5. Eleventh Hour (CBS): In 2006, ITV broadcast a four-part series entitled “Eleventh Hour,” starring Patrick Stewart as Professor Ian Hood, a special advisor of the British government’s Joint Science Committee who investigated threats related to various scientific developments and experiments. Each episode was 90 minutes in length, and it was received well enough in the UK that CBS immediately set forth on a quest to develop the concept into a weekly series in the States. Stewart was switched out for another talented Brit – Rufus Sewell – and even though he dropped his accent in favor of going “American” with his character (now renamed Jacob Hood), we were still optimistic about the series. Alas, despite an intriguing premise, the adaptation suffered from a couple of major problems.

First off, critics perceived the show as “troubled” before its premiere because of the delay in releasing the first episode for review, but, fair enough, many series have managed to survive that particular issue. The bigger problem came from CBS’s steadfast determination to make “Eleventh Hour” fit into the same procedural mold utilized by all of its other series. As such, the predominant thrust tended to be about the crime of the week, leaving not nearly enough focus on Dr. Hood, whose considerable knowledge on scientific matters makes him an enigma. Viewers should’ve been left wondering, “Who is this guy? What’s his story?” But just as we were starting to learn about Hood’s past and getting the impression that he might actually be able to find romance for the first time since the death of his wife, the series steered back into a let’s-stick-to-the-case mindset, making its cancellation after only 18 episodes less disappointing than it might otherwise have been.

4. Worst Week (CBS): The original series – which bore the slightly longer title of “The Worst Week of My Life” – had three incarnations. The first focused on the week leading up to the marriage of its two lead characters, the second shone the spotlight on the week before the birth of their first child, and the whole thing culminated in a three-part holiday special entitled “The Worst Christmas of My Life.” Anyone who enjoys a good bit of slapstick would see the merit in trying to adapt the series for an American audience, but after watching the pilot, I wrote, “Despite the first episode being thoroughly hilarious, it’s hard to imagine how they’re going to keep up that kind of momentum on a weekly basis.” What I didn’t write – but what I did indeed wonder – was why, given how much testing goes into television nowadays, they didn’t change the title. I mean, c’mon, if you watched the show, then don’t tell me you didn’t find yourself wondering from Episode #1 just how long they were planning to drag things out. In the end, “Worst Week” ran for 16 episodes, and given that its final episode* was entitled “The Epidural,” it’s clear that the series never had a chance to expand much beyond its source material. Not that they could’ve managed it much faster: getting from premiere to bringing the pregnancy to fruition within five months is certainly nothing to sneeze at. Still, with all British-adapted series, the rule of thumb is that you should create your own identity as quickly as possible…and they didn’t.

* As far as the show’s chronology is concerned, anyway. The actual final episode was entitled “The Party,” and it should’ve actually been the fifth episode. Instead, it was held back from the initial run and was later (and somewhat inexplicably) thrown into the network’s Saturday night schedule some four months after “The Epidiural” aired.

3. I’m A Celebrity…Get Me Out Of Here! (ABC, NBC): A lot of game shows and reality shows have successfully made the transition from the UK to the US, but even after two attempts on two different networks, “I’m A Celebrity…Get Me Out Of Here!” has found American popularity elusive. But, come on, surely this is a case where you can see the problem immediately: the show’s very, very loose definition of the word “celebrity.”

ABC’s take on the show featured as contestants three models (Tyson Beckford, Nikki Shieler Ziering, Alana Stewart), two well-past-their-popularity-date former TV hosts (Downtown Julie Brown, Robin Leach), a dancer best known for knocking up a pop star (Cris Judd), a former radio sidekick turned talk show announcer (John Melendez), an Olympic athlete who hadn’t yet had his reality-show renaissance (Bruce Jenner), and an actress whose most famous movie was 20 years old (Maria Conchita Alonso). So, basically, the contestant with the highest profile was Melissa Rivers. That’s just sad…and NBC’s stab at the series wasn’t much better, which was evident from the moment it was announced that they were bringing on the wife of disgraced Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich. Seriously, the only reason to watch was to see how much of a douche Spencer Pratt (“The Hills”) was going to be, and since we knew we’d end up seeing those clips on “The Soup,” anyway, what was the point in tuning in?

I’m not saying that the British version has been consistently better when defining “celebrity,” but they managed to convince John Lydon to participate in Season 3 of the show. No, the guy’s not as punk as he used to be (which you already know if you’ve seen him hawking butter), but at least he makes for interesting TV. In most cases, the participants in the American casts did not.

2. Viva Laughlin (CBS): I can’t even begin to imagine the level of intensity that the discussions about this show reached within CBS, but I’m guessing that, in the end, it boiled down to this key question: is the popularity of Hugh Jackman as Wolverine going to be enough to sell audiences on a drama filled with song-and-dance numbers? Someone decided that it was. It was not.

Yes, the curiosity factor may have there for viewers, but it was still too soon for TV critics to be able to resist bringing up “Cop Rock,” and the network was showing startling naivete if they thought otherwise. (Fact: we TV critics keep “Cop Rock” in our arsenal like Ollie Queen keeps the boxing-glove arrow in his quiver. You know the odds are long that you’ll ever need it, but you want to have it at arm’s length just in case, and when “Viva Laughlin” came around, you can damned well bet that we had that “Cop Rock” reference cocked and ready.) Plus, a casual observer with discerning taste…okay, it was my wife…watched the pilot and noted that waiting for characters to suddenly burst into song is like waiting for a bomb to drop. It was not a compliment.

At the time, I said of the series,” “It’s a unique show, make no mistake, and placing it on Sundays at 8 PM means that the possibility for a big family audience is there…but, then, a show about a casino doesn’t seem much like a family-friendly series. It probably won’t matter, anyway; neither the Jackman factor nor the novelty of waiting for the next song will be enough to keep it on the air for more than a handful of episodes.” If you define “a handful” as a mere two episodes, then I was right on the money.

1. Coupling (NBC): Try telling an American who’s never seen the original British version of “Coupling” that it’s one of the most hilarious sitcoms of the decade, and they’ll never believe you, but if you try telling it to someone from the same demographic who managed to catch an episode of the American version of “Coupling,” and they may never trust your opinion about television ever again. Still, I’m going out on that very limb, mostly because I know there are a lot of other folks out there who’ll vouch for me.

NBC’s attempt to bring “Coupling” to the States was accompanied by a huge advertising campaign, but what it did not come with, unfortunately, was anything original. The first episodes of the series to air – which, not coincidentally, ended up being the only episodes to air – slavishly followed the scripts of the British series, which only served to convince fans of the original that this had been a very bad idea. Meanwhile, BBC America did its part to secure that mindset by pointedly airing episodes of the original immediately after the new version, so that viewers could see exactly how much better the original version was. They could also see how much better the British cast was.

Certainly, the post-“Coupling” credits of our cast show that they had talent: Jay Harrington is the titular star of “Better Off Ted,” Colin Ferguson plays Sheriff Jack Carter on “Eureka,” Sonya Walger went on to “Lost” and is now on “FlashForward,” and if Lindsay Price hasn’t had the greatest taste in project, at least “Lipstick Jungle” and “Eastwick” have kept her working. Their problem was that they started with no chemistry and, by being forced to fit into the shoes of their British counterparts in an almost word-for-word fashion, they were never able to find any.

Honorable Mention: “The I.T. Crowd.” If this one doesn’t ring a bell as an American series, that’s because it never actually was an American series, but it certainly wasn’t for lack of NBC trying to make it one. Indeed, the network was excited enough about the adaptation for NBC Entertainment President Kevin Reilly to chat it up during the May 2007 upfronts, which – as you may recall – also included chatter about the much-vaunted “Heroes” spin-off that never was, but the sitcom was set for a mid-season debut, eventually getting wiped off the slate altogether. So can we blame the infamous writer’s strike on the fact that we never saw a Stateside take on “The I.T. Crowd”?

If so, then it’s something that fans of “Community” should probably be thankful for, as it was originally supposed to star Joel McHale. Same deal for “NCIS” fans, since Rocky Carroll – now better known as Director Leon Vance – was also penciled in as a cast member. What really had our hopes up, though, was the fact that Richard Ayoade was set to play the same role on the American version as he had in the British version. The idea of seeing Moss interact with Americans seemed like it would’ve been comedy gold, but would “The I.T. Crowd” have been the next “Office,” or would it have been another “Coupling”? The world will never know.

10. “School Reunion” – There are other stories that from a plot standpoint are much better written than this one, and thus more deserving of being in this Top 10, but I’ve an enormous fondness for this outing simply because it not only brought Lis Sladen’s Sarah Jane Smith back into my life, but it did it in such a way that left me a sobbing mess. If, like me, you grew up watching Doctor #4 (Tom Baker) and Sarah Jane battle the evil Morbius on Karn, defeat the diabolical Sutekh on Mars, and kill the giant Krynoid at the estate of Harrison Chase, then seeing her character – as well as her relationship with the Doctor – hit a poignant and dramatic high note of finality was most definitely a strong cup of tea. It’s a bit of a shame Sarah Jane has her own series now, because everything about her that’s come since has somewhat eroded what was beautiful about this story in the first place.

