The Best Cable Shows of 2007: A Top 10 list

As we inch closer to the end of the year, it’s time for yet another Top 10 list from A Mike Life or AML as we’re now calling it for those so tired of seeing my name. But get used to it, “Michael” was the #2 given name of 2006 for the United States. Gotta love that.

I’ve given you my favorite Christmas movies and my favorite network TV shows of the fall, and now it’s the Top 10 Cable shows for this entire year.

Cable deserves its own category because there doesn’t usually appear to be a cohesive schedule or season. They do tend to put on good shows during the summer though and that makes those long, hot months in Phoenix much more bearable.

And the fact that cable television is just getting better and better, it really belongs on its own. Before I start the list though, I want to stipulate that there is a TON of stuff on cable I don’t watch, because there is nowhere near enough time, nor do I want to spend 24/7 watching TV. So yeah, Dexter, The Sopranos, Burn Notice, Monk, etc., are all shows I don’t watch and would likely make this list if I did.

It’s already a good list I think and a hard one to rank. I like a lot of these shows better than network series and I’d probably watch anything in the Top 4 over Heroes.

Here we go:

The Top 10 Cable Shows of 2007

10. It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia

This third season of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia lost a bit of the charm that it had the first two years it was on, but the finale really brought the show back to being awesome.

It’s a pretty raunchy, politically incorrect show, but the first two seasons were brilliant anyways and slapstick funny. Make sure you catch the episodes where the gang pretends to be handicapped and go to the mall, or they go on welfare by trying to buy a “rock of crack” from a drug dealer.

9. Pardon the Interruption on ESPN

I really only need this ONE show everyday after work to keep me caught up on the world of sports. Michael Wilbon and Tony Kornheiser have a rundown list on the right side of the screen that they go through each episode, talking for not much longer than a minute on all the top sports stories.

They also do fun little games, like Odds, Role Playing, etc. They are hilarious, they know what they are talking about and I really love to listen to what they have to say. They are just real, real guys, who talk sports honestly. Good stuff.

8. Entourage

Man I love this show, but the past season was just a bit off and not as much fun as the others. There was so much focus on Medellin and the psycho director that it got somewhat old. The best parts were with Drama and his new series, and I loved when he tried to get his apartment annexed into the 90210 zip code. HBO has some good stuff and this was one of them.

7. Planet Earth

Wow is all I can really say here. If you didn’t get to see the Planet Earth series in high-definition, you truly missed a work of art that hasn’t been matched. The angles, views and shots done over the series were astounding. Hot air balloon seats where cameramen floated over the tops of trees conveyed a vision that one can only imagine seeing in real life.

And they did a ton of work to get this series put together. I believe it was a white cat of some sort in an Asian country that no one had every videotaped before. It took them 60 days of sitting and waiting until they caught 3 minutes of footage. That’s dedication man.

6. The Soup

We used to watch Best Week Ever for laughs every week to see what lame stuff was going on in the celebrity gossip world, but once some friends made us to watch The Soup, we realized how crappy BWE was.

Joel McHale is the host and the weekly recaps of the past week’s goofiness in the world of TV, talk shows and celebrities is just not to be missed. You can catch a Soup Presents the Best of 2007 Monday night.

(The next batch of shows was so very hard for me to rank…they are all awesome)

5. Build it Bigger

Discovery HD Theater is a remarkable channel and has some amazing shows on it. One used to be Extreme Engineering and they had a guy named Danny Forster host an episode where they explore the new Arizona Cardinals stadium under construction a few years ago. It was amazing.

Now Forster is back with his own show called Build it Bigger. This summer and into the fall, they’ve gone all over the world, above it and below it, to show us some simply amazing construction sites.

The episode on the Shanghai World Financial Center, which will be the tallest building in the world when completed, was especially amazing. He was up so high, hanging windows on the edge of the building, it was almost dizzying just to WATCH him up there.

Danny is a great host, slightly afraid of heights, but also fun. He gets so excited about what he does it’s contagious. And to top it all off, he also answers fan questions on their website at Discovery.com.

(yes I’ve posted a few times – I’m a Danny Forster groupie)

4. Flight of the Conchords

The first episode I watched I wasn’t sure about it so I turned it off. Then a week later, I finished it and kind of liked it. Then I watched the second one and really liked it. Then I fell in love with it.

Bret and Jemaine have their own folk band (just them two) from New Zealand and are trying to make it in New York. The humor is dry, there are musical numbers and some of the funniest stuff around. And don’t forget Murray, their band manager. He just might be funnier than the other two.

The complete first season is already available to watch for those interested.

3. Rescue Me

One of the most hard-hitting shows on TV, crude, brutal, dramatic, hilarious and awesome. Dennis Leary is one of the best actors working in television and he makes this show tick. But it’s a hard one to watch sometimes. It’s cable, so there are a lot of things going on that network TV can’t show you.

That probably makes it what it is. Tommy Gavin (Leary) is a fire fighter in New York City, who lost a best friend in 9/11 and deals with those issues and a host of others.

If you’ve never seen it, I suggest starting from season 1 and catching up before next summer. It did get renewed for a 5th season.

2. Battlestar Galactica

My love for this show has been well stated on this blog over and over. From the awesome Razor movie to the previews and tidbits for season 4 this next year, it’s seriously one of the best shows on TV.

It’s a shame really that it somehow gets overlooked during award season when it comes to best TV drama and the actors who do amazing work on it every week.

Humanity has been wiped out save for 50,000 refugees on spaceships trying to keep away from the Cylons who destroyed them. Some of the Cylons look like humans and some could be a part of those 50,000 people still alive. The first three seasons were amazing, with the finale for season 2 giving fans an ending never before done on a TV show.

Rent the miniseries which is part of season 1 and give it a test ride. If you like GOOD sci-fi, there is no reason you wont like this.

(and of course, the obligatory drum roll please….)

1. Damages

I envy those that get to watch this thing for the first time all the way through. Rent the DVD and enjoy a 13-episode marathon full of twists, turns, murder and one of the best seasons of TV I’ve ever seen.

You have Glenn Close and Ted Danson absolutely killing as a lawyer leading the prosecution against a CEO who sold his companies stock from under his employees, allegedly.

When I heard Ted Danson was in this show, I was leery, but the previews looked good enough to check out and it was summer. Imagine my surprise when he turned out to be one of my favorite characters of the season. He was brilliant as Arthur Frobisher, so quietly evil, he should be up for some kind of award.

The 13 episodes focus almost entirely on the case and the things that happen surrounding it. The best thing about this first season is that all your questions get answered in a finale that absolutely rocks the house.

It’s available on January 28th to purchase and was renewed for two more seasons.

—

There you have my list…I think it’s good, but I also think it’s amazing that there are a ton of shows I don’t watch that would probably make this top 10 list. Are cable shows starting to kick the crap out of network TV? What favorites do you have that I don’t?