Why ‘Enlightened’ is the Best Show You’re Not Watching

You Need to Watch Enlightened

There are a lot of shows that I have loved that have been canceled too soon: Pushing Daisies, Arrested Development, Sports Night, and Firefly, to name a few. Recently The Hour was canceled after a terrific second season on BBC, and it seems more and more likely that the world is conspiring against me.

However, no show on television right now is quite as good as Enlightened, the HBO series from creators Mike White and Laura Dern, and I refuse to consider that it may soon join the pile of 'Gone-But-Not-Forgotten' shows of yesteryear. The show ends its almost perfect season on Sunday, and it's crazy to think that this may be the last time that viewers will get the chance to see Amy Jellicoe and her many attempts to right wrongs and quell her inner demons.

The show follows Amy (played brilliantly by Laura Dern), a woman who, after a nervous breakdown (above), attempts to get her life back together and enact change in the lives of people around her. The only problems are that she's maybe not that different than she used to be AND nobody really takes her well-meaning nagging coaching to heart. With a drug addict ex-husband, a mother who can't seem to bridge the emotional gap between herself and her daughter, a coworker who's love for her develops into a complicated friendship, and a bevy of comedians doing solidly emotional work, Amy's world is filled with unique and challenging characters. Thus, she attempts to pull everyone in new and different directions with her (often cloying) meditational wisdom.

After the end of the first season, I wrote that Enlightened was "awkward, depressing, lonely… obviously one of the best new shows on TV." The first season was contemplative, allowing viewers really soak in the sadness of the characters. This season it's been all about narrative propulsion, which took the characters (who had developed over 10 1st season episodes) and put them in situations that made them grow and change.

With the finale just a few days away, it's more important than ever that viewers tune in to the show. To help make that decision easier, I've outlined some of the many ways in which Enlightened is just so much better than anything else on television right now: