19 Best Scripted Shows of 2024 so Far, Ranked

Created by Rapman, this super-powered show based in South London is equally exciting and informative. The premise: five normal people (played by Tosin Cole, Nadine Mills, Eric Kofi-Abrefa, Calvin Demba, and Josh Tedeku) suddenly develop superpowers, and the only apparent connection between them is that they are all Black. This widely acclaimed series makes a point to showcase the joy and conflicts of each of the five characters who develop unique powers using nuanced dialogue. Each character is forced to trust one another to protect someone dear to them, creating high stakes and realistic motives for their choices. My favorite detail is that those who have the Sickle Cell gene but don’t suffer from the disease are candidates who have a latent power. Using a disease that affects the Black community creates an important conversation around the disease and empowers those who suffer from it. — Ennica Jacob

Romance is the moment, and Netflix knows it. Bridgerton Season 3 focused on Penelope (Nicola Coughlan) and Colin’s (Luke Newton) long-awaited love story. After two seasons of building up Polin, fans finally got to see the friends-to-lovers payoff in the delightful third season. Coughlan shined as Penelope took ownership of her future, and Newton transformed into the ultimate leading man. Combining their sizzling chemistry with the fabulous costumes, musical moments, and surprising twists, you’ve got all the ingredients needed for a sure-fire hit. There’s a romance renaissance happening, and Bridgerton Season 3 was the 2024 version of Sandro Botticelli’s The Birth of Venus. — Avery Thompson

There were quite a few Disney+ originals this year that just failed to find a solid footing, but X-Men ’97 was an instant favorite for its clever nostalgia plays that harken back to an era when this superhero franchise wasn’t adapted to death. Following the events of the early ’90s show X-Men: The Animated Series, the series centers on the X-Men as they grapple with Magneto taking leadership in Professor Charles Xavier’s absence. The stakes are high for the heroes, for the present and the future of mutant-kind, and the action is well-paced and deftly honors the original while creating something entirely new. — Amanda Bell

After being such a hit in its first season, this fiery CBS drama has some high expectations to meet with its second, and it does — with only 10 episodes, too! Within that span of time, it gets Bode (Max Thieriot) out of prison and back at the fire camp for inmates, Three Rock, starts a new love triangle with him, Gabriela (Stephanie Arcila), and her fiancé Diego (Rafael de la Fuente), sets up a spinoff starring Morena Baccarin as a sheriff in Edgewater and Sharon’s (Diane Farr) stepsister, and frees Bode in the penultimate episode so the finale can start exploring what’s next for him. Furthermore, Season 2 highlights all the relationships in Edgewater — I’m particularly fond of Sharon and Manny’s (Kevin Alejandro) — and as always, it’s Sharon and Vince’s (Billy Burke) romance that keeps a hold of my attention because it’s raw and messy and feels real as they navigate her going off to a campaign fire and the real tension as a result of choices made regarding their son Bode. — Meredith Jacobs

Netflix’s adaptation of One Day illuminated the words of David Nicholls’ bestselling novel. The series chronicled the relationship between Emma (Ambika Mod) and Dex (Leo Woodall) for one day over 20 years. As they navigated the ebbs and flows of their careers, families, and relationships, Emma and Dex built an unbreakable bond. Life can feel mundane at times, but one day can change the course of your entire life. Anchored by star-making performances from Mod and Woodall, One Day is a beautiful and devastating journey of love and loss. — Avery Thompson

In a year filled with returning favorites, British import Big Mood, from creator Camilla Whitehill, is a refreshing addition to a must-watch TV slate. Centering around besties Maggie (Bridgerton & Derry Girls‘ Nicola Coughlan) and Eddie (Lydia West), the comedy offers a unique perspective on a friendship tested by mental health struggles as Maggie lives with bipolar disorder.

