Sarah Connor Chronicles in front of Angel - really??!! Also no offense to Dollhouse fans (which I am slowly becoming one) but it does not deserve to be so high on the list. Firefly deserves to be high - but not that high!


Oh so much controversy in one small list:)

angeliclestat | August 28, 19:06 CET

On a list of 100, isn't pretty much every even semi-decent show going to make the list?

The One True b!X | August 28, 19:08 CET

I think this list is quite useful, not so much for ranking one show over another, but for pointing out series you really should see, or at least might want to check out.

skeeler | August 28, 19:11 CET

Agreed, skeeler. I'm not even going to comment on the rankings, since it's so entirely subjective that none of us could ever agree, but I've found several intriguing looking shows that I'll be sure to check out!

Lirazel | August 28, 19:21 CET

I think that this is a list of the first 100 sci-fi/fantasy shows they could think of—good, bad, or mediocre—in almost a random order (especially toward the bottom). Most egregious error: putting Pushing Daisies so low. I'm just thankful that they didn't claim Tru Calling as their no. 1. Oh, and Doctor Who is totally better than Star Trek.

Invisible Green | August 28, 19:23 CET

I'm also looking at the list to determine shows to check out. We can argue over rankings endlessly, it's all subjective. I'm happy to see many of my favorites on the list, and wonder if I might find some new favorites there as well!

AnotherFireflyfan | August 28, 19:26 CET

I almost think it's a crime to list Star Trek as the best Sci-Fi/Fantasy show. Star Trek is perhaps the cheesiest show I have ever seen. How someone can list that about "Terminator", "Battlestar Galactica", and "Firefly" to name just a few is completely beyond me.

benboy606 | August 28, 19:52 CET

Wooh, some questionable rankings there- I agree, Dollhouse shouldn't be at 16 (yet), Pushing Daisies (and Farscape) should be higher- but glad to see the Firefly love.

kishi | August 28, 19:54 CET

True, but given that they also took into account how much influence the show had and the strength of its cult following, there was no question it would be at the top of the list. The show basically invented so many of the standard sci-fi tropes that we take for granted nowadays.

Polter-Cow | August 28, 20:02 CET

Oh Firefly, how we miss you! Great to see it so high in the list.

twinkle | August 28, 20:11 CET

Good to see Buffy and Firefly so high, but I would've put Angel and Quantum Leap higher, instead of Dollhouse at 16.
And no "Lois & Clark" ? that was so much better than Smallville.

We could also argue why wonderful shows like "Carnivàle" are not listed, but maybe it's more like a top 100 of popular shows.

Nico-Angel | August 28, 20:21 CET

I feel like they are puttting recent shows ahead just cause they are recent. Example: Fringe at 18. Really?

geratongs3000 | August 28, 21:12 CET

Disagree. Still, lists are fun.

CaptainB | August 28, 21:24 CET

Yeah, I wouldn't put Fringe or Dollhouse anywhere that high on the list - tere are a lot more groundbreaking shows below them. And Millennium, Earth 2, Life on Mars and Invisible Man would have definetely deserved a spot on the list instead of some of the shows that were included.

Also, I note that according to this list, 5% of all great scifi on television has James Marsters in it :D

(he's has appeared in Smallville, Buffy, Angel, Torchwood and Andromeda - plus Caprica, if you count as part of new BSG)

ruuger | August 28, 21:48 CET

To the extent that such lists are biased towards shows like Dollhouse which are still on the air and have a shot at attracting more viewers and not dying the untimely death of Firefly, I'm quite comfortable with them placing such shows far beyond what's reasonable in the hopes of attracting more not-currently-waching genre fans! :-)

jclemens | August 28, 22:49 CET

I would have re-arranged 1, 2, and 3 to make it

1. Doctor Who
2. Firefly
3. Star Trek

But it was a good list.

The Operative | August 28, 22:55 CET

Probably would have been safer to list 100 and stress that there is no ranking order. lol

WheelsOfJoy | August 28, 22:57 CET

Seen quite a few of the one's towards the end and the basic order of the list I agree with. Just not some specifics. As for Dollhouse's ranking, it somehow works for me. However, if I were to put it there, I for some reason feel bad that Smallville is so low.

Max Headroom... Er, okay.