9. “The Waters of Mars” – It’s entirely possible I’m riding a “Who” high at the moment, and that in time “Mars” won’t seem quite as perfect as it does at present. Further, since it won’t play on BBC America until Dec. 19th, it would be wrong to discuss it in any great detail. Nevertheless, it’s got an intricate premise from Russell T. Davies and Phil Ford, deft direction from Graeme Harper, creepy monsters, outstanding set design, and one helluva complex performance from David Tennant, that’s clearly aimed at setting up “The End of Time.” The last 20 minutes are frenzied and game-changing; this is Davies pulling the rug out from under the Time Lord and redefining everything we thought we learned about him over the past four seasons. It’s fucking glorious, and even if the big finish doesn’t quite live up to the buildup, I’ll know they made a damn good go of it.

8. “The Impossible Planet/The Satan Pit” – Here’s another story that might leave a reader or two scratching their heads, but it’s a tale that holds an immense amount of nostalgia for me. See, my kid was 13 at the time it premiered, as were his friends. For the second season of new “Who,” the fates conspired so that he and his buds gathered at the house nearly every weekend to watch the latest episode with me, and the otherworldly goings-on at Sanctuary Base in particular had all of us riveted. “Don’t Turn Around!” became the catchphrase for a good long while around my casa, and further, this was the story where Tennant “became” the Doctor for me. The scene where he was being lowered into the Satan Pit, talking of how the specifics of the creature didn’t fit his “rules” was the defining moment. If I’d had even a vague vibe that he might not be precisely the right actor for the role before this, any such thoughts were dashed immediately after viewing that scene. Beside, the Doctor meets Satan? Hot diggity damn! This two-parter also unleashed the Ood, who have clearly become one of the defining alien races of the new series; they returned for the aptly named “Planet of the Ood” in Season Four, and will be returning again for Tennant’s finale.

7. “The Parting of the Ways” – “Who” season finales are hyper-dramatic and a lot of fun, but typically they don’t stand out as being the cream of any given block. That wasn’t the case, however, with Ninth Doctor Christopher Eccleston’s swan song from Season One, which was in fact so perfect in its seasonal finality that Davies hasn’t topped it since. The thing is, when it was being written, he had no idea whether or not the show was even going to get a second season, and therefore it fell upon him to craft a story that put a fine point on everything he felt he needed to say about the concept. Eccleston is quite literally fantastic here, but perhaps even more so is Billie Piper, who just shines with one of her most painful performances in the series. I still get shivers when I watch the hologram scene, punctuated by her cries of “Take me back!,” as well as the moment between her and Jackie, when she explains how the Doctor took her to meet her deceased father: “That’s how good the Doctor is!” I’m man enough to admit I’m tearing up a bit just writing these words. Oh, and “Parting” also unveiled an army of friggin’ flying Daleks. There was a time when such a sight was indeed something to behold; now it’s somewhat unfortunately become the norm.

6. “The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances” – As good as “The Parting of the Ways” was, Steven Moffat managed to unleash a Season One tale that was just a tad better, and he brought the unforgettable phrase “Are you my mummy?” to the table, for which we are eternally grateful. Everything about this two-parter is just bloody brilliant: WW II, the London Blitz, a blond girl dangling from a barrage balloon, the introduction of John Barrowman’s Captain Jack Harkness, and gratuitously lush use of Glenn Miller. Who can forget the Doctor’s moves at the end, followed by his joyous cry of “Just this once – everybody lives!”? It was obvious the Moff was a force with which to be reckoned coming out of the gate, and in just a few months he’s going to literally be running the show (actually, he already is – we just haven’t gotten to sample the wares).

5. “The Girl in the Fireplace” – And so how does Grand Moff Steven top an epic like “The Empty Child”? By doing an intimate episode in which the Doctor, for all intents and purposes, falls in lust for the first time, although it’s a strange, neutered lust to be sure. This was another game-changer as far as the character of the Doctor goes, and thematically reflected what much of Season Two was about: The Doctor’s inability to see the effect he has on the people with whom he comes into contact. In this case the person is Madame de Pompadour, also known as Reinette (Sophia Myles), who encounters the Doctor periodically throughout her entire life, from childhood until death, even though the same events only occupy a few hours of time from his standpoint. It’s got a heartbreaking ending, gorgeous set design and costumes, and a truly inspired group of villains in the form of the Clockwork Androids, who very likely kept children of all ages awake at night ages after having viewed it.

4. “Midnight” – What happens when the Doctor loses his voice, which is perhaps his most valuable asset? The events that occur onboard the shuttle bus en route to the planet Midnight are some of the most unsettling the new series presented. Over the course of this hour we viewed the very worst aspects of humanity, which is a marked change from Russell T. Davies generally more positive outlook. Well, OK, Davies writes some pretty nasty material – what would a series like this be without villains? – but the folks onboard the shuttle bus with the Doctor might as well be you and me, and it’s in his presentation of these “normal” folk that the ugly beauty of this episode lies. Well, that and the fact that it’s utterly horrific in its depiction of an unseen creature that at first tries to break into the bus, and then later settles on taking over the mind and voice of passenger Sky Silvestry (Lesley Sharp, giving an atypically chilling performance). Towards the end, the mysterious force moves on to the Doctor, and he just seems so bloody helpless.

3. “Blink” – For many, “Blink” remains the crowning achievement of new “Who,” and with good reason – it’s an outstanding hour of TV that not only works as a great example of what this show can do when it stretches itself, but it also works in a vacuum; you could watch this episode without knowing anything about the series at all and still come away endlessly entertained and spooked. Funny that the Doctor is barely even in it, but therein lays a great deal of its perfection. Instead, he’s trapped in 1969, as well as on a series of 17 DVDs as an Easter Egg, and as a result our central figure is Sally Sparrow (Carey Mulligan of “An Education”). It’s up to her to stop the Weeping Angels (creatures from beyond so perfectly constructed, that a reappearance could only be a letdown) and get the TARDIS back to ’69 so the Doctor can resume his travels. Once again written by Steven Moffat, this hour is his strongest offering to the series, and more than anything else proves that he knows his way around wibbly-wobbley time-wimey balls of, um, time. Mulligan comes out of the gate, owning the series as if she’d been there since day one, and it’s no surprise that she’s moving up in the world of film and TV. Good thing, too, as people who’ve never even watched “Who” will likely soon start discovering this gem simply because they’re looking for older work from this up and coming talent, and really, what better episode to use to get someone into the show? An angel has the key to the phone box indeed.

2. “Love & Monsters” – There probably isn’t a more controversial episode that I could’ve chosen for this list than “Love & Monsters,” let alone the fact that I’m putting it at #2. I’m sure I’ve seen this one labeled more than any other as the worst episode of the new series – a sentiment with which I take obvious issue. A “Who” buddy of mine assures me this feeling only comes from stodgy, vocal old school fans who don’t like having their “Who” tampered with in this particular manner, and that the reality is that it’s actually a very well-liked episode. I’d like to think so, because the tragicomical story of Elton Pope (Marc Warren) and the other members of L.I.N.D.A., a group dedicated to collecting information on the mysterious Doctor, is one of the finest odes to the art of fandom ever written (thank you again, Russell Davies). This piece sings, makes my heart swell and manages to say everything and nothing about “Who” simultaneously – and it’s crammed full of ELO tunes! What more could a “Doctor Who” fan possibly want?

1. “Human Nature/The Family of Blood” – While Davies and Moffat wrote some of the best episodes of the decade, the #1 spot is reserved for a story from Paul Cornell. His previous outing, “Father’s Day,” was also very good, and came close to making this Top 10. But close only counts in horseshoes, hand grenades and body odor, so if by any chance Paul reads these words, hopefully he’ll forgive me leaving “Father’s Day” off the list in lieu of placing him at the very top. Mind you, that’s not really a strategical maneuver, as this two-parter, which features the Doctor becoming human and falling in love, is actually the greatest 90 minutes of ‘00s “Who.” Unfortunately, it would pack very little resonance for anyone unfamiliar with the series – you’ve got to be invested and well-versed in the new series up to this point in Season Three to get the most out of it, but that can hardly be counted against it. It’s a thing of beauty, the bee’s knees, the best of the best, the crème de la crème of all things new “Who.” Tennant is a marvel here, proving to viewers just how damn good an actor he is, in the calculated performance as John Smith, the schoolteacher living in a pre-WWI England. But Smith has strange dreams at night – dreams of a blue box and of being another man altogether. So do we, John, so do we – and Paul, we’ll never look into a mirror quite the same way again.

WARNING! LIST CAVEAT! – To be included within this list, the show cannot have started at any point prior to Jan. 1, 2000. Without that caveat, you can bet that “Angel” would’ve been included…and, yes, probably “Farscape,” too. But definitely “Angel.”

