https://tvline.com/lists/greatest-tv-season-ever-2004-2005-greys-anatomy-lost-desperate-housewives/sunday-night/

ABC alone had a great season with the 2004-2005 season, introducing Lost, Grey's Anatomy and Desperate Housewives -- with Dancing with the Stars launching shortly after the season was over. The 2004-2005 season also featured the premiere of The Office.

No.

The Office sucks. Its popularity led to a bunch of other lousy shows like 30 Rock and Parks and Recreation, forever ruining NBC's comedy brand. And I have hated Dancing with the Stars ever since it caused the cancellation of Hope and Faith. For 2.5 years ABC was fine with Hope and Faith as the anchor of Friday nights. But when the DWTS results show came, that crap was expanded to one hour after just one week, Hope and Faith only got one airing after DWTS then was relegated to burn-offs on another night. :rolleyes:

Gosh no.

How about 1965-66?

Walt Disney's Wonderful World of Color
Ed Sullivan
Lassie
Perry Mason
Bonanza
Candid Camera
What's My Line?
Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea
The FBI
The Farmer's Daughter
The Avengers
Peyton Place
To Tell the Truth
The Lucy Show
Andy Griffith
Hazel
Andy Williams
Hullabaloo
Dr. Kildare
Petticoat Junction
The Fugitive
McHale's Navy
F Troop
Ozzie & Harriet
Gidget
Patty Duke
The Big Valley
Lost in Space
The Virginian
Green Acres
Dick Van Dyke
Shindig!
Donna Reed
Bewitched
The Beverly Hillbillies
The Munsters
Gilligan's Island
My Three Sons
Batman
Dean Martin
The Flintstones
The Addams Family
Hogan's Heroes
Gomer Pyle USMC
Jimmy Dean
The Wild Wild West
Daniel Boone
Gunsmoke
Laredo
The Man from UNCLE
Get Smart
Secret Agent
I Dream of Jeannie
Flipper
Lawrence Welk
Hollywood Palace
Rawhide
I Spy

Etc... WOW!!!!!

Wow, 65-66 was awesome! I would add Combat to that list.

Sitcoms writers were pretty creative in the 1960s. There was a talking horse, a flying nun, a genie, castaways on a deserted island, to name a few. By the 1970s, Norman Lear was cranking out "Learcoms" which featured people sitting around arguing - All in the Family, Jeffersons, Sanford and Son, Maude, etc. Sitcoms were never quite the same afterwards IMO.

R.D. Heldenfels calls 1954 television's greatest year, and wrote an entire book (https://www.amazon.com/Televisions-Greatest-Year-R-Heldenfels/dp/0826406750) on why. He's got a compelling case. By the 1960s, TV had devolved into a weird landscape where talking horses, talking cars, flying nuns, genies, monsters, witches, and identical cousins had become the top series. And while I find many of those series enjoyable, I prefer the straight sitcom genre over gimmick shows...

Of course, the 1970s the Lear era had more weight to it, so there's something to be said for that era as well.

But the 2004-2005 season? No way. I did watch Stargate SG-1, The King of Queens, and a few others, but that's not a lot.

Though there were quite a few shows I watched then, no, no way is it the best ever.

No.

I concur, not even close.

yes it was


you are forgetting The WB network shows and FOX's KILLER Line up with Malcolm in the Middle and That 70s show ( even tho it was starting to slip a bit)

then you had MTV in it's silver age with TRL, Pimp my ride, room raiders, the debut of Laguna beach etc , Vh1 and all it's 80s shows. FX on fire etc etc.


I know people will snicker at the 2004 MTV part, but it was a big deal to teens at the time like myself then.

yes it was


you are forgetting The WB network shows and FOX's KILLER Line up with Malcolm in the Middle and That 70s show ( even tho it was starting to slip a bit)

then you had MTV in it's silver age with TRL, Pimp my ride, room raiders, the debut of Laguna beach etc , Vh1 and all it's 80s shows. FX on fire etc etc.


I know people will snicker at the 2004 MTV part, but it was a big deal to teens at the time like myself then.

Always good to get a different perspective. Why do you think those MTV/VH1 "reality" shows made 2004-2005 better than any other television season? TRL debuted in 1998 and Room Raiders debuted in 2003. What makes 2004-2005 stand out above all other years?

Always good to get a different perspective. Why do you think those MTV/VH1 "reality" shows made 2004-2005 better than any other television season? TRL debuted in 1998 and Room Raiders debuted in 2003. What makes 2004-2005 stand out above all other years?

For TRL it's when it finally found it's footing after Carson Daly left, Emo and Myspace had just came out of the gate at the time, it all kind of came together, like the culture, as well as Motoroloa Flip phones. It was a moment in time if that makes sense ? These videos kind of show an example of what I mean.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0DwbPGXe84

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2fGxxBGGig


TRL and music and general kind of rebooted itself with even more intense pop punk that turned into emo, websites like Myspace took off, it was just like a pop culture moment in time. Then you had the OC knock off movement with shows like Laguna Beach, it is all anyone talked about at the time as a teen,well that and Jackass shows.
Anything MTV did during this time such as NEXT, Roomraiders, Parental Control, PUNKD, they were all pop culture moments.


One that comes to mind is when Justin Timberlake got his house repossessed ( even tho that happened in 2003), you also had Newlyweds with Nick and Jessica Simpson
( chicken of the sea) yeah we all remember that moment from that show. It was just pop culture in a bottle.




As for Fox you had, That 70s show and Malcolm (tho past it's prime) you had the new JETIX from abc family which was basically Fox Kids part 2 led by a new season of Power Rangers called Dino thunder ( they brought Tommy the green ranger back as a recurring roll) Cartoon Network rebranded with it's CN logo it was in a new era as well. HBO with its Soprano's was HOTTER than ever at the time. And yes American Idol was a pop culture institution as well. Comedy Central had Chappelle's show on fire as well. ADULT SWIM... do I need to say more, the peak of Adult Swim right here.


Just man so many things happened at the time for tv. A bunch of the stuff in 2004 was just getting it's footing from 2003. By 2004 things started coming together more.
Bush hate was also starting to set in as well after the IRAQ war was making things clear what was happening. It was just a fresh feeling. I know I am missing a ton of networks with this post, overall TV was really good.



The only things that really sucked was maybe The Simpsons at the time & abc's TGIF revival.

you are forgetting The WB network shows

The WB was struggling that year. It's not a coincidence the network ended the following year. The WB stopped having good years after the 2000 - 2001 TV season. So many great shows were canceled or moved to other networks when the season ended. Or worst, a popular actress was fired from a hit show. The WB screwed itself picking shows that didn't help the network.

As for ABC sucking with their TGIF revival in the 2004 - 2005 TV season, 8 Simple Rules was really good that year. It even had better ratings than Hope & Faith and Less Than Perfect. Almost every show was doing better than Less Than Perfect, yet that was the show ABC decided to bring back ohno:

The only MTV show I watched back in the early 2000's was Date My Mom. I thought it was funny. It reminded me of the short lived reality show, Meet My Folks that aired on NBC. Everything else MTV had, I never watched.

I don't think the 2004 - 2005 TV season is the best, but it is certainly one of the most popular ones in history. Lost and Desperate Housewives were the talk of a lot of workplaces. Then when Grey's Anatomy came, that's all you ever heard from a lot of female coworkers because of the hot doctors and love triangles :lol: I don't think there's a best TV season. Each one has its positives and negatives about it.

The Office sucks. Its popularity led to a bunch of other lousy shows like 30 Rock and Parks and Recreation, forever ruining NBC's comedy brand.

According to the ratings TO was NOT popular. For overall viewership it was never in the top 30--its best season was at #41. In 18-49 it was #11 for seasons 6 and 7 only, season 3 was #28, season 8 was #29, and no other season was in the top 30.

Here are the blockbuster ratings for 30 Rock (overall only):

Season 1, 102; 2, 111; 3, 69; 4, 86; 5, 106; 6, 130; 7, 99.

Parks and Rec? Season 1 was 96, season 2 was 108, 3 thru 7 were 111 or below.

Guess the NBC execs liked these, too. Maybe they wanted to get them to 100 epsidoes for syndication. LOL--how'd that work out?

2004-05 the greatest U.S. TV season ever?

One reason NOT to agree with this: 2004-05 was the season that NBC's decline into fourth place began after they lost two of their best sitcom mega-hits, Frasier and Friends, after 2003-04.

To have a "greatest/most perfect U.S. TV season ever" would require ALL THREE of the U.S. Broadcast networks to be in the best shape possible.

For TRL it's when it finally found it's footing after Carson Daly left, Emo and Myspace had just came out of the gate at the time, it all kind of came together, like the culture, as well as Motoroloa Flip phones. It was a moment in time if that makes sense ? These videos kind of show an example of what I mean.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0DwbPGXe84

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2fGxxBGGig


TRL and music and general kind of rebooted itself with even more intense pop punk that turned into emo, websites like Myspace took off, it was just like a pop culture moment in time. Then you had the OC knock off movement with shows like Laguna Beach, it is all anyone talked about at the time as a teen,well that and Jackass shows.
Anything MTV did during this time such as NEXT, Roomraiders, Parental Control, PUNKD, they were all pop culture moments.


