A defining bastion of contemporary tv and maybe the one most pivotal model within the medium’s rise to change into a status type of dramatic leisure in current many years, HBO is a community and manufacturing home that has change into synonymous with searing high quality and inventive dare. It’s maybe no nice shock in that case that the pay tv service is dwelling to so most of the best TV exhibits of all time.
Whereas HBO has famously offered among the best miniseries of all time and even five-season sensations like The Wire and Boardwalk Empire, this checklist will focus solely on the community’s catalogue of exhibits to have gone past Season 5. Starting from crime dramas to satirical comedies, and even to fantasy phenomena, these 10 titles are a testomony to HBO’s insatiable urge for food for greatness and grandiosity.
10
‘Intercourse within the Metropolis’ (1998–2004)
Created by Darren Star
An icon of its time, Sex and the City has change into as well-known for the dialogue surrounding it and its central messaging because it has for its acidic wit, its flawed but resonant characters, and its potential to combine social milieu with satirical mania. It follows the friendship between 4 pushed and clever ladies dwelling in New York Metropolis as they fight every part from unusual sexual encounters to modern-day feminism, relationship woes, and the trials and triumphs of their respective profession trajectories.
Whereas Intercourse and the Metropolis is simple to criticize retrospectively, it stays a groundbreaking triumph of tv that normalized conversations surrounding sexuality from a female perspective, depicted the complexity of girls’s friendships, and de-stigmatized the notion of subverting gender roles in fashionable society. With its candid and crass type, which might typically be extra mocking than observational, the collection hasn’t aged as elegantly as different titles from its period, however Intercourse and the Metropolis does nonetheless stand as a defining icon of ‘90s/early-2000s television.
9
‘True Blood’ (2008–2014)
Created by Alan Ball
The romanticization and even the eroticism of all method of issues that go bump within the night time was a piercing pattern of the late 2000s-early 2010s period. Whereas titles like Twilight and The Vampire Diaries leaned into this taboo terror with various levels of dare, HBO went all out with True Blood. Tailored from Charlaine Harris’ hit novel collection, the present transpires in an alternate world the place legendary beasts like vampires, shifters, and witches don’t simply exist, however dwell brazenly alongside humanity, albeit in a strained interspecies concord. Louisiana bartender Sookie Stackhouse (Anna Paquin) finds her life altering when she meets the vampire Invoice Compton (Stephen Moyer).
Whereas the collection does dip in high quality in its later seasons, True Blood delivers thrills and spills aplenty with its bloodthirsty and lustful story of civil rights, religion, and the wedding of monsters and humanity. At its greatest, True Blood is nothing wanting addictive, a charming amalgamation of Southern Gothic attract, blood-drenched horror mania, and socially loaded themes that’s as heart-racing as it’s hilarious.
8
‘Ladies’ (2012–2017)
Created by Lena Dunham
It’s not one other Intercourse and the Metropolis, but it surely does observe a bunch of 4 ladies in New York who depend on their friendship as they navigate profession obstacles, romantic angst, and private discoveries, all whereas struggling to get by within the rigmarole that’s early maturity. To place it merely, the premise of Girls doesn’t precisely ship something new, however its genius resides in the way it is ready to use this acquainted framework to carry recent insights and a slicing commentary on fashionable society.
Described by some critics as being an exploration of a post-feminist society, the collection isn’t afraid to shirk notions of happiness and fulfilling relationships in its endeavor to showcase a extra genuine, grounded, and, at instances, unflattering illustration of contemporary life. Mixing this sense of millennial angst and melancholy with unflinching and specific observations on intercourse, Ladies makes up for its occasional lack of polish with sheer would possibly. Granted, it gained’t be to everybody’s style, however Girls’ six seasons never waver in high quality or dare, making for a collection that grasps HBO’s famed urge for food for boundary-pushing extravagance with absolute conviction.
7
‘Entourage’ (2004–2011)
Created by Doug Ellin
There’s a sure juvenile boyishness to Entourage that makes it considerably polarizing. To some viewers, it’s a hysterical fantasy of wealth, fame, and friendship that by no means fails to ship, whereas others might regard it as a repetitive and immature whirlwind of shallow comedy. No matter the place one sits on their analysis of the collection, it rockets alongside its eight-season stretch following younger Hollywood star Vincent Chase (Adrian Grenier) and his cohort of associates that he has saved with him since his childhood.
Supposedly primarily based on parts of govt producer Mark Wahlberg’s personal associates and their misadventures within the Metropolis of Angels, Entourage finally thrives as a result of genuine attraction of its characters and the innate sense of intrigue of the film star way of life. Whereas it did develop oppressively cyclical by its eighth and remaining season, the collection nonetheless delivers to be a memorable comedy delight from HBO.
6
‘Oz’ (1997–2003)
Created by Tom Fontana
Premiering in 1997—and thus predating many of HBO’s most pioneering titles of the very late ‘90s and early 2000s—Oz is arguably the true origin level of the golden age of tv drama. The grueling jail collection follows inmates of an experimental new ward in Oswald Most Safety Correctional Facility, with hardened criminals from rival gangs being thrust collectively, the meek getting caught within the crossfire, and the ward supervisor’s efforts to emphasise rehabilitation over punishment garnering blended outcomes.
