6. “Broad City”
Fans of laughter have been all over this show since its debut, but it’s still a little under the radar, implying there are a bunch of people who haven’t yet watched it. If that’s you, you’re in luck: The opening scene of Season 3 of Ilana Glazer and Abbi Jacobson‘s “Broad City” contains essentially everything that is great and wonderful about this show. I’m talking, of course, of the split screen of the two girls shooting the, er, breeze while performing various acts of personal hygiene in their respective bathrooms: It’s funny, exceptionally crude and a beautifully synchronous expression of female friendship. I mention this not just as a litmus test for the uninitiated, but also because if season 4 were nothing but the two of them in their bathrooms, we’d still be first in line, and that tells you quite a lot about how much these broads have become part of us. I mean, there’ll be other well-observed struggling-in-New York stuff going on (and this season was shot in winter, not summer like the others), but really, give us 10 episodes of Abbi and Ilana on the phone sitting on their toilets, and we’d also be happy.
Airdate: August.
5. “The Leftovers”
This third season of Damon Lindelof and Tom Perrotta‘s “The Leftovers” has already been announced as the last. On the one hand, that’s a shame, but on the other it means we can look forward to a definitive season of TV rather than one beholden to the week-by-week ratings scramble/renewal derby. Which is probably a relief for all concerned because no one really did watch the show. To be honest, even we had practically tuned out by the end of season 1, which suffered from the same endless high-concept mystery-boxing of Lindelof’s “Lost” with none of the fun parts. But then a weird thing happened: The creators returned with a totally retooled, rethought, relocated season 2, which, to everyone’s enormous surprise, turned out to be one of the absolute best, cleverest, most gripping, most beautifully surreal and weird and moving seasons of television in recent memory. It was clearly too late to salvage a big-enough audience to keep the show going beyond season 3, but creatively and artistically it was an absolute triumph, and Lindelof and Perrotta certainly earned the right to finish the show out in style. However, if they manage a similar leap up in quality between seasons 2 and 3, there’s a danger our heads might explode.
Airdate: April.
4. “Stranger Things”
With apologies to “Westworld” (which won’t return until 2018), “Stranger Things” was the big breakout TV series of 2016, becoming a pop-culture talking point in a way that no Netflix series up to now really has, and few other shows ever had. The Duffer Brothers’ ’80-set sci-fi mash-up benefited from being extremely under the radar when it debuted, so Season 2 has in some ways a tougher task in living up to expectations. Unusually, though, the Duffers and Netflix have been giving a dripfeed of revelations about the new season, up to revealing episode titles, and new cast members (’80s icons Sean Astin and Paul Reiser join the cast), plus dropping some plot details — Barb is still dead, for instance, but her death will have consequences, while we’re promised darker and weirder things, and the return of Eleven. Expect plenty more speculation in the months ahead, but there’s already a confidence here that bodes well.
Airdate: Likely in the summer again.
3. “Atlanta”
Already debuting at no. 1 with a bullet (fired in a gun range at an… unusual target) on our Best TV shows of 2016, Donald Glover‘s uncategorizably brilliant new show is one we can’t wait to have return. Partly that’s because there is simply nothing else like it, nothing that has quite its addictive, laid-back lolling gait that lopes between caustic authenticity and loopy surreality with such affable ease. Partly it’s that it was one of those rare first seasons that started great and got better, more intricate, more daring and flat-out funnier episode on episode so that from about ep. 5 onward (I mean, Black Justin Bieber — come on), it’s platinum disc after platinum disc. And partly it’s because not only the stratospherically engaging Glover, but also the breakout supporting turns from Brian Tyree Henry and Keith Stanfield, have given us characters we ache to return to. “Atlanta” is intimate, contained and low-key, but it feels like some of the most cinematic storytelling on TV.
Airdate: None yet, and given that season one only aired in September, we shouldn’t hold our breath. But we are anyway.
2. “Curb Your Enthusiasm”
There are a few shows here that have been away for a year or so, but “Curb Your Enthusiasm” holds the record here — when it returns for Season 9 later this year, six years will have passed since it last aired an episode, in September 2011, with only “Clear History,” that movie with Jon Hamm that everyone swiftly forgot about, to tide over Larry David fans in the meantime. But off his triumphant Bernie Sanders impression on SNL, David announced last summer that the show was returning, saying in typically David-esque fashion, “In the immortal words of Julius Caesar, ‘I left, I did nothing, I returned,’” and production got underway in November. Plot details are under wraps for now, but expect all the usual favorites — Jeff Garlin, Cheryl Hines, Susie Essman, J.B. Smoove, Richard Lewis, Ted Danson, Mary Steenburgen — to return, plus the usual smattering of surprise guests. Absence has certainly made the heart grow fonder, so we can’t wait to hear the seminal theme music again.
Airdate: The summer, we’d guess.
1. “Fargo”
Doing a TV series inspired by one of the very best movies by maybe our most singular filmmakers seemed doomed to failure. But Noah Hawley’s small-screen take on the Coen Brothers’ “Fargo” was something of a triumph, capturing an utterly Coen-ish spirit while also doing its own thing. The second season was very different, going back to the 1970s, but proved even better. After skipping 2016 (Hawley has been doing double-duty, also creating the X-Men-affiliated FX drama “Legion,” which debuts soon), the show’s back in 2017, but that alone might not have grabbed it the top spot here. Instead, it’s the show’s stellar cast, as good as any on film or TV, that nabs it the honor. Ewan McGregor headlines as a pair of twins, while Carrie Coon, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, David Thewlis, Michael Stuhlbarg, Scoot McNairy, Shea Whigham and Fred Melamed are also on board, playing beautifully Coen-esque character names like Gloria Burgle, Nikki Swango, Sy Feltz and Thaddeus Mobley. The show will be returning to the near-present day, and McGregor will play the Parking Lot King of Minnesota (and his brother), but beyond that, details are still fairly thin, but we’ll be there for every episode regardless.
Airdate: Filming only just got underway (“it’s a winter show,” Hawley said in an interview), so expect it late in 2017, likely October, when Season 2 debuted.
Aside from the shows above, and the ones we counted our ‘New Shows’ list, namely “Twin Peaks” and “Top Of The Lake,” there are plenty more favorites coming back in 2017. Staples of our Best TV lists including “Baskets,” “Billions,” “Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt,” “House Of Cards,” “Lady Dynamite,” “The Crown,” “Silicon Valley,” “Underground,” “The Carmichael Show,” “Hap & Leonard,” “Documentary Now!” and “You’re The Worst” are all back for more in the next year.
We think that production schedules mean that when “Black Mirror” and “The Girlfriend Experience” return, it’ll be 2018, but we’d be happy to be proven wrong — both would make this list if we were sure they’d be done in time. And in terms of shows that have been away a touch longer, we’re intrigued by the Jack Bauer-less “24” reboot starring Corey Hawkins from “Straight Outta Compton.” And we’re also getting new episodes of three underrated shows that debuted in 2015 but skipped last year: dense, ambitious sci-fi “The Expanse,” the Wachowski’s flawed but admirable “Sense8” and Viking drama “The Last Kingdom.” Let us know what else you’re excited about in the comments.