A new ranking of the 20 best anthology TV shows puts the format back into historical perspective. The list pairs classic British adaptations of Roald Dahl with Mike White’s satirical HBO hit, arguing that anthology TV has always been a staple of television.
The ranking, titled “20 Best Anthology TV Shows Of All Time, Ranked,” spans drama, comedy, horror, and animation. It includes everything from a 1970s British series based on Dahl’s short stories to a modern HBO satire about wealthy travelers. The common thread is the self-contained episode: each story stands alone, and the next season starts fresh.
Roald Dahl’s Twist Endings
“Tales of the Unexpected” opens the list at number 20. Originally aired on ITV between 1979 and 1988, the British series started as an adaptation of Dahl’s anthology books. Each episode of its first season ported over a different Dahl short story, and the show grew beyond that premise over time.
Dahl himself stayed on as presenter, and the series released 112 episodes across nine seasons. The episodes run just 24 minutes, but the source describes them as transporting and hard-to-shake. The show’s blend of quaintness, eccentricity, and dark comedy carries a sense of refinement and cinematic expressiveness that marked ’70s and ’80s British TV.
“Laced with Dahl’s signature blend of quaintness, eccentricity, and dark comedy, these stories — 112 in total, released across nine seasons — are as impossible to predict as they are invariably fascinating.”
Mike White’s Hotel Satire
“The White Lotus” lands at number 19. The show began as an off-kilter miniseries about class tensions between guests and staff at a luxury resort on Maui, Hawaii. It became so popular that HBO turned it into an anthology series, with each season placing a colorful cast of characters at a different hotel of the fictional White Lotus chain.
Mike White writes and directs all episodes, and each season opens with a flash-forward to a mystery death. The show is scathing, soothing, and satisfying in equal measure. White’s deft writing makes every character vivid, and the drama builds slowly across each year’s resort stay.
George Romero’s Dark Fantasy
Number 18 belongs to “Tales from the Darkside.” Created by horror legend George A. Romero, who helmed the “Night of the Living Dead” series, the American episodic anthology aired 90 chapters on syndication between 1983 and 1988. The show spanned horror, sci-fi, and dark fantasy, telling tales of people whose lives are disrupted by supernatural occurrences.
Several episodes were penned by or based on the work of prolific genre writers. The ranking praises the show’s ability to pack tension, pathos, and creepiness into just over 20 minutes. The strongest episodes carry an eerie sense of familiarity, as though the gruesome calamities could burst out from the TV and into the viewer’s own life.
Fargo’s Chilly Absurdism
“Fargo” takes the number 17 spot. In 2014, FX aired the miniseries created by Noah Hawley, which transposed the 1996 Coen brothers movie’s small-town criminal intrigue to a new story. The show became a critical and commercial sensation, and Hawley expanded it to an anthology.
Each season follows a different group of overwhelmed cops, charismatic psychopaths, and trigger-happy eccentrics in a new place and time. The five seasons share a single overarching continuity, revealed by occasional story-bridging details, but their plots are otherwise disconnected. What stays consistent is the show’s tone and its absurd philosophical outlook.
Thriller’s Scare Tactics
The ranking’s description of “Thriller” (1960) comes from NBC’s short-lived show focused on horror. Boris Karloff presented some episodes, and the show was sometimes billed as “Boris Karloff’s Thriller.” The ranking calls it a show that endeavors to scare viewers out of their wits, and it succeeds across 67 episodes.
The show’s early installments focused mostly on the titular genre, with crime and mystery tales making up most of its first few episodes. The ranking credits the show’s dark sense of humor as a trademark that brought out the best in its writers.
What This List Shows
The ranking makes a clear argument about the anthology format’s longevity. It is not a new phenomenon; it is a tradition that has simply changed shape over time. The 1950s British Roald Dahl adaptation sits alongside a modern HBO satire about wealthy travelers, and the list presents both as evidence of the format’s endurance.
Each entry on the list is its own shout-out, the ranking admits. The shows share a structure, not a style.
The ranking also shows how flexible the anthology format can be. It has carried dark comedy, horror, social satire, and philosophical absurdism. It has worked as a weekly series and as a seasonal event. It has survived decades of change in television.
The list is a reminder that anthology TV is not a fad. It is a method that has always existed, and it keeps finding new stories to tell.
- “Tales of the Unexpected” adapted Roald Dahl’s anthology books.
- “The White Lotus” satirizes wealthy travelers at luxury resorts.
- “Tales from the Darkside” brought horror and dark fantasy to syndication.
- “Fargo” reworked the Coen brothers’ film into a chilling anthology.
- “Thriller” scared viewers for 67 episodes.
The ranking argues that the anthology format has always been a staple of television. It just keeps finding new stories to tell.
Source material: “20 Best Anthology TV Shows Of All Time, Ranked,” TVLine.
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