, when the world felt like it was spiraling into chaos and the corporate sharks ushered in “stability” in the guise of Reagan’s optimism.
8. The Knick season two finale “This is All We Are” despite containing the year’s single best scene, a shocker that you won’t soon forget, it also contains great new plotlines for all the series main characters. What strikes you about The Knick’s early 1900s doctors is how compelled they are by their own ideologies whether it’s the dangerous pull of new surgical discoveries (Thackery) or black consciousness (Algernon) or Dr. Gallinger’s racial superiority theory that the finale alludes he’s bringing to Europe. [I.E. lookout for Nazis.]
7. Nathan For You okay so this is cheating somewhat because I think all his season three episodes were really strong, but especially the ones that featured only one plotline for the entire episode like “Smokers Allowed” where he helps a bar skirt California’s indoor smoking ban by staging a hilariously mundane “play.” Still, the best two are probably “Electronics Store” where he begins by trying to help a small business outwit Best Buy but this plan spirals into an insane moment where people are possibly willing to enter a room with an alligator to get a free flat-screen TV, and then “The Hero” with a set-up that’s too good to reveal. As always, it’s Nathan’s all-out, elaborate dedication that truly impresses.
6. The Leftovers episode “Off Ramp” which finds mother/son team Laurie and Tom trying to pull members away from their former cult The Guilty Remnant even as they both struggle to fully leave its easy answers behind themselves. It’s a shockingly great episode built on characters we don’t really care about—-neither Tom nor Laurie were really a big factor in season 1 and the rest of the main cast has moved to a different town at this point—-that makes us care about them by building standout scenes around encounters with the cult that are genuinely frightening (Liv Tyler as a cult leader makes a memorably scary introduction) and thrilling (Laurie finally running over two members who keep stalking her or standing down one of them that interrupts her meeting). When they discover that they can’t take away these people’s cult without replacing it with something—-by way of a heartbreaking exile’s car crash suicide—-Tom starts a new, gentle religion with him as the new prophet. In this ending scene, we are probably seeing how every religion in the world got started. Deep stuff for a show that only recently became worth watching.
5. Game of Thrones season five finale “Mother’s Mercy.” Most “Thrones” season finales just tie up or introduce plot-lines like some abacus tallying things up, but this one felt freed from that format with genuinely exciting sequences involving Stannis’ last stand, Sansa’s escape from her captors (while killing a loathsome one), a dragon far from home, and Jon Snow possibly getting stabbed to death in a huge cliffhanger. Still, the best scene was once-mighty-queen Cersei Lannister getting stripped naked—-in every sense—-and forced to walk through the streets as puritanical rabble spit on her or shame her. Sure, Cersei is horrible and she did help create this ISIS stand-in solely to hurt her daughter-in-law (when will secular governments learn you can’t control religious terrorists?) but this is still one of the most unsettling scenes of the year. You’ll come this close to actually feeling sorry for one of the worst humans still breathing on this series.
4. Vikings episode “To the Gates” is almost entirely a battle sequence as the Vikings try to invade the city of Paris. It’s full of “wow” moments that could stand apart as their own episodes, like Floki being trapped inside a flaming structure outside the battle, questioning why the Gods have abandoned him, a side plot that could almost be a stand-alone play. Then there’s Ragnar’s fall off the wall and near death right as he gets to see inside the walls for the first time. This is the single best episode of the year that isn’t a series finale.
And now for our series finales…
3. Getting On series finale “Reduced to Eating Boiled Magazines and Book Paste” is here mostly because it’s a terrific finale to a show I love and will miss.
2. Parenthood series finale “May God Bless and Keep You Always” is almost perfect. The final montage showing what they’re all doing in the future set to the show’s theme song “Forever Young” is what the finale of Parks and Rec wanted to be. Even if half the characters annoyed the hell out of me, this series deserved a lot more attention than it ever got.
1. Justified series finale “The Promise” is perfect. There’s a reason this has been routinely listed as the best series finale of the year. It had action, comedy, suspense, a duel, heartbreak, and fantastic performances. You don’t expect a show like “Justified” to have one of the most emotional scenes of the year, but the final one between friends/enemies/soul-brothers Raylan and Boyd is just that. The most satisfying series finale since the late-00s golden age of The Wire/Brotherhood/The Shield ended.