Best TV Shows and Streaming Series of 2021 - 50 to 26
When it comes to TV and streaming, there has been something incredible for everyone in 2021. Taking over our living rooms in 2021 were movie-sized superheroes, pricelessly funny comedies, amazing animation, brilliant documentaries, tense dramas, and too many shows we're still dying to watch.
Welcome to Part Two - 50 to 26 of our Best TV Shows and Streaming Series of 2021.
Head here for Part One - 25 to 1 of our Best TV Shows and Streaming Series of 2021.
26. This Is a Robbery: The World's Biggest Art Heist Season 1
This Is a Robbery is expertly structured to build and keep momentum, teasing major elements of the story before bringing them home later. Despite its cinematic luster (The Irishman producer Jane Rosenthal is among the producers), this is a tight, four-episode series, not a four-hour movie. The interviews in This Is a Robbery are an embarrassment of riches.
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27. Mythic Quest: Raven's Banquet Season 2
Mythic Quest, the Apple TV+ workplace comedy from the makers of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, bares the funny truths of working in the toxic video game industry. It sets you up with the promise of typical comedic hijinks, and then packs quite an emotional punch when you least expect it. That's the cheat code to its appeal: just when it's being silly, it steals in a sneakily mature moment.
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28. Eden: Untamed Planet Season 1
If you’re wondering what to do over the weekend, here’s a suggestion: wear your comfiest loungewear sets, put on Eden: Untamed Planet and be prepared to be mesmerised. Eden: Untamed Plant transports viewers to the far corners of the planet while discovering Earth’s untouched lands. With six episodes shot in various destinations, each story is an encapsulation of the biodiversity and how these Edens are protected from the damaging effects of human interference.
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29. Only Murders In The Building Season 1
It works because it embraces such entrancing details, but even more so because its creators recognize what grants any piece of art the potential to become classic: it's in the marriage of old and new.
Any show can string together a decent whodunnit, but examining loneliness as a universal mystery is the more captivating concept enriching the three-part harmony wrought by Gomez, Martin and Short's combined performances.
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30. Final Space Season 3
It’s always a treat to see what this show manages to unleash. It’s weird and wonderful and not hemmed in by an overly referential charm. With Season 3, ‘Final Space’ has managed to sharpen all of its component parts on both logistical and emotional levels. And there’s plenty of room for it to keep going.
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31. The Falcon and the Winter Soldier Season 1
Created with care and a depth of focus, the series leads to a rewarding, and in some ways, unexpected story that is nothing but a win for the Marvel faithful. The series does a fantastic job of connecting the MCU to an intriguing new plot line designed especially for television.
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32. The Great North Season 1
Like Bob's Burgers? In just their first season, The Great North has a straightforward family-sitcom dynamic, loaded up with endearing eccentricity. These are rich characters in absurd situations full of quotable dialogue.
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33. Why Are You Like This Season 1
Why Are You Like This could be the first great Gen Z TV comedy series. The three main characters have no time for fragility – and if they do feel a bit sad, they express it through memes. Penny (Naomi Higgins, also one of the show’s writers) is on the quest to be the perfect ally: forcing her company to run mental health seminars and have a Queer Visibility Day. Her friend Mia (Olivia Junkeer) keeps losing her job, extorts money from men on dating apps and chastises Penny for not wearing her Mooncup. Their flatmate Austin (Wil King) has an evening gig as a drag queen – his persona is murdered child pageant princess JonBenet Ramsay. If these characters sound insufferable, that’s because they are.
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34. Tuca & Bertie Season 2
Tuca & Bertie is a rare treat of a show. BoJack Horseman producer Lisa Hanawalt continues her compassionate adventure through friendship in a second season that deepens its rich characters while pushing into new territory.
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35. Murder Among The Mormons Season 1
This fascinating, three-part Netflix documentary gathers a treasure trove of info about Utah bombings linked to fake documents that shook up the Mormon church. Directors Jared Hess and Tyler Measom do a superb job of telling this incredible true story via a treasure trove of archival news footage, audio tapes and home videos; the occasional re-creation of events, and interviews with a host of historians, researchers, investigators, news reporters and other key figures.
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36. Rick and Morty Season 5
If you are plotting to monkey around with the space-time continuum, at least let it result in a show as funny, clever and brilliant as Rick and Morty. It’s much more clever and funny and sophisticated than its forebears – an adult cartoon that fills the yawning chasm where the now-cancelled BoJack Horseman used to go with something even more dense, with brilliant writing and a worldview so bleak it makes BoJack seem Pollyanna-ish.
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37. The Mysterious Benedict Society Season 1
With so many colorful characters it’d be easy for a show like “The Mysterious Benedict Society” to lose the plot completely, and that’s a valid fear with the episodes being so lengthy. Series creators Phil Hay and Matt Manfredi skillfully create a world engaging enough for children but with enough added mystery and complexity to ensnare adults (or Disney’s patented brand of childless millennials.)
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38. The Bad Batch Season 1
Do you love The Mandalorian? Do you love Clone Wars? Do you fantasize about being Dave Filoni’s cowboy hat to be as close to that brilliant Star Wars brain as possible? Then The Bad Batch is for you. In all seriousness, The Bad Batch is another home run for Disney and Star Wars.
