The 21st century has brought the dawn of so-called “Peak TV,” also known as “the Golden Age of Television,” but this term is mostly applied to dramas like Breaking Bad and The Sopranos. Still, this critically acclaimed era of television has affected the comedy genre, too. Long gone are the same-feeling multi-camera sitcoms with laugh tracks and familiar storylines.
Now, single-camera is the norm for TV comedies. All kinds of comic sensibilities have found an audience in the streaming age. Weird, niche comedy can find a huge audience, while multi-camera ensemble shows can fall flat. So far, the 21st century has brought some of the funniest shows in TV history.
10 Flight Of The Conchords
Bret McKenzie and Jemaine Clement first formed Flight of the Conchords as a band, then adapted it into a BBC radio series, and eventually found their biggest audience with a TV series on HBO that ran for two seasons.
With McKenzie and Clement’s quirky comic sensibility in spades, Flight of the Conchords is one of the most unique – and most hysterical – TV comedies of the 21st century. While the show only lasted for two seasons, it maintained a high level of quality throughout.
9 It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia
Described by early reviews as “Seinfeld on crack,” It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia has since developed its own weird sense of humor on its way to becoming the longest-running live-action sitcom in the history of American television.
Dennis, Dee, Frank, Mac, and Charlie are five of the most deplorable characters on television, and yet they’ve been oddly lovable for 14 seasons. It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia has delivered some of the biggest laughs of the last two decades.
8 The Inbetweeners
Perfectly capturing both the mundane dread and endless humiliation of high school life, Damon Beesley and Iain Morris’ The Inbetweeners is one of the greatest British sitcoms in recent memory.
Ultimately, the M.V.P. of The Inbetweeners is its cast. Simon Bird, Joe Thomas, James Buckley, and Blake Harrison are all believable as teenagers – which is rare for a high school show – and more importantly, they’re believable as a group of best friends.
7 Fleabag
Phoebe Waller-Bridge adapted her own one-woman show of the same name into the uniquely tragicomic series Fleabag. In the series, she plays the titular role, who traverses romance, friendships, and self-employment in the modern-day.
The frequent fourth wall breaks and the show’s focus on one character, as opposed to a recurring ensemble, made Fleabag a series like no other, and a must-see.
6 Veep
After satirizing British politics with the brilliant The Thick of It, Armando Iannucci traveled across the pond to satirize American politics with the equally brilliant Veep. The comedy stars Julia Louis-Dreyfus as a Vice President struggling to balance her career with her personal life.
Tony Hale, Matt Walsh, Anna Chlumsky, Gary Cole, and Sam Richardson round out a supporting cast filled with some of the funniest comedy people working today.
5 The Office
Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant’s The Office has been credited with making a trend out of workplace-based mockumentaries. But most of its derivative successors have missed what made the original Office so great: its naturalistic tone and believable characters. The Office isn’t just shot like a documentary; it often does feel like cameras capturing real moments from real people’s lives. The show flits effortlessly between comedy and drama, just like life.
The U.S. remake of The Office was great, too, but it’s let down by its terrible last couple of seasons after Steve Carell left (although the series finale managed to save it).
4 South Park
Although it premiered in the late ‘90s, South Park has spent most of its life in the 21st century. The last 20 seasons of the show have hilariously lampooned the 21st century’s biggest news stories, from the 9/11 attacks to the Great Recession.
Trey Parker and Matt Stone have been delivering the sharpest social commentary on television for the past two decades, and if “The Pandemic Special” is anything to go by, they are far from done.
3 Arrested Development
While its belated fourth and fifth seasons on Netflix seriously let it down, Arrested Development remains one of the most masterfully crafted comedy series to ever hit the airwaves.
Getting laughs from ironic plot twists, sharp characterization, and cutaway gags, Arrested Development’s first three seasons are densely packed with jokes, and it’s rare if there’s only one joke at play in a given moment. At its best, Arrested Development stands among the smartest TV ever created.
2 Curb Your Enthusiasm
After revolutionizing the multi-camera sitcom with the hugely influential Seinfeld, Jerry Seinfeld’s co-creator Larry David began starring as a fictionalized version of himself in his own series, Curb Your Enthusiasm. Two decades into its run and counting, Curb has provided some of the funniest moments in TV history.
With its single-camera shooting style, actors playing themselves, and entirely improvised dialogue, Curb is a wonderfully self-aware show that blurs the line between reality and fiction.
1 Peep Show
Shot from the point of view of its lead characters, stuffed-shirt loan manager Mark and laidback unemployed pothead Jez, Peep Show perfectly captured the frustrations of daily life and the painfully relatable foibles of social interaction across nine increasingly hilarious seasons.
The combined efforts of writers Jesse Armstrong and Sam Bain and comedy duo David Mitchell and Robert Webb ensured that every Peep Show script was jam-packed with jokes. After hundreds of viewings, fans can still pick up on lines they missed in a given episode.
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