Highly Rated TV Shows All Time: The list of good TV shows with a high (not lower than eight) rating could start with our favorite “Friends”, “KYAVVM”, “Clinic” or fed up with “Game of Thrones”. Top 20 Highly Rated TV Shows.
But why take the easy path of cultism – let’s talk about projects of the XXI century, which were easy to miss for “Stranger Things” and “Sherlock”.
Highly Rated TV Shows All Time
TV shows from this list were not talked about in every second smoking room, the heroes from here were not stamped with memes in public, and many shows from the top were modestly and proudly passed by the mass audience, with the hope that he would someday turn after them. The moment has come.
20. Ann (2017 – 2019, Netflix, Canada)
Genre: Drama
Creators: Moira Wally-Beckett, Nicky Caro (“The Zoo Keeper’s Wife”, new “Mulan”)
Episodes: 27 (3 seasons, episode – 60 minutes)
Cast: Amy Beth McNulty, Geraldine James
Movie Rating Search: 8 .6
IMDb rating: 8.7
A touching family drama in the spirit of Jane Eyre (by the way, the title of each episode is the title of chapters from Bronte’s novel) and Pride and Prejudice. The main character here is also a well-read and stubborn girl who values her freedom and dignity above all else. Anne is thirteen and, like her “friends” from the English classics, she found herself in a difficult situation: the girl has lost her parents and lives in an orphanage.
But soon Ann smiles with luck: a mistake in the papers gives the teenager a chance to live again in a loving family. The heroine ends up on a farm with the family of Marilla and Matthew Cuthbert, brother and sister who did not find their halves and decided to realize their love resources by adopting a child.
Yes, the Cuthberts wanted a farm boy. But in the end, we got a red-haired, naughty miracle with freckles. Ann will have a difficult time: you need to please the new guardians, learn to communicate with peers-neighbors, and go to school, where many believe that children from an orphanage are a human marriage. But Ann does not intend to give up, no matter what difficulties await her on the way to a real family and a happy childhood.x
19. Edge (2008-2013, US, Fox)
Genre: Fantasy, Thriller, Drama
Creators: J. J. Abrams (Lost, Star Wars: The Force Awakens); Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orsi (The Island, Transformers, The Legend of Zorro)
Number of episodes: 100 (5 seasons, episode – 40 minutes)
Cast: Anna Torv, Joshua Jackson, John Noble
Movie Search: 8
IMDb: 8.4
A large-scale sci-fi project in which there will be parallel worlds, evil doubles, chameleon robots, time travel, and ingenious scientists who are trying to prevent all alternative universes from under the cutting knife of techno-terrorists. The guys from the FBI will help great minds, so the landscapes are not only laboratory ones
One of the most recognizable and cool features of the project is glyphs. Inside each episode are scattered letters that add up to the episode’s keyword. Glyphs can be located anywhere from a normal roof to the back of a frog. So fans of puzzles and cunning codes may well like the series.
There is another trump card in the show that many fans have talked about – John Noble. In The Lord of the Rings, this actor played the father of the millennium – the governor of Gondor Denethor (the one for whom Boromir is the son of his mother’s friend, and Faramir is a consumable for the war). In the series, the actor again plays a half-insane dad, but in “The Edge,” Noble’s character evokes much more sympathy.
3. Narco (2015-2017, US, Netflix)
Genre: crime, drama
Creators: Chris Brancato, Doug Miro (“The Sorcerer’s Apprentice”), Carl Bernard (“The Uninvited”)
Number of episodes: 30 (3 seasons, episode – 50 minutes)
Cast: Wagner Moura, Boyd Holbrook, Pedro Pascal
KinoPoisk: 8.4
IMDb: 8.8
The story of Pablo Escobar from the first batches of Chilean coke to the Medellin cartel. The Colombian drug lord was a complex person: he gave money to the poor for no reason, then he blew up a plane with civilians in a political game; he either went to an agreement with the authorities or agreed to a prison term in order to cover up his own people, then he mercilessly killed dissenting comrades without the right to the last word.
They tell about Escobar’s life through an acute American NSA agent who has not yet managed to grow a normal mustache but already hopes to easily catch the drug mafia boss. True, Murphy quickly realizes what kind of world he found himself in: in Colombia, serving the law is almost insane because Pablo Escobar is the law.
