7. Delocated – This Adult Swim show is built around a gimmick – a reality show about a guy in Witness Protection who wears a ski mask and vocoder to disguise his identity. The first season last year was clever and very funny, but this season the episodes expanded to a half-hour in length and it went from being a funny oddity to a really excellent comedy. Sometimes the episodes depended on the premise of the show, like Jon going undercover in the Russian mob, or that same mob recruiting comedian Todd Barry as a hitman. Other episodes were just set in the strange world where wearing a ski mask is considered a valid disguise. Jon’s girlfriend opened a fashion store that caused a stir with tortilla hats, for example. Jon ran for the completely made-up position of “Dog Mayor”. Or in the funniest comedy episode of the year that didn’t involve paintball or 94 meetings, Jon developed his own prank show, influenced by Howie Mandel. “Jon He Does It” was really one of the best half-hours of TV all year. But possibly the episode that best exemplified Delocated was “Kim’s Krafts”. This was the episode that gave us the aforementioned tortilla hats, but it also had Jon competing against an inept Russian assassin in a comedy contest. (The assassin, Yvgeny Mirminsky, builds all of his punchlines around vodka.) Jon humiliated his nemesis by winning the contest with his routine that was based on pro-life propaganda and jokes about potato chips. (What a Crunch-ry!) It was completely absurd and funny, and unlike anything that I’ve ever seen on TV.
While I stand by my Top 10, I actually feel bad about Eastbound & Down and Louie not being on it! They are both so fabulous. And I know how much I’m missing out by not watching Breaking Bad…I will just have to hibernate with the DVDs one of these days, although it sounds like I may end up suffering from clinical depression if I do that.