15. Masters of Science Fiction (ABC): As an anthology series in the 2000s, it’s not like it ever had a chance in Hell of surviving, anyway, which is why it comes in at the bottom of the list. Still, it deserves mention here, partially because it was really good, but mostly because it got an even bigger shaft from ABC than “New Amsterdam” got from Fox.

Get this: during ABC’s executive panel during the TCA Press tour of summer 2007, someone asked Stephen McPherson, the network’s president of entertainment about the origins of the series, and he responded, “It was a low-cost initiative that we tried. We did this series of movies to see if there was a way to spark something different at a really low cost point. You know, I think there is some good work done there, but it’s very unseen. So it’s just been…it’s been a little bit problematic.” Okay, now, to be fair, he’s acknowledging that there’s “good work” inherent somewhere in the series, but to put these comments in a better perspective, they were made before the show had even premiered. And how did he decide to remedy this problem of the series being “unseen”? By premiering it at 10 PM on Saturday night. Hey, way to get behind your programming, Steve!

In fairness, I’m sure no one, not even the series creators, ever expected “Masters of Science Fiction” to be anything other than a short-lived midseason entry, but it’s not like it had to be. The series harked back to classic dramatic anthologies like “The Twilight Zone,” “The Outer Limits,” and the like, and while its budget might not be through the roof, the performances – including turns from Malcolm McDowell, Anne Heche, Sam Waterston, Judy Davis, Terry O’Quinn, Elizabeth Rohm, Brian Dennehy, and John Hurt – were top-notch. But, then, that’s what happens when you bring in directors like Mark Rydell (”On Golden Pond”), Michael Tolkin (”The Player”), and Jonathan Frakes (”Star Trek: First Contact”) to helm adaptations of stories by Robert Heinlein (”Starship Troopers”), Howard Fast (”Spartacus”), and legendary sci-fi writer Harlan Ellison, who actually adapted his own story, collaborating with Josh Olson (”A History of Violence”). If any of this sounds like it might be up your alley, you can at least take comfort in the knowledge that the entire series is available on DVD, including two episodes that ABC couldn’t be bothered to air.

14. Dark Angel (Fox): Nowadays, it’s best remembered for the fact that it introduced the world at large to the assets of Jessica Alba (which, by the way, look damned good in black leather), but when “Dark Angel” premiered, its high profile came from the fact that it was the first thing that it was produced by James Cameron. What not nearly as many people remember, however, is that the show also starred Michael Weatherly, who would get a much longer running gig a few years later when he took on the role of Anthony DiNozzo in “NCIS,” and Jensen Ackles, now better known as Dean Winchester on “Supernatural.”

But I digress. The slightly-futuristic (it took place in 2019) “Dark Angel” was predominantly about Alba’s character, Max Guevara, a genetically enhanced super-soldier who has escaped from the government that created her and is using her job as a motorcycle courier to cover for the fact that she spends most of her time searching for her brethren, i.e. the other 11 super-soldiers who escaped with her. She does this with the help of Logan Kale (Weatherly), a.k.a. cyber-journalist “Eyes Only,” whose unparalleled computer skills go a long way toward making up for the fact that he’s paralyzed from the waist down. The series looked great, and having John Savage serve as one of its primary villains (Colonel Donald Michael Lydecker) was inspired, but trying to get the general public to embrace the cyberpunk movement – even the highly diluted version of it that “Dark Angel” offered – was a lost cause. Truth be told, we’re probably lucky that we got as much of the show as we did. If Cameron’s name hadn’t been on it, it probably would’ve been over at the end of Season 1.

13. Kyle XY (ABC Family): Ironically, I’m writing this mere moments after getting word that a copy “Kyle XY: The Final Season” has just been sent my way. Even if you aren’t familiar with the series, you’ll nonetheless have deduced from the appearance of the word “final” in the set’s subtitle that this isn’t a show that came and went within the span of a single season. Yes, “Kyle XY” actually lasted for three seasons, but it was still going strong creatively when ABC Family decided that it just didn’t match up well enough with their other content, like “Greek” or “The Secret Life of the American Teenager.” Now, look, I dig those shows as much as the next thirtysomething who wants to vicariously relive his youth through semi-realistic TV characters, but is that any reason to kill off a great sci-fi melodrama like “Kyle”? No, sir, it is not.

12. The 4400 (USA): If I’m to be completely honest, I’m much more of a fan of this show’s concept that I ultimately was of its execution. When a series kicks off by depositing a group of exactly 4400 people at the foothills of Mount Rainier, each of whom had disappeared at various times from 1946 onward but haven’t aged a moment since then and don’t remember where they’ve been…I mean, damn, how can you not be intrigued? And the premise further expands to reveal that several members of the 4400 have begun to develop paranormal abilities, that’s icing on the cake! But while I loved the episodes which focused on individual members of the group and how they dealt with their return, I wasn’t nearly as enthralled with the ongoing storylines with the regular cast members. Still, when it was good, it was really, really good, and with well over 4300 stories left to be told, I have to imagine that, statistically speaking, there would’ve been quite a bit more sci-fi goodness yet to come.

11. Star Trek: Enterprise (UPN): No series wants to be remembered as the worst in its franchise, but you’d be hard pressed to find any “Star Trek” fan that wouldn’t use that label on “Enterprise.” The concept of stepping back in time to the pre-Kirk era and exploring the origins of Starfleet Command and the United Federation of Planets was unquestionably an intriguing one, but Rick Berman – who took the “Trek” reigns of command when Gene Roddenberry died – seemed insistent on rewriting established canon than putting together a good TV show. So why should such a mediocre series have continued? Because in its 4th season, uber-fans Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stevens came aboard the writing staff and turned things around in a big way, providing tributes to the original series and “The Next Generation” every time you turned around. The ratings didn’t change, though, and “Enterprise” was canceled. Give Berman credit, though: he managed to stab at us from Hell’s heart one last time by offering up an absolutely crap-tacular series finale.

10. New Amsterdam (Fox): When I think of this series, I always think of the panel for the show during the TCA Press Tour, when one of the journalists just absolutely refused to accept that the creators of “New Amsterdam” had never seen “Highlander.” I mean, seriously, it was starting to get ugly. The funny thing, though, is that aside from the fact that the lead character of the series was an immortal, the comparisons really weren’t all that dramatic.

The show was about John Amsterdam (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau), a NYPD homicide detective who’s 400 years old but looks 35. That’s because, way back in 1642, Amsterdam saved the life of a Native American girl, who in turn cast a spell that granted him immortality, with the caveat that his aging would resume when he found his one true love…which was darned nice of her, because, really, no one should have to outlive the love of their life. Though you’d expect the show to spend the majority of its time on Amsterdam’s search for his love, “New Amsterdam” didn’t take the obvious route. Instead, it spent a great deal of its time exploring the long life of its titular character, revealing that he’d been in the Army three times and also did time in the Navy, Marines, and Coast Guard (but not the Air Force, ostensibly due to a fear of heights), served as a doctor during the Civil War, worked for the CIA, taught history, made furniture, and – at some point – became an alcoholic. (He’s been in AA since 1965.)

I’ve never really gotten a handle on why “New Amsterdam” was so disliked by Fox, but it’s clear that it was. It was supposed to have premiered in the fall of 2007, but then they stopped production after the first seven episodes had been completed and proceeded to sit on the series until mid-season; once it finally got on the air, they did very little promotion on it, making it completely unsurprising when they pulled the plug on it. I’m still mystified. Like “Journeyman,” the romantic bent of the show was one which seemed perfect for cross-demographic success, but they never even gave it a chance.

9. The Dresden Files (Sci Fi): As someone who stepped into this series without having read any of the Jim Butcher novels which served as its inspiration, maybe I had an advantage, because fans of the literary franchise seemed to universally hate this adaptation. Me, I thought it was pretty cool. Paul Blackthorne played Harry Dresden as a cocky wizard who helped out the police department with their more eccentric cases, i.e. the ones that would be classified as supernatural if anyone on the force dared to claim a belief in such things, and the series managed to have a decidedly dark tone while still maintaining a sense of humor. But when you kick off a TV series by instantly alienating the majority of the people who made it a success as a book series, you’re pretty much doomed to failure, which is what “The Dresden Files” proved to be.

8. Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles (Fox): Here’s one one that we already detailed elsewhere, but, again, it deserves repeating that, when “The Sarah Connor Chronicles,” it did so far too soon. Season 1 had its highs and lows, but the show’s sophomore year was consistently intriguing throughout, starting with the season premiere and the introduction of Catherine Weaver (Shirley Manson), the co-founder and current CEO of ZeiraCorp…except that, as we discovered immediately prior to the closing credits, she wasn’t actually Catherine Weaver but, indeed, was a shapeshifting T-1001. As the season progressed, however, her physical transformation became less interesting than her emotional evolution, with the T-1001 being forced to maintain the façade of its new identity in its entirety, which required her to raise Catherine’s daughter, Savannah (Mackenzie Smith), and try to understand her. (I have a suspicion that all of the parents in our readership just snorted en masse and said, “Uh, yeah, good luck with that!”)

