17. Soap (ABC)
You've got to love it when a controversial show debuts amidst affiliate boycotts, then earns an Emmy nod. (It's something ABC, later home to NYPD Blue, knows a thing or two about.) Though the hoopla surrounding the soap satire (sex! murder! a gay man played by Billy Crystal!) had died down by this point, the second season, the storylines were still sufficiently sudsy. Enough to earn Robert Guillaume (No. 89 on EW and TV Land's list of the Top 100 TV icons) an Emmy — and a spin-off (Benson).
Seasons on DVD: All four