One that comes to mind is when Justin Timberlake got his house repossessed ( even tho that happened in 2003), you also had Newlyweds with Nick and Jessica Simpson
( chicken of the sea) yeah we all remember that moment from that show. It was just pop culture in a bottle.




As for Fox you had, That 70s show and Malcolm (tho past it's prime) you had the new JETIX from abc family which was basically Fox Kids part 2 led by a new season of Power Rangers called Dino thunder ( they brought Tommy the green ranger back as a recurring roll) Cartoon Network rebranded with it's CN logo it was in a new era as well. HBO with its Soprano's was HOTTER than ever at the time. And yes American Idol was a pop culture institution as well. Comedy Central had Chappelle's show on fire as well. ADULT SWIM... do I need to say more, the peak of Adult Swim right here.


Just man so many things happened at the time for tv. A bunch of the stuff in 2004 was just getting it's footing from 2003. By 2004 things started coming together more.
Bush hate was also starting to set in as well after the IRAQ war was making things clear what was happening. It was just a fresh feeling. I know I am missing a ton of networks with this post, overall TV was really good.



The only things that really sucked was maybe The Simpsons at the time & abc's TGIF revival.

Thanks for the reply. I never cared for "reality" TV.

Then when Grey's Anatomy came, that's all you ever heard from a lot of female coworkers because of the hot doctors and love triangles :lol:

... and it's still on.

I loved Lost.

I agree about 1965-66, a great season for TV shows and probably my favorite season overall.

No. I didn't remember anything from 2004-2005 season until I read this through this thread.

I wouldn’t watch it again, but Desperate Housewives was good. This isn’t the type of show I would have even bothered with, but it was extremely popular at the time and it had Terri Hatcher (because Terri Hatcher is one of the most beautiful women on Earth, not so much her acting). The redhead was the most interesting.

If you ask me, 2004-05 might have been one of the worst seasons in history, yet it was a gold mine compared to what has passed for primetime TV ever since. Losing Frasier and Friends left a big hole in NBC's lineup which allowed for CBS to eventually become the new home of Must See TV Thursday, a title it still holds. With more reality shows emerging and topping the ratings and with FOX, UPN, and WB continuing to spew out garbage at an alarming rate there's no way you can seriously look at this season and call it the best of anything. Then as now you might have about half a dozen series that you can claim as your favorites and watch every week. In the 1960s, particularly in 1965-66, unquestionably the best-ever season for me, you had at least 4 series that you couldn't miss every night. In 1965, every night was Must See TV night! Don't believe it? The best way to prove it would be to compare schedules which I will do now with all info from Wikipedia:

2004-05 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2004%E2%80%9305_United_States_network_television_schedule)

1965-66 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1965%E2%80%9366_United_States_network_television_schedule)


Sunday - 2004 - This may be the one night where the new guys have the edge. FOX had their only good night of shows with their lineup of King Of The Hill, Malcolm In The Middle, The Simpsons, Arrested Development, Family Guy, and American Dad. The other networks did well too. ABC had Desperate Housewives, Boston Legal, and Grey's Anatomy, CBS still had 60 Minutes, NBC featured Dateline, the original Law & Order, and Crossing Jordan. UPN and WB, as usual, had garbage

1965 - Like most nights, Sundays was dominated by CBS which featured an impressive group: Lassie and My Favorite Martian for the kids followed by Ed Sullivan, Perry Mason, What's My Line?, and Candid Camera. NBC had Walt Disney and Bonanza providing stiff competition while NBC had the slightly weaker Voyage To The Bottom of the Sea and The FBI.

Verdict: It's a tough call to make but I'll give the win to 2004.


Mondays

2004-05 - The garbage begins to pile up as reality shows infest all of the networks with ABC being the worst offender once Monday Night Football ended. This allows CBS to claim the victory on what has traditionally been their strongest night with Everybody Loves Raymond, Two and A Half Men, and CSI: Miami all gaining solid numbers. FOX counters with Trading Spouses and The Swan which is simply embarrassing. NBC has Fear Factor and Las Vegas which is a little better but still unwatchable.

1965-66 - CBS was at the peak of its Monday night dominance here laying the competition to waste with To Tell The Truth, I've Got A Secret, The Lucy Show, Andy Griffith, and Hazel. The others tried hard but still couldn't match them although you have to admire their efforts. ABC countered with Westerns followed by The Farmer's Daughter, Peyton Place, Ben Casey, and the debut of The Avengers. NBC had Dr. Kildare and Andy Williams in what was a weak night for them.

Verdict - Another tough call. I'll call this one even.

