Look at that title!  Not too big a task now is it?  All daunting feelings aside, a list must be made and in order to try and organize decades of quality televised drama, so must some rules be laid down.

First, no pay cable.  It’s just unfair.  HBO and the like have bigger budgets, fewer restrictions, more time to shoot, access to better sets, equipment etc. etc.  Networks are outgunned and this list is going to be about networks.  Second, a show must have run more than two seasons.  All greatness should have the time to screw it up too.  Third, I’m cutting out science fiction.  Yes, Battlestar Galactica (except the finale) was amazing and X-Files is a classic, but I’m looking for pure dramas or else this list is gonna look like a Star Trek convention.

This goes for fantasy as well.  Sorry Buffy!  Finally, I had to have watched it.  Now, I’m young, but I’ve seen a lot of TV so don’t fret Perry Mason fans, it was in the running.

5. thirtysomething

Any show that made me cry deserves to be here.  thirtysomething was such an impressive collection of plots, I connected to it even as a young teenager.  At times a little melodramatic, for the most part this show gave a voice to a previously unexplored demographic, injecting humanity into the struggle for an identity as a baby boomer with 1960′s radical roots.  This cast equals gold.

4. Bonanza

Of all the great westerns on television, none of them connected to such a wide variety of viewers as the Cartwrights living and learning at the Ponderosa.  In its 14 seasons, Bonanza only failed to crack the top 5 in ratings three times.  Tackling every social, political, and controversial topic of the day with down home wisdom, Bonanza remains one of the  most uplifting and positive portrayals of a family ever televised.

3. Northern Exposure

At a busy time in my life, only one show kept me up past my bed time.   This slice of heaven was about a culturally diverse town working together to survive in a small Alaskan hamlet as told through the eyes of a fish out of water big city doctor.  It was a poetic and often comedic parable about acceptance and featured the ever quotable receptionist Marilyn.  Oh she didn’t talk much, but when she did, look out.  Voted Outstanding Drama Series at the Emmy’s in 1992, Northern Exposure is a home run of writing and performance.

2. Columbo

What I love about Columbo is they show you the crime in the beginning.  They show you the murderer and the weapon, sometimes addressing things vaguely, but you get the big picture.  So, as each episode progresses (most were two parters) it becomes not about the big reveal, but the process of the character of Columbo peeling back the onion to expose the truth.  And it is Peter Falk’s portrayal of the title character that lifts the show into the stratosphere.  Don’t be fooled by his disheveled look or bumbling speech patterns, Columbo is the smartest detective in the history of your living room.

1. Gilmore Girls

Yep, go ahead.  Throw those stones.  Sling that mud.  I’m ready and willing to take it for one of the best examples of episodic writing I’ve ever seen.  If you didn’t watch the Loreleis, if you thought you were too cool for such a girly show, you missed out.  Creator Amy Sherman-Palladino sculpted a magical world trapped in a small town and handed it over to an ensemble of the absurd.  Armed with dialog sharper than Excalibur, the citizens of Stars Hollow brought me endless joy over the Gilmore Girls’ 7 seasons, not to mention Sebastian Bach as Gil!  I’m sure this is a controversial number one, but I love, love this show.

Honorable Mention

C.S.I.: Great show, very popular, but I’ve got a thing about bodies and death and such.  However, if there ever was a show that could get me to watch dead folks, it’d be this one.  Especially that furries and plushies episode!