The T-1001 wasn’t the only Terminator to get a crash course in humanity during Season 2. Cameron (Summer Glau) spent much of the season suffering from a serious chip malfunction, leading her at one point to adopt the approximate memories of future resistance fighter Allison Young, on whom her personality had originally been patterned, but we also saw her interacting outside of the Connor camp; elsewhere, the Terminator formerly known as Cromartie (Garret Dillahunt) had his chip destroyed, but his body was connected to ZeiraCorp’s artificial intelligence known as the Babylon A.I., leading him to take on a new name – John Henry – and leading the series to explore matters of spirituality by querying whether his sentience means that terms like “life” and “death” now apply to him. Oh, right, and there was also some pretty good stuff with the human characters, too.

Sure, there were moments which defied credibility, but when you’re dealing with a show that lives and dies by time travel, suspension of disbelief and acceptance of pretty much everything that’s handed to you is a necessity. Fortunately, executive producer Josh Friedman found a way to combine the necessary technological components of “Terminator” with deep characterization. It seriously sucked that “The Sarah Connor Chronicles” was canceled just as those who’d followed it from the beginning were really feeling rewarded for their steadfast viewership, but it was just insult to injury when “Terminator: Salvation” bombed, taking down any decent chance that the series might be revisited at some point.

7. Miracles (ABC): I feel a little weird about including a show with religious themes in the midst of a list about sci-fi series, but when even the show’s creator – Richard Hatem – is willing to acknowledge that it bounces back and forth between religious phenomena and paranormal phenomena, it’s hard to argue against its place here.

Starring a pre-“Jericho” Skeet Ulrich, “Miracles” introduced viewers to Paul Callan, an investigator of modern miracles for the Catholic Church at the Archdiocese of Boston. Though he’s dealing with the inevitable frustration of disappointing groups of believers each time he investigates and disproves the authenticity of their “miracles,” Paul’s faith is restored after he’s involved in a car accident: not only does he have a first-hand experience with a young boy’s ability to heal, but when his injuries lead to blood spatter on the windshield, he watches in astonishment as his his blood forms the words, “God Is Now Here.” But, wait, hang on: maybe it actually said, “God is Nowhere.”

Either way, these events lead to a schism between Paul and the church when his report on the incidents is dismissed, but he soon crosses paths with Alva Keel (Angus Macfadyen), who propositions him with a job offer at his organisation, Sodalitas Quaerito (“Brotherhood in search of truth”). From there, “Miracles” followed Paul, Alva, and Evelyn Santos (Marisa Ramirez) as they crossed the globe and investigated various phenomena, some less religious than others but all connected to life, death, and the afterlife in some fashion, rather like a spiritual version of “The X-Files.” Unfortunately, the series was manhandled by ABC, running three episodes, then preempting it for three weeks, then moving it all over the schedule. No wonder it never caught on. With that kind of treatment, it would’ve been a miracle if it had.

6. The Middleman (ABC Family): I used to say that the reason this series failed was that ABC Family was the wrong network for it, but when I spoke with the show’s creator, Javier Grillo-Marxuach, he set me straight and assured me that they were the right network. Why? Because they let him do it. “It would have been very easy for any group of people to pick up the show and say, ‘Gosh, we really like the idea of this girl fighting monsters, but can you make her sexier and kind of make the dialogue a little bit more accessible and make the sensibility of the show a little bit more accessible?’” he said. “And to ABC Family’s credit, they never asked me to do that.” When you go back and watch the show from start to finish (which is easy to do, what with Shout Factory having released a complete-series set), you really get a feel for the kind of freedom that Grillo-Marxuach was granted, but it still must be said that “The Middleman” might have been better served in the ratings if it had aired on a network that more readily catered to unabashed geeks. Or, then again, maybe it wouldn’t have. Given that the dialogue flies fast and furious, like a Kevin Smith movie on speed, and the amount of science fiction and fantasy concepts thrown at the viewer are only matched by the number of references to science fiction and fantasy movies and TV series, maybe it was always destined to be a future cult series.

5. Journeyman (NBC): What’s this? Another “Bullz-Eye” favorite? Certainly, several of us on the staff were thrilling to the weekly adventures of reporter Dan Vasser (Kevin McKidd) as he involuntarily traveled through time, doing so as much to see the next cool set piece – I particularly loved it when he was on a smoke-filling flight during the 1970s – as to find out how his unexpected disappearances and impossible-to-predict returns would wreak havoc on his life in the present. It was also unique for a sci-fi series in that it was unabashedly romantic, with Dan trying to reconcile his love for his wife in the present (Gretchen Egolf) with the revelation that his former fiancee (Moon Bloodgood), who he’d believed to be dead, was actually alive, well, and a fellow time traveler.

I talked to producer Kevin Falls at a point when the fate of “Journeyman” was in limbo, and he was understandably frustrated at the way the network was treating the series, even if he understood that they obviously had more stake in saving the shows that were produced by NBC-Universal. (“Journeyman” was a Fox production.) When I pitched the idea of moving from series to movie, a la “Firefly,” he was enthusiastic but realistic about the suggestion. “I would do anything to keep this show alive,” he said. “If there was interest and somebody wanted to make a movie, nothing would make me happier. But I have to be realistic: Joss Whedon had quite a following, and I don’t know that Kevin Falls has quite that following.” Unfortunately, it appears that he was right: not only was “Journeyman” canceled, but it wasn’t even released on DVD after its cancellation.

4. Reaper (The CW): I think this cancellation hurt more folks at Bullz-Eye than any other in this list. It’s a bold statement, but when you look back at our TV Power Rankings, you’ll see that I’m not kidding. Of course, its success there is probably – but not definitely – why got it canceled, but, dammit, we had to show our love. The trifecta of slackers in “Reaper” were great, but let’s not kid ourselves: as much as we laughed at their antics, it was Ray Wise who kept us coming back every week. It’s a crime that that man never got an Emmy nomination for his work as the Devil. Series creators Michele Fazekas and Tara Butters had a lot of battles with The CW about their desire to expand on the mythology of the show (the network, as is so often the case, was more comfortable with self-contained episodes), and given that the duo had departed by the end of the show’s second season, it’s a fair bet that Season 3 wouldn’t have been the same “Reaper” that we’d come to know and love, anyway. But, man, we sure would like it if Fazekas and Butters could find the backing to do a “Reaper” movie…and we have it on good authority that Bret Harrison and Tyler Labine would be back in a flash. So what are you waiting for, Hollywood? Let’s get moving on this thing!

3. Firefly (Fox): I feel like the majority of what I might have to say about this series has probably already been said somewhere within Bob Westal’s love letter to Joss Whedon’s best work of the 2000s…and if Bob himself didn’t say it, then surely one of the folks who commented on it did. Still, I’ll go ahead and throw in my two cents worth and reconfirm that, yes, the idea of a Western set in space was indeed a wonderful one…and it would’ve worked, too, if it wasn’t for those pesky network executives at Fox. As someone who literally grew up in the world of television (his father, Tom Whedon, was one of the original writers for “Captain Kangaroo” and went on to serve as the head writer of “The Electric Company”), Whedon tried to kick it old-school with “Firefly” by starting things off with a two-hour pilot to set the stage for the series. Fox, however, decided it would be a better move to just dump viewers into the deep end and had the series debut with the second episode instead. I think we all know how well that plan worked.

“Firefly” was set in the 2500s and offered a less than upbeat look into the future, suggesting that, although technology had reached a point where gravity-drive engines made travel beyond our solar system possible, things were pretty tough all over. Earth’s population was such that people pretty much had to leave the planet if they wanted to survive, but while terraforming had allowed humanity to set up colonies on many different planets, their existence tended toward the rough-and-tumble, not unlike America’s wild west during the late 1800s. As such, Whedon took several stereotypes of the era – cowboy, preacher, hooker with the heart of gold, blacksmith, doctor, and even stagecoach driver – and tweaked them to fit his new premise. Nathan Fillion’s performance as Captain Mal was such a career-defining role that he spent seven years trying to find another one that worked as well for him (you can bet that he kissed the sky when he got word that “Castle” had received a second-season pick-up), and Summer Glau’s creepy vibe while playing the troubled River was no doubt directly responsible for earning her the later role as a Terminator on “The Sarah Connor Chronicles,” but like Whedon’s other shows, the whole ensemble played well together from the start. “Firefly” had enough of a following to move from cancellation to the silver screen, but while the odds of ever seeing a sequel to “Serenity” are pretty slim, hey, it’s more of an afterlife than any other show on this list had.

