1. Man O Man
image source: mylondon.com
Man O Man showed us that 90s TV could put men through their beauty paces just as much as women – and for this show, we saw a line of male contestants posing in front of a swimming pool and being rated by women before they were pushed into the water if they lost. Brilliant telly!
2. Don’t Try This At Home
image source: bolddog.com
But we bet you did anyway, didn’t you? Either way, it was great TV. Presented by the one and only Davina McCall, this show went out at prime time Saturday night and let us watch the general public make fools of themselves as they tried a series of crazy challenges.
3. Hetty Wainthropp Investigates
image source: bbc.com
We best know Patricia Routledge for her role in another iconic TV show, Keeping Up Appearances – but she also appeared as the title character in Hetty Wainthropp Investigates, the 90s show that saw Hetty taking up solving crimes that the police didn’t want to bother with – set in rural England, of course!
4. Ground Force
image source: hulllive.com
Home renovation series were peak 90s – they just never got old, and they were everywhere. Ground Force was another one, though this time it focused on garden renovation rather than home updates. We’d sit back and enjoy as a team of builders and gardeners transformed outside spaces and inspired us to do things we knew we were too lazy to do.
5. The Thin Blue Line
image source: comedy.co.uk
Rowan Atkinson and Ben Elton have always been a match made in sitcom heaven, and The Thin Blue Line was absolute proof of that. The tragedy of this show was that it didn’t run for very long – but maybe that’s what makes it so perfect: that it never went on for far too long like most sitcoms!
6. Sunburn
image source: imdb.com
BBC dramas set in sunny countries were always the best kind of TV in the 90s! We loved a bit of drama happening on a holiday resort, and Sunburn was no different. This show followed the ups and downs of a group of holiday reps as they worked in the Algarve: perfection!
7. The Grimleys
image source: hampshirelive.com
Some of the best TV shows follow an everyday family, and The Grimleys was set in the Midlands in the 70s and starred TV royalty Amanda Holden, and was written by the same mind behind Line of Duty. This comedy drama was one of the most underrated shows of the 90s!
8. The Cruise
image source: bbc.co.uk
Jane McDonald is still going with her luxury cruise journeys, as we know – but back in the 90s, her show was a novelty when she was just starting out with it. And nothing’s better than watching someone else live your dreams going on trips you can’t afford, right?
9. House Doctor
image source: imdb.com
Before the time of the doctor named House, there was House Doctor – and an entirely different premise, at that. House Doctor was another home renovation series, but it wasn’t like others – it saw an expert property stylist come to the rescue of people struggling to sell their homes.
10. Peak Practice
image source: uktvplay.com
There were so many dramas in the 90s set in GP practices, and they were usually always in really remote locations with one or two doctors on call. But that doesn’t mean we didn’t love each and every one of them! Peak Practice was quite literally peak TV, and had some great cast members, too.
11. Talking Telephone Numbers
image source: youtube.com
Another big win for 90s TV was game shows – we just couldn’t get enough of them! But you probably forgot about this old gem. Talking Telephone Numbers would let viewers win money based on their phone number – back before we had too much anxiety about picking up the phone!
12. The Frank Skinner Show
image source: wikipedia.org
There were many comedians in the 90s trying their hands at their own talk shows, too, but Frank Skinner was one who got it right. The show was so successful it’s even still going on today as a podcast radio show, and originally the 90s chat show saw Skinner interview a wealth of entertaining guests.
13. The Animals of Farthing Wood
image source: digitalspy.com
What on the surface looked like a cute kid’s TV show about animals making their own way in the world was actually something much darker – but it still captured our hearts in the 90s. There was an important message there, after the animals had to find a new place when having their habitats destroyed by humans.
14. Bernard’s Watch
image source: thesun.co.uk
We’ve all wished to have the power to stop time, haven’t we? And way before Marvel and the Infinity Stones, Bernard and his watch was what you had to watch (heh) out for. This was such a great show – though in the end he only stopped time for boring reasons, like doing an exam, rather than world domination.
15. SMTV Live
image source: digitalspy.com
Was there anything we loved more in the 90s than getting up on a Saturday morning and watching Ant and Dec play Wonky Donkey while we had our cereal? This show defined an era, and it was so good that if it was back on today we’d still watch it with all the same love we used to have for it!
16. Sabrina the Teenage Witch
image source: teenvogue.com
This was a 90s defining TV show for young girls growing up. How many of us went into our wardrobes and wished it was a portal to elsewhere? Or pointed our ‘magic’ fingers at everything we saw? Sabrina was such an iconic TV show it still has newer versions being made today.
17. Absolutely Fabulous
image source: britishcomedyguide.com
Ab Fab remains one of the best comedies out there, and it was the best of 90s TV. With comedy leads as legendary as Joanna Lumley and Jennifer Saunders, and writing from the mind of Dawn French, it followed the wild adventures of Eddy and her best friend, Patsy.
18. Gladiators
image source: theguardian.co.uk
We all loved Wolf, right? There was nothing like watching him stir up a bit of drama with the contestants. This was one of the best shows on TV for family dinner entertainment – we all had our favorites, and we were definitely cheering the contestants on as they took on these athletic giants.
19. Noel’s House Party
image source: themirror.co.uk
You either have fond memories of Mr Blobby, or you still have nightmares – there’s no in between. Noel’s House Party was one of those TV shows that just sticks with you – mainly because it birthed the huge pink and yellow-spotted inflatable with eerily-jiggling eyes.
20. Only Fools and Horses
image source: gold.uktv.co.uk
Possibly one of the best sitcoms to come from any era, this was definitely one of the best of 90s TV – nothing could compete with David Jason’s legendary performance and even now we can still hear the voices of Rodney and Del Boy. It also cemented the three-wheeled yellow Reliant Regal as one of the best TV cars of all time!
