#93
Hogan’s Heroes
Known as the “Hogan’s Heroes March” this theme was composed by Jerry Fielding.
It is one of the most remembered instrumental themes of all time. Who would guess that a TV COMEDY about a prison camp in Nazi Germany would work? Portraying the Nazis as bumbling idiots helped, I guess. Still….
The theme outlasted the show, as it has been used and performed many times over the years. And you cannot deny the catchiness of the tune.
#94
Roseanne
The theme was primarily composed by Dan Foliart & Howard Pearl.
Some listings added W. G. Snuffy Walden and John Popper to the credits.
The start off with the harmonica is iconic and helps set the feel for this series.
#95
Night Court
Theme song was composed by Jack Elliot.
The theme to Night Court is one of the many instrumental themes appearing in the Top 100.
Notable musicians who played on the theme included Ernie Watts (Saxophone), Dave Hamlin (Drums), Kip Sophos (Bass).
#96
American Horror Story
Theme originally written by César Dávila-Irizarry and then reworked by former Nine Inch Nails keyboardist Charlie Clouser.
The theme of AHS was extremely creepy and fit right into the tone that the show was going for. The iconic movie Se7en was an inspiration for the theme and what creator Ryan Murphy wanted to get across.
#97
Inspector Gadget
Theme written and composed by Shuki Levy and Haim Saban.
Performance often credited to the Towenda Choir Orchestra
Here is an interesting tidbit for this theme. I never watched this show. I bet you could count the number of Inspector Gadget episodes I watched on one hand. Yet, the theme song has entered the zeitgeist enough for it to be in my Top 100 TV Theme Songs list. Wild.
There are other TV shows on this list that would not be considered my favorite TV shows, or even something that I would like. The only qualification for this list is the theme song, and Inspector Gadget’s theme is fun and entertaining.
#98
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
“Heroes in a Half-shell. TURTLE POWER!”
Written by Chuck Lorre and Dennis C. Brown.
This is the first animated series to appear in the Top 100 TV Show Themes list. There are 21 total animated programs in the list, 21% of the list. Animated shows have had some great themes and this one, with the “Turtle Power” line is one of the tops.
#99
Stranger Things
written by Kyle Dixon and Michael Stein, members of the Austin-based synth band S U R V I V E.
Stranger Things is one of the biggest hits from Netflix, and the music is part of the reason. Set in the 1980s, the show featured this theme, recorded with the heavy use of analog synthesizers.
Dixon and Stein won an Emmy for the main title theme.
#100
Mad About You
Title: Final Frontier
Performed by Andrew Gold; Anita Baker performed a version later in the show’s run.
Written by Paul Reiser and Don Was
The first song to kick off the new Daily Countdown is from NBC’s long running show, Mad About You, starring Paul Reiser and Helen Hunt.
Interestingly enough, the first song on this new list is from a TV Show that did not appear in the Top 100 TV Shows list. There are several others that will be on the theme song list but would fall short of the Top 100 TV Shows.
With the first Daily Countdown complete and our #1 TV show, LOST, revealed, it is time for another Daily Countdown. I considered a lot of different possibilities (and I am not brave enough to do movies yet), but when I came up with this idea, it felt right.
TV Show theme songs was a fun choice to do next. I have to tell you, I was surprised how hard compiling this list was. I found it much more difficult than the TV Shows list. Maybe that was because I knew from the beginning what my favorite TV show would be, but this list did not have one specific obvious #1. In fact, I think there could have been four or five possible themes that would reach the top. Still, it was really tough to make this list. Still, I am very happy with it.
Just like the TV Show list, as of right now, this list is locked in, even if it could be fluid.
TOP 100 TV SHOW THEMES
#100. Mad About You
#99. Stranger Things
#98. Inspector Gadget
#97. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1987 animated)
#96. American Horror Story
#95. Night Court
#94. Roseanne
#93. Hogan’s Heroes
#92.
#91.
#90.
#89.
#88.
#87.
#86.
#85.
#84.
#83.
#82.
#81.
#80.
#79.
#78.
#77.
#76.
#75.
#74.
#73.
#72.
#71.
#70.
#69.
#68.
#67.
#66.
#65.
#64.
#63.
#62.
#61.
#60.
#59.
#58.
#57.
#56.
#55.
#54.
#53.
#52.
#51.
#50.
#49.
#48.
#47.
#46.
#45.
#44.
#43.
#42.
#41.
#40.
#39.
#38.
#37.
#36.
#35.
#34.
#33.
#32.
#31.
#30.