2. Invasion (ABC): More love for another favorite of the Power Rankings. The premise of the show, more or less, was that a race of aliens had begun their takeover of Earth by slowly infiltrating the residents of a small town and possessing them…or bonding with them…or maybe they replaced them altogether but just retained their memories. I can’t quite recall – it’s been a fair while since I’ve revisited the series – but I’m not entirely sure that re-screening all 22 episodes would necessarily provide me with a definitive answer. There were a lot of mysteries lurking within “Invasion,” and creator Shaun Cassidy had big plans to considerably expand upon the mythos of the series in future seasons, but, as we know, he never got that opportunity.

“Invasion” was, at its heart, a show about family. You’ve got Sheriff Tom Underlay (William Fichtner), whose wife, Mariel (Kari Matchett), is the ex-wife of park ranger Russell Varon (Eddie Sibrian); Tom has a daughter from his first marriage (Alexis Dziena), and Mariel and Russell have a daughter (Ariel Gade) and a son (Evan Peters), plus Russell is remarried, and he and his wife Larkin (Lisa Sheridan) – who’s expecting – live with Larkin’s brother, Dave (Tyler Labine), an amiable conspiracy nut who regularly blogs about his theories…which, yes, include the possibility of alien invasion. Yes, the show had its faults, most notably an insistence on spending too much time on teen angst, but as the season progressed, “Invasion” evolved into must-see sci-fi TV. The concept that the aliens weren’t always successful in their attempts to possess their human hosts was an intriguing one, as was the question posited as the series progressed: what if an alien race wanted to infiltrate Earth but their ranks were divided on how to go about it? Unfortunately, this mystery and all of the others within “Invasion” remain unsolved.

1. Threshold (CBS): Dr. Molly Anne Caffrey (Carla Gugino) is a crisis management consultant for the US government who gets a major surprise when her worst-case-scenario plan for what to do in case of an alien invasion is activated. Pulls together a team of experts, including microbiologist Dr. Nigel Fenway (Brent Spiner, “Star Trek: The Next Generation”), linguist Arthur Ramsey (Peter Dinklage, “The Station Agent”), and aerospace engineer Lucas Pegg (Robert Patrick Benedict, “Felicity”), the group begin to investigate the aliens in order find out if they’re hostile or not. Hey, guess what? They totally are! Produced by Brandon Braga and David S. Goyer, both possessing seriously strong sci-fi backgrounds (“Star Trek” and “Blade,” respectively), “Threshold” did a really good job of building the histories of the characters, exploring the aliens and making them legitimately terrifying, and, perhaps most intriguingly, presenting a realistic view of how the government would probably handle such a situation, with various senators being let in on the top-secret organization out of necessity so that funding would continue. Although the series only lasted for 13 episodes, “Threshold” had actually been designed for three specific plot arcs, with its creators planning to change the title accordingly for each: “Threshold” was meant to indicate that the aliens had made contact, and from there it would’ve moved on to the self-explanatory “Foothold,” followed by “Stranglehold,” wherein the aliens would’ve overthrown the indigenous population – that’d be us – and become the overlords.

With such an awesome cast and a solid creative team, it’s still shocking to me that the series never took off, especially when you consider that, while it certainly maintained regularly-progressing plotlines, “Threshold” had an arguable advantage over the rest of these series by not ending each episode with a cliffhanger…or, in other words, you could miss an episode and not be completely and totally lost the next time you tuned in. Maybe the problem came from the tussle between the network and the show’s creative team. “It was always intended to be a serialized show,” said Goyer in a 2009 interview with Bullz-Eye. “Once we got going into the series, (CBS) wanted episodes to be more closed ended. And they have had a lot of success with that, but we hadn’t really designed it for that, so it felt like we were stalling…and I think the audience unfortunately sensed that as well.” That’s just the sort of thing you’d expect a frustrated creator to say, and you can’t blame him, but the potential for the show was so tremendous that it never occurred to me that they were stalling. I just thought they were just building anticipation.

More recently, I thought my fandom was under relative control. But now, I’ve been asked my opinion on the ten best examples of small-screen work in this decade from the creator and guiding force of “Angel,” “Firefly,” the already canceled “Dollhouse,” and, of course, “Buffy, the Vampire Slayer.” I only have to be thankful for the fact that first four seasons of “Buffy,” which contain most of that show’s greatest episodes, are disqualified because they appeared on TV sets before 2000. We take our mercies where we find them. (And, yes, if you’re about to catch up with these on DVD, there are a fair number of spoilers below for the various series, though I’ve tried to keep a few secrets.) One word of warning: my relative ranking of these shows is a matter of mood and borders on the random. In other words — don’t hold me to these choices!

Out of competition:

The Body” (“Buffy, the Vampire Slayer”) – This episode usually ranks extremely high when people make these kind of lists. Entertainment Weekly named it as pretty much the best thing Joss Whedon has ever done and maybe the best TV thing ever. The truth of the matter is that, yes, the episode where Buffy Summers (Sarah Michelle Geller) discovers the already cold body of her mother, Joyce (Kristine Sutherland, a wonderful asset to the show for the five previous years), dead from an entirely natural brain tumor, was probably one of the most remarkable episodes of television ever shown, and probably the only thing I’ve seen that comes close to capturing the essence of what it feels like when someone dies unexpectedly. The problem was, I didn’t find it depressing; I found it real. I didn’t feel any more like repeating the experience than I would the death of an actual loved one.

Whedon – who wrote and directed the episode himself – deserves all the credit in the world for the brave choices he made, including shooting the episode in close to “real time” and not using any music. If I have one complaint with , it’s his tendency to close emotional episodes with, dare I say it, somewhat drippy montages. His choice to eliminate music from the kind of “very special” show where other creators would lay in with three or four montages of Joyce frolicking in the woods or what have you, shows Whedon is, at heart, an outstanding filmmaker. I’ve never had a problem with his much-noted tendency to kill off sympathetic and/or popular characters. It might anger some fans, but especially if you’re dealing with inherently violent material, there’s something morally wrong about not dealing with the fact that good people are just as mortal as bad people. Still, I don’t enjoy watching this episode. If this were a movie, maybe I’d be more in awe or eager for profundity. However, if I’m going to be honest, I can’t call “The Body” a favorite and I can’t be sure it’s one of the “best.”

#10, Shiny Happy People (“Angel”) – Fans of the spin-off about Buffy’s ex, the vampire-with-a-soul detective (David Boreanaz), and various assembled demon-hunters and occasionally friendly demons, will be scratching their heads at this choice. It’s an unpopular episode from a widely and justly derided storyline involving a very weird affair between Angel’s unbalanced super-powered teenage son from another dimension, Connor (Vincent Kartheiser, now of “Mad Men“), and a suddenly evil Cordelia (Charisma Carpenter), a former high school mean girl turned lovably complex grown-up foil for her vampire boss. And, yeah, it was a little freaky for Cordy to give birth to a fully grown creature called Jasmine.

However, as played by the wondrous Gina Torres of the then recently-canceled “Firefly,” Jasmine was freaky in a good way. A being whose god-like ability to create an instant sense of peace, happiness, and complete obedience, is somewhat set off by the fact that she’s actually a deformed and decaying, if not entirely evil, monster who must consume people to live, she was every charismatic leader and every great screen beauty rolled into one monstrous ball. More than anything else, “Shiny Happy People” reminded me of Don Siegel’s 1956 film verson of “Invasion of the Body Snatchers.” It was another believable demonstration of how we humans are only too willing to surrender our our humanity to the first apparently completely beauteous and 100% wise being who comes along. You know, like Oprah, only less powerful.

#9. “Epitaph One”/“The Left Hand” (“Dollhouse”) — A tie for the two best episodes so far of Whedon’s most recent, most highly problematic, and most freshly canceled, series. Without going into what I think went awry with the show, about an immoral corporation providing semi-slave designer human beings for a very high price, these two very different episodes take creative risks that pay off in big ways. The DVD-only, lower-budget, “Epitaph One” is set ten years after the events of the series and makes use of its somewhat low-fi  aesthetic to create an exciting post-apocalyptic science-fiction drama that plays like a more thoughtful version of certain aspects of “The Terminator” (which Whedon is famously trying to buy). The episode features some especially good acting, both from guest stars like Felicia Day and series regulars like the always superb Olivia Williams and Harry Lennix.

The more glossy “The Left Hand,” which aired just before I started writing this, benefits from a breakneck pace, lots of prime Whedon tragicomic humor, as well as a scene-stealing guest appearance by “Firefly” and “Terminator”-alum Summer Glau as a truly messed-up techie on a soul-crushing vendetta against Eliza Dushku‘s self-aware “doll,” Echo, but with a definite crush on her enemy’s  programmer. Most of that humor I was talking comes from strong work by Fran Kranz, whose really grown into his role as seemingly 100% amoral nerdy brain-designer-genius Topher Brink, and the amazing Enver Gkojaj as, yes, seemingly 100% amoral nerdy brain-designer-genius Topher Brink. (He’s duplicated himself so he can literally be in two places at once.) The previously unknown Gjokaj may be one reason why – canceled or not, mixed reviews and controversy or not – “Dollhouse” may go down in TV history. Over the years, Whedon has shown an increasing flair for picking out shockingly good actors to populate his work in supporting roles, and Gjokaj may be one of the very best. His chameleon-like ability to inhabit a number of highly disparate characters with complete believability and – as seen on this episode – his Alec Baldwin-like gift of mimicry, pretty much guarantees that we’ll be hearing from this extremely accomplished young actor again very soon.

