TV’s Best Musical Moments of 2018

We collectively need to spend more time talking about “The Good Twin,” the straight-to-airwaves imagining of GLOW. Over the course of 32 minutes, Netflix gave us a look at an actual show from the Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling’s would be like, and the result was bonkers. And few moments were more fun than the ’80s-infused music video to the fake song, “Makeover.” From its mid-song narrative to its Madonna-esque dance, everything about the GLOW girls’ club song is screams fun. It’s a very silly moment in a series never afraid of the adjective, but it’s also one that speaks to this show’s understanding and appreciation of sisterhood. — Kayla Cobb

Watch GLOW on Netflix

Ironically, this song has balls. No other show on television would be daring enough to even attempt a female empowerment anthem that featured close up drawings of boobs, butts, vaginas, and naked little girls strategically covered by steam, but Big Mouth did it. And you know what? It works. “I Love My Body” is an endlessly catchy ode to female empowerment that reminds us of two things. One, Maya Rudulph is and will forever be a national treasure. And more importantly two, it’s senseless for women to compare themselves to other women. Love the body you have, bat wings, muffin tops, stretch marks, and all. — Kayla Cobb

Watch Big Mouth on Netflix

Leave it to Noah Hawley’s ever-strange Legion to give us a superhero fight like we’ve never seen before. Season 2 opens in a place that’s been discussed often but rarely explored — inside the psychic David’s (Dan Stevens) mind. What he claims happened in this season opener is that he once again fought with the Shadow King, represented by Aubrey Plaza’s Lenny and Jemaine Clement’s Oliver Bird. But as is always the case with this show the reality is far more complicated than that.

In a stunning dance battle between these three leads, which combines David’s power, Lenny’s sinisterly magnetic appeal, and Oliver’s brand of tribalism, the three face off. However, the scene plays as more of a conversation and an acknowledgement of strength than an actual battle. There are no real winners or losers when David is finished dancing, and that lack of clear-cut sides hints at the horrors to come. — Kayla Cobb

Where to stream Legion

The most surprising musical moment of the year came from none other than a late night interview with super serious indie darling Lucas Hedges. The actor, who is having quite the fall between Boy Erased, Ben is Back, and The Waverly Gallery, stopped by The Late Show with Stephen Colbert a few weeks back. Towards the end of the interview, Colbert encouraged Hedges to cut loose and perform his favorite Broadway number, “Rum Tum Tugger” from Andrew Lloyd Weber’s Cats. The impromptu performance is silly, exuberant, and all over the place. It’s also guaranteed to fill you with joy. — Meghan O’Keefe

Where to stream The Late Show with Stephen Colbert

Jay Pharaoh performs the song that introduces us to the lavish world of hip-hop music and the even crazier world of Champaign ILL. This song, specifically written for the show, sets the basis for the entire first season when Pharaoh’s character Lou dies while shooting his music video. Pharaoh raps the heck out of this song and there is truly nothing more enjoyable than watching Adam Pally and Sam Richardson ballin’ in the background. Even as a person who is not super into hip-hop music, there’s no denying that this song slaps. And good news, because it’s now available for purchase on iTunes. — Lauren Garafano

Where to stream Champaign Ill

No longer Canada’s best-kept secret, Schitt’s Creek broke out in a big way this year with its previous seasons getting added to Netflix. Binge-happy audiences were introduced to, among the hilarious others, David Rose, the perpetually irritated, pansexual, hothouse flower son of privilege who took a while to acclimate to the town of Schitt’s Creek. Part of that settling in was opening an apothecary store with the very handsome and flirty Patrick. Their burgeoning relationship was sweet, but it wasn’t until the shop’s open mic night, when Patrick serenaded David with a cover of Tina Turner’s “Simply the Best” that we all really swooned over these two as a couple. Extra special bonus points to David for reprising the moment with a lip sync extravaganza near season’s end. — Joe Reid

Where to stream Schitt's Creek

Even given what a strong season Castle Rock enjoyed this year, the episode “The Queen” stands out. Not only because of its jumping-through-time structure (a structure that helped unlock some of the season’s big mysteries) or because it gave the year’s best feature platform to Oscar winning national treasure Sissy Spacek, but also because of the episode’s expert use of music. In particular the way the episode uses the mourning tones of Max Richter’s instrumental piece “On the Nature of Daylight,” a piece of scoring that is devastating and beautiful all at once (and which shares a cultural moment with the Amy Adams movie Arrival). — Joe Reid

Watch Castle Rock on Hulu

When it comes to musical moments, The CW’s Crazy Ex-Girlfriend provides at least two per episode, making it hard to choose. For straight laugh out loud funny, you could go with the show’s riff on the title theme “I’m Just a Boy In Love” or the not safe for TV “Fuckton of Cats.” But that would be ignoring Donna Lynne Champlin’s gorgeous (and also hilarious) torch song from Season 4’s “I’m So Happy For You.” When her character Paula’s son shocks her by revealing he’s not a total screw-up, she sends him off on his international non-profit journey with a song about how she always never believed in him.

