AFT Awards: Best Ensemble in a Comedy Series

This is the eighteenth category of the 5th Annual AFT Television Awards, my personal choices for the best in television this past season. For the directing and writing categories, I’ve included only honorable mentions rather than semi-finalists and finalists. Nominees are listed in the order I've ranked them.

Best Ensemble in a Comedy Series

Last year’s nominees: Californication, Glee, Modern Family, Parks and Recreation, Party Down

Semi-finalists: Better With You, Burn Notice, Californication, Eastbound & Down, Entourage, Glee, Psych, Royal Pains, 30 Rock, Weeds, White Collar

Finalists: Hung utilized its tight-knit cast to extraordinary effect as they faced business and personal issues. Chuck kept things light as wedding bells loomed and their livelihoods were increasingly threatened. Episodes emphasized exaggeration and found the perfect players to make it entirely funny. White Collar made art crimes infinitely entertaining with its wise-cracking crew. Bored to Death made the most of uninteresting situations with a truly inspired trio and their various acquaintances.

The nominees:

Modern Family managed to become even more endearing in its second season with an entirely strong group of kids and adults making the jokes and the situations work. Shameless created a family unit as dysfunctional as ever, but the ensemble was fully functional and then some. The Big C crafted characters all at odds with one another using a cast that worked marvelously together. The Office may not have always been as strong as in years past, but the ensemble was still superb.

The winner:

Parks and Recreation made wacky plotlines work with a truly committed and dependable cast portraying extraordinarily awesome characters.

Next up: Best Main Title Theme Music