#. “Serenity” (“Firefly”) — High on the list of reasons why Whedon’s combination of horse opera and space opera never really had a chance to hit with audiences, the choice to air its original pilot — not to be confused with the later movie of the same name — as the final episode, and only after the show had already been canceled, is certainly among them. Just a hair darker in its outlook than the rest of the show, this “Serenity” is very much in the tradition of classic movie westerns and does a marvelous job of introducing a rich cast of characters. In particular, Captain Malcolm Reynolds (Nathan Fillion) is a combination of the swaggering Han Solo and the tragic, embittered Ethan Edwards of “The Searchers” but with a far sharper sense of humor than either and one of the best lead characters on any show, ever. Deemed too slow and not funny enough by the network and even some fans, the episode that introduced the mostly well-intentioned thieves-for-hire of the Firefly class ship named Serenity, is perfectly calibrated, comedy-laced, action film-making of the very best kind.

#7. “War Stories”  (“Firefly”) — A brutally funny combination of violence and character-driven comedy, this episode focuses on a kind of triangle we don’t often see in movies and TV. Space-freighter pilot Wash (Alan Tudyk, “Dodgeball,” “3:10 to Yuma“) is happily married to beautiful, ex-military, bad-ass Zoe (Gina Torres), but he finds himself jealous of her old combat buddy and current companion in danger, Captain Mal. Even if he can be convinced that there was never anything romantic between the two of them, he is desperate to somehow become a part of their unique relationship when it comes to dealing with life or death matters. Maneuvering himself into a situation where a real danger ensues, he not surprisingly gets more than he asked for.

This episode is notable for easily the funniest believably painful torture sequence ever filmed – a bit of inspired ultra-black comedy that Whedon might not dare to have tried in the post-Dick Cheney/post “24” world. The brilliance of the scene is accounted for not only by a great script credited to Cheryl Cain, but the top grade chemistry between Alan Tudyk and Nathan Fillion. To this day, they are darn funny appearing together as themselves in public, but they’ve never been better than when they were allowed to work out their issues while being electrocuted by an interplanetary criminal mastermind.

#6. “Chosen”  (“Buffy, the Vampire Slayer”) – Longtime fans know that Joss Whedon has a spotty record when it comes to season openers and pilots. However, he always seems to pull things out at the other end and delivers solid finales that leave you both satisfied and wanting more. Happily, so far, this seems to go double for series finales. The conclusion to Whedon’s most popular and long-lived show is pretty much everything fans could have wanted, providing a certain amount of closure to long-standing conflicts in thrilling and kind of beautiful ways.

As Buffy and her long-time friends, who are getting a bit old to be called “Scoobies,” face one more battle against the original evil and witness the destruction of their hometown, not everything goes so well. In typical Whedon fashion, a couple of beloved characters die (though one recovered from his nasty case of being burned to a crisp quickly enough to return as a regular on the next season of “Angel”), but the overall tone is wistfully hopeful, and fully in line with the show’s emphasis on friendship, female empowerment, and the need to tough out this thing we call human life.

#5 – “Not Fade Away” (“Angel”) — “Angel” was always the darker, meaner cousin of “Buffy.” So, naturally its conclusion is suitably more down-and-dirty and, remarkably, even better than the acclaimed wrap-up of its sister show the year prior. Largely a fantasy-noir variation on one of Whedon’s favorite movies, “The Wild Bunch,” this episode is about what happens when battle-hardened folks face an unbeatable enemy. Sure, the staff of Angel Investigations are more morally upright than Sam Peckinpah’s mangy hardcases, but this is still a tale about settling old scores in blood and a final battle that may be as ultimately pointless as it is noble. Again, not everyone survives…I think. The show’s ending is, rather brilliantly, far from completely resolved, though the tone is much more “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid” than “The Sopranos” finale. In any case, Whedon’s theme of life as perpetual struggle couldn’t be more strongly underlined than by this exchange from that vampire Hope and Crosby, Angel and Spike (James Marsters), as they ponder how to take on a (mostly unseen) horde comprised of all manner of demonic beast and humanoid.

Spike: And in terms of a plan?
Angel: We fight.
Spike: Bit more specific?
Angel: Well, personally, I kinda wanna slay the dragon. Let’s go to work.

#4 “Once More With Feeling”  (“Buffy, the Vampire Slayer”) — I really love good musicals, but I really kind of hate bad ones and I can’t stand bad music. So, when I heard that Whedon was using his vacation time to write songs for a musical episode of “Buffy,” I could see that it would be easy enough to make logical in the Buffyverse, where there’s a demon available for any and all plotting needs. I nevertheless had visions of “Cop Rock” dancing very badly in my head. Directing and writing a musical is hard enough, I theorized, without the additional burden of composing all the songs yourself. Little did I know that, while Joss Whedon may not quite be Stephen Sondheim and Elvis Costello rolled into one, he’s a solid tunesmith whose music ranges from the silly but tuneful to the downright enchanting and delightful, with the occasional bit of modern-day schmaltz thrown in.

Still, it’s the stunning level of humorous and dramatic invention that makes this episode such a massively enjoyable piece of work. The plot involves a song-and-dance demon (the great theatrical tap-dancer Hinton Battle) infecting Sunnydale with a dangerously incendiary plague of musical-comedy. Unusually among musical episodes, the show is very much a part of the regular series continuity. That might have limited its appeal to curious newcomers, but the integrity it shows in respecting the internal logic of the show’s fantasy universe while commenting good-humoredly on the musical comedy tradition, makes the show all that much weightier for regular viewers. Whedon knows what all creators of great musicals know: all the singing and dancing in the world should never get in the way of a good story.

#3 “Dr. Horrible’s Sing-a-Long Blog.” Sometime before the 2005 release of “Serenity,” I found myself at an early screening for fans, signing a birthday card to Joss Whedon. Just above the compulsory, “Happy Birthday” I wrote “Another musical?” Well, it took a writer’s strike and the burgeoning power of Web 2.0, but my timid request was answered in high style last year with the blissfully silly and often hilarious, yet ultimately rather tragic and haunting, web-movie musical about an earnest aspiring supervillain with anti-corporate leanings (the multi-talented Neil Patrick Harris). As he strives to enter the Evil League of Evil by pleasing its rarely seen leader, Bad Horse (“the Thoroughbred of Sin”), defeat his obnoxious superhero nemesis, Captain Hammer (a never-funnier Nathan Fillion), and win the heart of an adorable activist do-gooder he chats with at the laundromat (‘net star/creator Felicia Day of “The Guild“), we learn how becoming a full-fledged supervillain may create serious problems if you also want people to love you.

A true family project co-created with brothers Zack and Jed (a musician as well as a TV writer), and Jed’s then fiancee/now wife, Maurissa Tancharoen, “Dr. Horrible” has a low-budget comic book aesthetic that actually underlines its tale of aspiring artists of crime. Crisply directed by Whedon, it’s songs are some of the funniest and most haunting from a new musical you’re likely to hear these days, if a bit less tuneful than the slicker, more Broadway-inspired music of “Once More With Feeling.”

A third act plot point, however, takes a chance by daring us to take the premises of the plot to their logical, poignant conclusion that some may not appreciate. While it could be argued that the whimsical conceit might have allowed this to be one instance where Whedon didn’t actually need to keep things fictionally real by giving a cruel fate to a sympathetic character, the choice provides this brilliant mini-musical with a stronger ending and a far better set-up for the upcoming sequel than a more straightforwardly comic conclusion would have. All in all, “Dr. Horrible” proves that, even if driven off the airwaves entirely, the Whedon brand at this point has a far better prognosis for a long life than most of his characters.

#2. “Our Mrs. Reynolds” (“Firefly”) — By now, you may be noticing a bit of a trend. Yes, I love “Firefly” and I definitely would marry it, if only the courts would legalize man-on-TV show-marriage. It’s easily my favorite Whedon show and one of my favorite television shows of all time. Sure, some of that has to do with the fact that I just love a good western, but the show truly is special even among Whedon shows. It features the most consistently strong cast of any of any of his shows, and this episode introduces a very special, if then completely unknown, guest star with the appearance of Christina Hendricks (“Mad Men”). We first meet the future Joan Holloway as Saffron, an apparently shy, possibly completely submissive, member of a colony whom Mal, unaware of local customs, accidentally marries. Written by Whedon, this fan-favorite starts out as a feminist-friendly variation on a somewhat disturbing plot thread from “The Searchers,” but eventually becomes something like the perfect TV-length screwball farce, only with more violence. What more could you want?