Tuesdays

2004 - The networks were all over the map here providing strong dramas, average comedies, and stupid reality series. So it was just a typical night at "The Office", which was a highlight in NBC's schedule after "Will and Grace" and "Scrubs" followed "The Biggest Loser". By comparison, ABC's sitcom lineup was hopelessly weak: "My Wife and Kids", "George Lopez", "According To Jim" and "Rodney". "NYPD Blue" at 10 made up for it. FOX countered with "House" at 9 which followed mainly unwatchable reality series at 8.

1965 - Possibly the weakest night of the week yet there was still something for everyone to watch depending on your tastes. This was the year when the notorious flop "My Mother The Car" made its debut. NBC followed it with the equally short-lived "Please Don't Eat The Daisies" and "Dr Kildare". CBS had another strong lineup with "Rawhide", "Daktari", "Red Skelton" and best of all "Petticoat Junction". ABC was also strong across the board with "Combat", "McHale's Navy", "F Troop", "Peyton Place" and "The Fugitive".

Verdict: Another virtually even night with 1965 perhaps gaining a slight edge because of how much better ABC was than they would be 40 years later.

Wednesdays

2004-05 - A few good drama series on each network surrounded by a large mess of bad sitcoms and worse reality shows. The highlights include "Lost", "Alias", "CSI:NY", "Law & Order", and "The West Wing". The sitcoms include "King Of Queens", "Yes Dear", "That 70s Show" and "Bernie Mac", a sorry group if there ever was one.

1965-66 - You want to see great sitcoms? Try "The Beverly Hillbillies", "Green Acres", and "The Dick Van Dyke Show" on CBS or "Ozzie and Harriet", (replaced by Batman in the summer), "Patty Duke" and "Gidget" on ABC. "Lost In Space", "The Big Valley" and "I Spy" plus "Amos Burke" (formerly "Burke's Law") made for a good drama night as well.

Verdict: At last, an easy decision. 1965 takes this one all the way.

Thursdays

2004-05 - This used to be NBC's Must See TV night but, with "Friends" and "Frasier" having ended the year before, they had to make do with "Joey", "Will and Grace", and "The Apprentice" before finishing strong with "ER". Not exactly inspiring or worth seeing. CBS wasn't ready to take over just yet although "Survivor", "CSI", and "Without A Trace" did win the night for them but better things were still ahead. ABC and FOX offered terrible lineups by comparison, perhaps sensing a changing of the guard was about to take place which didn't involve them.

1965-66 - And now a perfect example of what Must See TV is supposed to be like. CBS: "The Munsters", "Gilligan's Island", "My Three Sons". ABC (Fall): "Shindig", "Donna Reed", "Bewitched", "Peyton Place". (Winter): "Batman", "Gidget", "Bewitched" and "Peyton Place". This would have been better if they hadn't bombed with "OK Crackerby" and "The Double Life Of Henry Phyfe", both failing badly at 9 pm. NBC had both Daniel Boone and Dean Martin but otherwise nothing to get excited about.

Verdict: Another big win for 1965!

Friday

2004-05 - ABC's former TGIF night, a mere shadow of what it had been, although "8 Simple Rules" and "Hope and Faith" were a lot better than what they had before. CBS had a good night with "Joan of Arcadia" and "JAG" and NBC had "Dateline" and "Third Watch" so it was a strong night all around except for FOX (of course). Still, not much to watch here. You were better off going out.

1965-66 - A mixed bag of sitcoms all around, both good and bad, but still good enough to make for an enjoyable and fun evening, starting with "The Flintstones" and "The Addams Family" on ABC, and CBS countering with "Hogan's Heroes" and "Gomer Pyle". For drama, your best bet would be "The Man From UNCLE" on NBC at 10 pm.

Verdict: The lineup overall could have been better, but I'm still going to give 1965 the win here because of the great comedies that it offered.

Saturdays

2004-05 - It was "Crimetime Saturday" on CBS and on all the other networks with heavy law enforcement dramas like "Cops", "America's Most Wanted" and 3 "Law and Order" series making for a long and depressing evening.

1965-66 - The biggest crime here is ABC scheduling Lawrence Welk opposite "Get Smart". Overall, it was NBC's strongest night, since it also featured "I Dream Of Jeannie" and "Flipper". It was also CBS's weakest, with Jackie Gleason no longer having the drawing power he once did, although "Gunsmoke" at 10 did make up for it. ABC countered with a couple of longtime favorites now entering their final season in prime time: "Ozzie and Harriet" (in color) and "Donna Reed". Like Fridays, this wasn't a strong group but still worth sticking around for a night of channel flipping. (Remember that?)

Verdict: Is the body warm yet? 1965 by TKO!

Overall grades: No contest! 1965 wins with a record of 4 wins, 1 loss, and 2 ties, with 1 of the 2 ties also potentially being a win for them.