5. “Task”
Brad Ingelsby’s HBO crime drama “Task” isn’t really a whodunnit so much as a slow, bruised audit of what happens when everyone’s faith runs out at the same time—faith in God, in institutions, in the rule of law, even in the story we tell ourselves about “good people” getting to stay good. Set in the working-class suburbs of Philadelphia, it pits Mark Ruffalo’s Tom Brandis—a former priest turned FBI agent, hollowed out by grief and drowning the void with vodka, baseball, and birdwatching—against Tom Pelphrey’s Robbie Prendergast, a desperate sanitation worker turned robber targeting biker-gang stash houses as his own identity collapses. Around them is a whole ecosystem of corrosion: a scrappy, underfunded task force (including Martha Plimpton, Fabien Frankel, Thuso Mbedu, Alison Oliver) and a community where even the most competent cop has already accepted the system is “rigged beyond repair.” What makes the series captivating is how it treats belief as a shared wound—Tom’s crisis of conviction, Robbie’s evaporating purpose, everyone else’s battered trust in justice—until the procedural machinery feels secondary to the spiritual wreckage. Directors Jeremiah Zagar and Salli Richardson-Whitfield keep it tactile and lived-in, Dan Deacon’s score stays restrained and brooding, and Alex Disenhof shoots it with shadowy clarity that finds poetry in silence. Ruffalo and Pelphrey are mirror-image engines, turning the show’s central idea into something painfully human: in a world where institutions fail, people start improvising their own religion, and it rarely ends cleanly. – RP
4. “The Studio”
This Emmy darling feels even more timely with the recent business news that’s dominating the headlines, but what makes Seth Rogen’s unforgettable comedy so great is that it’s not beholden to the state of things in the 2020s, owing as much to classic Hollywood comedies and even “The Player” as the travails of people like David Zaslav. Rogen does the best comic work of his career, leading one of TV’s most impressive ensembles, but it’s the writing here that separates it from the pack. In particular, it’s impressively devoid of cynicism about the Hollywood machine. Yes, the people who work at this fictional studio are pretty crazy, but the show makes the point that you have to be pretty crazy to get a movie made in today’s system. – BT
3. “Adolescence”
This drama wins the award for the most unexpected critical and commercial darling of the year. Netflix dropped it relatively quietly in mid-March, and it suddenly became all that people could talk about on its way to an Emmy sweep later this year. Created by Jack Thorne and its star Stephen Graham, it opened a window to troubled youth masculinity around the world as it told the story of a 13-year-old who may have committed a murder. Newcomer Owen Cooper is mesmerizing as the lead, and Graham will break your heart as the father who realizes he’s lost his son. Both won Emmys and should be able to use “Adolescence” as a springboard to more complex, innovative storytelling. Let’s hope. – BT
2. “Pluribus”
Vince Gilligan is one of television’s most impressive creators, and his latest feels almost like a hybrid of his “Breaking Bad”/“Better Call Saul” days with his “The X-Files” origins. “Pluribus” reunites Gillian with “Saul” star Rhea Seehorn, this time playing Carol Sturka, one of the last normal people on Earth after an alien virus turns most of humanity into a hive mind, sharing thoughts, emotions, and a bizarre desire to please Carol. Every episode of “Pluribus” balances character and plot, advancing the mystery of this invasion while offering an incredible study in grief and resilience from Seehorn. No one has any idea where this show is going next, but everyone can’t wait to see what’s around the next corner. – BT
1. “Andor”
Who would have ever guessed that a Disney+ original would be the best show of 2025? Tony Gilroy, probably. The incredible writer did something truly special with the second season of his “Rogue One” prequel, using the story of Diego Luna’s Cassian Andor as a commentary on fascism and resistance. With technical acumen that looks better than most blockbusters and writing that’s so dense with political commentary, philosophy, and character-driven drama, “Andor” was a rare bolt of lightning in a relatively predictable year of TV, a show that so many people hoped would be good but few knew would be an instant classic. – BT