A graphic nightmare of life behind bars, Oz might exaggerate sure elements of jail life for dramatic impact, but it surely makes its level with scorching readability and affect. Disturbing, bleak, confronting, and sometimes deeply upsetting, it’s an ultra-violent and unforgiving cautionary story. And but, there’s loads of stylistic would possibly and even just a few shreds of profound humanity inside it. The tip result’s a compelling and commanding viewing expertise that, past the weird ageing capsules subplot in Season 4, largely strikes viewers as probably the most sickeningly intense and brutal tv collection HBO has ever aired.
5
‘Silicon Valley’ (2014–2019)
Created by Mike Choose, John Altschuler, and Dave Krinsky
Co-created by the ever-magnificent and sometimes prescient Mike Choose, Silicon Valley thrives as a piercing and profound parody of the know-how business and fierce entrepreneurial tradition of the titular Silicon Valley. It focuses on the profession aspirations of Richard Hendricks (Thomas Middleditch) and his associates and colleagues, with Richard making an attempt to safe traders for his groundbreaking app whereas the opposite programmers navigate the networking minefield of Silicon Valley with little assist from their delinquent predispositions.
Armed with Choose’s real-life expertise within the business, Silicon Valley excels as an ideal marriage of relatable characters, succinct, skewering comedy, and deftly explored, high-concept concepts which might be offered in a fashion that’s digestible to all audiences. Each of Silicon Valley‘s six seasons was met with vital acclaim, making the collection considered one of HBO’s most profitable and well timed forays into comedy.
4
‘Veep’ (2012–2019)
Created by Armando Iannucci
Whereas it did have to beat a little bit of an unsure begin that was restricted to coasting by on Julia Louis-Dreyfus’ brilliance—which, in itself, is a deal with to observe—Veep quickly finds its ft as a stunning satire of political callousness and conniving. Louis-Dreyfus stars as Selina Meyer, a former U.S. Senator representing the workplace of Vice President of america the place she tries to juggle parts from her skilled and private lives all whereas quelling political catastrophes earlier than they’ll smash her present place, and her grander aspirations.
The collection’ wit isn’t simply acidic, it’s venomous, a vile and poisonous tirade of barbed insults and unadulterated ambitions that, mixed with the excellent, award-winning work of the ensemble solid, makes for a viewing expertise that’s as vicious as it’s addictive. Coming to a note-perfect conclusion with its appropriately absurd and brash seventh and remaining season, Veep is one other of HBO’s most defining and divine comedies in recent times.
3
‘Curb Your Enthusiasm’ (2000–2024)
Created by Larry David
It’s curious that so lots of HBO’s longest-running series have been comedies. Maybe the community’s best foray into the style is the moment basic collection, Curb Your Enthusiasm. Starring Larry David as an exaggerated and fictionalized model of himself, a profitable and semi-retired tv producer and author well-known for his work on Seinfeld. Cantankerous and uninterested in social conventions, Larry typically finds himself being swept away on outrageous misadventures along with his associates and celeb figures round Hollywood.
Whereas the collection isn’t resistant to the occasional lull in high quality, it’s outlined by its best moments, its uproarious sequences of unrestrained comedian genius that usually stem from the actors’ improvisational abilities. Following an preliminary run of eight seasons from 2000 to 2011, Curb Your Enthusiasm returned in 2017 for a one-off ninth season earlier than Seasons 10-12 premiered from 2020 to 2024.
2
‘Sport of Thrones’ (2011–2019)
Created by David Benioff and D. B. Weiss
Whereas many could be fast to dismiss Game of Thrones on account of its calamitous remaining season, such haste would solely serve to miss the seven seasons of not solely distinctive however groundbreaking tv that got here earlier than it. A fantasy epic primarily based on George R. R. Martin’s novel collection, Sport of Thrones unfolds because the ruling households of Westeros have interaction in a ferocious energy battle for the Iron Throne, with the political conniving and cold-blooded ruthlessness imbuing the collection with many unbearably intense twists alongside the best way.
Transcending tv leisure, Sport of Thrones at its peak was a cultural phenomenon. A combination of excellent writing, excellent performances, unmatched manufacturing worth and narrative scope, and faultless grasp of fantasy storytelling, the collection didn’t simply enthrall viewers, it absorbed them fully, with every episode’s first airing being an unmissable spectacle that was typically rewatched to be digested anew. The truth that the eight-season present got here to such a limp conclusion is unlucky, but it surely doesn’t change the truth that Sport of Thrones noticed HBO ascend to a brand new peak of tv reputation and status, and did so for an prolonged interval.
1
‘The Sopranos’ (1999–2007)
Created by David Chase
The flagship of HBO’s catalogue, The Sopranos isn’t simply within the dialog of being the greatest crime series of all time, it’s firmly entrenched among the many most sensible and pioneering exhibits the medium has ever seen. Following New Jersey mob boss Tony Soprano (James Gandolfini) as ongoing stress issues resulting from his sophisticated work-life steadiness lead him to start seeing a psychiatrist, the collection excels as the primary true nice examination of an antihero in tv, one which balances dramatic intrigue and visceral violence with a aptitude for high-end leisure and even glimpses of comedy.
The collection by no means wavers all through its acclaimed six-season run, with the exploration of Tony’s advanced psyche at all times supported by a litany of outstanding facet characters who propel the story with their very own ambitions. The collection’ well-known remaining moments are nonetheless a scorching subject of dialog nearly 20 years on because the episode aired, illustrating not solely the unmatched excellence of The Sopranos, however its enduring presence in popular culture as effectively.