4. Boys (2019 -…, USA, Amazon)
Genre: fantasy, drama, action, crime
Number of episodes: 16 (2 seasons, episode – 60 minutes)
Creator: Eric Kripke (writer of “Supernatural”)
Kino Search: 8, 2
IMDb: 8.7
The series painted the pretentious fences of Marvel and DC with excellent courtyard slang and pulled the superheroes out of the pop swamp. Of course, the stories about Cap, Batman, and Iron Man are not so bad, but “Boys”, unlike the listed colored sparkles, do not float in happy fantasy clouds. This show was filmed very close to the grimy city streets.
In the world of “Boys”, supers are stars and gods. And also very expensive goods – all the guys in tights, regardless of their abilities, belong to a rich corporation and sit on a beautiful leather leash with marketers.
Billy Butcher, a man with an evil face and an aggressive surname, does not agree with the cult of supermen and intends to prove to everyone that there is nothing human at all in supermen. Butcher is ready to blow up, dismember and torture corrupt “miracle workers”, but his fellow terrorist, Hugh Campbell, begins to doubt that all supers deserve a brutal reprisal.
5. Darkness (2017-2020, Germany, Netflix)
Genre: drama, thriller, fantasy
Creator: Baran bo Odar (“Who am I”)
Number of episodes: 18 (2 seasons, episode – 60 minutes)
Starring: Louis Hofmann, Carolina Eichhorn, Jordis Triebel, Maya Schöne Kino
Search: 8, 1
IMDb: 8.8
The debut German project Netflix from the start became popular: the first season is in many ways similar to “Stranger Things”, and then the comparison creeps to the legendary “Twin Peaks”. But those who have already watched “Darkness” now, perhaps, wanted to grin – in fact, this depressing, harsh series does not look like much at all.
Talking about the plot is tantamount to serving spoilers on a shiny platter, and the show’s plot and poster trick the viewer and laugh at Pennywise from their dark cave. Everything begins so familiar that it is embarrassing to retell: a small town isolated from the world somewhere in the German forests-fields; of the pre-attractions – a gloomy nuclear power plant and an eerie cave, and local forecasters predict nothing but clouds, fogs, and rains.
When teenagers start to disappear in the city, it seems that this is a variant of the norm, but residents still begin to worry. Detective? Past. Horror? Yes and no. Thriller? Exactly, but which one?
There will be mysticism, science fiction, and psychology – and all this is under the philosophy in the style of Kafka: whatever you do, no matter how you wallow in your vicious little world, everything will still be bad. Everything will be like this, there is no outcome (and this is already according to Blok).
6. Beyond the Fence (2014, US, CN)
Genre: animated series, fantasy, drama
Creator: Patrick McHale
Number of episodes: 11 (1 season, episode – 10 minutes)
Movie Search: 8.7
IMDb: 8.8
The 6+ rating of this animated series is a great example of how the age rating system does not work. Is a child able to answer questions about life and death at the age of six? About what is the pain of loss and how dearly people are willing to pay to satisfy it?
And do children know about the consequences of illusions that we swallow like analgesics from a painful reality? Maybe a child can tell what a soul is and why it is immortal? In this short project, they talk about it, and there is very little childishness in the animated series.
Two brothers Wirth and Greg travel through the Unknown – a dark forest inhabited by strange creatures. The elder, Wirth, is a realist, likes to dramatize, plays the clarinet, and is fond of architecture. The personality is vulnerable and delicate, keeps his grievances for a long time, and has already managed to seriously fall in love. The younger brother, Greg, wears a kettle on his head and gives funny names to his frog.
A journey through the forest for Greg is a game, a fun adventure, even in those moments when death is standing opposite and breathing quietly into the faces of the boys. First and Greg have a long way to go, but they must get out of the Unknown and return home.
7. Billions (2016, US, Showtime)
Genre: Drama
Creators: Brian Koppelman, Andrew Ross Sorkin
Episodes: 60 (5 seasons, episode -> 60 minutes)
Starring: Damien Lewis, Paul Giamatti, Maggie Siff
Cinema Search: 8.2
IMDb: 8.4
A principled prosecutor suffering from domestic abuse and billionaire Robin Hood with a tragic background is a fight worthy of adaptation. Bobby Axelrod survived the September 11 attacks, and soon, using the instability in society and the outbreak of the financial crisis, he built an entire monetary empire.