Living exclusively in the U.S. on Tubi, Big Mood is a bite-sized binge without regrets. While Maggie’s mood swings lead to unpredictable situations, Eddie is a true blue friend who has her back. As the season unfolds, the certainty of Eddie’s unyielding devotion to her pal becomes less clear as she deals with her own personal challenges. It’s a raw and honest portrayal of friendship that stands out against other current shows in a way that has us crossing our fingers for a second season. The fact that the show includes a Richard Curtis-themed birthday party, a rat hotel, a spirited pagan festival, and an abortion clinic run under the name “Girl Borsh” are merely added bonuses. — Meaghan Darwish

This based-on-a-true-story miniseries was another instant hit for Netflix, and for good reason: It reminds audiences that truth is often stranger than fiction (a tradition for the streamer, which previously released Making a Murderer, Tiger King, The Watcher, and Inventing Anna, to name a few other members of this milieu). In this case, the series was created by and starred Richard Gadd, adapting his one-man show for the screen. It follows a fictionalized version of himself, named Donny Dunn, as a pub patron, Martha (Jessica Gunning) — whose nickname for him explains the series’ title — stalks, harasses, and even assaults him. He’s then reminded of a horrific trauma from his past when he was sexually assaulted by a mentor. The subject matter is difficult to watch, but the twists and turns throughout make it an especially compelling (and confounding) binge. — Amanda Bell

The first, second, and third times were charms for this beloved ABC sitcom. This time, the teachers of Abbott Elementary got into a big field trip, an enhanced Ava Fest, and, of course, some more of that will-they-or-won’t-they intensity between Janine (Quinta Brunson) and Gregory (Tyler James Williams). Even in Season 3, the show has nimbly avoided becoming formulaic and consistently finds ways to be both kneeslappingly hilarious and full of tender truths about the public education system. — Amanda Bell

Curb Your Enthusiasm ended its 25-year run in April. Curb follows a fictionalized version of Larry David as he ruins relationships and botches social situations around Los Angeles, often with other celebrities playing versions of themselves. The final season was largely focused on Larry going to court. Many viewers clocked that this could be an homage to Seinfeld, which David created. Sure enough, the finale nods explicitly to the much-maligned Seinfeld finale, in which one-off characters testified against Jerry et. al and sent them to jail. Curb followed suit, hilariously taking us down memory lane of some of Larry’s worst gaffs, from when he sent a woman leaping off a ski lift to the infamous pants tent and more.

Plus, Jerry Seinfeld guest starred as himself. It also pokes fun at the ending, with Jerry and Larry agreeing, “This is how we should have ended the finale.” The series ends with the main characters all screaming at each other, as unhappy as ever. It’s a perfect, hilarious, mean ending for one of TV’s best comedies. — Leah Williams

There is nothing else like Fantasmas. The HBO series stars Julio Torres as himself on a journey through New York City looking for a gold oyster earring. Along the way, he encounters a slew of unique characters. Really, this is framing for a series of offbeat and wonderful sketches featuring guest stars like Bowen Yang, Paul Dano, Tilda Swinton, Ana Fabrega (Torress’ former Los Espookys costar), and more. Torres’ dreamlike, surreal, singular sensibility is on full display in Fantasmas, and it’s a true delight. It’s often melancholy (like the Torres-co-penned SNL sketch “Wells for Boys“), and more political than it seems on the surface. It’s also extremely funny. If you aren’t already watching, allow Aidy Bryant as Denise, a novelty toilet dress saleswoman, to convince you. — Leah Williams

Jake Gyllenhaal finally made his prestige television debut in this Apple TV+ crime drama. Adapting Scott Turow’s book of the same name, the eight-episode series was originally billed as limited but will have a second season due to the success of the first (and the availability of book sequels). The series took a few necessary liberties with the source material — a must for keeping audiences guessing — but more importantly, it also narrowed in on the family of the accused as the centerpiece of the story, with great emotional effect and, thus, audience investment and a grand payoff with the ending. — Amanda Bell

The fourth entry of HBO’s crime anthology took viewers to Night Country, aka Ennis, Alaska in the dead of winter. Opening with the mysterious disappearance of several scientists at a privately funded outpost, True Detective‘s latest chapter puts Liz Danvers (Jodie Foster) and Evangeline Navarro (Kali Reis) in charge of solving it all. When the tongue of a long-dead local Indigenous woman is recovered at the scene, and the scientists are found miles away frozen in the ice, it sets Danvers and Navarro on a collision course intermingled with supernatural traumas and a worsening water problem that has bigger implications than anyone could imagine.

