Approved Television

This a collection of /tg/-approved live-action television. Cartoons and animated series have been moved to Approved cartoons.

Comedy

• Mystery Science Theater 3000: A bunch of Minnesotans with robot puppets riff on terrible movies. Achieved legendary cult classic status after being canceled (since it confused and angered the norms and behind the scenes shenanigans) and spawned the venerable Rifftrax. Has come back from the dead on Netflix.

Crime

• Glina ["Cop"] Amazingly good Polish neo-noir series. While it starts slow, after initial few episodes it turns into a modern masterpiece of crime series. Very oldschool in style, with a wide range of different cases, juicy dialogues (or at least juicy translation) and great performances. If you ever wanted to run or play an investigation game, accept no substitute for inspiration or direct rip-off.

• True Detective First season, anyway. Southern gothic meets modern investigation meets a whole plot reference to The King in Yellow. Very dark and climactic series, with solid performances and a bunch of ideas how to pull a modern "investigator" type of game Call of Cthulhu struggles so badly to market.

Fantasy

• Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Old world of darkness, the (good) TV Show. The story of a teenage girl chosen by destiny to defend the earth from the aforementioned Vampires, as well as all sorts of nasty inter-dimensional demons and shit. Starts off as a cheesy monster of the week action/horror show but really comes into its own in season two, with some genuinely fantastic writing being done by Joss Whedon and his crack(head) team of writers, as well as some of the most memorable TV characters to date. This is the series that secured Joss Whedon's place in the nerdosphere for all time. Notable for popularising the Fantasy/Drama type of TV series that we see with Supernatural, as well as having spin-off shows whose continuity coincides with their parent show's like Doctor Who/Torchwood. Speaking of which...
  • Angel: So during season 4 of Buffy, Angel aired its first episode, and each episode of Buffy coincided with the following episode of Angel. Like most spin-off shows, Angel is maybe not as good its predecessor, but it has its moments. Best way to describe it is that it's Buffy with a bit more of a Neo-noir, crime edge to it, but because of the inter-weaving plots it's hard to watch one and not the other.

• Carnivale: A group of depression era carnies are caught up in a Manichean struggle between the forces of light and darkness. One of HBO's first experiments with high concept, high budget fantasy. Died ignominiously after two seasons due to scripting problems, audience apathy, and grimdark overload; but paved the way for those who would follow.

• Game of Thrones: The GRRM's pet project finally made it to the small screen. Combines the epic swords and sorcery of high fantasy with the nihilistic hopelessness of quasi-medieval life. Thanks to Martin's amazing horrible skubtastic writing and HBO's massive budgets this show has gone a long way towards making fantasy "respectable". Tacks a lot of gratuitous nudity and sex above and beyond the gratuitous nudity and sex already found in the books, thanks HBO.

• Hercules: The Legendary Journeys: Concentrated nostalgia from back in the days when fantasy shows were relegated to Friday night time slots where they couldn't harm the general public. If you're a neckbeard in your thirties, this show probably had something to do with it. Kind of embarrassing by today's standards, but it pioneered everything from CGI monsters to filming in New Zealand. Resulted in its much more famous spin-off series...
  • Xena: Warrior Princess: Before you knew her as an uppity Cylon or an insane Roman housewife Lucy Lawless was the leather clad, god slaying, Amazon OG. If you're a neckbeard in your thirties (or a ca/tg/irl who liked Gabrielle a little too much), you probably fapped to it. The cultural cachet of this show is so great that even underage B& that never could have seen it will recognize the character.

• Masters of Horror: An anthology resembling more a collection of short films than your typical TV series. Each story is directed by some legend in horror business and by general rule those fantasy-themed are better than the sci-fi ones. Special mention goes to "Deer Woman", "Cigarette Burns" and "Fair Haired Child". Warning! Certain episodes require hefty dose of brain bleach to forget what you've just saw (not kidding), while other are more black comedy than actual horror.