#29.
#28.
#27.
#26.
#25.
#24.
#23.
#22.
#21.
#20.
#19.
#18.
#17.
#16.
#15.
#14.
#13.
#12.
#11.
#10.
#9.
#8.
#7.
#6.
#5.
#4.
#3.
#2.
#1.
#1
LOST
So we have come to the end of our journey that started on the first day of September. We have reached the number one show of all time according to EYG, and, if you knew me at all, this would have been the least dramatic reveal of a number one ever.
LOST is, far and away, my favorite show ever. I remember the feeling I had when it came to an end: an emptiness in my gut that took several years to fill.
Some claim that LOST had one of the worst endings of any show, and I respectfully disagree. I found the LOST finale to be perfect. It focused on the characters that I had come to love for the previous six seasons.
LOST ran for six seasons on ABC, giving us 121 episodes of awesomeness.
A group of people, who were from all walks of life, boarded Oceanic flight 815 in Sydney, Australia for Los Angeles. That flight did not make it to LAX. Somewhere over the Pacific Ocean, the plane came across some major problems and crashed on an island. Almost immeditaely, you learned that this island was unlike anywhere else. As Charlie said…
“Guys, where are we?”
The Island was a character all its own, with a mythology and mysteries for the audeicne to chew upon. That was one of the criticisms of the show: they did not reveal the secrets of the Island. Again, I think there were plenty of mysteries revealed. It may not have spoon-fed you the answers you wanted, but if you paid attention, you could make educated answers to everything on the show.
The Island had a polar bear, a smoke monster, a group of Others, healing properties allowing a crippled man to walk again among other things.
The ensemble cast was brillaint. Led by Matthew Fox, the cast included Terry O’Quinn, Naveen Andrews, Jorge Garcia, Josh Halloway, Maggie Grace, Emilie de Raven, Daniel Dae Kim, Yunjin Kim, Evangeline Lilly, Malcolm David Kelley, Dominic Monaghan, Harold Perrineau, Michael Emerson, Ian Somerhalder, Henry Ian Cusick, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, Cynthia Watros, Elizabeth Mitchell, Nestor Carbonell, Jeff Fahey, Sonya Walger, Sam Anderson, L. Scott Caldwell, Jeremy Davies, Ken Leung, and Rebecca Mader.
Some of these actors will forever be their characters to me. Many have gone on to do other major roles (Evangeline Lilly was Wasp in the MCU, Terry O’ Quinn and Michael Emerson have had plenty of other roles), but my first thought will always be that they are their characters from LOST.
4 8 15 16 23 42
“See ya in anothe rlife, brother“
“You guys got any milk?”
“We got to go back!”
The greatest show of all time in the opinion of EYG… LOST.
That wraps up the first Daily Countdown. It was quite the undertaking, but we are far from done. Tomorrow we start the next Daily Countdown. It was actually a harder list to compile than the TV one. Tomorrow we start TV THEME SONGS.
#2
Twin Peaks
“… Wrapped in plastic…”
The number two TV show on out top 100 countdown is one of the biggest phenomenons from the early 1990s. David Lynch brought his flavor of insanity to the small screen disguised as a murder mystery in Twin Peaks.
The first episode kicked off with mild-mannered Pete finding the beautiful prom queen, Laura Palmer, dead on the side of the river, wrapped in plastic. The murder rocked the seemingly normal small town of Twin Peaks, Washington. The call went into the FBI for help in the investigation and the eccentric Agent Dale Cooper was sent.
Cooper had seen this before, and was already on the trail of the serial killer responsible. Using his bizarre techniques of investigation, Cooper made his way through a town that was anything but normal in search of the killer.
Twin Peaks gripped the natioin with its oddball characters and engaging mystery. This was one fo the earliest examples of how impatient the country was, anxious about finally discovering the truth behind Laura Palmer’s death.
The answer did not come until about halfway through the second season, at a point where some viewers had abandoned the show in impatient frustration. Turned out Laura was killed by a spirit called Bob, who had possessed her father, Leland Palmer. The reveal of Leland as Killer Bob was one of the most violent things I had seen on TV to that point, and it was artistically amazing.
There had been reports that David Lynch had intended on leaving the mystery of Laura’s death unsolved, and only bowed to pressure from the network to give a resolution to the crime.
After the death of Leland, Twin Peaks floundered a bit before it found its footing once again with the arrival of Cooper’s crazy former FBI partner. The show was left off on a horrible cliffhanger where Cooper had been possessed by Killer Bob.