Charles Rhoads Jr. is a prosecutor who hates the rich and the criminals. And he hates rich criminals even more. Grown men will play hide and seek, hide and seek and cat and mouse at the financial and legal level, and the winner will get something more valuable than stocks of sweets.
8. The Paper House (2017 -…, Spain, Netflix)
Genre: Crime, Drama, Thriller
Creator: Alex Pina (producer of “Three meters above the sky”)
Number of Episodes: 31 (season 4, series – 50 minutes)
Starring: Ursula Korber, Álvaro Morte, Itsiar Yitong, Pedro Alonso
kinopoisk: 8.2
IMDb: 8.4
The robbery series: seven masked men, sixty-seven hostages, eleven days of an ambush, and two and a half billion euros. They filmed a lot about robberies (we have already collected 20 films ), so “The Paper House” did not escape some secondary nature: here there is an Oushenada, “On the Crest of a Wave”, and “Not Caught – Not a Thief”.
And in total – this is neither one nor the other, nor the third (although the third is still decent). The creators of this crime drama managed the main thing – to remove the powerful preparation process, come up with a voluminous character organizer and maintain tension over several dozen episodes. Top 20 Highly Rated TV Shows.
9. Black Bookstore (2000 – 2004, UK, BBC)
Genre: sitcom
Creator: Dylan Moran
Number of episodes: 18 (3 seasons, episode – 25 minutes)
Movie Search: 8.2
IMDb: 8.5
A show that can convulse especially gentle marketers. Bernard Black is a bookstore owner, and most of all, Bernard dislikes customers. The sign at the entrance is always turned “Closed”, books are scattered on the floor, it smells of cigarettes and cheap wine.
Black jealously guards the introvert within himself and does not allow anyone to invade his personal space. It’s good that Bernard’s assistant Manny Bianco doesn’t care much about what the store owner wants – the guy is trying with all his might to put things in order on the shelves and in the life of his friend.
Sarcasm, irony, and black humor without a prescription and in unlimited quantities.
10. Kidding (2018 -…, USA, Showtime)
Genre: Drama, comedy
Number of episodes: 20 (2 seasons, episode – 30 minutes)
Creator: Dave Holstein
Starring: Jim Carrey
Cinema Search: 8
IMDb: 8
Many viewers in the reviews wondered – is it really necessary to laugh here? The series often plunges the viewer into the icy water, rather than warm smiles. The message is underlined, in bold and italicized: life is pain.
Jeff hosts a children’s puppet talk show: he tells little people about the kind big world. Only the world is not at all kind to Jeff himself: the wife wants a divorce, the father wants to replace Jeff with a life-size puppet, the sister is stuck in her own marital problems, and more and more tragedies are winding up all this.
But the creators, apparently, were afraid to openly fall into depression and added humor. So you can laugh, albeit to the endless soundtrack in the form of human agony.
11. Parks and Recreation (2009 – 2015, US, NBC)
Genre: Comedy
Creator: Greg Daniels (The Office)
Episodes: 125 (7 seasons, 20-minute episode)
Cast: Amy Poehler, Nick Offerman, Aubrey Plaza, Chris Pratt (Star-Lord)
Movie Search: 8.1
IMDb: 8.6
The series, which was conceived as a spin-off of The Office, eventually turned into an independent project. From their ancestor, “Parks” inherited pseudo-documentary filming and private improvisation on the set. Well, and the main topic: here they will joke about the everyday life of small officials in a small town.
So, the improvement department: low salaries, complete indifference to the outside world, and the incessant buzz of active citizens. Against the background of this despondency, Leslie Knope, the deputy chief, stands out very much: the smile of this energetic blonde and the manic gleam in her eyes scream that it is time to knock the dust out of the heads of the employees and finally improve something.
Leslie catches an abandoned foundation pit, hungry for public approval, and Knope decides to arrange a park there. The city immediately falls asleep and ghouls wake up: local residents, who do not want to change anything but only want to be indignant.
Greedy developers, from whom they are trying to rip out of their claws a pit that no one needed before; and the officials themselves, for whom the vigorous activity is deeply into the bureaucratic light bulb. But Leslie already sees a goal shining with virtue in front of him, and now not a single bulldozer can stop the official.