• Witcher: A shoe-string budget fantasy series (still one of the most expensive productions in native Poland) about - well, who else - Geralt the Witcher, made by Poles in 2001. The quality of episodes varies greatly, while the special effects aged like milk, but it's still a fun ride to take. This is how fantasy became for a while mainstream in Poland. Absolutely great music, which can be repurposed as a background for combat-heavy games. If you happen to get a DVD release and not just bootleg from TV, then the cinematography will be gorgeous too. Also, warning - the show was marketed abroad under "Hexer" title, as the term "Witcher" wasn't coined yet. It's confirmed that Netflix will do another version of the series.

• Wizards and Warriors: A short-lived fantasy series from early 80s, mostly memorable due to being so heavily borrowing ideas and imaginery from early Dungeons and Dragons it almost end with a lawsuit. Amazingly tacky, but still mineable in case of running old-school D&D games. And remember - those costumes won an Emmy. For real.

Historical

• Deadwood: Another HBO series, focusing on the settlement of Deadwood and its development from mining camp to frontier town. The attempts to make the town and its world come alive are glorious. Excellent performances across the board, with the standout being Al "Fuck That Cocksucking Motherfucker" Swearengen. GMs looking for how wild and lawless frontiers can become platforms for adventurers should check this out, and steal as many subplots as you can for your Deadlands game.

• Marco Polo: A Netflix exclusive series, Marco Polo follows the famous Italian merchant while he tries to survive in the court of Kublai Khan, the grandson of Genghis motherfucking Khan. While not historically accurate it is certainly very entertaining with war, political intrigue, and concubines out the ass. Also Mongols. If anything, the character One-Hundred eyes makes the show worth the watch because of how badass he is. Seriously; a Daoist monk that Kublai blinded with a spitting cobra because he wouldn't teach his martial art to his generals. And he can still kick ass while blind.

• Rome: It's HBO so the tits and ultraviolence spigot is still wide open, but this one actually does some good world building and political intrigue on the side. Just don't try to use it as a point of reference for historical campaigns.

• Spartacus: Blood and Sand A faithful historical narrative about the third servile war and the various social pressures that precipita... phhht no I'm kidding it's wall to wall tits and ultraviolence. Despite being a relentlessly silly 300 wanna-be that had no business ever being green lit it actually managed to be a treasure trove of feels and awesome, due in large part to unusually solid writing and some heroic performances by actors like John Hannah, Lucy Lawless, Craig Parker, and Peter Mensah.

• 三国 (Three Kingdoms 2010): Widely regarded as the best and most accessible version of China's most famous story (essentially their Iliad). Almost a hundred hours long, epic scope, tons of actors, and legions of extras (you can buy them by the bushel over there). Almost worth it for Chen Jianbin's gloriously dickish Cao Cao alone, but there's plenty of other reasons to stick around. The entire thing is available on youtube and elsewhere because CCTV could not give two shits about licensing it outside of the country.

• Vikings: History's bid to gain at least a fraction of GoT audience, while also catering to reenactors, historical witzs and just about general audience, since, duh, vikings. Very well-researched and tightly written, the show comes with very high initial quality. Unfortunately, it also suffers greatly from seasonal rot after first 2 seasons and utterly pointless continuation at this point, so be warned about highly visible drop of quality with each season.

Sci Fi

• Babylon 5: It's the future, after humanity narrowly escaped extermination in a war with the Minbari (bone headed guys who are like the Eldar with the dickishness dialed down to mostly manageable levels) it sets up a space station in neutral territory to act as a center of diplomacy to try to avert another war which gradually gets embroiled in an ancient conflict between two powerful alien civilizations. While most TV Science Fiction in the day was "this week's adventure" Babylon 5 set out to tell a grand story and (mostly) succeeded.