Jaymii | August 28, 23:31 CET

What, no Space Cases?

Nolan | August 29, 00:22 CET

What the hell is Serial Experiments Lain doing in 94th?! It should be in the top 30 at least. Otherwise I have no real problems with this list... It's not how I would rank it but it's good enough.

Djungelurban | August 29, 00:37 CET

A lot of things I don't agree with, but the high placement of Futurama, Babylon 5, Buffy and Firefly (almost at the 1# spot it deserves) make up for a lot. (And I also love the Jekyll mention)

the Groosalugg | August 29, 00:43 CET

I'm starting to feel like I'm the only one who prefers Angel to all of the other products of the Whedonverse. Not by, you know, a lot, but still...

Taaroko | August 29, 01:39 CET

I'd put Angel way above Firefly and Dollhouse. But I like the number one choice. Not that I prefer it to Buffy but just for the mark it made. Changed the face of Sci fi. The meaning of fandom. Yada yada.

Xane | August 29, 05:28 CET

I'm not a big fan of the school of thought that elevates the longevity and "influence" of certain franchises (Star Trek, Dr. Who) over their cheesiness factors. So I'm in total disagreement with the top two.
I'd put Buffy and BSG in a dead heat for # 1 - which actually works nicely, since Buffy is fantasy pretty much without a SciFi element, and BSG unfolds in a distinctly Scifi setting.

I can't argue with the high placement of Dollhouse (Fringe, not so much). I have less of a problem with overlooking a short run (so far for Dollhouse, forevermore for Firefly) than I have with overlooking cheesiness.
Also re. "short runs", the exclusion of Carnivale is totally inexcusable.

Thrilled with the B5 love. If you want to talk about "influence" and ground breaking work, IMO you need look no farther than B5. This is the show that gave Scifi permission to be dark, nuanced and adult. Far more laudable achievments than loingevity and huge fan bases.
B5 also pretty much pioneered the genuine story-arc form in Scifi. As opposed to X-Files, which had ten seasons of maddeningly mediocre (with a few exceptions) stand alone eps, interrupting what could have been a brilliant 6 seasons of a genuine, tight arc. I think of it as the ultimate "can't make up it's mind what it wants to be" show.)

I would have rated both Torchwood and T:TSCC much higher, and Lost and X-Files considerably lower. I enjoyed X-Files well enough when it was a total novelty, but I don't think it holds up as well as a lot of shows, with age. (Unless you skip 90% of the stand-alone eps).

Shey | August 29, 09:24 CET

Really? At least in season five--it's the only one I've watched straight through--I found the stand-alones consistently engaging and interesting, while the mythology made me want to bore something through my head. I hate X-Files mythology.

sumogrip | August 29, 10:18 CET

I like The X-Files, but I found, as the mythology gets weaker or stupider, you began caring less about them therefore enjoying the non-mytharc episodes. During the earlier seasons I found myself bored to death with the stupid stand-alones: Stopping me from seeing my serialized character developing episodes, how dare you?!

It deserves a decent place, though. It was different to a lot of the other things on the tellybox at the time and shows you can have a blockbuster on a Friday night.

Jaymii | August 29, 11:57 CET

I hear a lot of these arguments and it sounds a lot like we're having arguments that sound like, "this should be #1 because I liked this show."

I actually don't have much of a problem with the list. I think like quite a few on here, I think some are rated too high because they are too new to have justified a cult following or a standard for show quality. I like Dollhouse, but I think the cult following is a Joss cult following and not a Dollhouse cult following. That may change, but I think 16 is rather unrealistic today.

The Dr. Who/Star Trek debates however are quite funny to me because they never stop. So keep them coming. Next week, can we do Mac vs. PC?

azzers | August 30, 07:21 CET

I love Dollhouse but I’d put Angel before it for sure. Then again, I’d put Dollhouse before Firefly and think Buffy should have definitely nabbed number one spot out of Whedon’s shows… not to mention the entire poll.

I’ll never understand the Dr Who love so I don’t agree with that and would put Firefly, Dollhouse, Angel, Buffy and BSG all before it. Sometimes I think because it’s so old it automatically gets put into these high polls but that’s just my bias because I can’t see the appeal.

vampmogs | August 30, 07:44 CET