Film Junk Poll: What is the Best HBO Show?

Posted by on January 20th, 2009   Filed under: Polls, TV

With Big Love and Flight of the Conchords returning on HBO this past weekend, a couple of new shows premiering in the coming months, and little of interest in theatres at the moment, it’s a good time to curl up in front of the TV. I’ve been kind of curious to see which of HBO’s original series will pick up the slack for the ones that have long since retired. In general, I find that HBO’s programming is pretty solid across the board, but I’m not sure which of their shows currently have the biggest following — especially now that a lot of their most popular one have been finished for at least a few years. So go ahead and cast your vote in the poll below, and tell us which HBO series is your all-time favourite. As always, I’m sure there are some important ones that didn’t make it onto the list of options, but feel free to expand further in the comments (even non-HBO shows are fair game for discussion).

Online Surveys & Market Research



  • My vote is for “Extras.” Not Listed… I know it’s over, but so is Deadwood and Sopranos… What gives?

  • Well I did say “all-time favourite”. But is Extras an HBO original series? I thought it was just a BBC show that they aired here, but they may have been involved in the production.

  • I love Flight of the Conchords (“Band Meeting – whose present?”) but it is far from the best HBO Show. Probably a toss up between The Wire and Deadwood. (Admittedly I’ve never seen 6 Feet Under, Sopranos.

    (Back in the day however, Larry Sanders kicked all sorts of ass.)

  • And Trublood (or at least S1E1 was absolute suckage outside of a great opening credits sequence.)

  • I’ve always been a big fan of HBO but as of late, Showtime has been kicking serious ass. From the list above, my money’s on Six Feet Under granted I’ve never seen Deadwood or The Wire. As for Kurt’s hate for True Blood – can’t judge that show on the first episode alone. Took me 5 to really get into it and now it’s golden.

    Been catching up on Season 2 of Big Love after a 2 years of abstinence. Will likely jump into S3 soon.

    Showtime on the other hand: Dexter & The Tudors are gold and I’m looking forward to checking out The United States of Tara.

  • I like a lot of those shows and am very interested to see if this series of Flight Of The Conchords is as funny as the first. However, my vote had to go to The Wire. 3 series in and I cannot stop watching it.

    Sex And The City = Epic Fail.

  • Dave

    It was a tough choice but I went with Six Feet Under. The Sopranos, Entourage, and Flight of the Conchords are close behind. No love for Oz?

  • Ian

    You have to go for The Wire here. I hate to ever be on a critical bandwagon but it’s a really good show. Flight of the Conchords is hilarious too I guess it’s tough since they have a few good dramas and a few great comedies.

  • Bob The Slob

    Im a CURB die hard. That gets my vote. However, I’m sure the wire is a “better” show in the grand scheme.

  • Believe it or not, I either haven’t seen or simply don’t like every single one of those shows. I guess I’m a Showtime guy. Dexter and P&T’s Bullshit ftw!

  • IchigoNL

    Six Feet Under for me (one of my favourite shows). Although I have only seen one season of The Wire.

  • “Carnival” is one of my favourite shows of all time.

    It lasted only a couple of seasons but it was great.

    Even thought it’s not listed that’s my vote.

  • This is a tough call between The Wire and The Sopranos, but I gotta go with the Sopranos. Curb Your Enthusiasm comes close. I’ll tell you what the worst show on HBO is—Flight of the Conchords. Those smarmy hacks are not funny. Tim and Eric pull that shit off. Not so with FOTC. Every time I see that show something inside me dies.

  • The Hoge

    It’s got to be the wire, quite simply the best show ever made. So gritty, so complext and by far and way the only crime drama to ever come so close to reality. Watched all five series and now I’m making my way through David Simon’s books, I’m addicted!

  • #$%!!! I put ‘Entourage’ and immediately regretted the decision. Both that, FotC, and my new favorite, The Life & Times of Tim are very easy watches that I really enjoy sitting down to with a bunch of my friends every Sunday night.

    SFU on the other hand was such a powerful, extremely emotional, and altogether visceral series. Definitely something you didn’t just ‘watch’. The same goes for the late “Carnivale”, a series that I’m sure my boyfriend will reply below me about. The opposite of all these would be “True Blood” one of the worst things I’ve seen come out of HBO lately (we’ll pretend “Little Britain” never existed).

    So all that being said, I guess SFU is something I appreciated and grew from, but I would find myself sitting down to watching Entourage or FotC during an idle 25 minutes.

    God bless HBO.

  • Charley

    I’ll agree with “Carnivale” – don’t overlook it!

  • XD

    Flight of the Conchords is the worst piece of shit show I have ever seen. Its not even funny. I tried to watch the first episode but couldn’t watch because its so unfunny and shitty. I can’t believe people actually think this crap is good. Hope it gets canceled.

  • Goon

    Flight of the Conchords is rarely laugh out loud funny, its ‘smile while watching’ funny for me, and that’s usually what i actually prefer.

  • emilyn

    TRUE BLOOD = LOVE!!!

  • Raquel

    Flight of the Concords is pretty funny, I haven’t watched many of these shows except for True Blood. And True Blood does get pretty addicting once you start watching it. It’s my favorite show on TV at least :P, gives me something to look forward to on Sundays…

  • Adam

    I could write a novelette on how much and why I love The Wire. But in a word (or two), it is the best TV show I’ve EVER seen. Better than almost any movie I’ve seen. It’s the Godfather of TV. Absolutely brilliant!!!!!!!

    Also a fan of The Shield.

  • me

    True Blood and Sex and the City are candidates, aren’t they? REALLY OVERRATED!! Where the f**k is Oz?? It’s so unfair…