The 50 Best Television Pilots of All Time (original) (raw)

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Network: AMC
Air Date: 2011
Writer: Veena Sud
Creator: Patty Jenkins
Stars: Mireille Enos, Joel Kinnaman, Brent Sexton, Michelle Forbes,Billy Campbell, Eric Ladin, Kristin Lehman, Katie Findlay
Premise: As she's ready to retire, a Seattle detective unwittingly signs on to investigate the disappearance of a teenage girl named Rosie Larsen.

Ask any passionate hater of AMC's The Killing to explain why they loathe the series so much and the common response will be some variation of, "Because they didn't tell you who killed Rosie Larsen until the second season." It's an understandable complaint, but it's also rooted in something deeper: In its earliest episodes, The Killing showed the potential to be something extraordinary, an unnerving marriage of familiar procedural beats and the mood of Twin Peaks. Watching creator Veena Sud and her team squander that promise was tragic.

Revisit The Killing's debut episode and you'll see why. Though deliberately cold, the psychologically rich pilot instantly hooks you, parceling out details about the Rosie Larsen murder mystery (ending on a devastating shot of a girl's body in a car's trunk) while giving lead actress Mireille Enos (as Detective Linden) a strong platform to do that unique brand of internalization that ultimately earned her Golden Globe and Emmy nominations. —MB

Network: FOX
Air Date: 1993
Writer: Chris Carter
Creator: Chris Carter
Stars: David Duchovny, Gillian Anderson
Premise: A skeptical and brilliant FBI agent is paired with a sarcastic, equally bright operative who believes that evidence of an alien abduction in the Pacific Northwest will help unearth long kept government secrets.

Polarity is the engine that drives The X Files pilot. Fox Mulder (Duchovny) immerses himself in the supernatural on an insatiable quest to discover the secret of his sister's disappearance. Dana Scully (Anderson) knows that discrediting Mulder would send her up the ladder at the Bureau and show that she's an asset to agency brass. They both want something so deeply that they've given everything to their cause, yet there they stand, formidable obstacles in each other's way.

The friction between the two of them will never be as strong again: From the very beginning, we see chinks in Scully's armor of ambition as she begins her journey to belief in the supernatural. We don't begrudge her softening her stances. It has to be that way: Scully's character arc demands it. Nonetheless, there's something great about the first moments of the series, when the polar opposite world views collide and ignite the engine of The X-Files. —BG

Network: Syndicated
Air Date: 1987
Writer: Gene Roddenberry
Creator: D. C. Fontana and Gene Roddenberry
Stars: Patrick Stewart, Jonathan Frakes, Brent Spiner, Marina Sirtis
Premise: Jean-Luc Picard faces his first challenge as captain of the Starship Enterprise when a mischievous higher life form tests his, and by extension, humanity's, capacity for compassion.

The mixed reviews that the Star Trek: The Next Generation double-length pilot, "Encounter at Fairpoint" received were not inaccurate. There is an uneven rigidity to the episode that feels like the result of a staff trying to set too many ground rules without enough heart.

As a mission statement for what TNG would strive for, however, the pilot is much more successful. The central question at the heart of the episode: "Has man evolved into a civilized race?" One can feel the creators winking at us from a distance, choosing to begin a reboot with questions of human progress, but, hey, a little self-awareness is expected when resurrecting a beloved franchise.

Metatheatrics aside, the premise is compelling: Q (John de Lancie) has put humanity on trial, and Picard (Patrick Stewart) is the defense attorney. Every character's arc works towards this end in a sweet, if sometimes plodding way: from Data and Riker's developing friendship to Picard's burgeoning fondness for Wesley. By the end of the episode, we not only know that this will be a sci-fi epic of real creative ambition, we also know that this series will go to great lengths to tell stories with philosophical ambition, even if it slows the pace of the intergalactic action. —BG

Network: NBC
Air Date: 1990
Writer: Andy and Susan Borowitz
Creator: Andy and Susan Borowitz
Stars: Will Smith, Alfonso Ribeiro, James Avery, Janert Hubert-Whitten, Tatyana Ali, Karyn Parsons, Joseph Marcell
Premise: A street-smart Philadelphia teen is sent to live with his upper crust relatives in Bel-Air.

Chemistry is key. A sitcom pilot is (or should be, at least) less focused on being the funniest half-hour of all time than on establishing a winning chemistry that'll make an audience come back, simply because they like these people and this setting.

Rapper Will Smith's foray into television could've been a DOA vanity project, and though the pilot is far from anyone's favorite episode, but it's solid enough; it demonstrates damn well how the Prince bounces off of his relatives.

Will's all charm as he reacts to his new home as if it's a beautiful prison, there to strip him of his individuality and brainwash him into the likes of his preppy cousin. The culture clash is a little exaggerated (see: Will's menswear vs streetwear struggle at the dinner party), but by the end even those who began the episode wary of Will will have warmed up; Will the character and actor are too mischievously affable to deny.

By episode's end, each member of the Banks household has been defined to the point where the viewer can just imagine the hilarity waiting to be mined in future episodes. The cast just gels, even though the characters haven't yet. We can see why Janet Hubert is still salty to this day over being kicked out of the family. —FT

Network: NBC
Air Date: 1995
Writer: Paul Simms
Creator: Paul Simms
Stars: Dave Foley, Maura Tierney, Stephen Root, Andy Dick, Phil Hartman, Vicki Lewis, Joe Rogan
Premise: The young new director of a radio news program must contend with his eccentric boss and his self-possessed, older co-workers.

There are one of two ways to debut a workplace comedy. Either you drop the audience in at any given time, with the gang already fully formed, or you introduce the cast through the eyes of a newcomer. NewsRadio ingeniously pulls off both methods at once, when young new director Dave (Dave Foley) is forced to masquerade as a junior addition while he struggles to tell his predecessor Ed that he's been replaced. As such, the senior members of the team, unaware that they're dealing with their new boss, don't bother with any of the polite airs, and behave like themselves.

Lisa (Maura Tierney) figures she's the only person who can do Ed's job when he's inevitably fired, the co-anchor Bill (Phil Hartman) only respects whoever he needs to for his own agenda, and the others watch with amused nonchalance as Dave bumbles around the office trying to keep up his charade and let go of Ed at the same time. Above the chaos hovers the great Stephen Root as the eccentric billionaire owner of the station, who just loves throwing these people in awkward situations lest they learn a life lesson from it. —FT

Network: CBS
Air Date: 1978
Writer: David Jacobs
Creator: David Jacobs
Stars: Larry Hagman, Barbara Bel Geddes, Patrick Duffy, Jim Davis, Kimberly Foster
Premise: After his brother Bobby arrives home married to Pamela, the scion of a rival family, J.R. Ewing sets out to sabotage the newlyweds and consolidate his power in the family oil business.

Soap operas aren't the easiest thing to swallow in the age of gritty realism. Even the best wrought of them can feel over the top. The Dallas pilot suceeds because it's unafraid to go too far; the show relishes the danger of wringing emotion from every nook and cranny of the plot. Rather than strive for grounded emotions, the pilot seeks to convince you to get swept up in the grand scope and emotional theatrics: after all, everything is bigger in Texas.

Ostentatious shots of Dallas skyscrapers, the vast Ewing estate, and decadent homes serves to introduce you to a world where massive wealth and a bevy of secrets have made even the most commonplace exchanges volatile. At the center of the storm is J.R. Ewing, immortally embodied by Larry Hagman, who would seem completely diabolical and paranoid were it not for the fact the Senate, rival businessmen, and even members of his own family are after him.

It's up to us, the audience, to appreciate the stakes of this melodrama, to rise to the challenge of the show's scope. J.R. knows only grand gestures are worth a damn in Dallas: The first time we meet him, he's trying to destroy his brother's marriage. By the end of the pilot, as an audience, we understand this as well. —BG

Network: HBO
Air Date: 2002
Writer: Daniel Knauf
Creator: Daniel Knauf
Stars: Michael J. Anderson, Adrienne Barbeau, Patrick Bauchau, Clancy Brown, Nick Stahl
Premise: After a young man's farm is foreclosed, he joins a travelling carnival where everyone has secrets.

Normally, a pilot will give you a clear idea of the journey that the characters will take throughout the run of the series. Carnivàle's pilot keeps its cards close to its vest. Every character has secrets, and by the end of the pilot, we don't really know any of them except that Ben Hawkins (Nick Stahl) has healing powers. But that really only raises more questions.

Though the two magical figures that we can only assume will anchor the show, emerge, indeterminate distances apart, we have no clue how, when or if their paths will cross. The enigmatic aura around Carnivalé is appealing. A sense of mystery and magic pervades both seasons of the show and keeps us watching even when the plot gets a tad convoluted.

