Every year, I’m left with the same feeling: sitting down with a list of series is less about ranking titles and more about rereading what that period said about us. 2025 was a curious year for television. Fewer unavoidable “global phenomena” and more a mature consolidation of shows that chose depth, time, and dramatic density. A year in which prestige outshone noise — and that alone says a great deal.

Something is revealing about the fact that, among the best of the year, so many productions engage with politics, power, identity, class, grief, ambition, fear, and memory. The television of 2025 was adult. Sometimes harsh. Sometimes brilliantly human. Rarely escapist. Every year, I’m left with the same feeling: sitting down with a list of series is less about ranking titles and more about rereading what that period said about us. 2025 was a curious year for television. Fewer unavoidable “global phenomena,” and more a mature consolidation of shows that chose depth, time, and dramatic density. A year in which prestige overcame noise — and that alone already says a great deal.

Something is revealing about the fact that, among the best of the year, we find productions that deal with politics, power, identity, class, grief, ambition, fear, and memory. The television of 2025 was adult. Sometimes harsh. Sometimes brilliantly human. Rarely escapist.

Here is the ranking and the list of the best and worst of 2025.

The Best of 2025 According to Miscelana

1. Andor (Disney+)

At the absolute top, for me, is Andor. What Tony Gilroy has built here is no longer a “Star Wars spin-off,” but one of the most sophisticated political narratives in contemporary television. A study of fascism, moral choices, and resistance that refuses to anesthetize the viewer. Cold, tense, and profoundly current. It is the series that best speaks to our time precisely because it takes place in a galaxy far, far away.

2. Task (HBO Max)

Among the great surprises of the year, Task established itself as one of the most rigorous and emotionally uncomfortable narratives of the season. The kind of series that does not ask for easy applause — only for attention. It is a drama that does not fear silence, ambiguity, or the unsettling feeling that no one is entirely right, nor entirely wrong. Deservedly renewed for a second season.

3. Chad Powers (Disney Hulu)

Chad Powers may surprise you, but it is a rare case of a comedy that perfectly understands the time in which it is being made. It plays with masculinity, sports, media, and ego without falling into obvious parody. Beneath the jokes lies a very precise portrait of a culture that turns anything — even a fake persona — into a product and a celebrity. It is already filming its second season.

4. Slow Horses (Apple TV+)

Slow Horses remains perhaps the most unfairly underestimated series on streaming. Intelligent, sharp, with characters who age alongside their flaws, it turns espionage into existential drama. Gary Oldman continues to deliver a silent masterclass as a brilliant, bitter man who is tired of knowing too much. His monologue, in which he shares Jackson Lamb’s greatest personal conflict, reminds us why Oldman has always been referred to as the “actor’s actor.” Unbeatable.

5. Adolescence (Netflix)

Adolescence won practically every major award of 2025 and, more importantly, provoked a global discussion about mental health and violence among young people. It does not hide behind slogans; it plunges into school, family, and digital environments with cruelty and empathy in equal measure. It does not romanticize collapse, simplify suffering, or offer easy exits. It leaves the audience with the most uncomfortable question of all: what are we doing to our adolescents?

6. The White Lotus (HBO Max)

On the more pop and acidic front, The White Lotus proved it still has the stamina to reinvent itself while maintaining the sharp social X-ray that became its trademark. Each season is an autopsy of privilege, guilt, and self-deception — and 2025 was no different. The resort changes, so do the rich guests, but the feeling remains the same: no one there is innocent. When it’s on the air, it’s a fever. Speaking of monologues, how could one forget the emotional words delivered by Carrie Coon, or the absurdity Sam Rockwell shared with Walton Goggins? Even more so, the series stitched together the previous seasons with precision, avoided the obvious ending, and leaves us longing for the conclusion that will arrive in 2027. It’s still far away.

7. The Gilded Age (HBO Max)

If there is one series I am openly in love with, it is The Gilded Age. It remains a visual and narrative delight: luxury, hypocrisy, social ascent, and women playing chess on a board built for men. Beneath the impeccable gowns and golden halls runs a very clear commentary on power, money, and who is allowed to occupy certain spaces. It is comforting to watch, but never entirely comfortable. Everyone is terrific, and I would gladly spend an entire year with these characters. Thankfully, we will return to them in 2027.

