American Craft Beer’s Best Television Shows of 2023

It was another good year for craft beer and a terrific year for cutting-edge television and as usual we overindulged in both.

Clearly HBO is responsible for taking long form cutting-edge TV in the US seriously. (Would there ever have been a Breaking Bad without The Sopranos?). But with the emergence of Netflix  and the streaming networks it has spawned television’s possibilities have grown exponentially.

2023 saw almost too many new streaming networks flexing creative muscle forcing traditional networks like ABC to up their games with series like Abbot Elementary if they wanted to survive.

And now in no particular order….

Best Television Series of 2023

Succession (HBO)

One of HBO’s most talked about series in year, Succession ended it’s four season run in 2023 with an assuredness that defined the family  saga. The series centers on the Roy family, the owners of a Murdock-like global media and entertainment conglomerate, and Logan Roy’s power-hungry offspring, played brilliantly by Jeremy Strong, Kieran Culkin, and Sarah Snook, as they fight for control of the company amidst uncertainty about the health of the family’s patriarch.

The writing remained razor-sharp in 2023, as was the meme-ready dialog, and unlike the conclusions of many great TV series like Peaky Blinders and Gomorrah, Succession’s pitch-black ending was as smart and unsentimental as it gets.

The Bear (FX Hulu)

The Bear was one of 2020’s biggest word-of-mouth successes and it’s second season which returned in 2023 was even more impressive.

Jeremy Allen White stars as an award-winning New York City chef who returns to Chicago to run his family’s Italian beef sandwich shop after the suicide of his older brother, who left behind debts, a rundown kitchen, and an unruly staff.

Supported by a strong cast of fresh urban characters that make this dramedy sing The Bear is a gripping tale of family and trauma, coupled with the intensity of running a new kitchen that’s always on the brink.

The Last of Us  (HBO)

The Last of Us is an American post-apocalyptic drama television series created by Craig Mazin and Neil Druckmann for HBO. Based on a popular video game franchise, the series is set twenty years into a pandemic caused by a mass fungal infection, which transforms its hosts into zombie-like creatures and collapses society.

The first season, which closely follows the 2013 game with some surprising sidesteps, stars Pedro Pascal as a smuggler tasked with escorting a teenager (Bella Ramsey) across a post-apocalyptic United States.

Both Pedro Pascal and Bella Ramsey made striking appearances in Game of Thrones and like that defining series The Last of Us created a world where even its heros unexpectedly fall no matter how much we like them.

Jury Duty (Amazon Frevee)

Created by team behind The Office (Lee Eisenberg and Gene Stupnitsky), Jury Duty was the best comedy of 2023. Both a send-up of reality TV and something entirely new, Jury Duty centers on Ronald Gladden, an average guy called to jury duty who believes that he’s also being filmed as part of a documentary on the American jury system.

The series chronicles the inner workings of a jury trial in the US through the eyes of an innocent and well-meaning solar contractor from San Diego, who is unaware that his jury duty summons was not official, and that everyone in the courtroom, aside from him, is an actor. Everything that happens, inside and outside the courtroom, is planned and everybody around him, hilariously improvising situations to see how he’ll react.

The supporting cast of fake jurors is terrific, especially Edy Modica as Jeannie Abruzzo (Juror #4), a wacky, promiscuous juror and James Marsden (Westworld, Dead to Me) who gamely plays himself as a comically arrogant, actor/celebrity.

Honorable Mentions

Top Boy (Netflix )

Barry (HBO)

The Crown (Netflix)

Ferry (Netflix)

Happy Valley (BBC America)

Mrs. Davis (Peacock)

Reservation Dogs  (FX/Hulu)

Dead Ringers (Amazon)