A third season was released 25 years after the end of season 2. It was released on Showtime where Twin Peaks was originally on ABC. The third season wrapped up that cliffhanger from the end of the original series, but left off on another one in the final episode of the Return.
Dale Cooper was played by Lynch favorite Kyle MacLachlan. Other cast memebers included Sherilyn Fenn, Lara Flynn Boyle, Michael Ontkean, David Lynch, Peggy Lipton, Mädchen Amick, Sheryl Lee, Jack Nance, Frank Silva, Ray Wise, Piper Laurie, James Marshall, Russ Tamblyn, Catherine E. Coulson, Eric DaRe, Ian Buchanan, Miguel Ferrer, Richard Beymer, Chris Mulkey, Dana Ashbrook, Joan Chen, and Michael Horse. There were dozens more cast members over the three total seasons.
Twin Peaks was at the heights of what television could be. It was bizarre, weird, funny and dramatic. The sad story at its core brought people into one of the most iconic shows of all time.
#3
Moonlighting
“Fine!”
“Fine!”
“Good!”
“Good!”
*Door slams*
*Door slams*
That was a scene that happened many times during the run of Moonlighting, a show that went for four seasons on ABC starring Bruce Willis and Cybill Shepherd.
Set at teh Blue Moon Detective Agency, Maddie Hayes had lost almost all of her fortune to a crooked accountant and she was forced to work in one of the few businesses remaining, a detective agency. There, she met David Addison, a wise cracking, song singing, limbo dancing private eye who challenged her to expand her life.
Moonlighting is one of the best shows on TV. It also felt down to earth quicker than any show on TV. The whole “will they won’t they” aspect of the show kept the viewers glued to their screen, but, when they did, much of the magic was gone.
Still, David and Maddie were amazing together. Charming, fighting, arguing, detecting. They could do anything.
One of the things that they could do was break the fourth wall. This was one of the first shows that I specifically saw do this technique and I found it hilarious. Another specialty of this show was the special episodes… the dream sequences. They had a show called “The Dream Sequence Always Rings Twice” where David and Maddie had dreams that they were musicians in an old time club. Another episode saw them dancing to “Big Man on Mulberry Street.”
But one of the greatest episodes of all time was “Atomic Shakespeare” which Maddie and David played the roles of Katharina and Petruchio in a satire of Shakespeare’s “Taming of the Shrew.” This episode was written in iambic pentameter and was an absolute joy.
The last season and a half was much weaker, but the first two and a half was some of the best TV of all time. I remember planting myself in front of the TV every Tuesday night to watch Moonlighting… although their behind the scenes challenges and fights caused many of those nights to be a rerun.
When compiling this list, I debated between #3 and #2 for Moonlighting, and it could easily be flipped. Moonlighting made Bruce Willis a superstar and helped him get Die Hard.
“Blue Moon Investigations ceased operations on May 14, 1989. The Anselmo Case was never solved… and remains a mystery to this day.”
#4
Whose Line is it Anyway?
Improv is hard, but there are a handful of people who can do it unlike anyone else. That is the concept behind the EYG Hall of Fame show Whose Line is it Anyway?
Whose Line started in England before being brought to the states by Drew Carey, whose pull at ABC was strong. The show ran for 21 years in America, at first on ABC, and then, eventually, over at the CW, when Drew Carey was replaced by Aisha Tyler.
There were three main cast members that were on the majority of the episodes, Ryan Stiles, Colin Mochrie and Wayne Brady. Stiles and Mochrie were regulars on the British version of the show and Brady became a series regular after season one of the American version (though he also appeared on the British show at times). There is a fourth recurring cast member, referred to as the fourth chair, which included a number of other improv comics such as Brad Sherwood, Jeff Davis, Chip Esten, Greg Proops, Keegan-Michael Key, Gary Anthony Williams, Denny Siegel, Kathy Greenwood, Jonathan Mangum, and Heather Anne Campbell. There were celebrities who appeared as the “fourth chair” including Robin Williams, Whoopi Goldberg, Stephen Colbert and Kathy Griffin.
The show featured members of the cast performing improv games read off by the host. Some of these games included Helping Hands, Whose Line, Scenes from a Hat, Three-Headed Broadway Star, Doo-Woop, African Chant, Dating Game, World’s Worst and Hoedown.
Hoedown was particularly disliked by the cast, which became a running joke on the show.
The quick-witted performers had amazing ability to come up with funny responses consistently Stiles and Mochrie had an unbelievable chemistry with each other which led them to having many scenes together.