8. Down Cemetery Road (Apple TV+)

Based on the work of Mick Herron, Down Cemetery Road arrived to fill a rare space: that of the political and espionage thriller that knows how to be cynical without being empty. Nothing is simple, no one is fully trustworthy, and it is precisely from this ambiguity that the series draws its strength. For those who felt orphaned by certain British mystery and intrigue dramas, it was a gift — especially thanks to the performances led by Emma Thompson (always spectacular) and Ruth Wilson.

It is a series that has not yet been fully discovered, but it fully deserves its place among the best of the year. Fehinti Balogun’s performance is the source of panic, tension, and razor-sharp irony that makes me both anxious for and fearful of his scenes. I had to single it out.

9. Round 6 (Netflix)

The global impact of Round 6 did not repeat itself on the same scale as its first wave, but its presence on this list shows how the series has consolidated itself as a cultural phenomenon that transcends the initial shock. It remains a cruel mirror of inequality, economic desperation, and the way we turn other people’s pain into entertainment. The tragic trajectory of the unlikely hero, in an inevitable arc, surpasses what many criticized (the parallel police storyline). Even with script flaws, the critical ambition and protagonist’s construction make it impossible for the series not to be among the best of the year.

10. Alien: Earth (Disney+)

Closing the Top 10 was difficult — it could easily have been a Top 20 — but I included Alien: Earth as the boldest gamble of 2025. For its scale of production, its creative risk, and, above all, for restoring to televised science fiction a sense of adult, political, and existential terror that rarely reaches the mainstream. It is not merely a franchise expansion: it is a commentary on body, technology, exploitation, and power — themes that permeate the entire spirit of this ranking. By choosing Alien: Earth as the 10th place, the Top 10 closes looking forward, toward television’s ability to reinvent worlds and provoke discomfort.

Outside the Top 10, but Far from Minor

What perhaps best captures the strength of 2025 is precisely what remained outside the Top 10. The volume of good — very good, and in some cases excellent — series was so large that the very idea of a podium became, by nature, unfair. There were award-winning productions, widely celebrated by critics and audiences, that missed out by a narrow margin. There were also personal favorites of mine, shows I followed with pleasure and affection throughout the year, such as Only Murders in the Building, capable of balancing charm, humor, melancholy, and entertainment like few others.

This “noble middle” also included series that sustained important debates, others that maintained exceptionally high technical standards, and others that may not have been loud but were extremely consistent. Not being among the ten best does not diminish them — on the contrary, it only reinforces how fiercely competitive 2025 truly was. It was a year in which the political, the intimate, the epic, the pop, the experimental, and the emotional coexisted with force. Not all could make it to the podium. But many ran the entire race with dignity. There are more than 35 wonderful series, and I will try to justify ten of them.

The Last of Us — HBO Max

More than a successful adaptation, The Last of Us has already established itself as one of the great emotional narratives of contemporary television. In 2025, less interested in action than in bonds, loss, guilt, and care, the series reaffirmed that the most complex apocalypse is always the internal one. Pedro Pascal’s farewell and the criticism directed at Bella Ramsey were strongly felt, but it remains a major franchise.

The Bear — Disney+

It continues to be one of the most physically distressing experiences on television. Work as identity, obsession as a survival engine, affection as a difficult noise to organize. In 2025, The Bear kept talking about burnout with brutal honesty. It’s a paradox? Being awarded as a comedy when it rarely makes us laugh, unless it’s through anguish. Even so, the entire cast delivers a spectacular showcase of performances.

The Studio — Apple TV+

One of the most cynical and self-aware portraits of Hollywood ever made for television. The Studio looks at the industry’s backstage with acidic humor and quiet melancholy. The laughter comes, but it always carries a bitter taste of structural failure. Award-winning and a critic’s favorite, it fully deserves its place here.

The Pitt — HBO Max

A medical drama that understands the hospital as a moral microcosm. It does not romanticize medicine, it does not simplify ethical decisions, and it does not turn its characters into heroes. The Pitt invests in continuous wear and exhaustion as a narrative.