The uncompromising visual style of the show combined with the complex, mysterious plotting would ultimately lead HBO to axe the show after only two seasons, but that unique vision makes for one of the most mesmerizing pilots ever made. —BG

Network: FOX
Air Date: 2008
Writer: J.J. Abrams, Alex Kurtzman, Roberto Orci
Creator: J.J. Abrams, Alex Kurtzman, Roberto Orci
Stars: Anna Torv, Joshua Jackson, John Noble, Lance Reddick, Mark Valley, Blair Brown, Jasika Nicole, Kirk Acevedo
Premise: An FBI agent investigates a bizarre pattern of science-rooted crimes with the help of two geniuses who are also estranged father and son.

Is this the last great J.J. Abrams pilot? After the classic debuts of Lost, Alias, and even Felicity, it seemed as if J.J. had mastered the pilot episode like no other TV auteur before him. Unfortunately, as it stands, his epic run ended here; at least he went out on a high note.

Billed as an amalgam of The X-Files and The Twilight Zone, and boasting one of the most expensive price tags for a pilot in TV history, Fringe doesn't waste the dollars or your time. The haunting imagery that the series would gain notoriety for is there in the very first scene, in what is probably the most horrific airplane incident that doesn't involve a crash.

Soon after, FBI top-cop Olivia Dunham (Anna Torv)—the next in a long line of endearingly fearsome Abrams heroines—is on the case, with a personal incentive to save her dying boyfriend, who's been exposed to the same bio-toxin that killed hundreds on the plane. Her research leads her to unite the Bishops, an estranged father and son, the former of which specializes in "fringe science." Patriarch Walter (John Noble) has been in a mental institution, his sanity a casualty of his experiments, while son Peter's (Joshua Jackson) been using his IQ to keep one foot on the wrong side of the law.

Prestige sci-fi dramas are a rarity, and to fulfill the void Fringe could've been content to be another procedural with cases that have a freaky twist. Instead, by the end of the hour we've met a shady CEO with a robotic hand, and the series inaugural experiment involves Olivia journeying into her comatose boyfriend's mind to crack the case. The run-and-gun and conspiratorial elements of Alias, combined with the mystery and visually compelling elements of Lost created the most daring Abrams experiment yet.

Fringe lived up to its name and existed just outside of the realm of popular television during its five-year run. But with a great pilot that ended up as nothing more than a mere peek at the emotional stakes and beautifully bizarre stories the show was capable of, it's due for a cult-classic coronation any day now. —FT

Network: Showtime
Air Date: 2005
Writer: Don Coscarelli, Joe R. Lansdale, Stephen Romano
Creator: Mick Garris
Stars: Bree Turner, Angus Scrimm, John DeSantis, Ethan Embry
Premise: A young woman, hardened by some traumatic experiences with a mean boyfriend, figiths for survival against a disfigured homicidal maniac on an open country road.

Developed by filmmaker Mick Garris, Showtime's ambitious anthology series Masters of Horror united some of the genre's biggest directorial icons for one purpose: to create hour-long, original episodes that would air on a weekly basis and provide them with total creative control. The talent that participated is quite impressive, including names like John Carpenter (Halloween), Stuart Gordon (Re-Animator), Takashi Miike (Audition), and Dario Argento (Suspiria). In all, _Masters of Horror_was wildly uneven, with a few grueling duds (Tobe Hooper's "Dance of the Dead," for example) ultimately paling in comparison to highpoints like Brad Anderson's "Sounds Like" and Joe Dante's "Homecoming."

Wisely, Garris introduced Masters of Horror with one of its strongest efforts. "Incident On and Off a Mountain Road," directed by the perennially underrated Don Coscarelli (Phantasm, Bubba Ho-Tep), is a lean, nasty, and efficient piece of business steeped in the horror tradition of kick-ass heroines, or "final girls." Ellen (Bree Turner) gets into a fender-bender on a secluded road, leading her into a nightmarish stalk-and-chase bout against a large, ugly bastard known as Moonface (John Desantis).

Based on Joe R. Lansdale's short story, "Incident On and Off a Mountain Road" balances strong characterization (Ellen's self-reservation instincts come from her tumultuous relationship with her survivalist husband) and moments of harsh bloodshed—it's a delicate see-saw act that, unfortunately, few future Masters of Horror episodes were able to emulate. —MB

Network: The WB
Air Date: 1996
Writer: Bently Kyle Evans
Creator: Bently Kyle Evans, Jamie Foxx
Stars: Jamie Foxx, Garcelle Beauvais, Christopher B. Duncan, Ellia English, Garrett Morris
Premise: An aspiring singer helps his aunt and uncle run their fledgling hotel in L.A. while he pursues his career.

The summer that Fresh Prince ended, another musically talented comedian (and future A-lister) rushed in to take the torch. The premise is nearly identical: Jamie Foxx relocates to L.A. to bunk up with his aunt and uncle, charms everyone, and routinely spars with stuffy polar opposite (Christopher B. Duncan, basically doing a black Niles Crane).

But the series wouldn't have lasted five years if it was just a mere carbon copy. For one, the Fresh Prince blueprint is plugged into a workplace setting, with Jamie helping his family run a fledgling hotel. The promise of finding a worthy successor lies mid-way through the pilot, when Jamie dons a hilarious R. Kelly get-up, and even better, performs a parody song (have fun getting "Big Toe" out of your head for the next couple of hours) for the hotel lounge.

Until that point the humor is stock sitcom stuff, but this gag displays a wit and flavor that is clearly all Foxx (especially in retrospect). It's refreshing and original for its time, which begs the question: Where's the syndication love? —FT

Network: FX
Air Date: 2009
Writer: Adam Reed
Creator: Adam Reed
Stars: H. Jon Benjamin, Aisha Tyler, Jessica Walter, Chris Parnell, Judy Greer
Premise: A suave, bumbling spy works alongside his emotionally manipulative mother and vindictive ex-girlfriend.

A James Bond framework draped in a Mad Men aesthetic, Archer isn't just the funniest secret agent parody since (the first) Austin Powers, it's also as solid a workplace sitcom as the contemporary live-action greats. "Mole Hunt" is so comfortable and assured that it doesn't even feel like a pilot—the wonderfully deadpan titular spy trades insults with his over-bearing mother (also head of the agency) and ex-lover Lana that it feels as if we've been watching everyone in this office interact (and commiserate over their hate for Pam) for five episodes already.

It's so fun that we could watch Archer butt heads with his co-workers sans a "mission," but nevertheless his accidental outing of an agency mole—the existence of which he previously made up to service his own selfish agendas—is brilliant. —FT

Network: Showtime
Air Date: 2003
Writer: Bryan Fuller
Creator: Bryan Fuller
Stars: Ellen Muth, Mandy Patinkin Rebecca Gayheart, Callum Blue
Premise: A directionless young woman comes to grips with her new (after)life as a grim reaper.

If Pushing Daisies was a triumph of form and style for Bryan Fuller, then Dead Like Me is a triumph of substance. The 75-minute run time and the freer hand of Showtime (Fuller's previous shows ran on network) allowed Fuller to create a pilot that transcended required world building: The first episode of Dead Like Me is a fully realized meditation on death.

Fuller holds back the story for the first few minutes to show us a fable detailing how frogs created the afterlife. For the rest of the episode, strange cutaways, diner monologuing, and narration are employed to come at the idea of death from all angles. The result is an episode of television that is both profound and light on its feet, as the procedural structure and whimsical pop of Fuller's other work is on full display.

Unfortunately, the promise of the Dead Like Me pilot was never fully realized; Fuller was gone before the end of the first season. In the pilot and the first handful of episodes, Fuller achieved something that's deeply impressive: He delivered a show that could focus on an idea in the way that plays or novels can without losing the momentum and structural precision essential to the television form. —BG

Network: ABC
Air Date: 1988
Writer: Neal Marlens, Carol Black
Creator: Neal Marlens, Carol Black
Stars: Fred Savage, Danica McKellar, Dan Lauria, Alley Mills, Olivia D'abo, Jason Hervey, Josh Saviano
Premise: The world of the late '60s and early '70s as seen through the eyes of a pre-teen during his coming of age in a typical American suburb.

The coming of age dramedy by which all succeeding pre-teen-centered sitcoms are measured: Set in 1968, narrated reflectively by Kevin Arnold (Fred Savage) on his first day of junior high, the Wonder Years pilot hits all of the coming-of-age hallmarks like it had a goddamn checklist: nerdy friend, girl next door, douchebag older brother, the parents that just don't understand.

The episode's real finesse emerges in how it approaches its dual identity as a period piece as well. Images of 1968's most batshit moments flash across the screen in the beginning, but they don't overwhelm the narrative because, with a pre-teen main character, they shouldn't. Instead, a tactful trickle down approach is taken, when a peripheral but imposing character—girl next door Winnie's (Danica McKellar) older brother is killed in Vietnam, which impacts the major storylines on the home front.