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39. Brooklyn Nine Nine Season 8
"Brooklyn Nine-Nine" always led with its kindly nature, exhibited by a crew of understanding good cops dedicated to doing the best by their community. While the writers never pretended the larger New York Police Department isn't corrupt, the antagonists representing the worst aspects of the force are generally as feckless as the criminals Jake (Andy Samberg) and the gang pursue.
In seasons past, "Brooklyn Nine-Nine" earned critical praise for building episodes around hot-button cultural issues such as sexism and homophobia while maintaining its comedic integrity. In its final season, everything people still adore about the show remains intact, particularly in a subplot involving Sergeant Amy Santiago (Melissa Fumero) diving into her fear that her strange, geeky chemistry with Captain Holt (Andre Braugher) is off.
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40. The Harper House Season 1
Sometimes family is a pain, but they can also be all that people have sometimes. The Harper family look incredibly normal upon an initial glance, but the first episodes of this new show do excellent work to establish each of them as individuals and accentuate the quirks that make these characters stand out among the standard animated sitcom family flock.
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41. We Are Lady Parts Season 1
‘We Are Lady Parts’ invigorates the girl-power formula with wit, rowdiness and faith. Whatever your expectations from the show’s general premise of “all-female punk band struggle to reconcile their personalized interpretations of Islam while also emphasizing their commitment to the music and to each other,” the lively, funny, and lovely ‘We Are Lady Parts’ will exceed them.
Read more here.
42. I Think You Should Leave with Tim Robinson Season 2
It’s hard to review a show like ‘I Think You Should Leave’. Not only is the Netflix comedy a series of disconnected sketches, but half the fun of the sketches is not knowing what the heck you’re watching when they begin. If you enjoyed the first season you’ll love this second one, and just as with those first six episodes, these have tremendous re-watch-ability and many grow even funnier the more you watch them.
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43. Star Wars: Visions Season 1
The galaxy far, far away has never looked more stunning in animation, and at its best Visions folds core Star Wars tenets into compelling stories with characters you instantly want to see more of. Here’s hoping this isn’t the only season we get.
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44. The Cleaner Season 1
Long-time comedy TV star and panel show host Greg Davies leads The Cleaner, a dark and curious comedy. Loosely inspired by the German comedy series Der Tatortreiniger (Crime Scene Cleaner), it is written by Davies, who also stars as Paul “Wicky” Wickstead, a cleaner sent to mop up the messes left behind after gruesome killings and untimely deaths.
The standout episode ‘The Widow’ sees Davies playing across from Helena Bonham Carter as the titular widow-slash-murderer. Here, she is at peak HBC – dishevelled, reaching for madness, and in a stylishly oversized coat. The Widow stabbed her husband 38 times. “You only need five stabs,” Wicky grumbles. “Anything else is showboating.”
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45. Patriot Brains Season 1
Legendary comedian and Black Books star Bill Bailey hosts TVNZ’s new series Patriot Brains, a trans-Tasman comedy panel show pitting a trio of Aussie and Kiwi comedians against each other in a low stakes, highly humorous outing.
The Kiwi trio of Mel Bracewell, Guy Montgomery and Madeleine Sami are welcoming towards the Aussie threesome of Mel Buttle, Tom Ballard and Rhys Nicholson, even if Nicholson at one point queries whether they’d actually been tricked into attending “a roast”.
Read more here.
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46. Made for Love Season 1
Cristin Milioti stars as a woman trying to escape from her narcissistic billionaire husband, but he’s surreptitiously tracking her every move through a microchip. ‘Made for Love’ occupies a sweet spot of satire, social critique and surveillance-state-inspired horror while still being hilarious, because it doesn’t have to try. The humour is everywhere.
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47. Marvel’s What If Season 1
Marvel 's What If...? is a thrilling ride into the multiverse. Each episode locks viewers in with breezy scripts, an agile narrative energy and a mesmerizing, near-photorealistic animation style. ‘What If…?’ holds the highest potential for longevity among all the Marvel shows we've seen so far, due to its relative freedom from either contributing to or connecting with the existing universe moving forward.
Read more here.
48. Schmigadoon! Season 1
Along with ‘Trying’ and ‘Ted Lasso’, ‘Schmigadoon!’ is another entry into AppleTV+ cornering the market on uplifting, positive, smart TV. It may be a niche joy, but you can’t watch without smiling. In this six episode series from executive producer Lorne Michaels, Melissa (Cecily Strong) and Josh (Keegan Michael Key) are two New York doctors who embark on a camping trip designed to bring them closer together. They get lost and find themselves stranded in the musical town of ‘Schmigadoon!’, where despite their continued efforts, they are unable to leave until they find true love.
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49. Masters of the Universe: Revelation Season 1
Netflix’s Masters of the Universe: Revelation radically re-imagines He-Man’s 1980s world. The characters look familiar, but the story is a startling departure. Its story is simple, fun and efficiently told. Its action is slightly more violent than that of its predecessor, though it’s never unpleasant, so younger viewers will have a blast.
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50. The North Water Season 1
Colin Farrell and Jack O’Connell anchor ‘The North Water,’ a gripping story of villainy at sea. By the strength of its storytelling, the show eventually earns its darkest flourishes; it adds depth and real heft to its vision of the past as a land of monsters. In all, ‘The North Water’ serves as a bracing plunge into inhumanity that’ll stick with you after its running time melts away.
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Head here for Part One - 25 to 1 of our Best TV Shows and Streaming Series of 2021.