Not only has Champlin’s enormously powerful and emotional singing voice always been the not-so-secret weapon of Crazy Ex, but the song, written by Rachel Bloom, Jack Dolgen, and Adam Schlesinger is relentlessly, cleverly structured to get to a basic truth of parenting. As much as you spend every day encouraging your kids to be anything their heart desires, deep down you add a little “well, except” to the end of those statements.

Add in that the song ends with a montage of all the other characters on the show moving towards their destinies (everything from moving to New York, to finally binge-watching a TV show on their own), and you get to the heart of what the series is all about: we don’t change in big leaps; it’s the small steps forward that are the most shocking. For a TV show that many viewers always never believed in, that’s a lot of pressure to place on one song. But Champlin’s singing crushes it, and the simple direction/performance bring it home. To paraphrase a lyric from the song, it’s feels strange to say it, but it’s true: I weirdly, shockingly, completely believe in the power of this song. — Alex Zalben

Where to stream Crazy Ex-Girlfriend

There’s no show on television that uses music as effortlessly as Donald and Stephen Glover’s brilliant Atlanta. The dry and always weird comedy never feels defined by its soundtrack choices. Rather the bops and bangers that slipped into Season 2 felt as natural and lived in as Paper Boi’s (Brian Tyree Henry) apartment. From slipping in “Mfn Right (Remix)” by 2 Chainz feat. Lil Wayne right after the viral video of the woman crying to “Paper Boi” to the throwbacks to Curtis Mayfield and L.T.D. that appeared in the ever-bizarre “Alligator Man,” music is much more than a mood setter in Atlanta. It’s another character. — Kayla Cobb

Where to stream Atlanta

So much of what made Pose great was that it was a celebration of the vibrant roots of a community that was, and in many ways still is, under fire from society. While the drag balls were desperately needed moments of opulence and exuberance, however, Pose also turned its gaze towards the more terrifying aspects of LGBTQ+ life back in the day. Clearly, there would be no escaping the AIDS crisis for these characters, no matter how fiercely we loved them. One of the best storylines followed Pray Tell (Billy Porter) as he stood by his lover’s side during his last days and weeks. Pray Tell and Blanca (Mj Rodriguez) performing Diana Ross’s “Home” to a room full of the lonely and infirm was not only a transcendent musical moment but a reminder of the ways in which the queer community did and continues to lean on each other. — Joe Reid

Where to stream Pose

For the bulk of the Amazon dramatic series Homecoming, director Sam Esmail employed the muted color palette of industrial office spaces and an almost entirely instrumental score as the primary tools to create a creeping sense of dread and paranoia. By the time Episode 10 (“Stop”) rolls around, though, the larger “mystery” of the series has been solved — don’t worry, I’m not going to spoil it for you here — and it was time to inject a bolt of energy into the denouement. Enter “Tremendous Dynamite,” a scuzzy, late Aughts riffsplosion from Eels, which is used to score Heidi Bergman’s (Julia Roberts) final quest. Esmail not only switched up the soundtrack, but he takes the opportunity to employ a series of ’70s style screen wipes, camera zooms, match cuts, and split-screens in what is one of the year’s most exciting montage sequences. Sure, Esmail is showing off a bit, but it provides a nice capper for the series and perfectly sets up the season’s final moments. — Mark Graham

Watch Homecoming on Prime Video

If there was an award for the best television song of the year, it should go to The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Story. Right away Episode 2 places us in a weird position. Ryan Murphy, Brad Falchuck, and Nina Jacobson’s series opens with the serial killer Andrew Cunanan (Darren Criss) taking the life of his final victim — the legendary designer Gianni Versace (Édgar Ramírez). But “Manhunt” moves its story back a few days, showing us exactly how this young men who had already murdered four innocent people stole the truck that would take him to Versace’s death.

It’s as Cunanan finds “Gloria” on the radio that he’s at his least stable and most sinister. Belting it out to Laura Brannigan’s 1982 mega-hit is an immediately humanizing moment. We’ve all been in Cunanan’s musical shoes. But knowing that this manic sing-along will lead to the targeted and preventable murder of one of the most iconic designers of the ’90s warps this moment, transforming it into something dark. The brilliance of The Assassination of Gianni Versace never just rested in how sympathetic the series made its victims or how provably preventable Cunanan’s many deaths could have been. It rested in making Cunanan himself painfully relatable, and that’s chilling. — Kayla Cobb

Where to stream The Assassination of Gianni Versace: American Crime Story