Was the 2004-2005 season the best TV season ever?

[TMC]

https://tvline.com/lists/greatest-tv.../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.

[Babalu]

No.

[icecream]

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.

[merlinjones]

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!!!!!

[SarahBellum]

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.

[RetroGuy2000]

R.D. Heldenfels calls 1954 television's greatest year, and wrote an entire book 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.

[Torgo]

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

[Zoneboy]

Originally Posted by Babalu

No.

I concur, not even close.

[FHCastmember]

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.

[RetroGuy2000]

Originally Posted by FHCastmember

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?

[FHCastmember]

Originally Posted by RetroGuy2000

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.

[Christopher]

Originally Posted by FHCastmember

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

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 I don't think there's a best TV season. Each one has its positives and negatives about it.

[stevea]

Originally Posted by icecream

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?

[James28]

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.

[RetroGuy2000]

Originally Posted by FHCastmember

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.