Rhoda: Season One

Image credit: CBS /Landov

Valerie Harper and David Groh in season 1 of Rhoda

Just because single gal Rhoda (Valerie Harper) was married off midseason didn't make the sitcom any less revolutionary. Rhoda, the Mary Tyler Moore Show spin-off in which Mary's pal moves back to New York, had her talking about birth control with little sister Brenda (The Simpsons' Julie Kavner), showed Rhoda and new hubby Joe (David Groh) in bed (seemingly nude), and regularly took a feminist bent. Like contemporaries Maude and All in the Family, it embraced controversy — even if 
Rhoda now looks abashed: Time degraded the series' master tapes; that's why Valerie Harper looks red-faced in ep 11, when Rhoda thinks she's pregnant. A–