# The 30 Best TV Dramas of the 2000s

> Prestige cable, network soaps and a few teen melodramas all count here, from the decade TV started being taken seriously.

*By YPB Team · Published October 31, 2026 · https://youpick.best/ranking/the-30-best-tv-dramas-of-the-2000s*

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## Current results (no votes yet)

1. **The Wire** — score 1000/1000
   David Simon's HBO crime drama (2002-2008) dissecting Baltimore's drug trade, police, unions, politics and schools.
2. **Life on Mars** — score 944/1000
   BBC drama (2006-2007) about a modern detective who wakes up in 1973 Manchester.
3. **Gossip Girl** — score 852/1000
   CW teen drama (2007-2012) about privileged Upper East Side teenagers watched by an anonymous blogger.
4. **Breaking Bad** — score 851/1000
   AMC drama (2008-2013) in which a chemistry teacher with cancer turns methamphetamine kingpin.
5. **Six Feet Under** — score 851/1000
   HBO drama (2001-2005) about the Fisher family and their Los Angeles funeral home, known for its famous finale.
6. **Mad Men** — score 809/1000
   AMC period drama (2007-2015) about ad man Don Draper on 1960s Madison Avenue; four straight Emmys for Outstanding Drama.
7. **Veronica Mars** — score 787/1000
   UPN/CW teen noir (2004-2007) with Kristen Bell as a high-school private investigator.
8. **Friday Night Lights** — score 787/1000
   NBC/DirecTV drama (2006-2011) about a high-school football team and its small Texas town.
9. **Damages** — score 726/1000
   FX legal thriller (2007-2012) with Glenn Close as ruthless litigator Patty Hewes.
10. **House** — score 713/1000
   Fox medical drama (2004-2012) starring Hugh Laurie as the brilliant, misanthropic diagnostician Gregory House.
11. **Sons of Anarchy** — score 713/1000
   FX drama (2008-2014) about an outlaw motorcycle club in the California town of Charming.
12. **The O.C.** — score 713/1000
   Fox teen drama (2003-2007) about a troubled kid taken in by a wealthy Newport Beach family.
13. **Skins** — score 713/1000
   British E4 teen drama (2007-2013) about a group of Bristol sixth-formers, cast with real teenagers.
14. **The Tudors** — score 713/1000
   Showtime historical drama (2007-2010) on the reign of Henry VIII, starring Jonathan Rhys Meyers.
15. **Big Love** — score 629/1000
   HBO drama (2006-2011) about a polygamist Utah businessman and his three wives.
16. **Deadwood** — score 629/1000
   HBO western (2004-2006) set in a lawless South Dakota gold-rush camp, famous for its profane, Shakespearean dialogue.
17. **Battlestar Galactica** — score 629/1000
   Syfy's reimagined space drama (2004-2009) about humanity's last survivors fleeing the Cylons.
18. **Dexter** — score 532/1000
   Showtime drama (2006-2013) about a Miami forensic analyst who secretly kills other killers.
19. **Fringe** — score 532/1000
   Fox sci-fi drama (2008-2013) about an FBI unit investigating fringe science and a parallel universe.
20. **Lost** — score 420/1000
   ABC mystery drama (2004-2010) about plane-crash survivors on a strange tropical island.
21. **Rome** — score 420/1000
   HBO/BBC historical drama (2005-2007) about the fall of the Roman Republic seen through two soldiers.
22. **True Blood** — score 420/1000
   HBO supernatural drama (2008-2014) about vampires living openly among humans in Louisiana.
23. **Gilmore Girls** — score 420/1000
   WB drama (2000-2007) about a fast-talking single mother and her daughter in a quirky Connecticut town.
24. **Grey's Anatomy** — score 420/1000
   ABC medical drama launched in 2005 about surgeons at a Seattle hospital, one of TV's longest-running dramas.
25. **Prison Break** — score 420/1000
   Fox thriller (2005-2009) in which an engineer gets himself jailed to break out his wrongly convicted brother.
26. **CSI: Crime Scene Investigation** — score 420/1000
   CBS forensic procedural (2000-2015) that made crime-lab science a global TV phenomenon.
27. **Heroes** — score 420/1000
   NBC drama (2006-2010) about ordinary people discovering superpowers; its first season was a pop-culture sensation.
28. **24** — score 0/1000
   Fox real-time thriller (2001-2010) with Kiefer Sutherland as counterterrorism agent Jack Bauer.
29. **The Shield** — score 0/1000
   FX cop drama (2002-2008) following corrupt LAPD detective Vic Mackey and his Strike Team.
30. **The Good Wife** — score 0/1000
   CBS legal drama (2009-2016) about a politician's wife returning to law after a public scandal.

Tags: 2000s, tv shows, hbo, classics, crime