60 best sitcoms of all time

34. Wings

Wings is a show that feels as if it got left in the wake of the other comedies surrounding it. During its run from 1990 to 1997, NBC launched Friends and Frasier, and Seinfeld had just started the year before. As those three series hit the TV stratosphere, Wings just quietly did its own thing. But it could be just as good as its more successful counterparts — after all, it was created by David Angell, Peter Casey and David Lee, the same trio that would go on to also create Frasier.

The series served as a launching pad for Tim Daly, Steven Weber, and Tony Shalhoub, who’d all go on to plenty of other projects (most famously Shalhoub as the star of Monk, which not only earned him several awards but put USA on the map for original series).

And Wings was more than just a talent builder. There was something incredibly sweet in its humor, too. It was in how brothers Joe and Brian Hackett (a great double act in Daly and Weber) were reluctantly brought back together, or how Joe and childhood friend Helen Chappel (Crystal Bernard) finally fell in love and married, realizing Helen’s childhood crush. Wings felt like a show you wanted to be a part of with characters that you wanted to spend time with. It recaptured that same feeling that Cheers had created (no surprise, since the show creators had also come from Cheers). Maybe it wasn’t as high-profile, but eight seasons and plenty of laughs are still worthy accomplishments.

Next: 33. The Thick of It