After watching True Detective: Night Country, aka s4, it brought back an idea long in the hopper. This'll be a short list of single season TV shows, the best, I think, I've seen. These didn't make sense with my favorite TV shows post years ago, it's a different category in my mind, but they belong somewhere. Back on initial conception I didn't have enough examples but by now it's filled out nicely.
The criteria, to elaborate, is that these shows, or individual seasons of these shows, are self-contained. You don't need to watch something beforehand to understand what's going on or continue on afterward several seasons to get the whole story. It's one and done. To achieve that each of these are either a limited run 'mini-series' or part of an anthology with seasons lacking real connections between them. All are short as well, with between five and ten episodes in total. There's a lot of historical drama here, and HBO, unsurprisingly.
Let's get to it:
True Detective s1 (HBO, 2014)
8 episodes
A pair of mismatched detectives (Matthew McConaughey, Woody Harrelson) are pushed to the brink over nearly 20 years by a series of grisly murders. Groundbreaking, even in a genre way overdone, and presaged a new era of prestige television. Time jumps, complex relationships, intricate plotting, it has it all, including McConaughey at his unhinged, conspiratorial best. Kicked off the recent fad of long one-camera 'tracking' shots and produced some top-notch social media fodder too. Thus far there've been three more (all interesting!) seasons of this anthology but none have topped the original.
Band of Brothers (HBO, 2001) -> see post on D-Day/BoB
10 episodes
Easy Company, part of the 101st Airborne Division, trains and jumps into Europe during World War II. We follow them on D-Day, during Market Garden, through the Ardennes, to the liberation of a concentration camp and all the way to Hitler's Eagle's Nest. Based on Stephen Ambrose's 1992 book what we see is almost entirely true (though I know some liberties were taken to simplify who did what etc.) The strengths here include continuity, we really get to know these men, and an absolute gem of a man to lead them, Dick Winters (Damian Lewis), who you can't help but love.
See also: The Pacific (HBO, 2010), Masters of the Air (Apple TV+, 2024) for more in this vein.
Shogun (FX/Hulu, 2024) -> see post on this series
10 episodes
An English sailor lands in Japan in 1600 during a long period of seclusion from the outside world. He must navigate the vast cultural barrier, the rival Portuguese (the only Europeans allowed on the island) and the tense political situation he stumbles into, with several prominent lords jockeying for position following the death of the old emperor. The show's creators (including star Hiroyuki Sanada) were painstaking in their recreation of feudal Japan and it sucks you in. Best new show I've seen in some time. For now we'll ignore that they intend to extend past the source material and original story.
Chernobyl (HBO, 2019)
5 episodes
In 1986 the Chernobyl nuclear power plant loses containment and melts down due to a failure in design and incompetence of its operators. A scientist (Jared Harris) is brought in to contain the disaster and we witness events through his eyes. A number are unforgettable, the unprepared firefighters showing up on scene, the Communist Party deciding to bury or downplay the story everywhere, the helicopters struggling to drop sand on the fire, the men sent in to kill all exposed animal life. I most appreciate the breakdown, near the end, of how a nuclear reactor works and how it got out of control. If you want to see the ills of Communism, and learned what happened here, watch this show. I should again.
The Terror s1 (AMC, 2018)
10 episodes
In the 19th century the British Empire sought a Northwest Passage, i.e. a way between the Atlantic and Pacific through the Canadian Arctic. One expedition in 1845-48, led by Sir John Franklin (Ciaran Hines), got stuck in the ice and never returned. In subsequent years a few details were discovered and it wasn't pretty, with evidence the sailor's deaths were slow and cannibalism was likely. This series, named for the actual HMS Terror, shows what may have happened. It's certainly horror-ish, with the men beset by inevitable glacial freeze, dwindling stores and increasing desperation. On top of that a supernatural threat looms. Not for the feint of heart but utterly fantastic, and that reminds me, I want to read this book.
At one time or another I've wanted to write about all these individually, and up to now I've done two. They're some of the best things I've ever watched and benefit, I think, from having a limited scope. All, however, can be trying for one reason or several. True Detective and the Terror are legitimately disturbing, scary. Violence and other gruesomeness pervade them all. Shogun is largely in Japanese, with subtitles, and highlights the cultural prevalence of seppuku, or ritual suicide. Be warned. But they're the highest quality television ever produced, considering the writing, the acting, the visual details, everything. If any of these sound interesting at all, check them out. I doubt you'll regret it.
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