2025 will always be the year that gave TV viewers Adolescence, The Studio and The Pitt. This trio of small-screen highlights sits among the best TV shows of the last 12 months, with each one raking in the attention and accolades to prove it, including Emmy wins and Golden Globe nominations.
They’re also just a fraction of 2025’s television debuts, joined by plenty of also-excellent series that you might’ve missed.
Here are five standouts to catch up with ASAP. Hint: they’ll make top-notch vacation binges.
Best TV series of 2025 – quick links
Dying for Sex (Disney+)
With Dying for Sex, it’s almost impossible to pick which element of Michelle Williams’ astonishing performance is more impressive: the life, heart, texture and depth that she brings to someone navigating the terror of a stage IV breast cancer diagnosis, or the committed yearning for desire that pulsates through her character’s quest to go out with more than a few bangs.
Adapted from the non-fiction podcast of the same name, which told of Molly Kochan’s experiences, this eight-part dramedy does still evoke and earn tears. Told not just with unflinching candour about sex and death, but also with the clearest of eyes when it comes to embarking upon an erotic odyssey while terminally ill and facing mortality, it couldn’t be further from a standard sickness weepie.
Australian filmmaker Shannon Murphy, who directs six of the series’ episodes, again demonstrates how to tell a touching tale about cancer that’s a celebration of living, as she did with her equally excellent 2019 film Babyteeth.
If there’s a downside to Adolescence’s well-deserved awards domination from 2025’s TV offerings, it’s that Dying for Sex hasn’t been receiving its due as a result. In a different year, this deeply moving and also funny gem would be showered with statuettes. Watch the trailer.
Carême (Apple TV)
Just like cooks in a kitchen, historical dramas can stick dutifully to a recipe or be guided by whims and flavours. Focusing on a 19th century French talent who left a hefty imprint upon haute cuisine and has been dubbed one of the world’s first celebrity chefs, the captivating Carême falls heartily into the second category.
Antonin Carême worked his way up from an apprentice patissier to whipping up dishes for Napoleon. That was always going to be too juicy a path for the screen to resist, although Carême also sprinkles in spy thrills and lusty romps amid copious helpings of culinary antics, eagerly taking liberties with the facts in service of delicious and moreish viewing.
Courtesy of series creators and screenwriters Ian Kelly and Davide Serino, plus The Three Musketeers: D’Artagnan and The Three Musketeers: Milady director Martin Bourboulon, the mix sizzles. Kelly literally wrote the book first, courtesy of Cooking for Kings: The Life of Antonin Carême, the First Celebrity Chef. Bourboulon’s flair for handsome period affairs also proves handy.
The crucial ingredient, other than an array of tastebud-tempting food, is star Benjamin Voisin, who plays Carême as a rebellious rockstar-type, and adds another outstanding performance to his resume after memorable turns in Summer of 85 and Lost Illusions. Watch the trailer.
Hal & Harper (Stan)
Earnest, personal, vulnerable, generous, authentic, tender and moving. All of the above applies to the work of Cooper Raiff. At just 28, he’s written, directed and starred in two films – Shithouse, also known as Freshman Year, won SXSW’s 2020 Grand Jury Award, while Cha Cha Real Smooth picked up a 2022 Sundance Audience Award – and now a TV series. And Hal & Harper is one of 2025’s small-screen delights.
College student Hal and his older sister Harper have spent their lives co-dependently by each other’s sides, especially after trauma changed their childhood forever. Some of the most affecting performances of the year linger within Hal & Harper’s frames, including from Raiff and Lili Reinhart, plus Mark Ruffalo as the pair’s father and Betty Gilpin as his pregnant girlfriend.
Unpacking adults in a state of arrested development is so common that one cult-classic sitcom used that term as its moniker. However, Raiff has a knack for making every element of his characters, their dialogue and the stories they’re within feel so lived in, relatable and resonant. Watch the trailer.
The Lowdown (Disney+)
Between 2021 and 2023, watching Sterlin Harjo’s Reservation Dogs meant not only enjoying a remarkable piece of television but also hoping for plenty more from everyone involved once the Indigenous teen-focused series came to an end. With Tulsa neo-noir caper The Lowdown, Harjo has made a second Oklahoma-set charmer grounded in a First Nations perspective. He’s also delivered a welcome reunion.
While Ethan Hawke wasn’t a star of Reservation Dogs, he brought star power to an unforgettable single-episode guest spot. Now, in a year that’s a dazzling advertisement for his versatility – as Hawke gets villainous in horror hit Black Phone 2 and tracks for a well-deserved Oscar nomination for biopic Blue Moon – he leads The Lowdown as bookstore owner, journalist and ‘truthstorian’ Lee Raybon.
When a subject of one of his recent articles, a member of a local prominent family, winds up dead in an apparent suicide, Raybon is certain that little is what it seems. Cue a gleefully shaggy and playful detective tale, often with its protagonist’s high-schooler daughter (Ryan Kiera Armstrong) in tow.
That Harjo is taking some cues from author Jim Thompson is worked into the storyline. His nods to the Coen brothers and David Lynch? Casting Tim Blake Nelson and Kyle MacLachlan immediately and astutely sets the tone. Watch the trailer.
Film Club (Binge)
There’s escaping into beloved movies, and then there’s Film Club’s version of worshipping at cinema’s altar. Every Friday night in the garage of her mother’s Manchester house, Evie (Aimee Lou Wood) hosts lovingly immersive screenings of her favourite flicks for her best friend Noa (Nabhaan Rizwan) and their pals. Homemade themed decor and snacks are a staple, with costumes mandatory.
This ritual is an anchor for Evie, who moved back home after a mental health incident and hasn’t been able to walk out the door since. It’s also a source of solace, as well an excuse to sling famous movie dialogue back and forth with the obvious object of her affection, as Evie or Noa avoid giving voice to their true feelings.
Read: Film Club checks in The White Lotus star for new drama about movie lovers
Wood leads, co-created and co-wrote Film Club. Clearly, she didn’t just add a stellar turn in season three of The White Lotus to her resume in 2025. Adolescence’s Owen Cooper is in similar territory, with the youngest-ever male acting Emmy-winner also featuring as a neighbour.
As a romcom, Film Club is endearingly heartfelt. Diving into Evie’s all-female household, it slides in beside the hilarious Such Brave Girls. This wonderfully nuanced series also sincerely understands the experience of feeling through cinema and feeling seen by it. Watch the trailer.
