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- samanathon, on 09/06/2008, -0/+839 HBO Series That Changed TV
TRUE BLOOD
(2008)
What if vampires lived among us, out in the open? That's the underpinning to HBO's newest original series, from Six Feet Under's Alan Ball — who apparently can't get enough of the dead — and starring Anna Paquin. In honor of its premiere, we look back at other notable HBO original programs.
INSIDE THE NFL
(1977-2008)
Not the first original program on HBO — Wimbledon coverage began in 1975 and there were a couple of comedy shows (On Location and Standing Room Only) — but this weekly recap analysis show was the great-granddaddy of longevity. Even though HBO made the boneheaded decision to cancel it last year (INFL is now on Showtime), it was a refreshing oasis of sober football journalism in a sports TV world that increasingly steers towards boo-yah hyperactivity. And that awesome NFL Films footage didn't hurt.
FRAGGLE ROCK
(1983-1987)
Jim Henson followed Sesame Street and The Muppet Show with this subterranean kid hit, about underground creatures who live in harmony with each other and their environment. Kind of like hobbits, really, without the beer and weed.
1ST & TEN
(1984-1990)
Delta Burke headlined this football comedy playing a Southern belle who got a professional football team, the California Bulls, as part of a divorce settlement. What began as a mildly amusing diversion got more and more mild as the years went on.
TALES FROM THE CRYPT
(1989-1996)
Inspired by the classic EC comic series of the same name, Crypt wasn't HBO's first supernatural-ish anthology series — that'd be The Hitchhiker — but it was, by far, the best. Executive-produced by Robert Zemeckis, Joel Silver, Walter Hill, Richard Donner, David Giler, and David Geffen, Crypt was glossy, pulpy, and, most importantly, occasionally scary.
DREAM ON
(1990-1996)
What if you could see inside a guy's mind as he daydreamed his life away? That was the idea behind this Brian Benben sitcom, which frequently took advantage of HBO's ''nudity allowed'' policy.
DREAM ON
(1990-1996)
What if you could see inside a guy's mind as he daydreamed his life away? That was the idea behind this Brian Benben sitcom, which frequently took advantage of HBO's ''nudity allowed'' policy.
THE LARRY SANDERS SHOW
(1992-1998)
This is the show that Studio 60 wanted to be when it grew up. Blisteringly funny, hilariously scathing, stocked with comedy all-stars (Garry Shandling, Rip Torn, Jeffrey Tambor, Janeane Garofalo), this late-night-show satire set the TV comedy bar to a height that's never been hit again.
REAL SEX
(1992-)
C'mon, you know what this show's about, and you know why it's been on for so long. (And you know what Cathouse is, too. But we’re not gonna tell on you.)
DEF COMEDY JAM
(1992-)
With this Russell Simmons-shepherded showcase, stand-up comedy received an urban energy injection. The runaway success that was The Original Kings of Comedy — and with it, the careers of many a black comic — can trace its origins back here.
DENNIS MILLER LIVE
(1994-2002)
The hyper-referential comic got his own forum with this talk show. It would prove to be a much better outlet for Miller's particular talents than, say, cohosting Monday Night Football.
TAXICAB CONFESSIONS
(1995-2006)
There are a million stories in the naked city, and if you use this show as a measuring stick, a decent number of them involve naked people. A handful of cabs were rigged with hidden cameras and driven by masters of conversation resulting in portraits of passengers that are, by turns, funny, sexy, and harrowing.
MR. SHOW WITH BOB AND DAVID
(1995-1998)
Sketch comedy has never been more unhinged than on Bob Odenkirk and David Cross' half-hour wackfest. Taint gonna get much better than this.
REAL SPORTS WITH BRYANT GUMBEL
(1995-)
The ex-Today anchor channeled his love for sport into this multiple-Emmy-winning investigative series, which has dug into topics as wide-ranging as steroids in baseball, gambling in tennis, and the going rates for an ex-thoroughbred put out to stud.
