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The 7 best (and 3 worst) TV shows of 2023

By Michael Patterson

The Flash -- "So Long and Goodnight" -- Image Number: FLA616a_0906b.jpg -- Pictured: Grant Gustin as The Flash -- Photo: Sergei Bachlakov/The CW -- © 2020 The CW Network, LLC. All rights reserved
The Flash -- "So Long and Goodnight" -- Image Number: FLA616a_0906b.jpg -- Pictured: Grant Gustin as The Flash -- Photo: Sergei Bachlakov/The CW -- © 2020 The CW Network, LLC. All rights reserved /
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The Flash, The Flash season 9, The Flash season 9 episode 13, Arrowverse, TV
The Flash — “A New World, Part Four” — Image Number: FLA913fg_0011r — Pictured: Grant Gustin as The Flash — Photo: The CW — © 2023 The CW Network, LLC. All Rights Reserved. /

The Flash

Ugh. I hate that The Flash – a show I have loved watching for this past decade – has found itself on the “worst” end of this list, especially as it was The CW show’s final season. But season 9 was such a colossal disappointment that it needs to be discussed.

To say it dropped the ball would be a major understatement. The creative team knew that season 9 was going to be the final season, and they knew they weren’t going to have 22 episodes to tell their story. And yet they delivered a segmented season that once again employed that tired old “graphic novel” approach, slicing a 13-episode season into three different parts – the second of which was just a bunch of filler – sorry, “interlude” – episodes.

To make matters worse, supporting characters like Chester and Allegra went round in circles with their underdeveloped-and-yet-overexposed romance subplot, Cecile decided it was her time to become a superhero too, Joe West left Central City for a few episodes (only to apparently return a few episodes later), and when Caitlin was “killed off” without a mourning period, Team Flash decided to go out and party. It was all over the place (and that is understating it!).

There were moments of brilliance in there, particularly when the show leaned on its classic story arcs such as Oliver Queen’s return and the night that Nora Allen died, but that couldn’t make up for the disappointment that this season ended up being.

The first season of The Flash told an intricately plotted story over the course of 23 episodes. The final season couldn’t even muster a coherent one in just 13. Instead, we got this legendary show’s final ever storyline shoehorned into just four episodes. And that is a waste of a final season.

Verdict: WORST

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