This latest entry into the series breathes fresh life into the franchise while pulling in some fun ties to Season 1’s characters. At the same time, showrunner Issa Lopez shines a light on the environmental dangers marginalized communities are facing directly as well as the horrors being endured by Indigenous women. Night Country pays homage to its predecessors but brings something new to the table that makes keeping True Detective in the pop culture conversation worth it. — Meaghan Darwish

Modern remakes are often produced for the nostalgia factor; the new renditions rarely outdo the original. That can’t be said here. Creators Donald Glover and Francesca Sloane (of Atlanta fame) saw major plot holes in the 2005 film of the same name and set out to give the story’s great hook (spies in an arranged marriage figure out how to coexist and fall in love in the process) a better interpretation. They succeeded.

Key narrative changes give John (Glover) and Jane (Maya Erskine) an actual story for how they got together, and while their employers stay a mystery, we’re not left wondering how the agency works. We’re also treated to meeting more Smith spies and weirdly sympathetic targets thanks to a collection of great guest stars (Parker Posey is sublime). The central couple working for the same employer rather than dueling agencies allows for commentary on power dynamics in romantic relationships between men and women, and the biggest narrative threat is also the show’s best detail: being a “super high-risk” Smith means your targets are other Smiths. This new rendition is a realistic look at modern relationships that impeccably balances the oddball comedy for which Glover and Erskine are uniquely equipped with the sexiness of true intimacy. And given that finale cliffhanger, thank goodness it’s getting a Season 2. — Kelli Boyle

Fargo‘s 10 years in, could it possibly still be that great? You betcha! Noah Hawley‘s FX anthology may have aired partially in 2023, but the Year 5 installments that did broadcast in 2024 — “Blanket,” “The Useless Hand,” and “Bisquik” — were among some of the season’s best. Revolving around Juno Temple‘s Dot Lyon, viewers quickly discover that the Minnesota housewife has an interesting history as the runaway bride to Jon Hamm‘s abusive North Dakota Sheriff Roy Tillman who is determined to reclaim her. The ensemble is flawless with Jennifer Jason Leigh shining as Dot’s condescending mother-in-law Lorraine, Sam Spruell as spooky sin-eater Ole Munch, New Girl‘s Lamorne Morris as good-guy cop Witt Farr, and so many more. Completely unconnected to prior chapters of the anthology, Fargo‘s latest season proved there’s no better time than the present to jump right into the oddly cozy crime world Hawley weaves. — Meaghan Darwish

This post-apocalyptic dramedy follows in the footsteps of HBO’s The Last of Us as the next widely acclaimed video game adaptation, and it has nearly 20 Emmy nominations to prove it. In it, Lucy MacLean (Ella Purnell) has lived in an underground bunker for her entire life, just like many generations before her, in the fallout of nuclear winter in Los Angeles. When her father (Kyle MacLachlan) is kidnapped by surface-dwellers, she ventures out to save him only to find her entire education on the world above completely flipped on its head. While she’s disillusioned up there (Walton Goggins‘ the Ghoul and Aaron Moten‘s Maximus play big parts in her awakening), so too is her brother (Moises Arias) below as they learn dark truths about their supposedly safe and innocent underground home — and the second half of the season is where things really pick up. The show’s biggest feat is that it’s easy to love whether or not you’re familiar with the video game on which it’s based. — Kelli Boyle

This mystery thriller has consistently been one of the best shows on television since its premiere in 2019 — as we expect from Robert and Michelle King — and its fourth and, sadly, final season (we’re still holding out hope on it being saved) is just as chillingly excellent. No other show combines comedy, drama, and horror so well and in the same scene like Evil does. Where else could the Antichrist’s grandmother (Christine Lahti) have him baptized? Could a demon be chasing after people only for his skin suit to get caught around his legs like pants? Could villain Leland (Michael Emerson) be reduced to whimpering by a baby? Could a nun (Andrea Martin‘s Sister Andrea) take out demons in a church using whatever weapons at hand? The relationships among the central trio — forensic psychologist Kristen (Katja Herbers), priest David (Mike Colter), and skeptical tech genius Ben (Aasif Mandvi) — have been at the heart of the series all along, and the final episodes showcase those completely, as the assessor program is shut down (meta!), Kristen and David grapple with their feelings for each other, and Ben questions what he does and doesn’t believe. — Meredith Jacobs