ARLI$$
(1996-2003)
And while Bryant Gumbel was gilding HBO's sports credibility, Robert Wuhl was sullying it with this lowest-common-denominator comedy about an athletic supporter, er, agent.
THE CHRIS ROCK SHOW
(1997-2000)
Part sketch comedy, part interview, part variety show, this forum for whatever was on Rock's mind fell flat as often as it flew high. But it paved the way for The Chappelle Show years later.
TENACIOUS D
(1997-2000)
Less a series and more a collection of short films about the self-proclaimed greatest rock band in the world, Tenacious D is best known for unleashing Jack Black on the world. Oh, and for being a legitimately great band.
OZ
(1997-2003)
You wanna talk about your scared straight. Tom Fontana's unflinching look at life inside the Oswald State Maximum Security Prison — specifically, at the experimental unit called Emerald City — played like a Shakespearean tragedy, albeit one populated by rapists, white supremacists, Muslim prophets, and correctional officers in over their heads.
FROM THE EARTH TO THE MOON
(1998)
Ron Howard and Tom Hanks produced this miniseries — HBO's most ambitious to date — which chronicled America's quest for outer space, encompassing the triumphs and pitfalls of the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo astronauts
FROM THE EARTH TO THE MOON
(1998)
Ron Howard and Tom Hanks produced this miniseries — HBO's most ambitious to date — which chronicled America's quest for outer space, encompassing the triumphs and pitfalls of the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo astronauts
THE SOPRANOS
(1999-2007)
Where Sex and the City showed viewers what HBO could do, David Chase's mafia famiglia magnum opus showed the world what television could do. And it earned each and every accolade heaped upon it. Because it was just that good.
THE CORNER
(2000)
This six-part miniseries from David Simon and David Mills would set the stage for what would eventually be The Wire. Directed by Charles S. Dutton, it followed a family struggling to survive in the open-range drug zone that is a particular block in downtown Baltimore.
CURB YOUR ENTHUSIASM
(2000-)
Larry David is a master of the embarrassing, and for eight years and counting, his semi-improvised series has put the comic in the most awkward situations imaginable.
BAND OF BROTHERS
(2001)
From executive producers Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks, fresh off Saving Private Ryan, came this ode to the men of Easy Company — whose action in World War II saw them parachute into enemy territory on D-Day, hold the line in the Battle of the Bulge, and eventually capture Hitler's Eagle's Nest stronghold — and to the Greatest Generation at large.
SIX FEET UNDER
(2001-2005)
All stories are about entrances and exits, so it was perfect that creator Alan Ball set his somber series around life's terminus, a funeral home. And in seeing how the proprietors of that home, the Fisher clan — eldest brother Nate (Peter Krause), younger brother David (Michael C. Hall), sister Claire (Lauren Ambrose), and mom Ruth (Frances Conroy) — dealt with the loss of the family patriarch and their own arcs, we saw a little bit of ourselves reflected back.
THE WIRE
(2002-2008)
This insider's deep dive into Baltimore's inner-city battlegrounds consistently gets mentioned in the same best-show-on-TV breath as The Sopranos and Battlestar Galactica. Which is saying something.
DA ALI G SHOW
(2003-2004)
HBO imported this series from the U.K. and, in so doing, introduced America to the many faces of Sacha Baron Cohen: hip-hop poseur Ali G, fatuous supermodel Bruno, and blinkered foreign correspondent Borat. Tackling a different issue — fame, politics, war — each episode, Da Ali G Show was much smarter than it appeared on the surface. (Plus, it gave Seth Rogen an early writing gig.)
ANGELS IN AMERICA
(2003)
Tony Kushner's Pulitzer-winning play + director Mike Nichols + a glistening cast including Meryl Streep, Al Pacino, and Jeffrey Wright = an Emmy-sweeping television event.
