Television has been around for decades now. Heck, it’s almost been around for a whole century. The small screen has told all kinds of stories to viewers over the years. The formatting of TV shows allows shorter, but more frequent installments, meaning a story can be drawn out over a longer period of time, but told in small spurts so as not to overwhelm the audience with long runtimes. It covers a wide variety of genres, from fantasy to war.
Regardless of genre, a few TV shows over the years have established themselves as classics that refuse to grow old, either because of their outstanding quality or their heartfelt messages. Indeed, as the years have gone by, many of these shows have only gotten better and will likely continue to do so until the end of time. These are the most classic war-themed TV shows that have aged like a fine wine, and which don’t feel dated for even a moment.
6
‘The Winds of War’ (1983)
Robert Mitchum in The Winds of WarImage via ABC
Based on a novel of the same name by Herman Wouk, The Winds of War is a seven-part miniseries set during the Second World War. The story follows the lives of two fictional families, the Henrys and the Jastrows, and the roles they play in the looming conflict. Many of the family members’ lives intersect with some of the most famous events of the world’s deadliest conflict, shaping how the characters perceive the world and themselves.
While this miniseries didn’t do anything super daring or revolutionary, it did do a very good job with what it had, providing high-quality entertainment with a little sprinkle of history mixed in. Perhaps most importantly of all, it portrayed how war touches every aspect of human life, from soldiers to civilians. The war affected everything and everyone in one way or another, and it was completely inescapable. At the end of the day, this series still holds up in the modern day, remaining as high-quality and emotionally impactful as ever.
5
‘Tour of Duty’ (1987–1990)
A group of soldiers stands in a line in Tour of Duty, one holds a gun over their shoulder and there are sandbags in the background.Image via CBS
Tour of Duty is a series that explores a conflict not commonly addressed in the world of television: the Vietnam War. This conflict, which ran from 1955 until 1975, was a period of civil war in Vietnam that pitted capitalist factions against communist factions. It served as a proxy conflict during the Cold War, with the US heavily intervening in an effort to stop the communists from winning. However, this effort was highly unsuccessful. The result was that the conflict became incredibly unpopular with the American public, as many felt their country had no business being in Vietnam in the first place.
Tour of Duty is such a classic because it was the first TV show to actually depict the combat conditions in South Vietnam, bringing the horrors of the war to the small screen. It even won an Emmy Award, along with two additional nominations. Though it isn’t as widely talked about now, Tour of Duty is still known as a timeless classic for its anti-war message and for how it depicts the public opinion about the conflict at the time. This one just refuses to age and is only getting more relevant as the years go by.
4
‘Combat!’ (1962–1967)
Pierre Jalbert and Rick Jason as Caje and Lt. Hanley, wearing war gear and looking wary in Combat!Image via ABC
Combat! is widely considered to be the first war drama TV show to ever reach American audiences. While it’s hard to pinpoint the first one ever made, Combat! is likely a close contender for this spot, as well. The series is set at the height of World War II, following the lives of an American infantry unit serving in France. At the time, no one had ever seen anything this large-scale on television before, as the show brought massive battles and frontline action to the small screen.
Sure, people were accustomed to seeing this kind of thing in movies, but seeing it in one’s own home on their personal TV was a whole new world. Even today, the scale of Combat! is really impressive, and can easily wow anyone with how it portrayed World War II combat. It’s heroic, action-packed, emotionally intelligent, and entertaining all around, even 60 years after it first aired. This is bound to stay a classic in the future, no question about it.
3
‘Roots’ (1977)
Leslie Uggams standing in front of Richard Roundtree in Roots 1977 miniseries.Image via ABC
Rootsisn’t entirely about war, but much of it does take place during the American Civil War, so it still counts. For the most part, this miniseries is about the practice of slavery throughout the United States of America, especially during the 19th Century. The practice was more prevalent in the South, though it was, at one point, much more widespread. To get the appeal of this show, one must understand that this came out when the internet didn’t exist, so information about the cruelties of slavery wasn’t something everyone had at their fingertips. Sure, people knew about slavery, but Roots forced them to confront the really nasty details about it, ones that were often left out of history books.
Roots didn’t just serve as an eye-opener—it spawned entire academic debates and discussions about race relations, and how the effects of slavery carried over into modern society. While this is a horrible thing to have to confront, it’s a necessary truth that all should be aware of. That’s probably why Roots is only getting better with age: because its message is so timeless. After all, those who don’t learn from history are doomed to repeat it, so Roots plays an important role in delivering that history in an easy-to-consume way, ensuring that the practice never happens again.
Collider Exclusive · Oscar Best Picture Quiz Which Oscar Best Picture Is Your Perfect Movie? Parasite · Everything Everywhere · Oppenheimer · Birdman · No Country
Five Oscar Best Picture winners. Five completely different visions of what cinema can be — and what it can do to you. One of them is the film that was made for the way your mind works. Ten questions will figure out which one.
🪜Parasite 🌀Everything Everywhere ☢️Oppenheimer 🐦Birdman 🪙No Country for Old Men
01 What kind of film experience do you actually want? The best movies don’t just entertain — they leave something behind.
02 Which idea grabs you most in a film? Great films are driven by a central obsession. What’s yours?
03 How do you like your story told? Form is content. The way a story is shaped changes what it means.
04 What makes a truly great antagonist? The opposition defines the protagonist. What kind of opposition fascinates you?
05 What do you want from a film’s ending? The final note is the one that lingers. What do you want it to sound like?
06 Which setting pulls you in most? Where a film takes place shapes everything — mood, stakes, what’s even possible.
07 What cinematic craft impresses you most? Every great film has a signature — a technical or artistic element that makes it unmistakable.
