The Best TV Performances of 2025

Starz-castoff-turned-Netflix-hit The Hunting Wives may have been one of the most purely entertaining shows of the year, with its juicy combination of sex, violence and soap-opera silliness. And while Akerman’s mischievous performance as Margo wasn’t the only reason for its success, it’s hard to deny she was the sun around which the rest of the series revolved. Akerman played the gun-toting, social-climbing seductress with a wink that let you know Margo is aware exactly how thick she’s laying it on. But that never came across like Akerman herself felt embarrassed or self-conscious to be there — even when she was stripping down within moments of meeting Brittany Snow’s Sophie, or practically purring while flirting with her under the guise of teaching her to shoot. Sure, Margo would turn out to be as toxic as they come, setting off a chain of events leading to multiple deaths. But with her beguiling mix of Texan warmth, straight-shooting snark and brazen sexuality, was it any wonder that we, like Sophie, found ourselves powerless under her spell? — ANGIE HAN

It’s no shade to say that in its fourth season, HBO Max’s hit comedy, while still very sharp, was no longer as surprising as it once was. What a joy, then, to be caught completely off guard by Randi, one of the most delightful oddballs the show has ever graced us with. Played by Hoffman with a stupefying combination of aggressive cheeriness and completely unearned confidence, the formerly Hasidic Randi doesn’t let the fact that she’d never even seen a movie until a few days ago stop her from making grand proclamations about “the industry” — or, ultimately, from turning out to be a pretty good assistant to Paul W. Downs’ Jimmy and Megan Stalter’s Kayla. But Hoffman’s Emmy-nominated turn on Hacks was just part of a very good year that also included a sexy guest spot on FX’s Dying for Sex and an IRL wedding to another beloved pop culture figure, Traitors breakout Gabby Windey. Seriously, was anyone having a better time than Hoffman in 2025? — A.H.

Jagannathan, a Tunisian-born Indian-American actress with an impressively international upbringing, long ago moved past the stage of her career when casting directors saw her primarily as “Background Indian Doctor With No First Name” (see: standout roles in shows like Never Have I Ever and The Night Of). As good as she’s been in so many things, you don’t need to imagine the elation Jagannathan felt when Abdullah Saeed’s Deli Boys landed at her feet. That joy is evident in every frame of the Hulu comedy, in which Jagannathan plays “Lucky,” former consigliere to a Pakistani-American crime boss, now forced to deal with his bumbling sons (Asif Ali and Saagar Shaikh). Lucky is funny, but we’ve seen Jagannathan be funny before. She’s also vicious, violent and generally badass, and Jagannathan seems thoroughly liberated, bringing a dangerous and hilarious swagger to every scene-stealing appearance in this clever exploration of identity and the dark side of the American Dream. — DANIEL FIENBERG

This would normally be the place where I would remind you that Zahn McClarnon is giving one of the small screen’s best star performances in Dark Winds, repeating for the thousandth time that it’s shameful that awards voters remain oblivious. But let’s extend the laurels for AMC’s Tony Hillerman adaptation, which got darker and weirder in its third season. Dark Winds was able to open up its world in large part thanks to the confidence that Matten brought to a mostly standalone storyline, with her Bernadette Manuelito leaving the Navajo Tribal Police for a position with Border Patrol. This allowed Matten to successfully anchor thriller and romance threads, as she held her own opposite the likes of Bruce Greenwood and Tony Serpico. In the moments that found her reintegrated into the series’ main drama, I warmed to the relationship between Manuelito and Kiowa Gordon’s Jim Chee for the first time. — D.F.

If Netflix’s historical drama about the rise and assassination of James Garfield (Michael Shannon) had treated Chester A. Arthur exclusively as a drunken buffoon, that would have been enough for Offerman to turn the tonsorially distinctive future president into a scenery-chewing delight. Calling on the broadly comic instincts that transformed several inebriated Ron Swanson scenes from Parks and Recreation into venerable memes, Offerman slurs and dances and wears funny hats and makes Arthur the life of the 1880 party. But Death by Lightning has bigger ideas about Arthur, whose unlikely path led him from Collector of the Port of New York to vice president to president. Offerman and series writer Mike Makowsky find the soft-spoken potential in Arthur; he’s both a drunken buffoon and an underestimated pawn who realizes, for the first time in his life, that he might have more to offer. Offerman makes Arthur a comic figure, but a tragically relatable one. — D.F

