Clockwise from top left: Krysten Ritter (Jessica Jones), Michaela Coel (Chewing Gum), Suranne Jones (Doctor Foster), Aziz Ansari (Master Of None), Norman Reedus (Walking Dead), and Gemma Chan (Humans). Photograph: PR company handout

Never catch-up TV: 2015 was the year of too many good shows

This article is more than 8 years old

If one theme defines this year’s TV, it’s that there has been too much for anyone to watch everything worthwhile. Here’s a rundown of all 112 shows that our critics voted for in the Best of 2015 TV poll, with handy micro-reviews all the way to No 1 so you can bluff the ones you didn’t see

If the Guardian’s Best TV of 2015 countdown proves anything at all, it’s that there was simply too much television this year. There was more TV than anyone could realistically watch.

Once all the ballots were compiled, our writers ended up voting for 112 different programmes. Assuming the mean length of each programme was 10 hours (although some were one-off documentaries and some were, ahem, Homes Under the Hammer), that works out at 46 and a half days of television – 46 and a half days, watched straight through without work or sleep or food or going outside. That’s simply an unreasonable amount of television to be expected to watch. Even I, as someone who writes about television for a living, missed out on about a third of the list.

What’s surprising is the sheer number of sources that these shows have come from. They’re smeared across 28 different platforms; big traditional channels such as BBC1 and Channel 4, but also on-demand services such as Netflix and Amazon Prime and iPlayer. Even TruTV gets a look in. (I didn’t even know what TruTV was until now. Apparently it’s a channel famous for a series called Santas in the Barn. That one didn’t make the list, by the way, which is a shame because it looks amazing.)

And these are just the shows we liked. There’s so much more out there, all the bad television: the cruddy lower-EPG filler documentaries about shark attacks and men who kill, and endless, pointless auctions. We ignored those in favour of diligently crafted, beautifully shot labours of love that were full of heart and interesting points of view and winning performances. And we still ended up with 112 of them.

Obviously, you’re going to disagree with most of the list. You’re going to point out shows that nobody here voted for (such as the terrible third season of House of Cards), and shows that premiered slightly too late to do better (such as Jessica Jones). You’re definitely going to have something to say about Homes Under the Hammer, because I can’t work out why that’s there either. But, as a snapshot of the programmes that the coddled broadsheet metropolitan elite enjoyed this year, it seems largely representative.

However, there was so much good television this year that, inevitably, you’re going to get caught out. You’re going to meet someone, and they’re going to ask you what you thought of Mr Robot, and you’ll be left spluttering and flailing like an uncultured fool. So consider this a cheatsheet; here’s every show in the ballot, in reverse order of popularity, accompanied by a micro-review that you can use to fool friends and acquaintances into thinking that you’ve seen them. You are welcome.

112 The Flash (Sky1): So-So

111 Grayson Perry’s Dream House (Channel 4): Intelligent

110 The Man in the High Castle (Amazon): Potential

109 Rupaul’s Drag Race (truTV): Colourful

108 Homes under the Hammer (BBC1): A Clerical Error

107 Atomic: Living in Dread and Promise (BBC4): Hypnotic

106 Jane the Virgin (E4): Relentlessly Entertaining

105 The Game (BBC2): Less Than The Sum Of Its Parts

Wet Hot American Summer: the obscure cult favourite is about to get a TV reboot

104 Wet Hot American Summer (Netflix): Giddy

103 Agent Carter (Fox): An Empty Delight

102 Inside the Commons (BBC2): Dry, But Fascinating