08 What kind of main character do you root for? The protagonist is the lens. Who you choose to follow says something about you.
09 How do you feel about a film that takes its time? Pace is a choice. Some films sprint; others let tension accumulate slowly, deliberately.
10 What do you want to feel walking out of the cinema? The best films leave a mark. What kind of mark do you want?
The Academy Has Decided Your Perfect Film Is…
Your answers have pointed to one Oscar Best Picture winner above all others. This is the film that was made for the way your mind works.
Parasite
You are drawn to films that operate on multiple levels simultaneously — that begin in one genre and quietly, brilliantly migrate into another. Bong Joon-ho’s Parasite is a film about class, desire, and the architecture of inequality that manages to be darkly funny, deeply suspenseful, and genuinely shocking across a single extraordinary running time. Your instinct is for cinema that hides its true intentions until the moment it’s ready to reveal them. Parasite is exactly that — a film that rewards close attention and punishes assumptions, right up to its devastating final image.
Everything Everywhere All at Once
You want it all — and this film gives you all of it. The Daniels’ Everything Everywhere All at Once is one of the most maximalist films ever made: action comedy, multiverse sci-fi, family drama, existential crisis, and a genuinely earned emotional core that sneaks up on you amid the chaos. You are someone who responds to ambition, who doesn’t want cinema to choose between being entertaining and being meaningful. This film refuses that choice entirely. It is overwhelming by design, and its overwhelming nature is precisely the point — because the feeling of being crushed by infinite possibility is exactly what it’s about.
Oppenheimer
You are drawn to cinema on a grand scale — films that understand history not as a backdrop but as a force, and that place their characters inside that force and watch what happens. Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer is a film about the terrifying gap between what we can do and what we should do, told with the full weight of one of the most consequential moments in human history behind it. You want your films to feel important without feeling self-important — to earn their ambition through sheer craft and the gravity of their subject. Oppenheimer does exactly that. It is enormous, complicated, and refuses easy comfort.
Birdman
You are drawn to films that foreground their own construction — that make the how of the filmmaking part of the what it’s about. Alejandro González Iñárritu’s Birdman, shot to appear as a single continuous take, is cinema examining itself through the cracked mirror of a fading actor’s ego. You respond to formal daring, to the feeling that a film is doing something that probably shouldn’t be possible. Michael Keaton’s performance and Emmanuel Lubezki’s restless camera create something genuinely unlike anything else — a film that is simultaneously about creativity, relevance, self-destruction, and the impossibility of ever truly knowing if your work means anything at all.
No Country for Old Men
You are drawn to cinema that trusts silence, that refuses to explain itself, and that treats dread as a form of meaning. The Coen Brothers’ No Country for Old Men is a film about the arrival of a new kind of evil — implacable, arbitrary, and utterly indifferent to the moral frameworks we use to make sense of the world. It is one of the most formally controlled films ever made, and its controlled restraint is what makes it so terrifying. You want your films to haunt you, not comfort you. You are not interested in resolution if resolution would be dishonest. No Country for Old Men is honest in a way that most cinema never dares to be.
2
‘M*A*S*H’ (1972–1983)
Alan Alda as Hawkeye looking at an object with others behind him in M*A*S*H Season 1.Image via CBS
M*A*S*H is so unique because it’s inherently a comedy series, focusing on the lighter side of things rather than the inherent tragedy that is war. It’s not that tragic or emotional moments don’t happen; it’s just that the comedic ones take up a larger percentage of the runtime. The show is set during the Korean War, a conflict in the 1950s that has been largely forgotten. Rather than being about frontline combat, the show instead takes viewers to an American military hospital, where a group of surgeons and medics are dealing with the wounded.
M*A*S*H ran for a whopping 11 seasons. This isn’t unusual for a sitcom, but it’s certainly abnormal for a war TV show. But this is largely because of how revolutionary it was, rewriting the rules of the war genre and encouraging audiences to find the lighter side of things, even in the most trying times. To be frank, it’s something that people could do with a lot more of these days. Despite first airing over 50 years ago, M*A*S*H remains a classic well into the 21st century, and has seen a resurgence in popularity thanks to streaming services and on-demand viewing. It never gets old, and it likely never will.
1
‘Band of Brothers’ (2001)
Matthew Settle with a cigarette in his mouth looking at someone off-screen to the right in Band of Brothers, Day of DaysImage via HBO
Band of Brothersis the groundbreaking war miniseries that still stands as one of the greatest war TV shows ever made. The series was co-created by Stephen Spielberg and Tom Hanks, and is set during the Second World War. The story follows a squad of US Airborne Infantry who participate in some of the greatest and bloodiest battles of the war. From the D-Day landings in Normandy to the Battle of the Bulge, audiences won’t miss a second of the final Allied push to reclaim Fortress Europe from the clutches of the Third Reich.
The series is supplemented by interviews with actual World War II veterans, who tell their stories about the battles depicted in the miniseries. Approaching its 25th anniversary, Band of Brothers remains an extremely popular series known for its stellar portrayal of World War II’s brutal and chaotic combat. Even though it isn’t as old as some of the other entries on this list, it is clear that Band of Brothers will forever serve as a way of remembering and recreating the Second World War, keeping it fresh in the minds of many. Like a great big barrel of unopened wine, it has only gotten better and better with age, and will continue to do so.