• Battlestar Galactica: In a galaxy far, far away humanity is engaged in a war with a legion of cybernetic assholes called Cylons. In a total dick move the genocidal toasters feign a peace offering and decimate the human fleet, except for a a few starships which manage to escape. Organizing under the protection of the titular Battlestar-class Galactica this ragtag refugee fleet, assuming they are the only survivors, attempts to escape to the fabled planet called Earth.
  • Comes in two flavors: Original 1970s (Cheesetastic, but hilarious if you're into that sort of thing) and Immediate-Post-9/11-Reboot (Grimdark, and actually pretty good). Both recommended, but other than initial premise, the two are wildly different.

• Doctor Who: The adventures of the universe's saddest time traveling bro. Absolutely ancient in canon and out (the show predates Star Trek by three years). Cheesy special effects, but it's got heart and (usually) good writing. It's bigger on the inside.

• Farscape: Muppets in spaaaace! This show, produced by the Jim Henson company, is dark. Even media in self-professed grimdark settings rarely put their main characters through this much torment. You wouldn't think it when it starts out, the first half of the first season being notoriously cheesy, but the cheese you wade through at the start belies an intense series as every major military organization in the galaxy targets our hero for torture, mindrape, and death. Few stories to date put their heroes through such a gauntlet, but the audience follows John Crichton's journey from all-American hero to notorious interstellar terrorist from start to finish, rooting for him the entire way.

• Firefly: Traveller except about post-bellum Confederates IN SPAAAAAACE. Like most of the Whedonverse praising it on /tg/ will unleash a category 5 skubstorm.

• Spellbinder: A two-season series, or rather two thinly connected standalone series dealing with parallel worlds. Each "season" can be seen as separate story, as they only share one character (an extremely compelling villainess) and the general concept of alternative universe(s). Despite being made for kids, it's very much watchable even two decades later - think "Sliders", but good and with plot. It also comes with few pretty interesting settings with some rich world-building. A third season has been in development hell since 1998.

• Star Trek: It's Star Trek. If you were born some time in the last half century you probably heard of it're not a drooling mongoloid you've heard of it.

• Stargate: At first there was a Roland Emmerich movie based around the Ancient Astronaut theory and finding a Big Ring in Egypt which can take you to another world, which was an adequate science-fiction action romp. Even so, it did well enough to get a Television series in Stargate SG-1. It changed a few things about from the movie (usually for the better) and had a rocky first season (for the worse), but after that it became one of the better science fiction series. Plenty of action, excellent characters performed by excellent actors, memorable humor and succeeds both as an episode to episode series as well as with long continuity arcs.

• The Expanse: A Syfy adaptation of the novel series. Tensions are building between Earth, Mars and the Asteroid Belt when an unknown alien element gets discovered and throws everything out of wack.

• The X-Files: All possible and imaginable conspiracy theories about aliens mixed together for the show that redefined how to even make a sci-fi themed series. Plus monster of the week plots thrown in for a good measure. The show balances between being serious, self-aware, camp and horror. Following adventures of two FBI agents, both working in a sub-division dealing with "paranormal" cases, treated by rest of the Bureau as a dead-end in the career. Even if you don't have time to watch all episodes, you can pick up at any given moment and still catch up on the go with the arc story. (ProTip for new viewers: The show worked best in the stand-alone episodes. Most of the "arc" episodes are actually fairly dull and uninspired, while the arc itself is infamous for being fake and going nowhere)

• The Prisioner: A 60s classic sadly fallen into obscurity, it tells us the story of an unnamed British spy that gets kidnapped by a secret organization after resigning for motives unknown. He is moved to a place only known as "The Village", a sort of idylic place inhabited by old and brainwashed special agents of many nationalities, where noone can escape. Incredibly ambitious for its time, it tackles themes such as identity and duty, while also making the protagonist fight with his wit and smarts his captors, while at the same time they keep him trapped in The Village. If you haven't heard about it, don't worry, you've probably heard about it because it has been parodied in The Simpsons once.

References

One of many threads.