It's a solid preview of the way the series would continue to tackle major social issues during its '68-'73 run—present, but filtered through Kevin's eyes and the rest of the Arnold family. In other words, meet one of the ruling royal families of American television. —FT

Network: CBS
Air Date: 2005
Writer: Carter Bays, Craig Thomas
Creator: Carter Bays, Craig Thomas
Stars: Neil Patrick Harris, Jason Segal, Alyson Hannigan
Premise: After his roommates get engaged, Ted Mosby resolves to end his years of bachelorhood and meets a woman he thinks might be the girl of his dreams.

The major criticism of CBS sitcoms is that they lack heart. Character development and real emotion are lost admist the snappy dialogue and joke-a-second pace. In its pilot, How I Met Your Mother sets out to assert its place as a snappy sitcom with a soul. Though the show is rife with rapid-fire laughs and every bit is called-back again and again, by the end of the first episode we have a keen sense of who the main characters are.

It's been said on numerous occasions that the most important thing in creating a television show is to provide characters that you want to hang out with every week. The pilot of How I Met Your Mother introduces us to the complex, loving relationships between the four main characters so thoroughly and immediately that after only one half-hour of television, we feel like we have our own personal seat at McLaren's. In a time when so much of what is written about television focuses on the unique shows that challenge what TV can be, there's something to be said for a show that sets out from to make a damn good product in the traditional mold. —BG

Network: CBS
Air Date: 1970
Writer: James L. Brooks, Allan Burns
Creator: James L. Brooks, Allan Burns
Stars: Mary Tyler Moore, Gavin MacLeod, Edward Asner
Premise: After she breaks it off with her long-term boyfriend, Mary Richards starts a new life on her own.

It's still difficult to find any positives to take from the experience of watching the Two Broke Girls pilot, but one thing it did do was make us appreciate The Mary Tyler Moore Show pilot even more. The sparkling dialogue of the original broke girl still holds up today. In fact, very few multi-camera sitcoms have matched the level of banter seen here.

It would be so easy for the back and forth between Ed Asner and Moore to devolve into simply workplace stereotypes, or for the Rhoda and Marry exchanges to sound like, well, Two Broke Girls, but this episode hits every beat of its rapid-fire comedic rhythm. As sitcoms move to the single camera style and away from the studio audience, we have to wonder if there will ever again be a door-slamming, fast-talking comedy with smarts and vigor of The Mary Tyler Moore Show. —BG

Network: FOX
Air Date: 2001
Writer: Joel Surnow, Robert Cochran
Creator: Joel Surnow, Robert Cochran
Stars: Kiefer Sutherland, Dennis Haysbert, Elisha Cuthbert, Carlos Bernard, Sarah Clarke, Leslie Hope, Penny Johnson Jerald
Premise: The head of an L.A. government agency Counter Terrorist Unit must prevent the assassination of a visiting presidential candidate, while also fighting to keep his family safe, all in real-time.

Jack Bauer's inaugural bad day doesn't hit the ground running with the same intensity and suspense of later seasons, which is a sign of just how insane this show became (considering this hour ends with a commercial airplane exploding mid-flight while the femme fatale who pushed the button parachutes to safety).

Nevertheless, this pilot, and by extension all of season one, is a moment in TV history: It's one of serial drama's most daring narrative experiments, and one that actually managed to stick the landing. 24 likes to start its seasons off with family intrigue to complement the espionage, a precedent set in this episode. Jack's teenage daughter (and future bane of every faithful viewer's attention) Kim (Elisha Cuthbert) sneaks out at midnight to hang with a friend and two boys who are so clearly shady as fuck. The daughter of the director of a Counter Terrorism Unit lured outside, on the same night that the city is on edge for the presidential primaries? On 24, there's no such thing as coincidence, and the pilot is one big warning to strap yourself in for the ride—before the aforementioned climax blows you out of your seat. —FT

Network: HBO
Air Date: 2011
Writer: David Benioff, D.B. Weiss
Creator: David Benioff, D.B. Weiss
Stars: Sean Bean, Peter Dinklage, Lena Headey, Emilia Clarke, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, Michelle Fairley, Kit Harrinton, Richard Madden, Maisie Williams, Isaac Hempstead-Wright, Alfie Allen, Mark Addy, Jack Gleeson
Premise: Several royal families compete for power in the fictional realm of Westeros, where winters and summers last for years.

The funny thing about the Game of Thrones pilot is that it's the first and last time the majority of the infamously sprawling cast are more or less in one place. Just one episode later they'll splinter off to various corners of "the realm" of Westeros, kicking a myriad of concurrent plotlines into high gear. But by starting off with most of the main players in one location—Winterfell, for a meeting of the royal families Stark and Lannister/Baratheon—the seeds of future storylines are effectively sown with minimal confusion, despite a tidal wave of exposition.

Anchoring this is the superb cast, amidst some truly gorgeous on-location shooting in the likes of Northern Ireland and Malta. As the hour draws to a close, promising a slow but deliberate battle of the royal blood between houses Lannister and Stark, things accelerate with one of those classic, gasp-worthy pilot closers that leaves you thirsting to return.

Meanwhile the episode's only other main location is Across the Narrow Sea, where future fan favorite Daenarys Targaryen is preparing for the worst wedding ever, in her power hungry brother's bid to regain the throne back home in Westeros. Her story in "Winter Is Coming" is compelling on its own, but it's reinforced tenfold from the vantage point of someone up to date with the series, cementing the dragon lady as one of the tube's most dynamic characters of all time. —FT

Network: ABC
Air Date: 2009
Writer: Steven Levitan, Christopher Lloyd
Creator: Steven Levitan, Christopher Lloyd
Stars: Ed O'Neill, Sofía Vergara, Julie Bowen, Ty Burrell, Sarah Hyland, Eric Stonestreet, Jesse Tyler Ferguson, Ariel Winter, Nolan Gould, Rico Rodriguez
Premise: Three different but interconnected families deal with the typical shenanigans of life together.

Modern Family's pilot sums up the progressive Emmy winning series, thrusting us into the chaotic life of three very different but interconnected families. There's your prototypical suburban family, with the embarrassing dad, neurotic mom, and three warring kids. There's the old rich guy with a young MILF that make it work despite the gold-digging stereotype. And there's the gay couple, clearly still struggling with being out as a pair, en route home from Vietnam, where they just adopted a baby.

The episode provides a welcome and approachable look into these different worlds, and through humor and some genuinely affecting Disney-esque moments, creates sympathy for characters who haven't been warmly received by the major networks. —TA

Network: NBC
Air Date: 1984
Writer: Anthony Yerkovich
Creator: Anthony Yerkovich
Stars: Don Johnson, Philip Michael Thomas, Saundra Santiago, Michael Talbott, John Diehl, Olivia Brown, Gregory Sierra, Edward James Olmos
Premise: Two Metro-Dade Police Department detectives work undercover to keep Miami safe.

Palm trees shot from a low angle encircle the viewer. Cut to: The camera racing over the face of the water. Flamingos. Boobs. Water. Jai alai. Parrots. Water. Cars. Babes. Each cut, mind you, occurs in time to the gnarly guitar and steel drums of the soundtrack. Welcome to Miami Vice, the triumph of cinematic style on the small screen.

The two-hour pilot of Anthony Yerkovich's landmark crime drama is a marvel. One of the beefs film lovers still have with TV is that the medium tells its stories through talking. TV, it's often argued, doesn't use camera movement, editing, and mise en scene to tell a story; it relies on dialogue. Critics have attacked the current season of Mad Men for this very reason.

Traveling back in time to watch the 1984 premiere of Miami Vice feels like moving into the future. The story is the images. Miami Vice is a POV shot from the grill of a Ferrari as it races down the strip with precise recklessness, running red lights and changing lanes to pass anything that can't cut it.

The pilot introduces viewers to Crockett (Don Johnson) and Tubbs (Philip Michael Thomas), undercover cops who live for their jobs. They team up to take down Calderone (Miguel Piñero), a Colombian drug dealer. Tubbs is introduced in NYC as the the Rolling Stones' "Miss You" plays; Crockett is a flashing white suit and a wise-crack.

Of course, executive producer Michael Mann, the greatest stylist in modern crime pictures, deserves much of the credit for the pilot's success, as the show is a direct extension of the aesthetic he developed in his film Thief, and would go on to use in Manhunter and Heat, among other classics. Bask in the neon glow of this scene, set to Phil Collins' "In the Air Tonight." —RS

Network: FX
Air Date: 2010
Writer: Graham Yost
Creator: Graham Yost
Stars: Timothy Olyphant, Walton Goggins, Nick Searcy, Joelle Carter, Natalie Zea
Premise: A U.S. Marshal is transferred to his hometown, where many of the criminal elements are former friends and family.