The Beast in Me — Netflix

A psychological thriller that grows through detail, suggestion, and the emotional instability of its characters. The Beast in Me does not rely on cheap scares, but on slow erosion: identity, guilt, desire, and violence as forces battling for control from within. In 2025, it was one of those series that may not have made massive noise, but stayed with those who watched — unsettling, elegant, and layered.

House of Guinness — Netflix

A historical drama that understands that legacies are not only financial — they are moral, emotional, and toxic. House of Guinness travels through the origins of an empire to reveal a family fractured by ambition, silence, power, and resentments that span generations. For the orphans of Succession, it became a very particular kind of solace: less irony, more tragedy, but the same fascination with dynasties built upon emotional ruins.

Severance — Apple TV+

The most distressing corporate fiction of the decade. 2025 reinforced that Severance is not just about work, but about fractured identity, alienation as policy, and the false promise of balance between life and productivity.

Hacks — HBO Max

One of the most beautiful narratives about aging, vanity, and reinvention in recent television. Hacks continues to prove that comedy can be a radically political territory when it speaks about the passage of time.

The Morning Show — Apple TV+

Irregular, but always symptomatic. In 2025, it maintained its place as a distorted — and at times uncomfortable — mirror of power, journalism, reputation, and emotional spectacle.

Billy the Kid — MGM+

The conclusion of the series that deconstructed the outlaw myth as a romantic figure is one of the hidden gems of 2025. Here, the western became a study of youth, impulsiveness, structural violence, and the fabrication of heroes.

Chief of War — Apple TV+

An epic that favors fracture over heroism. Colonization, territory, identity, and war are shown without varnish. One of the most ambitious productions of the year in both scale and subject. Niche, I admit, but deeply compelling.

Only Murders in the Building — Disney+

I will not justify myself for simply loving Only Murders in the Building. It continued to work as elegant, metalinguistic, and affectionate entertainment. A mix of crime, urban loneliness, and unlikely friendship that keeps getting the tone just right.

The Forgettables: When the Promise Fails

And there are, of course, the series that came and, for me, are unjustifiable. Some are burdened with excessive expectations, others lack soul from the very beginning. Among the so-called “Forgettables,” the criterion was not a lack of talent — which is rarely absent — but a lack of risk. These are works that followed market codes, got the polish right, but did not take risks with language, form, or discourse. In a year marked by maturity, density, and productive discomfort, they ended up sounding small.

The Buccaneers — Apple TV+

For me, it is offensive to Edith Wharton. Beautiful on the outside, fragile on the inside. The Buccaneers invest more in costume and surface than in emotional density. It passed as noise: it made a splash at the premiere, but did not remain in memory. Yet it returns for another round of dramatically weak scenes and a senseless plot.

Étoile — Prime Video

An idea that never found its own tone. It oscillates between homage and caricature without achieving either the lightness of a fable or the weight of drama. Ballet deserved more.

And Just Like That — HBO Max

It continued to exist more as a brand than as a narrative. In 2025, the creative exhaustion of a universe that had already said what it had to say became even clearer. It said goodbye by staining its own legacy — something diehard fans do not forgive.

The Old Guard — Netflix

It began as the promise of a strong franchise but proved unable to sustain its own world. A lot of concepts, very little permanence.

The Twisted Tale of Amanda Knox — Disney+

Yet another true-crime production that adds little to an already exhaustively explored case. There is information; deeper reflection, not so much.

Merteuil – The Seduction — HBO Max

Aesthetics try to compensate for the fragility of the writing. It seduces visually, but does not sustain the psychological game it promises. It sits on the same negative level as The Buccaneers.

What 2025 Told Us

If I had to sum up 2025 in a single word, it would be: maturity. Television drifted a bit away from the logic of the “viral” and returned to investing in density, character construction, and social commentary. The best series of the year spoke about power, work, politics, class, identity, trauma, and survival. Not by chance, they are also the ones we take the longest to forget.

It was not a year of absolute unanimities, but it was a year of consistency. A year in which television asked for patience, attention, and, often, discomfort. And perhaps that is exactly what good television is meant to do.

It does not exist to spare us from the world. It exists to force us to face it.

What’s your ranking?