#1. “Objects in Space” (“Firefly”) — Unlike every single other season finale he’s written, the de facto conclusion to “Firefly” resolves very little in the way of ongoing plot elements. Indeed, it appears that fact so frustrated Whedon that it probably largely led to his determination to wrap up the story arc in more suitable fashion with the movie, “Serenity.” Nevertheless, viewed on its own, this episode is my personal selection for Whedon’s all time best work ever. It features guest-star Richard Brooks (“Law & Order”), who is letter perfect as Jubal Early, a coolly brutal and mentally unbalanced bounty hunter — Whedon’s off-kilter homage to Boba Fett, in fact — sent to recover River Tam (Summer Glau), a psychotic young fugitive who has taken refuge on board Serenity. The episode gradually boils down to a highly charged and very strange battle of wits between Early and the schizophrenic-like-a-fox Tam. It’s a blend of suspense, psychology, action, and odd pathos that, if you care to look, has some existential undercurrents. (Whedon discusses those in some detail in the somewhat unusual DVD commentary he recorded for the episode.) Still, this tale of outer space cat-and-mouse between two individuals whose life experiences has rendered them both less than whole, but more than merely human, is simply great science fiction entertainment for people who enjoy thinking a little. If there’s one thing I’m bummed about from the cancellation of the show and the box office disappointment of the ensuing movie is that we may never get to see Jubal Early face off again against the Serenity crew, though a guy can always hope. (Note to dubious viewers in light of the ending: yes, Early lives!)

Within the format itself, the whole concept of reality TV must surely have been the biggest revolution of the decade. It’s really easy to bag on reality TV – mostly because the bulk of it is so damned unreal – but anybody who spends any time in front of the tube has surely had at least a couple of reality series they consider appointment TV. The two concepts that paved the way for everything else are undoubtedly “Survivor” and “American Idol.” The former, of course, opened the floodgates for the genre, and while it’s seen a considerable dip in the ratings department over the years, 12 million viewers isn’t a viewing figure to sneeze at. The latter, despite all the bitching and moaning and cries of “it’s not as good as it used to be” that accompany each new season, remains one of the most watched shows on the tube, likely due to the fact that it’s strictly a talent competition.

On “American Idol,” the only backstabbers are the judges, and since they aren’t part of the competition, their amusing duplicity is championed. The contestants, on the other hand, are innocents, and once the competition is underway, we’re given no peek into any possible backstage drama, which is a good thing, because by the time the audition rounds are over, we’ve had enough drama to last the whole season. Everything that comes after is all about who can best transfix us for three minutes a week via one pop ditty. It actually says something positive about the U.S. that “American Idol” remains our #1 form of reality entertainment, even if the actual reality is that the vast majority of Americans couldn’t care less about buying the winner’s album six months after they’re crowned.

You might think reality TV is a bunch of crap, and in most cases you’d be right, but the whole idea of it, to my mind, led to an important revolution, and that is serialized nighttime television (the classic “soap” formula notwithstanding). Reality shows taught viewers how to become invested in characters, how to be concerned for their eventual fate, and, most importantly, how to pay attention to an ongoing storyline, and the need to tune in every week. It didn’t take long for the networks to figure out that there was an audience for shows that didn’t continually hit the reset button. “24” must have been the first successful show of the decade to embrace the serial formula, and it embraced it whole hog. It required you to tune in for every episode, because each installment was another hour of a single day in the life of Kiefer Sutherland’s Jack Bauer. That “24” premiered less than two months after the terrorist attacks on 9/11 was pure happenstance. That it became enormously popular with viewers? Probably not so much. America needed some fictitious reassurance that there were folks on the job who could get shit done, and “24” filled the prescription.

Strangely, “24” didn’t open the network floodgates for more such programming right away. It took a few years, and then “Lost” made its mark. The number of “Lost” episodes I’ve seen could be counted on two hands, but that’s not because I didn’t like it, but because real life got in the way of it being appointment TV. Yet I viewed the pilot for “Lost” several months before its 2004 premiere, and when it ended I was convinced that I’d seen the second best TV pilot ever made. (“Twin Peaks” stills sits at #1.) The fact that a show as intricate as “Lost” still has a hardcore, central audience is perhaps a testament to that pilot. “24” started a new story with each new season; “Lost” required that you tune in for every episode of every season.

Another sci-fi series that did just that was “Battlestar Galactica,” a show that, due it being on a niche network (Syfy), never amassed a huge audience yet snagged boatloads of publicity and awareness nonetheless. It was no small feat to take an utterly laughable short-lived series from the late ‘70s and re-envision it for modern audiences, but Ron Moore and company did just that…and they did it far more successfully that anyone ever guessed possible. Most amazingly, the show taught us a lot about ourselves, by thoroughly defining what it means to be human, and as the damaged ‘00s dragged on, there may not have been a more important lesson to be learned.

On the same day I saw the “Lost” pilot, I saw another pilot for a completely different kind of series. While I didn’t rank it as one of the greats, there was one thing I was sure of: it would be a massive hit…and it was. “Desperate Housewives” was precisely the sort of vapid, soapy fare that had been absent for far too long on American TV. It clued into the seemingly bland suburban construct which surrounds so many Americans, via the Lynchian notion that “all is not what it seems.” Most anyone who lives a suburban life can no doubt relate to that idea, because wherever there are groups of people, there are bound to be some of them that are fucked up. “Housewives” is littered with fucked up suburbanites of all shapes, sizes and types, but they’re kooky and funny and there’s always some twinkly music playing in the background that in the end makes everything OK. It is not great television, but over the years it has, for the most part, been immensely watchable in the most disposable sort of way.

Around the same time period as “Housewives,” “Grey’s Anatomy,” made some major waves. It’s a series I have never watched and never plan to, but I’d be foolish to omit it from discussion since it brought two annoyingly obnoxious terms to the TV table: McDreamy and McSteamy. I haven’t heard either in a few years, but there was a time when they seemed to define everything that was wrong with television. I assume “Grey’s” fans have grown out of it…or maybe the show killed one of those guys off? I’ve no idea and can’t be motivated to investigate. Presently, there’s a brand new version of it going around, through cinema, via Camp Edward and Camp Nimrod. People can be so easily distracted it makes you wonder why some shows actually try harder.

Speaking of trying harder, it’s a good time to bring up some cable shows, otherwise I’m going to lose about 90% of the readers – only people who appreciate cable fare are likely to be on the net reading an article like this in the first place. “The Sopranos.” Jeez, what can possibly be said that hasn’t been said already? It turned pay-TV into a must-have for millions, and proved that there was a huge audience for an ongoing series with gratuitous nudity, violence and bad language. Of course David Chase’s baby wasn’t just tits, blood and variations on the word fuck – it was also a deep exploration of the human condition. You didn’t have to be a gangster to identify with Tony Soprano’s problems – you just had to understand them, which wasn’t a tall order since most of his dilemmas had nothing to do with offing people. The show rearranged the mafia formula so methodically, that it’s presented a serious challenge for any like-minded material that’s come since. It’s too soon to proclaim the definitive TV series of the ‘00s, but were I placing bets on what folks would say 20 years from now, I’d put my money on this one.

Fans of “The Wire,” would tell me I’m insane with the previous assertion, but since every time I’ve tried to watch “The Wire” I’ve fallen asleep, I’ve no basis for an argument. The thing is, the people I know who worship “The Wire” (and for some it really is a fucking religion) are the smartest, most well-read and educated, witty and interesting folk in my life. I’m probably a boob for not “getting it,” but I’m willing to bet there are quite a few other “boobs” reading these words, nodding in agreement. “The Wire” must be engaging, literate television…that was so niche it failed to capture a huge audience. The thing is, “Wire” fanatics, not everyone “gets” your show, no matter how damn good it is. You know how I know this? My two favorite shows of the ‘00s – both of which I believe to be incredible examples of TV – are “Doctor Who” and “Farscape,” and yet I know better than to showcase them in this piece, because it quite simply wouldn’t make any sense to do so, as neither of them had any real impact on American culture. “The Wire,” however, probably made some very relevant statements on certain segments of our culture, which is why I’ve devoted this much space to it. It’s too bad the general public didn’t bother to tune in and care. Maybe there wasn’t enough tits and ass?

There was plenty of tit and ass on another HBO series that captured a great deal of attention, and that was “Sex and the City.” This one I’ve seen far too much of, and I’ve no hesitation in saying that while “The Wire” made me comatose, and its fans may have driven me up the wall, “Sex and the City” made my blood boil, and its fans are some of the most clueless I’ve come across in all my TV watching years. Here’s the thing with this show: These women are not meant to be emulated. They are not just bad examples of women, they are bad examples of human beings. Some folks made the same mistake by rooting for Tony Soprano, only David Chase had the good sense to eventually call them on the carpet for it. The people who made this show never did any such thing, even though I’m fucking positive they damn well know better. If you think Carrie Bradshaw is an encouraging role model, then I hope you enjoy living alone for the rest of your life, because that’s exactly what’s going to happen if you choose to behave as she did in this series. Since the show has miraculously moved on to successful movies – proving that its disciples are more slavish than any fan base outside of “Star Trek” – it begs to have a happy ending sooner or later. And unless the writers dig way down deep and drag these women through the muck all the way to a reasonable sense of enlightenment – it’s going to be horribly hollow. There was, quite simply, no show that was more evil and insidious in the past decade than this one. Not even “According to Jim.”