12. This Is Us (2016 -…, USA, NBC)
Genre: Drama, comedy, melodrama
Number of episodes: 74 (6 seasons, 45 minutes episode)
Creator: Dan Fogelman (Rapunzel: A Tangled Story)
Cast: Milo Ventimiglia, Mandy Moore (A Walk to Love), Sterling K. Brown, Chrissy Metz, Justin Hartley
Kino Search: 8.4
IMDb: 8.7
A therapeutic series about the value of the family. The “Big Trinity” – Randall, Kate, and Kevin – were happy children, grew up in a bright house, with parents who loved their family more than anything else.
The Pearson family is shrouded in warmth and comfort, such that even skeptics, introverts, and singles will want at least a small piece of this idyll. But in large families, conflicts and difficulties are not complete, so the twins Kevin and Kate and their adoptive brother Randall absorb more and more emotional toxins with age.
As a result, Kate has problems with being overweight, handsome Kevin has a whole van of complexes and fears, and the smart, talented Randall, who was able to build both a career and a healthy marriage, cannot cope with periodic attacks of panic and aggression. All this is from the family, and flashbacks about the life of the Big Three with their parents prove it, but the family is the main cure for all problems. We look at the healing power of love in action.
The This Is Us cast has six major awards (Emmy, Golden Globe, Actors Guild Award), and one of the episodes of the project won the Best Heartbreaking Scene nomination at the MTV Awards.
13. Dirk Gently Detective Agency (2016-2017, USA, BBC)
Genre: detective, comedy, adventure, fantasy
Creator: Max Landis
Cast: Samuel Barnett (Desperate Romantics), Elijah Wood (Frodo)
Movie Search: 8.1
IMDb: 8.3
The series, itself looks like a half-insane freak with glasses, who is always in a hurry somewhere and shouts. Dirk Gently is a detective in a yellow jacket, and he will not arrogantly chew on his Watson what is happening around him, he will not crawl around the crime scene with a magnifying glass, he will not conduct interrogations and check the type of soil from the sole of a criminal.
Instead of all this, Dirk is looking for some mystical connections between the events taking place and involves a simple bellboy Todd in his crazy investigations. The duet, which is classic for a detective, looks fresh here: in terms of mood, the series is closer to Doctor Who than to Sherlock, but the show does not fit the family format.
There will be blood, shock content, and all sorts of non-childish statements. Fun and courage in the project are very competently and closely intertwined with serious drama, and at the end of the series, it becomes obvious to the audience: that everything is really connected.
15. Sinners (2013 – 2016, UK)
Genre: Comedy
Number of episodes: 14 (2 seasons, episode – 20 minutes)
Creators: Gary Janetti, Mark Ravenhill
Cast: Ian McKellen (Gandalf Gray and White), Derek Jacoby, Ivan Rheon Kino
Search: 8
IMDb: 8.1
Ian McKellen and Derek Jacoby are outstanding actors with titles of knighthood. And both are openly gay (and McKellen is so open that he even initiated a letter to Putin against the ban on gay propaganda, and the actor called Sobyanin a coward for canceling the gay pride parade in Moscow). In Sinners, Her Majesty’s knights play almost themselves:
McKellen and Jacoby play the roles of Freddie and Stewart – elderly gays who love guests and swear at any reason. The couple has been together for half a century, and in order not to dry up completely shabby gentlemen communicate in the language of sarcasm and, at every opportunity, release verbal fractions into each other. A charmingly caustic series about the everyday life of deceptively cute old people.
16. Gravity Falls (2012 – 2016, USA, Disney)
Genre: fantasy, adventure, comedy, detective
Number of episodes: 41 (2 seasons, episode – 20 minutes)
Creator: Alex Hirsch
Kino Search: 8.8
IMDb: 8.9
Another animated series not only for children. The series has the magical ability to make you smile and hum the opening tune fanatically. And cry when everything ends without the slightest hope for a new season.
The twins Mabel and Dipper visit a distant relative for the summer and immediately find themselves in the epicenter of the mysterious events of a provincial forest town.
Gnomes, minotaurs, a devil goat, a city madman, a stack of homemade sweaters, and a greedy, cunning uncle hiding a ton of skeletons in a snack machine – how does it all have to do? The main characters will have to conduct a thorough investigation to understand what is happening in Gravity Falls.