Fans may have waited quite a while for Season 3 of Max’s enduring original comedy Hacks, but it was well worth it. The continuation of comedian Deborah Vance (Jean Smart) and writer Ava Daniels’ (Hannah Einbinder) working relationship sent viewers on a rollercoaster ride. Reuniting to chase after Deborah’s dream of becoming a late-night TV host, the women separated by generations push each other much to the audience’s delight while interacting with a colorful cast of characters that include manager Jimmy (series co-creator Paul W. Downs), Kayla (Megan Stalter), Marcus (Carl Clemons-Hopkins), and Damien (Mark Indelicato) among many others including a startlingly stacked guest cast. If anything, Hacks proved that the fun is just getting started as a shocking dynamic shift in Season 3’s final moments teed up what could be the show’s best chapter yet in Season 4. If that’s not great television or comedy, then what is? — Meaghan Darwish

Our top two picks of the year so far have three things in common: dense scripts, the best dramatic acting performances of the year (arguably some of the best of recent memory), and a likelihood to be included in “best shows of all time” lists in the future. The 1980 Shogun series is already regarded as one of the best miniseries of all time, and now FX’s spectacular new rendition of the James Clavell novel joins if not surpasses it in quality (it’s also getting a second season).

Emmy nominee Hiroyuki Sanada stars as Lord Yoshii Toranaga, who fights for his life as his enemies on the Council of Regents unite against him in 17th-century Japan. English sailor John Blackthorne (Cosmo Jarvis) becomes an unexpected addition to Toranaga’s camp that evolves into a useful (if unwilling) military ally. The slow-burn love story that blooms between Blackthorne and interpreter Lady Mariko (Anna Sawai in what’s sure to be an Emmy-winning performance) is second only to the slow reveal of Toranaga’s plan to win his war with little bloodshed. The whip-smart dialogue (which is mostly in Japanese with English subtitles) draws out the plot so slowly and carefully, you can’t help but marvel at the final results when Toranaga’s long game is revealed, not only because of what the main character pulls off, but also because of the high quality every aspect of the series maintains from start to finish. It can and should sweep the 2024 Emmys drama categories. — Kelli Boyle

It was a tough choice choosing between Shōgun and Interview With the Vampire for the top spot, but the decision ultimately came down to the astounding narrative feat the AMC series accomplished in its second season.

Part 2 left New Orleans behind for post-World War II Paris, where Anne Rice’s beloved vampires Louis de Pointe du Lac (Jacob Anderson, who’s long overdue for Emmys recognition for his performance — Season 2 will be eligible next year) and daughter Claudia (the wondrous Delainey Hayles) attempt to make a new life for themselves after their attempted murder of their maker/Louis’ immortal companion, Lestat de Lioncourt (Sam Reid, equally snubbed by awards shows for his Season 1 performance). Season 2 follows the second half of the eponymous Rice novel, which being the gothic, romantic horror story it is, ends in tragedy for this broken family of bloodsuckers but also in catharsis wholly earned after 15 episodes in a storytelling pressure-cooker.

The series at large, but Season 2’s fifth and last two episodes especially are examples of what TV can be when artists are given the carte blanche to create (another thing this and Shōgun have in common). Showrunner Rolin Jones and his team planted narrative seeds in the show’s very first episodes back in 2022 that wouldn’t pay off until these final hours, all culminating in multiple jaw-dropping reveals involving Lestat and Armand (Assad Zaman, one of the casting department’s greatest finds) that were decades in the making in the show and yet still unpredictable. (Season 3, The Vampire Lestat adaptation, is going to be even more uncharted territory.)

Like the Rice novel before it, Interview With the Vampire uses monsters to excavate the depths of human emotion, taking bigger and bolder swings with the source material than the 1994 film dared to do. Love and death, grief and remorse, euphoria and despair are all covered as Louis carries out his “odyssey of recollection” with investigative journalist Daniel Molloy (Eric Bogosian at his best) in 2022 Dubai. At its core, the show is a remarkable exploration of a most basic but confounding human experience that we spend our lives navigating: there are many sides to every story, but no matter how strongly we feel that our version is fact, the one haunting truth is, multiple things can be true at once. Imagine unpacking that for all eternity. — Kelli Boyle