My goodness, what an effort! With each passing year it seems more and more difficult to compile this list of best and worst seen on TV. It may be the years that pass… but not so much for me, especially for a television that appears older and older, less and less inclined to the new. And the difficulties arise not so much in finding the best (come on! in an entire year something good comes out), but in defining the worst because it also stands out downwards on a basis of ugliness so intense and widespread it becomes a feat.
So let’s start from here, let’s get it out of the way.
1. On the podium of horrors, the steps are up to you, you can’t miss it Sunday in in its fiftieth anniversary season. It is clear that carrying forward a program for half a century is a feat. From the years of its birth and those of its splendor, when it was hosted by Corrado, Damato, Baudo or Boncompagni and the guests were the most famous and interesting actors, directors and musicians, everything has changed. Television, its forms of consumption, the public and even Sundays have changed maybe it doesn’t exist anymore. But how sad to see what was a stage sparkling with lights, colours, games and dances replaced by a miserable local TV studio filled with good feelings and chatter. Talk and badge, as that guy said… In fact there is also a useless debate to justify the presence of I see
2. A place on the podium should be reserved for a strange matter rather than for a program or a character. As you know, a few weeks after the start Dancing with the stars has undergone a small shift in the schedule from 8.40pm to 9.30pm on Saturdays. Reason? The extraordinary success in that prime time access segment of Your business, the parcel program ably conducted by Stefano De Martino. Since the Saturday night battle between Rai 1 and Canale 5 is particularly this year compelling, played on decimals, it was thought that the presence of a very popular towing could allow a Dancing to surpass the competitor. Now I’m not a huge fan of Dancing with the starstoo much chatter, too many artificial conflicts. But good God, that a solid, tested programme, based on an international format, a talent show with its own interesting content, dance, to counteract the antics of Canale 5, has to ask for help in towing the parcels, is a sign that the world is going backwards (even if Vannacci didn’t notice this).
3. The last of the worst moments of 2025 could also be in the other sector, that of the best. Let me explain: I really appreciate it Massimo Cacciari as a philosopher and as a political commentator, but I get the most enthusiasm when he gets angry and defines other people’s opinions or decisions as “bullshit”. Whores is a somewhat obsolete word, it was popular in my high school days (the sixties to be clear), later replaced by other terms: bullshit (always green), bullshit, bullshit (very current). So when I hear him pronounce that slightly vintage word with his Venetian inflection I find it irresistible.
One fine morning last spring he was forced to repeat it several times during the Rai 3 information program ReStart conducted with a flamboyant Tuscan accent by Annalisa Bruchi. To her and the other guests who were explaining the reasons why rearmament must continue to prevent Russia from invading all of Europe up to Lisbon, Cacciari offers only one objection: it is just bullshit and it is shameful that such bullshit is fed to public opinion. To which the very perceptive presenter opposes, revealing that this is nothing less than the position of a phantom American ambassador to NATO. Here, reiterates Cacciari, they are really bullshit, creating the right one aura of ridiculousness around the certainties peddled on talk shows.
And now let’s move on to the blackboard of good.
1. There is no doubt about the best program of the year. The winner is without a doubt and in a big way the show is a tribute to his father Paolo Jannacci made at the Arcimboldi theater and broadcast on Rai 3 on 27 August, not exactly a happy date. It is the most beautiful program because for once TV becomes a simple witness to an event without imposing its choices, its times, its rhythms, its characters. Thus, they parade on the stage, alongside famous artists, musicians unknown to the general public with forgotten pieces by the great Enzo. At a certain point he also arrives Ornella Vanoni who plays a Ma mi of an extraordinary intensity, giving you goosebumps. Well, if we really want to remember Ornella, those three minutes are worth more than her last Ma mi of all the words freely spoken and written on the occasion of his passing.
2. Then you can’t miss out on a mention for Crozza and his band, in which the skill of Andrea Zalone. A mention for his courage, his obstinacy and his insistence on denouncing the wrongdoings and malpractices of politics. Some say that we laugh less this year and perhaps that’s true. Perhaps a bit of comedy is sacrificed in favor of the analysis of contradictions, of indignation, of the revelation of the absurd. However, Minister Urso’s speeches and Recalcati’s psychoanalysis alone are worth the price of the ticket.
3. Finally, among the good things I can’t help but remember an episode. It’s the evening of the final of Champions and it’s over as everyone knows. During the post-match special on Sky Federica Masolin in the role of presenter she talks with Luis Enrique, the great winner of the match. But with him, as we know, the conversation cannot fail to focus on the tragedy of the death of his daughter while she was still a child, on her terrible experience faced with great nobility of soul. But Masolin, who is pregnant, understandably can’t handle the emotion and bursts into tears that she doesn’t show, trying to get out of the frame. To resolve the delicate situation, taking charge of the interview, he thinks about it, as a great gentleman, Esteban Cambiasso. Here it is: sometimes it happens that you actually come across truth TV.
