In the spirit of largely unnecessary, solipsistic best-of lists, I’d like to humbly present GAMbIT’s list of the best and worst of TV this year. It was a damn good year for television, and as such I was unable to get to everything, which brings me to a very important point: The Knick is not here. The Knick absolutely would have been here, had I finished it in time (I was trying to do so before posting, but couldn’t manage it). I don’t need to tell you exactly why I’m just now catching up on the show, but rest assured this whole list has a giant asterisk next to it, an asterisk shaped like Clive Owen’s face. Anyway, before we get started, let’s indulge in some yearbook-style superlatives.
Best surprise: Halt and Catch Fire, season two. Who saw this coming? AMC’s 1980s-set tech drama stunned everyone this summer with confident, gutsy storytelling. Lee Pace in particular really came into his own, as he shed Joe MacMillan’s Don Draper Lite persona that prevented HaCF’s first season from excelling. In the process, Joe became one of TV’s strangest, most compelling villains. (Runner-up for Best Surprise: “The Truth” episode of Wayward Pines. The intake of air you heard was the sound of thousands of critics reconsidering the whole show.)
Worst surprise: The Walking Dead, season 6A. After a fantastic string of episodes, The Walking Dead painted itself into a corner – or maybe under a dumpster – with how badly it botched the mystery surrounding Glenn’s apparent death. Not only was his survival an inexcusable narrative contrivance, but it cost the show an amount of goodwill that will be nigh-impossible to regain. On a show where seemingly no one was safe (with the obvious exception of Daryl), Glenn’s survival showed that the stakes have been lowered dramatically. The only people killed in the first half of the season were disposable Alexandrians, and the show’s newfound attachment to its core cast has rendered it somewhat toothless. Is anyone really scared of Negan anymore? I mean, except for maybe Heath?
Best addition to a cast: Richard Armitage as Francis Dolarhyde in Hannibal, obviously (more on him later). Also Lars Mikkelsen as Russian president Viktor Petrov in House of Cards – Mikkelsen’s presence alone elevated HoC’s lackluster third season.
Worst addition to a cast: the Sand Snakes in Game of Thrones. GoT’s fifth season was uneven from the get-go, and nowhere is that better exemplified than in Oberyn Martell’s trio of bastard daughters, favorites of book readers, who absolutely failed to live up to the hype. In combat they were slow and unengaging, and their storyline, which held so much promise, fizzled out anticlimactically.
Best character on a bad show: Chad Radwell, Scream Queens. Ryan Murphy, with Scream Queens, tried to mix horror and comedy, but screwed up the formula often enough to wind up with camp. But for all the show’s faults, it did give us Glen Powell’s pitch-perfect performance as Chad, head of the Dickie Dollar Scholars, budding necrophiliac, and packing enthusiast. Powell took the show and ran with it, and even when Scream Queens indulged its worst tendencies, any scene with Chad was guaranteed to be fun – and sometimes even a little scary.