Best Interests, which premiered on BBC One in 2023 and on BritBox this year, is a tough sell, focusing on the legal battle between two parents (Sheen and Horgan) forced to decide whether or not to continue treatment for their daughter with muscular dystrophy. It’s often unbearably sad, but viewers who chose not to look away were treated to two of the very best performances of the year. The limited series, written by Adolescence scribe Jack Thorne, is impressively non-judgmental, and the performances from Sheen and Horgan give viewers two characters who are flawed and tormented and each fully convinced that they’re doing the right thing. At different points in the series, both Horgan and Sheen will absolutely break your heart and change your perspective on what, exactly, that “right thing” is. — D.F.

When the Long Island-born, Chicago-trained comic was first added to the Saturday Night Live cast, fans of her aggressive alt-comedy roots — think David Cronenberg by way of Pee-wee Herman — wondered how she’d assimilate into the venerable NBC institution. The answer almost immediately, and increasingly, has been “exceptionally well.” It isn’t a surprise when Sherman drops by the “Weekend Update” desk to taunt and torment Colin Jost, nor when she embodies outlandish characters like a horny, drunk raccoon or Matt Gaetz (not all that different from a horny, drunk raccoon, I suppose). But the delight has been seeing how well she’s been able to adapt her persona to play a variety of more conventional, yet still bizarrely funny, characters. It’s that capacity to even be the straight-woman that has made her such an essential part of the cast. And lest you think Sherman has left her wild alter ego behind, she capped the year with HBO’s Sarah Squirm: Live + In the Flesh, a celebration of bodily fluids and other grotesquerie that proves conclusively that she has not been tamed. — D.F.

Netflix’s adaptation of Judy Blume’s YA classic lived or died by your ability to believe that the young couple at its center felt such an immediate and intense connection that they had no choice but to weather all the ups and downs of teen romance. Thankfully, its leads, played by Lovie Simone and Michael Cooper Jr., shared that sort of chemistry and then some. Simone, in particular, brought us into every complicated emotion boiling just underneath the surface, from giddy attraction to nerve-jangling anxiety to utter heartbreak, even as Keisha fought to keep her head high through a sex tape scandal and make herself into the high-achieving golden girl her mother (an excellent Xosha Roquemore) raised her to be. Her luminous performance rendered it impossible not to get swept up in the whirlwind right along with Keisha — no matter if you were young enough to relate to her as a peer, or old enough to hope you’d know better. — A.H.

In the first season of Apple TV’s dystopian workplace dramedy, Tillman’s Mr. Milchick cut a menacing but mysterious figure, a secondary villain for Lumon’s innies to rebel against. It wasn’t until season two that Severance really cracked him open, squishing him between the proverbial rock of unhappy upper management and the proverbial hard place of an increasingly restless MDR team. As the newly promoted boss was forced to swallow one humiliation after another, Tillman planted simmering resentment and growing disillusionment under Milchick’s previously unshakeable composure, then set them off like bombs in scenes like the marching-band-soundtracked finale battle or (perhaps even more menacingly) in the “Grow up” growl he gives himself in the mirror. Milchick may still be a bad guy for now — or at least is working for them — but Tillman made sure we understood him to be as complicatedly and tragically human a figure as any of the severed souls he spends his day managing. — A.H.

By its third season, we thought we knew what to expect from the spoiled-rich guests on The White Lotus: They’re cruel at worst and thoughtless at best, utterly clueless even when they’re trying to be nice. But then there was Chelsea, a free spirit with an easy smile, a strong romantic streak and a total lack of pretension. Wood radiated earthy charm and disarming sincerity in the role, animating every thought that crosses Chelsea’s mind across her wide-open face — from the pleasure she takes in her new BFF Chloe (Charlotte Le Bon) to her matter-of-fact disdain for Patrick Schwarzenegger’s douchey Saxon to, most fatefully, her devotion to the troubled man she’s taken as her soulmate (Walton Goggins’ Rick). And while Chelsea’s goodness wasn’t, in the end, enough to save her or her boyfriend, Wood’s enchanting performance ensured she’d live on in our hearts for a long time to come. — A.H.