"...what...?"

Okay. Now I've seen some bad list TV shows in my time, but Channel 4's The Greatest TV Shows of The Noughties easily tops the list of the worst of the lot. It was billed as;

It's the end of an era: the decade no-one can pronounce is coming to an end; and Channel 4 is celebrating by finding the greatest music and TV programmes of the past ten years. Channel 4 has conducted a survey with the leading TV critics and industry figures, and asked the public in a YouGov national poll, to tell us what they think was the greatest television of the last ten years. In a decade apparently dominated by box-sets, will the number one show be The Wire ? And where will Big Brother chart? The Greatest TV Shows of the Noughties counts down the 20 shows that represent the best of the decade.

With a description like that, it surely couldn't go wrong, could it...? Well... Let's just say it was the most bizarre list of "best shows of the Noughties" that could possibly be imagined, with shows that didn't belong there, shows that didn't deserve to be there, and great omissions... Here's the list, with comments;

First of all, before it started, I confidently predicted it would be The Wire that wins it; after all it gets plaudits everywhere, and even Charlie Brooker gushes over it like a 15 year old gushes over the Jonas Brothers... Anyhow;

20) Dragons Den

Alarm bells should have started ringing here. I mean. it's not a bad show, in fact it's quite entertaining. But 20th best, of the whole decade...?

19) I'm A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here

And if the alarm bells hadn't yet started ringing they should have by the time we got here...

18) Strictly Come Dancing

And by now they should have been a cacophony of noise and pain.

17) Spooks

At last, something deserving of its place.

16) Coronation Street

Okay, alarm bells again. Now, whilst Corrie has indeed been on all through the Noughties, it's not really a programme that's really a "Noughties" show; it's the same it's always been. Constant. Confortable. Ever reliable.

15) Gavin and Stacey

Whilst I'm not really a fan of this, it does deserve its place here; it's been phenomenonly popular.

14) Grand Designs

Really. The will to live it lost.

13) Shameless

Glad to see this one there.

12) Harry Hill's TV Burp

Now, I was somewhat surprised to see Harry in the chart; pleasantly surprised, but surprised none the less.

11) Friends

No, sorry; this is very much a 90s show; everything about it is rooted in that decade. Yes, it ended in the 00s, and was repeated endlessly throughout the 00s, but that does not make it, to my mind, a 00s show.

10) Life On Mars

Hooray!

09) Planet Earth

I never actually saw this, but it certainly deserved its place from the clips shown. I think this is going to be one to track down on Blue Ray when I finally go HD...

08) The Office

Strewth! Three deserving shows on the trot... surely things are looking up...!

07) The Simpsons

D'oh! No. Similar comments to Friends; yes, new episodes througout the 00s, yes, endless repeats throughout the 00s... but common consesnus is that the peak of Simpsons episodes was the mid-90s run, and it's been losing steam throughout the 00s... a point even made in the programme yesterday. Several times... Ho-hum...

06) The X Factor

Hmm... Certainly a phenomenon, but worthy of being so high...? Nope...

05) QI

Yeah... I can see this being worthy of being in the list, but not so high...

04) Britains Got Talent

Stone me, how anything with Piers "Morgan" Moron in it could get in this chart is beyond me...

03) Doctor Who

Hooray! Glad to see it here. Now, I know there will be some of you here that will cite the arguments I gave for # 7, 11 and 16 and say that for those arguments this should not be here... however, there is a difference. That difference is that the new, Russell T Davies, series of Dr Who is an entirely different production from that which went before; it's not a contiunation of the same processes, it's something entirely new and 00s. With 7, 11 & 16, you could interchange 00s and 90s episodes and there would be no real difference.

02) The Apprentice

This surprised me greatly; I can see an argument for it being in the top 20, but at #2...? I mean, I enjoy it, but would never have seen it placed so high.

It was, when watching, at this point I repeated my earlier prediction to The Mrs that The Wire would win. "We've gone the whole list, one left, and The Wire's not been on yet; it's #1." After all, why would you have Dominic West as a talking head if The Wire wasn't in the list.... So they announce the #1 and it's;

01) Top Gear

Hang on... Top Gear...? I can see it belonging in the top 20 list (see #3 argument, rather that 7, 11 & 16)), but at the very top...? Even Clarkson seemed surprised.

Frankly, at least half that list didn't belong there. How any such list could ignore Lost, which pisses on everything else the 00s had to offer from a great height is beyond me... (But that's my pure personal opinion).

Speaking more objectively, the omission of shows like The Wire, The Soparanos, The West Wing, or even Battlestar Galactica, from the list was quite shocking (and it should be noted that of those four shows, there's two I've never even seen an episode of; so it's not my own bias, just knowledge of shows with a high critical acclaim). I mean, Grand Designs better than The Wire...? Charlie Brooker is probably laying catatonic on that sofa of his, brain reduced to mush at the inanity of it.

It's unusual for me to agree with every position in such a list, but usually it's possible to understand the reasoning behind why shows are rated so high. Here... well, the mind is well and truly boggling...