The game “Living Scenery” was used when guest star Richard Simmons was on the show and it led to, perhaps, the funniest scene in the entire show’s run. If you have never seen this game, do yourself a favor and find it on YouTube. It is as funny as anything you’ll ever see.
Ah heck… here it is…
#5
Picket Fences
David E. Kelley has had a couple of other shows on this list. Picket Fences is my absolutely favorite one of his oeuvre.
A little town called Rome, Wisconsin was home to all sorts of weirdness. I have been a fan of the genre of show that feature a strange, eccentric town full of bizarre things (from Eerie, Indiana to Twin Peaks). Rome is certainly in the mix.
The family at the center of this weird town is the Brocks, including Sheriff Jimmy Brock and his wife Doctor Jill Brock. Jimmy’s daughter from his first marriage, Kimberly, and Jill’s two sons, Matthew and Zach, were part of the family too.
Much of the action took place inside the Rome Court House, where Judge Henry Bone oversaw the court. One of my favorite characters of all time was the defense attorney for just about anyone… Douglas Wambaugh! “Wambaugh for the Potato man,” “Wambaugh for the steamroller, your honor.” Douglas Wambaugh was as bombastic as humanly possible, played with perfect precision by Emmy Award winning Fyvush Finkel. The combative relationship between Wambaugh and Judge Bone was one of the most original and entertaining relationships on TV.
Picket Fences was also where I was introduced to Don Cheadle, who played D.A. John Littleton. Cheadle went on to a successful movie career, including replacing James Rhodes in the MCU.
Some of the most amazing plot lines happened on Picket Fences, and somehow, they all seemed to have major impact on the Brock family. Any holiday where the Brocks gathered for a dinner was destined to turn into fireworks. Thanksgiving? Hold on to your hat.
Jimmy and Jill loved each other but they were never afraid to throwdown if the story called for it.
Some of the major events in Rome included the capture of the Green Bay Chopper, the arrival of serial killer Cupid, a mayor who was arrested for murdering the guy who carjacked him and then. before going to prison, spontaneously combusted, a woman who flattened her husband with a steamroller and blamed it on PMS, the iconic Dancing Bandit who eventually became Rome’s mayor (not the one that spontaneously combusted), and a town where one of the most dangerous appliances was the human sized icebox.
These are just some of the stories that populated this wonderful town.
Picket Fences ran for four seasons and wound up winning 14 Emmy Awards in that run, including Outstanding Drama Series twice.
Cast members included Tom Skerritt, Kathy Baker, Fyvush Finkel, Ray Walston, Don Cheadle, Holly Marie Combs, Costas Mandylor, Kelly Connell, Zelda Rubenstein, Adam Wylie, Justin Shenkarow, Lauren Holly, Marlee Matlin, Ray Dotrice, Leigh Taylor-Young, Roy Brocksmith, and Robert Cornthwaite.
As Judge Bone would so nimbly put it at the end of a case, “Now get out.”
#6
Monk
Adrian Monk, the defective detective, slips into the number six slot in our top 10. Monk ran for eight seasons on the USA Network and helped garner star Tony Shalhoub three Emmy Awards for Best Actor in a Comedy Series.
Adrian Monk was a homicide detective who had a series of OCD and other fears. However, when he met his future wife, Trudy, those traits calmed down. Adrian Monk was brilliant, seeing things at crime scenes that no one else could. Tragedy struck when a car bomb exploded, killing Trudy and sending Adrian into a spiral of neurosis and depression.
Adrioan Monk slowly got back to doing what he did best, though the police force understandably doubted his ability to rejoin the force. So Monk would work as a consultant on the cases that no oen could solve.
Monk was both a comedy and a drama, doubling down on the problems Monk faced. He was afraid of heights, crowds, enclosed spaces, as well as milk, bees, germs, needles, mushrooms, lightning and MANY more The show listed 312 phobias that Monk suffered from during the show.
He was also very compulsive, with everything needing to be just right. Everything had its order and Monk spent time vaccuuming and cleaning to make sure everything was as it had to be. Adrian Monk knew how ridiculous he was, but he just could not get past these compulsions.
The best episodes though were the ones where Adrian Monk, despite his massive list of fears and eccentricities, was able to overcome and still be brillaint. Monk showed his own personal determination, even through some of the most harrowing moments for the defective detective.
Tony Shalhoub led the cast which included Bitty Schram, Ted Levine, Traylor Howard, Jason Gray-Stanford, Stanley Kamel, Emmy Clarke and Héctor Elizondo.
EYG- Embrace Your Geekness 