The first half of 2025 has been so front-loaded with quality TV that I could easily put together a top 10 list with a number of honorable mentions. Weirdly enough, the year has been packed with seasons of shows that released their last seasons in 2022 (Severance, The White Lotus, The Rehearsal, Andor, Mythic Quest, etc.), which upped the antes of what came before and set the bar even higher. Of course, there are some blind spots – most notably, Adolescence, Hacks, The Righteous Gemstones, Daredevil: Born Again, and Your Friends and Neighbors – but the following is as close to comprehensive as can be.

Honorable Mentions:

• Harley Quinn
• The Last of Us
• Mythic Quest
• The Studio
• Welcome to Wrexham
• Win or Lose

Andor

At times during the second and final season of Andor, you almost have to remind yourself that you’re in the world of Star Wars. No Jedi, no lightsabers, and only occasional mentions of the Force, Darth Vader, and Emperor Palpatine. Yet it’s this aversion to fan service which made Tony Gilroy’s masterful spy epic so special, as it allowed the show to focus on the nitty gritty details of how the galactic rebellion began and the toll it took on its major and minor players. With three episodes released per week, Disney allowed viewers to experience each bit as a kind of stand-alone movie that still flows together nicely. Diego Luna, Stellan Skarsgard, and Adria Arjona headline an expansive cast with no weak links, and the show’s production and costume designs were eye-catching and helped distinguish one world from another. After a long three year wait for season 2, Gilroy managed to raise the bar not only for Star Wars as a franchise, but for television overall.

The Pitt

The Pitt season 1 was more than a clever new take on the 24 formula, and it was more than a return to medical procedurals like ER or Gray’s Anatomy. Over the course of 15 consecutive hours, R. Scott Gemmill’s show intermixed personal dramas between the hospital staff with the life-or-death stakes of their patients. Noah Wyle stood as the anchor to a crew composed of new doctors and experienced vets as they saw all manner of medical emergencies, from poisonings to freak accidents. Medically speaking, The Pitt season 1 excelled not from sensationalizing every case a la House, but in making each one grounded and mostly relatable with characters we either loathed or loved – and that’s not including the show-stopping mass shooting segment late in the season. And the interpersonal dynamics between each of the staff always lurked in the background of the show, with breakthrough performances from Patrick Ball, Katherine LaNasa, Supriya Ganesh, Isa Briones, and more. Sometimes it’s best not to reinvent the wheel, and The Pitt season 1 is living proof of the sentiment.

The Rehearsal

No other 2025 show has made me laugh, cringe, or emotionally affected (sometimes all at the same time) as The Rehearsal season 2. Nathan Fielder’s detour into exploring the aviation industry felt like a bizarre swerve at first, but it all came together to fit into the show’s ethos to explore human connection. The show went into unexpected directions every week as Fielder utilized every last HBO dollar (not his own) while recreating Sully Sullenberger’s childhood and the Houston airport, and putting together a fake singing competition in between. Throughout the course of season 2’s 6 episodes, you never really knew what you’d be getting, which lent itself to the shock value of Fielder’s grand experiment. To top it all off, Fielder surprised the world by putting together one of the most daring and insane season finales in TV history. Where does The Rehearsal go from here, and how can it possibly top what it’s already done? Nobody knows but Nathan Fielder, and I can’t wait to discover the answer.

Severance

Beyond the mounting tension, the layered character work, the ever-evolving mysteries and more, season 2 of Severance was a community experience. Week after week, it was a joy to catch the public’s reactions and theories to what creator Dan Erickson and executive producer Ben Stiller cooked up for the show about separating your work and personal lives. Nearly 3 years after its first season premiered, Severance expanded its world and mythologies in thought-provoking and dramatic ways, and utilized its deep bench of actors to give years-best performances from Adam Scott, Britt Lower, Tramell Tillman, John Turturro, Zach Cherry, and more. Whether it was the mystery of Helena Eagen (Lower) posing as her innie to win the affections of Mark (Scott), the ORTBO retreat, or the powerhouse “Chikhai Bardo” flashback episode, the show harkened back to the best of the mystery box shows like Lost or Twin Peaks, while stepping into bold, new territory of its own.

Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man

Did we really need Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man? More than 20 years into the web head’s cinematic life and countless iterations of Peter Parker’s origin story would suggest we don’t. But Disney+’s comic book homage subverted expectations at nearly every step of the way, with newly reimagined versions of Peter, Norman and Harry Osborn, plus brand new characters around Pete’s orbit. Since his immersion into the MCU, Spider-Man has dealt with aliens, multiverse-altering stakes, and AI-assisted nano-suits. The series takes the character back to his roots, as he takes down street-level criminals while balancing school, friends, family, and a burgeoning science career, all alongside his obligations as the titular web head. Whereas the Spider-Verse films have utilized unique animation styles, Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man harkens back to its comic book origins, with cel-shaded characters and moments where the scene is literally framed by a white panel. Perhaps no other superhero has permeated the culture in the last decade more than Spider-Man in both good and bad ways, but here is a show that stands on its own, deepening and twisting the mythology we already know and love.