"I apologize. I know I left some of your favorite shows off this list. How do I know that? Because I left some of my favorite shows off this list. The happy and unfortunate fact is that there are far more than 100 great shows, and more created every year. Lists are incredibly important: they are how we define what matters to us, what we want entertainment and art to do, what we expect of our culture." —TIME TV critic James Poniewozik
TV has always loved to talk about itself, and this sitcom was the first in a line of classic shows set in the TV business. Unlike some of its cutthroat successors, DVD made the TV biz seem downright friendly, as Rob Petrie wrote sketches for the egotistical Alan Brady (Carl Reiner, in occasional guest shots) and cut up with pals Buddy Sorrell and Sally Rogers (Rose Marie, in a rare early role as working woman comic). But this hybrid series was also set half at home, and the comic chemistry between the dashing, ottoman-tripping Van Dyke and a smokin’ young Mary Tyler Moore as Laura makes the show hold up even today.
Viewed alongside a complex modern cop drama like The Wire or even The Shield, Jack Webb’s mother of all procedurals looks like a cave painting. But there’s an artistic economy to the show’s simple storylines and clipped cadences—Det. Joe Friday may never have used a semicolon in his life. And a lot of more ambitious dramas could learn something from its clean, documentary style and single-minded commitment to story, story, story. (“Just the facts, ma’am” was not a slogan but a command.) And then there are the spare, noir visuals; not only did this show teach Law & Order and CSI how to tell stories, it looked damn fine doing it. Friday kept his personal life under his tilted-just-so hat, but he arrested our attention all the same.