CARNIVALE
(2003-2005)
The eternal battle between good and evil, played out in a dust-bowl traveling circus. Short-lived, but much loved, especially for the performances by Nick Stahl and Clancy Brown.
DEADWOOD
(2004-2006)
In telling the story of a frontier town in the middle of gold country and its inhabitants — most notably bar/brothel owner Al Swearengen (Ian McShane) — creator David Milch made the profane positively poetic, and gave us a dirty, filthy version of the Old West that would shake our grandfathers to the core.
ENTOURAGE
(2004-)
What Sex and the City was to the ladies, Entourage is to the fellas. Boys will be boys, especially when one of them, Vinnie (Adrian Grenier), is a movie star and the other three (Kevin Dillon, Jerry Ferrara, Kevin Connelly) are riding on his young, restless, and rich coattails.
THE COMEBACK
(2005)
Lisa Kudrow followed her Friends success with this life-on-the-B-list showbiz satire about a once-beloved TV star named Valerie Cherish trying to make her way in Hollywood. Some found it painfully funny, others found it just painful.
ROME
(2005-2007)
The rise and fall of the Roman republic, seen through the eyes of two of Caesar's soldiers, Lucius Vorenus (Kevin McKidd) and Titus Pullo (Ray Stevenson). History has never been so vibrant. (Seriously, there's a whole mess of sex and violence.)
BIG LOVE
(2006-)
The family that plays together stays together. In this case, the family is a polygamous one, with Bill Paxton as the head of three different households and Jeanne Tripplehorn, Chloë Sevigny, and Ginnifer Goodwin as his wives.
FLIGHT OF THE CONCHORDS
(2007-)
Two Kiwi songbirds — and their fan — make New York City an MGM-style backdrop for their musical adventures. Sort of. Okay, not at all. Still, much like Tenacious D, this has the virtue of being fall-down hilarious and completely hummable.
JOHN FROM CINCINNATI
(2007)
After the cancellation of the beloved Deadwood, creator David Milch turned his attention to this allegorical show about a surfer who might be an angel who, er, helps people? (No, I never watched it. And neither did anyone else, and it was canceled after a single season.)
TELL ME YOU LOVE ME
(2007)
What if porn had a real, honest-to-goodness plot? With real actors willing to drop trou if the story required it? Those enduring questions got addressed — along with more pressing ones about human relationships and sexuality — on this short-lived series.
IN TREATMENT
(2008-)
Here's a bold experiment: a daily TV show about a therapist (Gabriel Byrne) where each day of the workweek gets an episode devoted to a different client, with the fifth day finding the therapist himself on the couch. A lot to commit to (especially for those with commitment issues) but, if one's willing to do the work, a rewarding process.
JOHN ADAMS
(2008)
Believe it or not, Paul Giamatti acquitted himself admirably as the titular president in this epic miniseries, costarring Laura Linney as his First Lady. - sjorsvb, on 09/06/2008, -0/+8Yeah... 40 friggin' pages
- bixby1, on 09/06/2008, -2/+6TRUE BLOOD FTW!
- MikeonTV, on 09/06/2008, -1/+4I'm downing them all right now!
- slugicide, on 09/06/2008, -0/+2I'm not going to read something spread across 40 ***** pages.
- lesfleanut, on 09/06/2008, -0/+2Wow, HBO has a lot more great TV than I thought, I loved a good portion of those shows. Dugg.
- sweetsaprik, on 09/07/2008, -0/+1Much appreciated.
I watched most of those when they were on, and some of them were downright amazing. Band of Brothers being my favorite. - AmyVernon, on 09/07/2008, -0/+1Yeah, I think they very nearly did just that. A few of the shows on here didn't "change TV," but an astonishing number of them did.
- Bornagain, on 09/06/2008, -0/+1It seems as if they just named every hbo series ever made. Perhaps a shorter list would have meant more. Still dugg for my love of all of those shows.
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