Raylan Givens may wear a Stetson, but Justified is not set in the old west. No, "Fire in the Hole" begins in present-day Miami, so you can imagine the viewer's surprise when it opens with U.S. Marshal Givens sitting across from crook Tommy Bucks, threatening to make good on an old promise to kill him if they ever crossed paths again. Surely this is just requisite tough talk before the arrest right? Nope. Raylan counts down to three, baiting Bucks to draw ("They always draw," he'll say later), and giving Raylan a justified excuse to gun him down right there in public. And now, Justified has your attention.

Thankfully this isn't some USA procedural, content to keep the awesomeness relegated to that moment and coast on a killer performance of a dry-humored, quick-witted Marshal who's clearly battling some inner demons. No, after that treat Justified dials back from the big city, as Raylan is transferred for his troubles back to his hometown in Harlan County, Kentucky—and we get to see the setting and people responsible for those demons. Later, at least.

The first episode of Justified just keeps with the awesome, pitting Givens against his ultimate nemesis and former friend, Boyd Crowder. We'll later learn that Boyd is something of a chameleon, and in "Fire" he's taken up with a bunch of white supremacists that let him do what he does best: blow shit up.

Adapted from the Elmore Leonard story of the same name, showrunner Graham Yost and co. don't miss a beat translating the author's unique perspective, flavor, and, most importantly, dialogue. Boyd and Raylan bounce off of each other so beautifully that the episode abandons the source material at the last minute, sparing Boyd during their tense, climactic stand-off, turning his and Raylan's frenemy state into the heart of the show.

The star of the hour is still Timothy Olyphant, who in a final scene that sees Raylan pay an unorthodox visit to his ex-wife, solidifies the show as a must-watch. From the Miami rooftop to his dinner table face-off with Boyd, Raylan's been unflappable, almost action movie cool, projecting control and confidence that no matter the situation, no one's quicker with the piece than he is. Then his ex-wife remarks that he's "the angriest man she ever knew" and the intrigue of Raylan returning to his hometown jumps another notch. You can't wait to find out what—and who—made him into the man he is today. In a word: sold. —FT

Network: NBC
Air Date: 1984
Writer: Ed Weinberger, Michael Leeson
Creator: Ed Weinberger, Michael Leeson, Bill Cosby
Stars: Bill Cosby, Phylicia Rashad, Malcolm Jamal-Warner, Lisa Bonet, Tempestt Bledsoe, Keshia Knight Pulliam
Premise: Heathcliff Huxtable and his loving wife Claire impart family values and life lessons to their kids in their comfortable Brooklyn brownstone.

Has a sitcom family ever introduced themselves as assuredly as the Cosbys? It's no wonder they became one of America's favorite clans, with a pilot episode that contains a handful of the series' most memorable moments. Cliff's lesson to Theo about the value of a dollar using Monopoly money is classic.

The real appeal of the Huxtables and The Cosby Show is epitomized late in the episode, when Cliff cuts through Theo's love-me-as-I-am bullshit excuse for poor grades with "that is the dumbest thing I've ever heard." Cliff and Claire Huxtable may be loving parents with classic values, but June and Ward Cleaver they are not. Which is to say, they're awesome. —FT

Network: ABC
Air Date: 1994
Writer: Winnie Holzman
Creator: Winnie Holzman
Stars: Claire Danes, Bess Armstrong, Jared Leto, Tom Irwin, A.J. Langer,
Premise: A teenage girl struggles to find her identity.

It's easy to see why My So-Called Life is a revered cult classic today. Angela Chase's (Claire Danes) musings about discovering her own identity, feeling lost in a sea of cliques, and feeling like a stranger in her own family are the blueprint for contemporary heroines like Veronica Mars or even Hannah Horvath. When we meet Angela, she's already in the throes of an identity crisis—dying her hair, hanging out with the school's resident bad girl—and later, in English class, she opines that Anne Frank was "lucky."

Developed before the WB came along and patented the youth soap opera, So-Called Life is the forefather of the intelligent teen drama. There's no sermonizing, no "very special" episodes with an underlined message at the end. Things simply happen.

By the end of the pilot, Angela has had two disastrous, sobering nights, but in the final scene in the school hallways she's all smiles. Disastrous perhaps, but they were experiences nonetheless. And now the older boy with the super cute lean and smoldering gaze knows her name. —FT

Network: HBO
Air Date: 2009
Writer: Ben Best, Jody Hill, Danny McBride
Creator: Ben Best, Jody Hill, Danny McBride
Stars: Danny McBride, Steve Little, Andrew Daly, Katy Mixon, Jennifer Irwin
Premise: A disgraced and out of shape former baseball player attempts to start a new life as a middle school phys. ed. teacher.

There have been very few sequences in recent comedy with the hilarity and efficiency of the opening montage of Eastbound and Down. The sequence, which follows Kenny Powers (Danny McBride) from the top of his game to the very bottom, is not just flurry of funny bits, the montage encapsulates the journey that Powers will take through the rest of the series, both foreshadowing and distilling what's to come. We see from the very beginning that this egomaniac has a long way left to fall.

In the rest of the pilot, the quick, rhythmic scenes combined with McBride's mile-a-minute line delivery work together to create a fast-paced ride for Powers' swift descent to the bottom. By the end of the episode, after Kenny has triumphantly recommitted to throwing himself head-on into failure, we aren't surprised at how far Powers has fallen—that we expected. No, we're surprised at how quickly it's happened, and are left to wonder how much further he has to go. —BG

Network: HBO
Air Date: 1992
Writer: Gary Shandling
Creator: Gary Shandling, Dennis Klein
Stars: Garry Shandling, Jeffrey Tambor, Wallace Langham, Rip Torn
Premise: A talk show hosts struggles with network demands in the face of struggling ratings.

Content perfectly reflects form in the pilot of The Larry Sanders Show. It's only fitting that the pilot of a show that used seven cameras to shoot both the on-stage and off-stage life of Larry Sanders (Gary Shandling) would begin with some soul-searching regarding whether commercials belong inside a TV show.

The pilot establishes the series as a show that will not only be funny, but also examine what it means to be funny. As ridiculous as it sounds, the differing points of view presented on the Garden Weasel create a discussion of performance and authenticity. The opinions of a hard-assed executive, a protective producer, a natural pitchman, and a high-minded comic introduce us to this excellent comedy about the making and purpose of comedy. By the end of the episode, we see that there are as many ways to think about funny as there are cameras shooting the show. —BG

Network: FOX
Air Date: 1999
Writer: Paul Feig
Creator: Paul Feig
Stars: Linda Cardellini, John Francis Daley, Samm Levine, Seth Rogen, Jason Segal, Martin Starr
Premise: Uncool brother and sister Sam and Lindsay Weir (Daley and Cardellini) navigate complex high school social politics.

From the very first moments, the Freaks and Geeks pilot is concerned with establishing the social structure of William McKinely High. Both the "freaks" and the "geeks" are outcasts, but the series hinges on the differences between the two groups of losers.

We tilt down from a pair of lame Ken and Barbie jocks to see the dark, rebellious cool of the freaks, who hang out under the bleachers, mocking and cursing the jocks who practice cheesy romantic gestures in broad daylight. We float across a faded parking lot to the geeks, who aren't even in the social conversation. They ignore the world across the cement, focusing on their best Bill Murray impressions instead of the social hierarchy. The only people who notice them are the bullies who want to pummel them.

Wide shots and a floating camera continually establish the rigid social order of William McKinley High School at an almost scientific distance, with the freaks and the geeks always at the bottom of the pecking order. We may best remember the intimate moments of the pilot, like Lindsay's story of her grandmother's death and Sam's climactic failed slow-dance, but those moments succeed because so much time has been spent providing a sweeping macro view of the Weir's tiny corner of the high school world.

In the final moments of the pilot when the siblings are rocking out to "Come Sail Away" at the homecoming dance, we care about Sam's love life, Lindsay's angst, and the emotional life of numerous minor characters with a depth of feeling that some shows can't even reach after healthy series runs. —BG

Network: ABC
Air Date: 2001
Writer: J.J. Abrams
Creator: J.J. Abrams
Stars: Jennifer Garner, Ron Rifkin, Carl Lumbly, Kevin Weisman, Bradley Cooper, Michael Vartan
Premise: Recruited out of college, a no-nonsense CIA agent must carry out multiple top secret missions while concealing the truth line of work to protect the ones closest to her.

There's no other word for this pilot besides cool. Born out of a joke Abrams cracked about Felicity, his first TV heroine, being a spy, Alias is a proper introduction to the brilliance of J.J. Abrams. Every trope, theme, and trick the auteur has employed elsewhere on the tube and the silver screen is right here.

