Normally this list focuses on new TV shows, but that's really what the second season was, remaking itself from scratch with a chillifying nuclear-bomb plot. And the end of season one — with hero Jack Bauer (Kiefer Sutherland) — finding his wife shot dead, was one for the TV history books.
(Fox)
The Piano Man conquers Broadway, Eminem goes Hollywood, plus the rest of TIME's picks for the best of the year