BENJAMONSTER AWARDS 2026: Outstanding Drama Series

Today's award is Outstanding Drama Series!

Past Awards in This Category: 2025   2024   2023   2022   2021   2020

This year's nominees are...















THE BEAR (FX/Hulu)
THE DIPLOMAT (Netflix)
ELSBETH (CBS)
THE LOWDOWN (FX)
THE PITT (HBO Max)
PLURIBUS (Apple TV)
TASK (HBO)

And the Winner Is...
THE PITT
HBO Max
It was a tall task to follow up a breakout freshman season that is pretty much universally loved. I don't know if The Pitt's second season was quite as good as its first season but it was really wonderful and worthy of a second straight Outstanding Drama Series crown. The show showed that its format works even without a mass casualty event. The show zeroed in on some of its best characters with leveling up for Katherine LaNasa and Shawn Hatosy. And it still had the weekly cases and patients that make it such compelling TV. Yes, there were sometimes frustrating moments with Dr. Robby but I like that the show chose to not make him the perfect doctor this time around, they showed more of his negative qualities. I couldn't wait for Thursday nights from January to April so I could spend time with the characters of The Pitt and I love what lessons executives seem to hopefully be taking about the return of good old-fashioned weekly dramas that can have some streaming trappings without forgetting what makes TV special.

Thoughts on the Rest of the Nominees:
First of all, yes I know I have three shows that the Emmys are classifying as comedies. I'm not going to continue to relitigate The Bear, which is clearly a drama. I could see the argument for The Lowdown and Elsbeth (which switched this year) but I decided to keep them in Drama. Just because they have comedic parts doesn't mean they are dramas. Elsbeth continues to be my favorite network drama. The Lowdown took a minute to warm up for me but once I bought in, I was completely in. The Bear didn't have my favorite season but still had a lot of great parts. The Diplomat rebounded from a shaky second season to a more self-assured third season. The biggest threats to The Pitt were Pluribus and Task. Pluribus arrived fully formed with a great vision while Task was a slow burn at first that eventually became one of the most thrilling shows on TV.

Tomorrow: The final award - Outstanding Comedy Series!

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