In media res opening? Check. Badass, yet emotionally vulnerable heroine? Of course: Sydney Bristow still stands as the best role the underrated Jennifer Garner has had. That brilliantly emotionally manipulative score by Michael Giacchino that he'd later perfect on Lost. Also, Bradley Cooper. They all started here, in the weirdest, freshest, at times frustrating but usually awe-inspiring spy series ever.

The coolest thing back in the day, before the rise of pay-cable TV, was that this story was broadcast on network TV with nary a commercial. With a running time of about 70 minutes, "Truth be Told" is one of the most dynamic pilot episode in contemporary TV, as Sydney goes through the emotional spin cycle about seven times, enduring enough drama and plot twists to fill a half season of TV.

We open with her in a ridiculously eye-catching red wig, being tortured in a manner chilling for its simplicity, as she flashes back to the events that led her there. She's a grad student, we learn, with a full life—fiancé, best friend, friend-zoned male best friend—but her real major is with the government. She's a field operative for SD-6, a black ops branch of the CIA. Life is good. And then she has to go and tell her fiancé the truth, kick-starting a chain reaction that begins with Danny's death on the orders of SD-6 director Arvin Sloane, and then the mother of all reveals from her estranged father Jack after he stops an attempt on her own life. SD-6 reacted to the security breach so forcefully because they aren't a part of the CIA; all of the junior agents like Sydney's partner and delightfully giddy tech expert Marshall are being gaffled. SD-6 is one cell of a multi-national terrorist organization, and the wins Syd's been delivering for them are actually just furthering the bad guys' agendas. Oh, and her dad's been one of them this whole time (must be one big office).

Instead of taking his advice and going on the run, Sydney completes a mission for Sloane, proves her loyalty to the fold, then secretly takes her talents to the real CIA to become a double agent. In between all of this lies some of the best choreographed action you've ever seen on TV (Jack's backwards driving shootout in a parking garage is still the flyest thing ever) and production value that lends more authenticity to the various exotic locales than one would expect on a network series. Makes sense that Tom Cruise approached Abrams to do the upcoming Mission: Impossible film at the time. —FT

Network: AMC
Air Date: 2008
Writer: Vince Gilligan
Creator: Vince Gilligan
Stars: Bryan Cranston, Aaron Paul, Anna Gun, Dean Norris, RJ Mitte, Betsy Brandt
Premise: A down on his luck chemistry teacher resolves to use his smarts to enter the methamphetamine drug trade.

Most drama pilots like to close on a holy-shit moment that leaves the viewer desperate for more. Breaking Bad, innovative from the very start, flips the script and opens with such a scene. Even if you finish the hour and decide the show's not for you, you're definitely going to sit through it no matter what, because it fucking starts with that mesmerizing shot of pants billowing in the air, followed by an RV, filled with bodies tearing through the desert, and then our lead in underoos recording a farewell message to his family before raising a gun in the direction of some oncoming sirens.

We'll learn later that Walter White (Bryan Cranston) is rotten, that his dire circumstances in the pilot are just a means for his transformation. The more time he spends exposed to the criminal element the more his soul erodes, until he becomes the villain of his own story in just one year in show time. And what a difference a year makes, because here it's hard not to root for the guy to turn to a life of crime. Walt's life is a series of increasingly shitty situations: He's a genius relegated to teaching uninterested high schoolers; he has a shit job at a local car wash; his wife is pregnant; and he has cancer.

Breaking Bad revels in process, so amidst Walt's reconnection with ex-student Jesse (Aaron Paul) and their narrow escape from bloodthirsty drug dealers, the real triumph is that Walt doesn't end the hour as a meth-cooking badass nor on his way to being one, just yet. His chemical smarts gets him into this mess, and as will become a pattern on the series, chemical ingenious saves his bacon. But after surviving the seemingly un-survivable mess that opens the pilot, he returns home to wife Skylar (Anna Gunn) aggressive and full of vigor. She asks, "Walt, is that you?" It is indeed. The transformation has begun. —FT

Network: FOX
Air Date: 2002
Writer: Joss Whedon
Creator: JossWhedon
Stars: Nathan Filion, Gina Torres, Alan Tudyk
Premise: A crew of smugglers try to unload some illegal cargo, and in the process acquire some unexpected and far more dangerous human cargo.

Firefly spends its first episode answering all of your FAQs about how a western can take place in space. We don't mean that to say it's boring—no, the pilot is quite riveting, featuring Mexican stand-offs and space ship stunt maneuvers. It's just impressive how Whedon walks you through every western trope and shows you Firefly's sci-fi infused equivalent.

Our hero didn't fight for the Confederacy as many outlaws did—he fought for the Browncoats. There are Reivers instead of Indians, Alliance instead of Pinkertons and sheriffs, and Companions instead of prostitutes. The list goes on and on, and it's delightful every step of the way.

Watching Whedon's sci-fi nerding out combine with what must be extensive knowledge of westerns is one of the great joys of Firefly. The clothes, the vehicles, the vocal patterns, the plots—all aspects of the show create a pastiche inspired by equal parts John Ford and George Lucas. —BG

Network: Showtime
Air Date: 2011
Writer: Howard Gordon, Alex Gansa, Gideon Raff
Creator: Howard Gordon, Alex Gansa
Stars: Claire Danes, Damian Lewis, Mandy Patinkin, Morena Baccarin, Diego Klattenhoff, Morgan Saylor, David Harewood
Premise: A manic CIA analyst believes a recently rescued Marine is really a sleeper agent poised to attack the country.

Who would have thought the creative minds behind 24 would be capable of paring down the action, dialing up the nuance, and delivering one of the best espionage series out? Even the staunchest of 24 fans must have realized that, by its eighth and final season, the show had become campy secret agent fiction. Which is cool, yet also a far cry from, say, The Manchurian Candidate.

But as they closed the book on that series, Howard Gordon and Alex Gansa crafted a companion, and it's different in nearly every way. Where 24 was pulse-pounding and thrilling, Homeland is taut, quiet, and contemplative, anchored by a smooth, atmospheric jazz soundtrack. Protagonist Carrie Mathison (Claire Danes) doesn't fire a gun, let alone carry one during the pilot, yet its even more engrossing than its FOX forebear. She's a manic CIA analyst—who may or may not be completely in tune with reality and rationality—and she's certain that newly rescued POW Nick Brody (Damian Lewis) was turned during captivity. The pilot doesn't give us an answer, even as Carrie breaks several laws and threatens to burn several bridges to prove herself. What it does give us is a brutally honest, voyeuristic look into the Brody's re-assimilation, or lack thereof, into his household. Instead of incriminating evidence, we discover that our lead may be just as broken as her mark. —FT

Network: AMC
Air Date: 2010
Writer: Frank Darabont
Creator: Frank Darabont
Stars: Andrew Lincoln, Jon Bernthal, Lennie James, Sarah Wayne Collies, Chandler Riggs, Emma Bell, Steven Yeun, Laurie Holden, Michael Rooker, IronE Singleton, Melissa McBride
Premise: In the outskirts of Atlanta, hospitalized sheriff Rick Grimes wakes up in an empty, ravaged hospital to discover that zombies have taken over the world.

Let's step outside of the TV realm for a second. "Days Gone Bye," The Walking Dead's superb 67-minute premiere, is one of the best pieces of visual zombie fiction ever made. That's right, it's up there alongside the top-tier works of George A. Romero, lesser-hailed but equally great flicks like The Return of the Living Dead, and the gruesome efforts of Italian undead maestro Lucio Fulci.

Using Robert Kirkman's graphic novels as his springboard, series creator Frank Darabont (director of films like The Shawshank Redemption and The Mist) designs the entire episode around one Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln), who'll become the show's primary hero. In "Days Gone Bye," though, Rick isn't surrounded by the show's currently inflated lineup of both compelling characters and useless ones—it's just Sheriff Rick, waking up in a hospital after getting shot while on duty. Only, there aren't any nurses around, just hordes of reanimated corpses outside the building. And they want human flesh.

"Days Gone Bye" demonstrates what makes The Walking Dead so special when the show's at its best. On one hand, the zombie scenes are effectively intense and hardcore enough to satiate demanding horror lovers, particularly the episode's climax, a thrilling scene in which Rick, on horseback, unexpectedly confronts an army of ghouls. On the other hand, though, Darabont executes a moment of overwhelming heartache that, frankly, The Walking Dead, has yet to truly match: fellow survivor Morgan (Lennie James) trying to put the final bullet in his zombie's wife's head, looking at her through his rifle's scope, unable to pull the trigger. Not even George Romero has given us a moment that emotionally harrowing. —MB

Network: NBC
Air Date: 1994
Writer: Michael Crichton
Creator: Michael Crichton
Stars: Anthony Edwards, Eriq La Salle, Julianna Margulies, George Clooney, Noah Wyle, Sherry Stringfield
Premise: Doctors, nurses and staff must juggle the daily struggles of working in an emergency room at a Chicago hospital with their own personal lives.

