Copyright Screen Rant
A lot of HBO shows are classics on the whole, but some individual seasons stand out as unimpeachable masterpieces. Some of HBO’s best shows have had middling seasons, like Silicon Valley’s post-Erlich seasons, or just outright terrible seasons, like Game of Thrones season 8. But the network has also given us some of the best seasons of television ever produced. Deadwood’s first season was a perfect introduction to HBO’s revisionist western. Succession’s final season was an appropriately bittersweet conclusion to the Roy family saga. From sturdy classics like The Sopranos season 2 to more recent gems like The Rehearsal season 2, these are the greatest seasons of TV ever aired on HBO. The White Lotus Season 2 Mike White took the formula he established in the first season of The White Lotus to new heights in its second season. Season 2 swaps out season 1’s satirical focus on money for a commentary on sexual politics. It’s steamy, shocking, and it builds to a deeply disturbing finale. This is truly captivating television; it’s as emotionally resonant as it is darkly hilarious. Deadwood Season 1 David Milch’s dramatization of Deadwood’s journey from a small encampment to a full-blown town got off to a perfect start in its first season. Deadwood season 1 introduced us to all the complex characters in the town, the show’s uniquely gritty vision of the revisionist western subgenre, and Milch’s ability to mix notorious historical figures into the lives of his characters. The Rehearsal Season 2 Nathan Fielder conceived The Rehearsal as a thought experiment that allowed people to roleplay every possible eventuality before entering a difficult situation. In the show’s second season, he focused on a more specific goal: improving communication between pilots. He noticed that many plane crashes occurred because the first officer was afraid to speak up to their captain, and he set out to rectify that. In his attempts to revolutionize aviation safety, Fielder delivered one of the most profound seasons of television ever produced. He put on a fake singing competition, he cloned a dog, he got breastfed by a giant puppet of Sully Sullenberger’s mother, and he even piloted a 737 full of people. No one else is making television quite like Fielder. Succession Season 4 The fourth and final season of Succession marked an appropriately bittersweet end to the Roy family saga. Early in the season, the show abruptly killed off Logan Roy in perhaps the most realistic portrayal of sudden loss ever put on-screen. From then on, it took the aftermath one day at a time, building toward the long-awaited fate of Waystar Royco. Seeing the different ways that Kendall, Roman, Shiv, and Connor dealt with their grief revealed a lot about their respective characters. Those last few episodes of the season gave us Logan’s somber memorial service, a stolen U.S. presidential election, and an emotional rollercoaster of a series finale that felt both wildly unpredictable and exactly right. Curb Your Enthusiasm Season 4 Every season of Curb Your Enthusiasm had great episodes, but the one with the best overarching story was season 4. Mel Brooks casts Larry in a Broadway production of The Producers, which leads to all kinds of social disasters, building to the perfect punchline. Much like in The Producers itself, Brooks wanted the show to bomb, so he cast Larry to doom it. Six Feet Under Season 5 Six Feet Under is a rare TV show that never had a dip in quality. Each season was even greater than the last, as Alan Ball and the writers took their darkly hilarious exploration of mortality and dysfunctional family dynamics even deeper. The final season of Six Feet Under builds to one of the most moving and satisfying series finales in television history. The Sopranos Season 2 The second season of The Sopranos is the pinnacle of the show’s unique blend of realism and surrealism. It has much more authenticity and verisimilitude than the average gangster show, but it also has bizarre non-sequiturs, pitch-black humor, and an abundance of dream sequences left open to interpretation. Season 2 is the season that best exemplifies that tricky tonal balance. Every other season of The Sopranos has at least one uninteresting story thread or a character that doesn’t quite fit the ensemble, but season 2 is all bangers, all the time. Tony’s rivalry with Richie, his complicated relationship with Dr. Melfi, and his growing suspicion of Big Pussy are all compelling storylines, and the food-poisoned finale is an all-time classic. Game Of Thrones Season 4 Although it would take a nosedive in its last couple of seasons, Game of Thrones was one of the best shows on the air for a few years. It peaked in season 4; this was when Game of Thrones perfected its blend of high-stakes medieval fantasy and relatable human drama. The season has jaw-dropping action sequences and shocking twists, like the highly anticipated death of Joffrey Baratheon. True Detective Season 1 The first season of True Detective is one of the greatest pieces of television ever produced. Nic Pizzolatto writes deeply flawed human characters and a dual-timeline murder mystery with the complexity of a novel, and Cary Joji Fukunaga directs the season with a cinematic Southern Gothic visual style worthy of the big screen. Woody Harrelson and Matthew McConaughey brought the central detective duo to life and proved that transitioning to television didn’t have to mark the end of a movie star’s career. It simply gave them an opportunity to dig even deeper into a character and tell their story on a much larger canvas. The Wire Season 4 Every season of The Wire tackled a different broken institution in the city of Baltimore, and every season is poetic and insightful in its own way. But the best season of the series — and maybe the best season of television ever produced — is season 4, which goes right to the source of the problems: the underfunded public school system. After three seasons chronicling the day-to-day lives of various drug dealers and hired killers, The Wire season 4 showed us how wayward young kids end up falling into a life of crime. The story of these four boys is heartwarming at times, heartbreaking at times, and an all-round eye-opening look at inner-city education.