Lest you think that outside of “The Sopranos” I’ve a hatred for all things HBO, that’s hardly the case. Even with my opinions of “The Wire” and “Them Clueless Bitches in NY,” there’s no question that HBO uniformly provided the finest entertainment of the decade. There have been times when critics have championed Showtime as “the new HBO,” yet I couldn’t come up with a single series from that network that really mattered. Oh, they’ve tried, but if the cream of their crop is “Dexter” and “Weeds,” they’ve got a long way to go before catching up to Home Box Office (a phrase that’s all but forgotten, yet is perhaps more descriptive than ever). “Six Feet Under” and “Curb Your Enthusiasm” are two series that have had a lot to say about the people we are/were in the ‘00s: The former through its deep exploration of fractured and problematic humanity, and the latter though its shallow exploration of fractured and problematic humanity. I miss “Six Feet Under” immensely, although it ended at a perfectly reasonable point. I look forward to more “Curb” because it has no clue where to end; hopefully Larry David will keep coming back to it every few years until either he dies, or runs out of straw men to bash.

“Curb” is damn funny. Wish I could say that about more comedies in the ‘00s, but the humor was scattered and inconsistent. As far as the defining comedy of the decade? That’s a tough one to assign, since nearly every single offering seemed to appeal to a different kind of audience, but the honor should probably go to “The Office.” Here’s a show that, given the track record of translated Britcoms, should not have worked, and yet it did, and continues to do so. I’m not sure exactly what “The Office” has to say about the typical workplace, because I haven’t done that sort of work in years, yet it still largely manages to be a scream on the occasions I bother to tune in, which is, admittedly, maybe once every six or so weeks (chances are if I tuned in every week I’d have gotten sick of it a long time ago).

Probably the most influential comedy of the past ten years was “Arrested Development,” and it also happened to be the most prescient: George Bluth, Sr. was Bernie Madoff long before the phrase “Ponzi scheme” entered our everyday vernacular. The series has a devoted following that continues to demand a movie followup that they may never even see (but we’ve got our fingers crossed, even if the storyline revolves around George Michael’s funeral).

Fox discovered it could build a Sunday night empire on animated fare outside of “The Simpsons” by bringing back a series in ‘05 that it’d cancelled in ‘02. “Family Guy” may not be the definitive comedy of the ‘00s, but it must be one of, if not the most popular. It’s been amazing to watch comeback kid Seth McFarlane conquer the world through sheer idiocy, and one wonders exactly what sort of Faustian deal was made, and which supernatural deity has such a warped sense of humor.

Comedy Central’s “South Park” remains the go-to series for pissing people off, and rare is the season that goes by without some kind of shitstorm erupting from the questionable content presented by Messrs. Parker and Stone. Again, here’s a show I never really got into, but probably not for any reason you’d guess: I simply get bored by the cutout animation style, and it visually fails to hold my attention. One of my editors, however, was quite insistent that it be included here, which seemed a reasonable directive, especially given how often it’s been a focal point for controversy and discussion.

Also on Comedy Central we’ve seen the rise of “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart,” a comedic take on daily events that for many has turned into an actual source of news, which in itself says something more profound about our country than anything I can possibly come up with. But I ask you, who presents a more reasonable version of the day’s events – Stewart or Glenn Beck? Sometimes the only thing left to do is laugh, because nothing’s really funny anymore. Something should be said about the show’s previous host, Craig Kilborn, but it would fall on mostly deaf ears, as nobody either cares or remembers that “The Daily Show” ever even had another host. (See also “The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson.”)

“The Colbert Report” is a spinoff of “The Daily Show,” and a lot of people are fervent believers in Stephen Colbert’s mock brand of conservatism. Occasionally, you get the awful sensation that some of them might not realize that it’s all a big joke, but rest assured it is. Mind you, I say that even though the joke has always escaped me, but then again, I love “Real Time with Bill Maher,” so what do I know?

Actually, one thing I do know for sure is that Americans love their fictitious cops, doctors and lawyers. We can’t get enough of idealizing these three professions that in real life we fear and/or hate. Noteworthy legal dramas were on the lean side in the ‘00s, and with a half a dozen versions of “Law & Order” (a concept that has the cojones to showcase all three professions to varying degrees) on the schedule, it’s perhaps unsurprising that lawyers especially got the short end of the TV stick. Regardless, “Boston Legal,” was a fantastically entertaining series that was never shy on opinion. During its run (’04-’08), it managed to do an exhaustive job of chronicling the political and social landscape as seen through the eyes of two very different lawyers – über liberal Alan Shore (James Spader) and extremist conservative Denny Crane (William Shatner). The show was clearly aimed at folks who wanted to think, which is probably why it never amassed a huge audience.

On the cop front – or indeed on any front – there was no show people tuned in for en masse more than “CSI.” Man, this thing was a ratings monster, and it even spawned two successful spinoffs. Of course, the central characters aren’t actually cops, but rather criminologists, but since they’re investigating and solving crime, they might as well be. The concept likely paved the way for all sorts of other successful fare such as, but not limited to, “NCIS” and “Criminal Minds,” as well as their current and future spinoffs.

The best cop drama of the ‘00s was “The Shield,” and it was a huge step forward for the genre, since it didn’t ask us to love its morally bankrupt central character, Vic Mackey (Michael Chiklis), and yet the intricate study of this man made it very difficult not to relate to him on some level. For perhaps the first time in a cop drama, we saw an officer of the law (actually several) faced with all the temptations we assume cops are presented with on a daily basis; sometimes they indulged, sometimes not. Either way it went down, for the first couple of seasons especially, the damn thing felt so real.

If “The Shield” was the most real cop show of the decade, then “Monk” was the most absurd, but it never pretended to be anything other than a whimsical presentation of criminal investigation. In lieu of delivering a fascinating storyline, “Monk” delivered a fascinating central character, brought to life by Tony Shalhoub. This past weekend saw the end of “Monk,” which was heartbreaking and uplifting simultaneously, and yet it was an ending for a lengthy ongoing series that snagged little press. People won’t realize how much they’re missing “Monk” until it’s been off the air for a few years. This is the kind of show of which we’ll see TV-movie followups in the coming years; Shalhoub, much like Peter Falk before him, will never escape this character.

Then there are the doctors. Resting uncomfortably at the top is Hugh Laurie who stars as “House.” I personally have some major reservations about this show, but I’d be a damn fool to not realize its power to entertain, and much like “Monk,” the show wouldn’t work without the talents of its central star driving the bus. There’s no question that the man just inhabits this character, and adding to the equation is the fact that, once again, it’s a bold new stab at a tired genre. The idea of taking the medical cases for which nobody has the solution is a grand one, and episodes typically feel more like mysteries than medical drama. The other great series of the ‘00s that revolved around surgery turned out to be not so great after all.

FX’s “Nip/Tuck” charged out of the gate, and its first two seasons rewrote the book on what TV doctors could be. During that period, it felt like we were watching TV history unfold, and we probably were. Too bad that book ended up being more of a novella. Here I am watching the show’s sixth season every single week, mostly because the end is nigh and Episode 100, which, as I understand it, airs in March of ’10, will be the finale. (If the show had no end in sight, I’d have given up some time ago.) Surely there must not have been a series this decade that showed more promise in the beginning, and then went so disastrously south so quickly? I suppose there’s a lesson to be learned here about making tit jobs the central draw of your series – or perhaps knife-wielding madmen are just not the best course of action to take when telling this kind of story. In any case, flawed though it is, you gotta give credit to the show for saying everything there is to say about the previously unexplored topic of plastic surgery.

Speaking of madmen, let’s wrap all this up with “Mad Men,” a series I was reluctant to mention here, yet two people on the Bullz-Eye staff suggested it as being important to this piece. The main reason I didn’t see it as worthy of inclusion is because, even with three seasons under its belt, the show still feels as if it’s in its infancy. Perhaps this is my problem, as I don’t see that the series has properly defined its mission as of yet. It’s a period piece and when I watch it, I wonder, “How will these characters react to disco?” Yes, that proposition is ludicrous, yet I’m unable to see a proper end for this story, and I’m not sure how it fits into this decade any more than it will fit into the next. But I have a feeling that the deepest parts of the series have yet to be presented, and that much of what we’ve seen over the past three years has been a sort of buildup. Matthew Weiner cut his teeth on scripts for “The Sopranos,” and even though the first few years of that series had massive amounts of greatness, the show delivered some of its finest, most definitive and thought-provoking material in the last two seasons. I’m hoping that Weiner took some notes from David Chase.