The pilot of ER was basically a two-hour TV movie event, teeming with extra storylines to justify the extra time. We're expertly introduced to the world of Chicago Country General Hospital through the eyes of an inexperienced med-student (Noah Wyle), through whom we get to soak in and experience the overwhelming day-to-day shift in the ER_—_gunshot wounds, aneurysms, and burns included.

At the same time, the issues of the other doctors come to light, providing a host of drama to get hooked on. Most memorably: a suicide attempt by a troubled head nurse (Julianna Marguiles). —TA

Network: NBC
Air Date: 1999
Writer: Matt Groening, David X. Cohen
Creator: Matt Groening, David X. Cohen
Stars: Billy West, Katey Sagal, John DiMaggio
Premise: A delivery boy is cryogenically frozen in 1999. He emerges a thousand years later to fulfill his destiny as...a delivery boy.

Very few shows in the history of television have had as hard an act to follow as Futurama. You might have heard of Matt Groening's previous show, The Simpsons which received near universal acclaim en route to becoming a cultural institution. The stakes were high for Futurama, but the show did not disappoint.

The pilot comes out guns blazing, with a hilarious, smart, tightly executed arc. Nothing less than the meaning of life would do for the theme of Futurama's inaugural episode. Fry (West), a hapless delivery boy, expects a whole new lease on life after he finds himself a millennium in the future following a cryogenic mishap. His travels through time don't change much though: He is re-assigned his previous position as a delivery boy.

The pilot of Futurama is a triumph of scope and substance. So many of the great bits from the rest of the series begin here, from Nixon's head to Bender's drinking problem, as we are given a firm sense of the rules in this world. Bits alone wouldn't be enough to make this a great pilot though. What makes this episode great is that despite travelling a thousand years and through myriad well-drawn sets, Fry ends up exactly where he started. At the heart of this rollicking journey through the intricately constructed futuristic world is an examination of those huge existential questions that keep us up at night: Who, and why, are we?

Fry knows he's a delivery boy, but he is utterly unprepared for what that means for him in his new life. By the end of the pilot, he is both the same person he was before and fundamentally altered. We're excited to go on adventures with a man who knows he is a delivery boy, but has no idea what he will be delivering. —BG

Network: ABC
Air Date: 2007
Writer: Bryan Fuller
Creator: Bryan Fuller
Stars: Lee Pace, Anna Friel, Chi McBride, Kristen Chenowith
Premise: Ned (Lee Pace) uses his macabre magical power to bring his beloved Chuck (Anna Friel) back to life. They attempt to solve the mystery of her murder with the help of private investigator Emerson Cod (Chi Mcbride).

The quirky visual style of Bryan Fuller's Pushing Daisies strikes a beautiful contrast with the show's murder-mystery procedural plotting from the very first moments. Though the show is certainly intended for adults, the series begs comparison to the works of Roald Dahl and Edward Gorey as readily as it does any television show.

Fuller is careful in introducing us to this carefully constructed, off-kilter world. Most pilots thrust us in to the day-to-day scenarios of the show immediately, but Fuller wisely begins the pilot with an extended flashback. We spend more than five minutes strolling through the memories of Ned and Chuck's ill-fated childhood romance. We watch them play dinosaur dress-up and frolic in wild flowers. The goal here is to quickly establish a tone of childlike wonder; Fuller needs us to know that this will feel more like an adult version of a storybook than a television show. This early work prepares us for the zany world filled with synchronized swimming mermaid and magical pies the show will inhabit. Now we're prepared to accept any witty whimsical mystery the show might throw at us.

Fuller suspends our disbelief for us early on, making us Neds when we could have easily have been dour Emerson Cods. —BG

Network: NBC
Air Date: 1999
Writer: Aaron Sorkin
Creator: Aaron Sorkin
Stars: Rob Lowe, Allison Janney, Richard Schiff, Bradley Whitford, Martin Sheen
Premise: Following the President's bicycle accident, a Cuban refugee crisis, and Josh's major PR gaffe with the Christian Right, the White House Communications Department finds themselves overwhelmed as poll numbers dip.

Rarely in a pilot is a major character defined by their absence, but President Bartlett's (Martin Sheen) physical absence from the West Wing pilot is what sets him up as a dominant presence in the rest of the series. Though Bartlett doesn't appear until only six minutes remain in the pilot, we feel his weight. Just after we fade in, the word POTUS is on every staffers' lips as we watch them begin their day. We are shown that this invisible man has the power to end careers and challenge nations. We're even asked to feel reverence for the empty Oval Office; even when vacant, the office is bathed in an amber hue and Mrs. Landingham (Kathryn Joosten) is going to make sure you watch your tongue while you're in there.

The expectations are incredibly high when Martin Sheen's Bartlett does finally enter the room, in no less grand a fashion than bellowing the 1st Amendment at some Christian-right big-wigs. The sweeping music, the ethereal sunbeams, and the self-important walk and talk set a grand stage that a lesser actor in a lesser role would surely fail to fill. Lucky for Sorkin, he had an actor and a role that we believe are just as important as Sorkin thinks they are. Bartlett proceeds to drop the mic as only a POTUS can, and the audience is readied from the optimistic and blustery pageantry that will be The West Wing. —BG

Network: HBO
Air Date: 2001
Writer: Alan Ball
Creator: Alan Ball
Stars: Peter Krause, Michael C. Hall, Frances Conroy
Premise: A family deals with the death of their funeral director father and the future of the family owned funeral home.

It seems strange that Alan Ball is the mind behind both Six Feet Under and _True Blood_—at least it does until you revisit Six Feet Under. The show is best remembered for the stellar performances, particularly those turned in by the talented duo of Peter Krause and Michael C. Hall, but upon revisiting the show, what struck us was not the vaunted honesty of the acting, but the touch of magic infused throughout.

The ghastly poker game, Nathanial in his Hawaiian shirt haunting his own funeral, the surreal commercials cut in with the action—these moments work to create a tone that is slightly unreal, a feeling that the show, like the Fishers, occupies a space just beyond reality, that is both slightly magical and slightly terrifying. Over ten years and a dozen premium cable family melodramas later, there's still something uniquely unsettling, and charming, about our introduction to this family of morticians. —BG

Network: FX
Air Date: 2002
Writer: Shawn Ryan
Creator: Shawn Ryan
Stars: Michael Chiklis, Walton Goggins, Kenny Johnson, CCH Pounder, Jay Karnes, Benito Martinez, Catherine Dent, Michael Jace, Reed Diamond, David Rees Snell
Premise: Justice is served in a fictional L.A. district as seen through the lens of every facet of the policing: the bureuacratic higher ups, detectives, beat cops but most notably the anti-gang Strik Team as led by Vic Mackey, a corrupt cop who is simultaneously the district's biggest hero - and its biggest criminal.

The Shield's pilot is dangerously deceptive. In just fifteen minutes, it establishes tone (this fictional L.A. county is dark as midnight, yet not without jokes); we meet every character that will serve as our respective windows into the four tiers of policing (gang task force, homicide, beat cops, and politics); and the central conflict: The ambitious bureaucratic Captain Acevada’s (Benito Martinez) top cop, Strike Team leader Vic Mackey (Michael Chiklis), is as dirty as they come.

The team’s newest member Terry (Reed Diamond) is really Acevada’s man on the inside, ready to snitch all the way to a cushy job in D.C. at a moment’s notice. Acevada sees Vic as a contemptible thug and a meal ticket to the mayor’s office—in other words, a necessary evil. Late in the hour, straight arrow ace detective team Claudette (CCH Pounder) and Dutch (Jay Karnes) can’t crack a kidnapper in timely fashion, so Acevada goes to Vic quite plainly: “I need you.”

When Vic enters the interrogation room and unloads a goody bag full of all kinds of blunt objects, the smarmy pedophile asks if this is the good cop/bad cop rope-a-dope. Vic one ups him: “Good cop and bad cop left for the day. I’m a different kind of cop.” And he's right.

That’s solid, debut episode set-up right there. This isn’t a series about an anti-hero who makes questionable but understandable choices, and gets progressively darker, a la _Breaking Bad_—this is the story of a calculating opportunist, and this pilot finds him at the height of his arrogance. What Vic does—and we won't spoil it—is reprehensible, one that earned FX the no-holds-barred reputation it has today.

