Time picks the 100 best TV shows of all-time

I like lists as much as the next guy, but I'm not sure how useful a "100 Best" list of anything is. Twenty-five best? OK. Ten best? That's good too, because you're really picking what you think are the best. But once your lists gets into three digits, it seems more like history than opinion. I mean, what wouldn't be on the list?

Time's James Poniewozik picks the 100 Best TV Shows of All-Time (or All-TIME, as the web site cleverly puts it). Since he picked 100 shows, all the usual suspects are here. The obvious ones (The Dick Van Dyke Show, All in the Family, Your Show of Shows, 60 Minutes, Cheers, I Love Lucy, M*A*S*H, etc) and the not-quite-so-obvious but certainly deserving (Mystery Science Theater 3000, The Odd Couple, Friends). And it includes a few surprises too (American Idol, King of the Hill, Oprah).

But lists like this are fun because they start debate (though, again, I think that debate would be more vigorous if he had picked 10, 25, or 50). He explains his reasons for choosing what he chose really well in this video, which also includes a nice defense of television itself.

While most of the list is fairly predictable, it's still good to see a lot of these shows on a list, because sometimes we forget to think of them because we might not watch them regularly or we're too busy watching current shows. I love any list that puts The Dick Van Dyke Show as one of the best, along with The Odd Couple and MST3K and A Charlie Brown Christmas and The French Chef and Leave It To Beaver and the early days of MTV (though I wonder if that's less "best of all-time" and more "best at that particular time of my life"). It's good to see Friends, too, because beyond all the hype and expensive salaries and Jennifer Aniston's hair, it really was one of the best shows. I would have picked Guiding Light over General Hospital, but hey, that's me.

Now, the question is, what shows did he leave off the list that you would have put on? I'm surprised that Magnum, P.I. isn't on the list but Sanford and Son is. No Star Trek: TNG? And the "N" section could have easily been filled with NewsRadio.

(If you don't want to click through page by page, here's the complete list.)