With our next pick, we do not want to wait any longer to ensure our namesake winds up on Team Emerald City... Thus, we are proud to select, the first ever one-hour HBO show, one that paved the way for The Sopranos... A series that launched the careers of an unbelievable number of future television stars -
everyone was on this show at one point or another. Not only a critical examination of the American system of crime and punishment, this series proved to be an abstract, theoretical examination of the very nature of these concepts. What exactly is a criminal, and who deserves to judge one as such?....
Oz!
As noted, virtually every Oz alum went on to starring (or at least character roles) is future network shows.. To name a few: Harold Perrineau, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje (Lost), Christopher Meloni (Law&Order:SVU), JK Simmons (Law&Order, The Closer), Dean Winters (Rescue Me)
Oz may have even been more influential than The Sopranos, when thinking about the fact that there had
never been anything even close to it on TV before.