The risks, shocks and efficiency make this an all-time classic pilot, but what helped The Shield become an all-time classic series, is Vic’s almost instant realization that he went too far. He and the Strike team continue to take risks, but their overreaction to Terry haunts them and echoes all the way to the series finale. The journey in between is one immensely satisfying full circle. —FT

Network: NBC
Air Date: 1981
Writer: Steven Bochco and Michael Kozoll
Creator: Steven Bochco and Michael Kozoll
Stars: Daniel J. Travanti, Taurean Blacque, Bruce Weitz, Joe Spano, Kiel Martin, Betty Thomas, Charles Haid, Veronica Hamel
Premise: A police precinct in an unnamed American city goes about its rough business.

Steven Bochco and Michael Kozoll's groundbreaking police procedural opens in the early morning, at the roll call for the Hill Street Police Department. In just a few minutes, all the expected moving parts of today's law enforcement dramas hit the ground running: a shaky hand-held camera, a large, diverse cast of cops with plenty of quirks and flaws, gallows humor galore, and a strong undercurrent of violence. It's a lively introduction that still holds up, still feels fresh. This is the genesis of today's cop shows, and without it we wouldn't have Homicide or The Wire.

What doesn't feel fresh? The shows gender politics feel creaky, and the gang members comes off as campy as something out of The Warriors. But the sudden burst of violence—two cops shot on the job—is bracing; it's jaw-dropping like the lawnmower scene on Mad Men. Of course, it's shot in chintzy slow motion, so it's not quite up to Weiner standards. And, in the next episode, the cops pull through (though the original script called for one to die).

If the show were produced today, they wouldn't be so lucky. But truly, that's one of the only changes you'd encounter if Hill Street Blues was made today. And that's saying a lot. —RS

Network: HBO
Air Date: 2004
Writer: David Milch
Creator: David Milch
Stars: Timothy Olyphant, Ian McShane, Molly Parker
Premise: When a sheriff leaves behind the life of a law man and moves to the lawless frontier town of Deadwood, he quickly realizes that leaving behind his sense of duty will be harder than he thought.

Deadwood sets out to show us what kind of man has a prayer of survival in the hard-ass mining town of the show's title. The weak, stupid, and loud-mouthed end up in the dirt as quickly as you can down a shot of whiskey.

Even the most violent shows tend to handle death with some sort of reverence or at least as a plot point. In Deadwood, death is a fact of life, a Darwinian necessity, an occurrence as regular as nightly poker games. Though little is resolved at the end of the Deadwood pilot we know that the body count is just going to rise, and most folks in town won't bat an eye when it does. Oh, and they'll all talk pretty while it's happening. —BG

Network: NBC
Air Date: 1975
Writer: Anne Beatts, Chevy Chase, Al Franken, Tom Davis, Lorne Michaels, Rosie Shuster, Garrett Morris, Michael O'Donoghue, Herbert Sargent, Tom Schiller, Alan Zweibel
Creator: Lorne Michaels
Stars: Dan Aykroyd, John Belushi, Chevy Chase, George Coe, Jane Curtin, Garret Morris, Laraine Newman, Michael O'Donoghue, Gilda Radner
Premise: Ten comedians perform a variety of sketches with a celebrity host and musical guest every Saturday.

Lorne Micheals scouted the U.S. and Canada to find the funniest performers, including the unforgettable John Belushi, Gilda Radner and Chevy Chase. On top of that, he made his variety show unforgettable by getting the biggest names in the music industry.

The first episode was hosted by one of the greatest, and most offensive, comedians of all time, George Carlin, setting a tone for the show that has lasted for almost 40 years. —TA

Network: NBC
Air Date: 1993
Writer: Paul Attanasio
Creator: Paul Attanasio
Stars: Ned Beatty, Clark Johnson, Richard Belzer, Melissa Leo, Kyle Secor, Andre Braugher, Callie Thorne, Yaphet Kotto, Peter Gerety, Toni Lewis, Jon Seda
Premise: The men and women of Baltimore Police Department's Homicide Unit solve crimes and try to keep their lives together.

Following in the footsteps of Hill Street Blues, Homicide: Life on the Street, based on David Simon's book of non-fiction, was The Wire for the '90s, albeit with a smaller focus. The documentary style of Hill Street is even more aggressive here. Jump cuts are commonplace. There's no regard for the 180-degree rule. It feels real.

To accomplish the exposition any pilot needs, the episode kicks off with the arrival of a new detective to the unit. He's eager, which means he's already at a disadvantage. The playful and dark banter between the cops of the Baltimore Police Department's Homicide Unit is weary and intelligent, just like we've come to expect from our TV cops. The talent of the cast is unimpeachable. Melissa Leo. Andre Braugher. Clark Johnson. They inhabit their characters from the jump, making for a vital hour of television, especially for procedural junkies. —RS

Network: NBC
Air Date: 2006
Writer: Tina Fey
Creator: Tina Fey
Stars: Alec Baldwin, Tina Fey, Tracy Morgan, Jane Krakowski
Premise: TV showrunner Liz Lemon struggles with the addition of new management and a new star to her struggling show.

With the pilot's opening sequence explicitly nodding to The Mary Tyler Moore Show, 30 Rock starts seeking its place in the sitcom pantheon from the jump. Tthe show is at once a classic workplace comedy and a pop-culture referencing modern joke machine. Elaborate puns, self-referential gags, and a bevy of satirical fake TV shows and films make 30 Rock feel current and hip, while the classic set-up (buttoned-up executive clashes with frazzled creative) and crisp rhythm of the humor hearken back to classic laugh-track comedy.

The result is a show the feels effortlessly timeless from the start. Looking back on it, it's strange that this show was so often considered an underdog, as from the first moments the show was taking self-assured, winking strides into comedy history. —BG

Network: HBO
Air Date: 2002
Writer: David Simon
Creator: David Simon
Stars: David Simon
Premise: A police detail investigates a drug network in the city of Baltimore.

The opening of the pilot for David Simon's The Wire is perhaps the best opening to a series in TV history, for two reasons. One, it's an incredible piece of writing, rich with grim humor and an unexpected turn that reveals something about America. Two, it encapsulates the whole of show perfectly, with a tone that's dark and inquisitive and a slow rolling pace.

When the episode aired, critics wondered if the show had a chance: Who was going to watch a show that took its time like this? The pilot, like the rest of the series, isn't full of shootouts and sex. David Simon has some points he wants to make about power and American institutions, and to do that, he needs your complete attention and lots of your time.

Because Simon is a great talent, he recognizes that to earn our attention and time, he needs to give us memorable characters and smart conversation. And so we have McNulty and Bunk and Daniels and Greggs. And Avon and Stringer and Wee-Bey and D'Angelo. And Bubbles, don't forget him.

That the pilot of this show, the greatest TV viewers have seen thus far, lays out so many of the pieces of the chess game in its first hour, and does so without rushing, never feels anything less than remarkable. —RS

Network: SciFi
Air Date: 2003
Writer: Ronald D. Moore, Glenn A. Larson
Creator: Ronald D. Moore, Glenn A. Larson
Stars: Edward James Olmos, Mary McDonnell, Katee Sachoff, Jamie Bamber, James Callis, Tricia Helfer
Premise: The last surviving Battlestar in the colonial fleet fights for survival in the face of an enemy bent on exterminating the human race.

Epic. This is the only word we can think of to describe the scope of the Battlestar Galactica pilot. We're not talking about the three hour run-time, though this is the longest piot we've seen by far. We're talking about the depths of defeat the characters endure, and the reserves of strength they summon to continue the fight.

Most post-apocalyptic stories begin after the apocalypse has come, or relegate the end-times to a short montage during the credits. This pilot takes its time ending the world (well, worlds) and shows us all the fear and trembling of cataclysm. It isn't common to begin a pilot with a sense of hopelessness, but that is exactly where we find the characters at the end of the mini-series.

The episode ends with the Galactica fleeing an enemy with infinitely superior numbers and flying aimlessly towards a safe haven that may not even exist. Survival in the face of absolute destruction seems hopeless until the very last moments of the mini-series. In the final minutes of the episode, after the crew narrowly avoids human extinction, the crew and the audience are provided a glimmer of hope. We hear Admiral Adama (Edward James Olmos) utter his trademark phrase, "So say we all," for the first time. He barks the words again and again with dogged determination, until his crew responds in kind.

The resolve he demonstrates through his words, his refusal to accept defeat, set the tone for a series that, again, can only be described as epic. —BG

Network: NBC
Air Date: 1982
Writer: Glen & Les Charles
Creator: James Burrows, Glen & Les Charles
Stars: Ted Danson, Shelley Long, Nicholas Colasanto, Rhea Perlman, George Wendt, John Ratzenberger
Premise: Boston locals meet and commiserate in the titular bar, owned by former alcoholic Sam Malone (Ted Danson).

"Give Me a Ring Sometime" is a lesson in sitcom debuts. It employs what is now a familiar plot trope by easing the audience into the universe by throwing a newcomer into the world of Cheers bar. Diane Chambers (Shelley Long) is a stranger in a strange land when her fiancé leaves her stranded in the eponymous bar with just her classic English lit. and charming owner Sam Malone. From then on, the structural device for introducing the main cast is simple: Each character stumbles in one after the other, and we glean all we need to know about their personality for now through their interaction with Sam.