17. The Amazing Mrs. Maisel (2017 -…, USA, Amazon)
Genre: Drama, comedy
Number of episodes: 26 (3 seasons, episodes – 55 minutes)
Creator: Amy Sherman-Palladino
Cast: Rachel Brosnahan (House of Cards), Marine Hinkle, Erin Maya Dark
Movie Search: 8.5
IMDb: 8.7
In the late 50s, women are locked in their ideal homes with curtains slicked down and the scent of homemade pies. And when a man leaves such a house, this is the end.
Miriam Meisel decided that it was enough to endure it: a woman picks up the courage (and alcohol), goes to a bar, and gives out to workers at smoky tables such an improvised stand-up that in modern times she would have gotten to Dudy even before Saburov and Shcherbakov.
Feeling the strength and the opportunity to perform, Meisel finally understands that she does not intend to serve as a bedside rug for men for a single day. And the heroine will not be stopped either by the prison bars, or the ridicule of others, or the condemnation of her relatives.
Rachel Brosnahan has won two Golden Globes and one Emmy for her role as a female stand-up artist in the last century.
18. Why Women Kill (2019, CBS)
Genre: Drama, romance, comedy
Number of episodes: 10 (1 season, episode – 40 minutes)
Creator: Mark Cherry (Desperate Housewives, Insidious Maids)
Cast: Lucy Liu (Charlie’s Angels, Elementary, “Lucky Number Slevin”), Ginnifer Goodwin (“Once Upon a Time”, “Promising Doesn’t Mean to Marry,” “Hire a Groom”), Kirby Howell-Baptist
Movie Search: 8.3
IMDb: 8.3
The series, which at first pretends to be a cozy and simple show about housewives, then pushes the viewer from the back into a pit of deep drama. And by the end, he throws suspense as much as any detective thriller. And in fact, in fact, it really is talking about women and their life – recognizable and close to every spectator.
But this is not “Desperate Housewives” and their reincarnations (like “Insidious Maids”) – this series will have something to think about and what to see, regardless of gender.
The series takes place in the same house, but in three time periods: in 1963, 1984, and 2019. The main characters live in a luxurious mansion in Pasadena, unaware that their house is probably cursed. In each timeline, murders take place and weapons are always in fragile but confident female hands.
Different reasons, different personalities, very different families, but the outcome is the same – the police, the neighbors’ gossip, and the black bag.
This is the case when everything is stylishly done: temporary stylization, costumes, editing, sound – the heroines make mistakes, but the creators of the series worked flawlessly.
19. Doctor Terrible Sing Alone Blog (2008, USA)
Genre: musical, sci-fi, comedy, melodrama
Creator: Whedon family – Joss, Jed, Morissa, and Zach (Agents of SHIELD, A Doll’s House)
Number of episodes: 3 (15 minutes each)
Starring: Barney Stinson, Castle & Howard Wolowitz
Cinema Search: 8.4
IMDb: 8.5
A short musical sitcom about a superhero was released only on the Internet. Sounds crazy, looks even crazier. Doctor Terrible dreams of getting into the Evil League of Evil under the leadership of Bad Horse.
Viewers will learn about all this from the Doctor Terrible video blog, in which the villain responds to fans’ letters and confesses his secret love for the girl Penny and not secret hatred for Captain Hammer. And it’s all in the songs.
Thresh and absurdity jump over the sacrificial fire from logic and common sense, but it’s fun and very clever in places. Yes, and also shortly after Chekhov.
20. Young Pope (2016 – 2017, Italy, HBO)
Genre: drama
Creator: Paolo Sorrentino (“Youth”, “Great Beauty”)
Number of episodes: 10 (1 season, episode – 60 minutes)
Starring: Jude Law
Cinema Search: 8.2
IMDb: 8.4
Lenny Belardo became Pope at forty-seven – very early for global Catholic fatherhood. Having received a new name, Pius XIII also changed his character: from the very first hours as a pontiff, Lenny showed toughness, willfulness, and pride, and the politicians who fed the young Pope, instead of an obedient and frightened puppet, gave the Vatican into the hands of an eccentric scoundrel.
Pius XIII easily beats competitors, expels homosexuals from the Church, gracefully repurposes his sins into benefactors, and refuses to appear in public. The cardinals understand that Lenny must be eliminated and the Vatican is covered by a secret war for church power.
A daring and witty show in the traditional high style of Sorrentino films: bright images, a picture oversaturated with gloss and poison, oozing out of the script like juice from overripe fruit.