And as for our sure-to-be romantic foils Sam and Diane? She's cruelly jilted for the whole bar to see, while Sam reveals, ironically, that he's a recovering alcoholic. Factor in waitress Carla's (Rhea Perlman) single motherhood by way of deadbeat spouses and bartender Coach's pseudo-dementia, and it's clear that there's an inherent sadness to these otherwise hilarious people.

There's more to them than just laughs, and as a result the viewer wants to see more. But even without all the substance, the guaranteed hilarity mined from Diane's culture clash amidst hilariously original bar discussions like "What's the sweatiest movie?" all but ensures you'll return to the bar where everyone knows each other's name. —FT

Network: NBC
Air Date: 2006
Writer: Peter Berg
Creator: Peter Berg
Stars: Kyle Chandler, Connie Britton, Taylor Kitsch, Minka Kelly, Gaius Charles, Scott Porter
Premise: Newly promoted Dillon Panthers Football Coach Eric Taylor prepares his team for the first game of the season and prepares himself for the critical eye of the football-crazed residents of Dillon, Texas.

Cacophonous dialogue spoken by unseen characters and in-your-face documentary style filmmaking create a sense of chaos around the Dillon Panthers from the first time the stadium lights go up for a Monday morning press junket. All eyes are on them, and their Friday night reckoning barrels towards them. Time will not slow down, regardless of the how much the players and coaches would like it to. Yet, it is always either sunrise or sunset in Dillon, and the characters find time for idle chats and contemplative stares next to aging pick-up trucks and solitary windmills.

As the series would go on to do, the pilot offers alternating moments of absolute chaos and absolute solitude, moments when the entire world's eyes are on our heroes, and moments when they are utterly alone. The pilot of Friday Night Lights is not just an introduction to the Dillon Panthers—it's a mission statement for what the show would become. In the superficial, melodramatic world of teen sports drama, Friday Night Lights would strive for unrelenting reality. The unabashed, ruthless honesty would be palpable in moments of sweaty chaos and numbing loneliness in equal measure, and despite the endless string of failures we would watch the cast endure, the audience would feel triumph in their sheer humanity. —BG

Network: AMC
Air Date: 2007
Writer: Matthew Weiner
Creator: Matthew Weiner
Stars: Jon Hamm, Elisabeth Moss, Vincent Kartheiser, January Jones, Christina Hendricks, John Slattery
Premise: An ad man deals with his complicated identity and the quickly changing world of the 1960s.

Matthew Weiner wrote the script for the pilot of Mad Men in 2000, seven years before it would enter the homes of TV lovers. It was on the strength of this pilot, which followed an advertising firm in the '60s, that David Chase hired Weiner to work on The Sopranos, and it was on the strength of that seminal series that Weiner got the greenlight from AMC in 2007 to make his baby.

If you want to talk about structure, you have to talk about Mad Men. The pilot is a tight piece of craftsmanship, opening with Don Draper (Jon Hamm) as he drinks an Old Fashioned in a bar. He's got a pitch later in the day to sell an ad campaign to Lucky Strike. The episode follows Don over the course of a single day, as he takes meetings, both romantic and business, in the build up to the pitch. That it's his new secretary's first day of work allows for easy exposition. Finally, he has his meeting.

It's thrilling, watching him work, and first-time viewers must feel as if the episode has climaxed with the successful pitch. But no, the real climax comes just before the credits roll. Don's a married man, with a family and a suburban house. With this reveal, Weiner introduces deception and the idea of a second life into the series, a theme that carries tremendous importance for Mad Men. This pilot is a Swiss watch. —RS

Check out Complex's recaps of the current season of AMC's Mad Men here.

Network: FOX
Air Date: 2003
Writer: Mitchell Hurwitz
Creator: Mitchell Hurwitz
Stars: Jason Bateman, David Cross, Michael Cera, Portia de Rossi, Jeffrey Tambor, Tony Hale, Jessica Walter
Premise: At the celebration of the Bluth family patriarch's retirement, the family's sins come back to haunt them. Squeaky clean and hard-working Michael Bluth must decide if he's going to help the family through this rough patch or cut ties.

Callbacks and foreshadowing are at the heart of Arrested Development's comedy. It's always impressive to revisit the pilot and see how many running gags are established that punctuate episodes of the show throughout its run.

We get references to Kitty, Barry Zuckerkorn, and Ice. Major events, such as the unfortunate calamity that befalls Buster (Tony Hale), are presaged. Entire scenes will pop up again from differing perspectives in subsequent episodes.

Arrested Development endures largely because of its meticulous craft. While watching an episode, you can't help but imagine an infinitely long dry erase board detailing each of the dozen running gags in series. Watching the gears start turning in the pilot is an awesome sight indeed. —BG

Network: ABC
Air Date: 2004
Writer: J.J. Abrams, Damon Lindelof
Creator: Jeffrey Lieber, J.J. Abrams, Damon Lindelof
Stars: Matthew Fox, Evangeline Lilly, Terry O'Quinn, Jorge Garcia, Josh Holloway, Daniel Dae Kim, Yunjin Kim, Harold Perrineau, Ian Somerhalder,Dominic Monaghan, Maggie Grace, Naveen Andrews, Emilie de Ravin
Premise: After Oceanic Flight 815 crashes on a deserted island, a diverse group of survivors explores the foreign terrain and encounters a variety of strange occurrences, leading them into a whole world of mythological weirdness.

Lost's pilot, as a whole, is exceptional—its opening scene, however, is unparalleled. Rather than build up to the action, director/co-writer/co-creator J.J. Abrams drops curious viewers directly into the mayhem. We see Jack Shephard (Matthew Fox) waking up on a beach full of a crashed plane's wreckage; people are screaming, fires blazing, and, before Jack can rescue the man, a dude gets sucked into one of Ocean Flight 815's spinning propellers. The impact is immediate.

And the rest of Lost's two-part "Pilot" keeps the intrigue flowing, skillfully introducing the show's many interesting character and teasing the deserted island's supernatural mysteries: Did the pilot just get killed by a cloud of black smoke? Has that French radio transmission really been on loop for 16 years?.

By the time drug-addicted rocker Charlie asks, "Guys, where are we?" it's impossible to not eagerly anticipate what's to come. Especially since, when translated into English, that French message says, "Please someone come. The others are dead. It killed them. It killed them all." —MB

Network: ABC
Air Date: 1990
Writer: David Lynch and Mark Frost
Creator: David Lynch and Mark Frost
Stars: Kyle MacLachlan, Michael Ontkean, Mädchen Amick, Dana Ashbrook, Richard Beymer, Lara Flynn Boyle, Joan Chen, Eric Da Re, Sherilyn Fenn
Premise: An FBI agent arrives in the town of Twin Peaks to investigate the murder of high school student Laura Palmer.

"She's dead, wrapped in plastic."

And so begins David Lynch and Mark Frost's small-town murder mystery Twin Peaks, the likes of which we will never again seen on network television. We'll never see it again because now this kind of show—off-kilter, with a slippery tone and bizarre subject matter that's hilarious and revolting all at once—would be made on cable or a premium station. Likely the series would become even more violent, sexual, and profane on, say, HBO, but watching Lynch work his singular magic within the confines of network standards is what makes Twin Peaks so great. Because he can't be as fucked up as he normally would, he pulls different tricks from his bag.

The tricks are the characters, and the pilot brings out the entire town in the wake of the murder. Laura Palmer, high school sweetheart, has been found dead. And yes, wrapped in plastic. FBI agent Dale Cooper (Kyle MacLachlan) is the strange in town handling the case. What comes next is a strange joy. —RS

Network: HBO
Air Date: 1999
Writer: David Chase
Creator: David Chase
Stars: James Gandolfini, Lorraine Bracco, Edie Falco
Premise: At mob kingpin enters therapy after family strife and workplace pressure cripple him with panic attacks.

There's little crime in the pilot for The Sopranos. Besides the beating at the beginning and the arson at the end, the violence is off-screen. Now that the show has left its giant leather footprint on pop culture, this may not seem so incredible, but if you think back to gangster stories that were produced before Tony sat in the therapist's chair, this is incredible. Even the most domestic of mob dramas show us numerous sequences of goodfellas being goodfellas.

In The Sopranos, hits are ordered at softball games and deals are struck over the family grill. What made the series great, and what sometimes gets lost in retrospect, is that this show intentionally lived as much in the world of Six Feet Under as it did in the world of The Godfather. The pilot of The Sopranos reminds us that this is a show about a suburban family man unhappy with life—he just so happens to be a gangster. —BG