The TV Moments That Revealed the Truth About America

As the United States approaches its 250th birthday, we're asking TV insiders—actors, creators, critics, and enthusiasts—to tell us about small-screen moments they think capture something essential about America right now. For TIME TV critic Judy Berman, for example, insight can be found in the atomic opus that is the centerpiece of Twin Peaks: The Return, the 2017 coda to David Lynch's saga, which recreates, in majestic and surreal slow motion, the first nuclear detonation. "Born in that Nevada desert in 1945 is a uniquely American form of evil that festers behind the quaint, small-town facades built in the decades that followed to help us forget it," she says. "But Lynch was no fatalist; The Return insists that good still exists in our nation’s soul, if we could only defeat our denial and fight for it."

The 25 responses below range across genres, from reality TV to classic sitcoms to era-defining live news broadcasts; they take us from real-life California to fictional Queens, N.Y., and even, in a moment that spoke to several of our respondents, to outer space. Here, they explain how TV holds up a mirror to this moment.

Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl Halftime Show

Selected by Kathryn Hahn
Bad Bunny’s 2026 Super Bowl halftime show felt like watching the sunrise: It glowed with optimism and faith. It was a joyful, generous reminder of the dream that is America—the one that we deserve to live in, each and every one of us. As the sign behind him flashed: “The only thing more powerful than hate is love.” Indeed. 
Hahn is an actor who can be seen in The Studio on Apple TV+ and in the upcoming movies Tangled and Madden.

Saturday Night Live’s first show post-9/11

Selected by Tony Hale
My wife was a makeup artist on Saturday Night Live, and there is still much for the country to learn from the show’s return after 9/11—firefighters onstage, Paul Simon singing “The Boxer,” and Lorne Michaels asking Rudy Giuliani if it was okay to be funny (prompting the response, “Why start now?”). It captured a moment when the country felt briefly, genuinely united. Watching it now, it feels less like history and more like something we’re trying to find our way back to.
Hale is an actor who can be seen in the upcoming movies Toy Story 5 and Office Romance.

The attack on funny

Selected by Alan Alda
The push to silence political humor on television is a pretty good snapshot of where we are right now. Jimmy Kimmel almost lost his program but was saved, as everyday people pointedly stopped paying money to the company that owns his network. Stephen Colbert’s late-night show has been shut down for, the network says, “financial" reasons. This is not such a trivial thing. It’s a cycle we’ve seen before. First, they take your jokes away. Then they take your thoughts away. And then they take you away.
Alda is an actor, filmmaker, and the host of the Clear+Vivid with Alan Alda podcast.

News broadcasts of the No Kings marches

Selected by Liza Colón-Zayas
An estimated eight million people nationwide showed up to No Kings rallies on March 28, 2026. As I was flipping through cable news channels that day, I was so blown away and heartened by the turnout across the country, and the world. I had been taking a break from the 24-hour news cycle because it was too depressing, but seeing the country stand up gave me hope.
Colón-Zayas is an actor who can be seen in The Bear on FX and in the upcoming movie Spider-Man: Brand New Day.

The Simpsons: Season 4, Episode 21 — “Marge in Chains”

Selected by Gillian Anderson
There’s a reason so many academics love The Simpsons: Few works of satire capture social realities so succinctly. When the show reaches for the most absurd joke imaginable, it often ends up predicting the future. “Marge in Chains” remains eerily relevant 33 years after it aired. From Bart writing “I do not have diplomatic immunity” on the chalkboard to absurd consumer products (a car chandelier, sunscreen that doubles as a laxative), pandemic misinformation, and performative leadership—the President delivering a public-health address from a beach holiday—the episode feels uncomfortably contemporary. Add a rioter convinced that swallowing a bee will ward off illness, Ned Flanders blaming Married... with Children for God giving his son the flu, a women’s prison presented like a lifestyle brand, Marge shoplifting her way out of hardship, and a household collapsing without unpaid domestic labor, and the satire still lands with startling precision.
Anderson is an actor who stars in the film Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma, in theaters Aug. 7; her new book More: Sexual Fantasies by Anonymous will be available Sept. 15.

Bill Clinton playing sax on The Arsenio Hall Show

Selected by Daymond John
When I saw Bill Clinton play the saxophone on The Arsenio Hall Show, it was the first time I felt like a President could also be just a regular American. He came from Little Rock, Ark., a place that understood struggle and everyday people. He showed up on a Black late-night show, not as a politician, but as one of us. That moment made America feel more connected, and reminded me that what makes this country powerful is not our differences, but the moments when we recognize ourselves in one another.
John is an investor on ABC’s Shark Tank, CEO and founder of branding firm The Shark Group, and co-founder and CEO of Fubu.

NASA’s televised Artemis II launch

Selected by Lester Holt 
The successful April 1 launch of NASA’s Artemis II mission to the moon ushers in a new era of possibilities and an American future where big things suddenly feel within reach. Though the mission was in many ways an encore of the Apollo days, this feels different, as we extend our reach to not just the moon but what lies beyond, igniting the imaginations of those who watched—and shaping the America we are today.
Holt is the anchor of Dateline NBC.

The Comeback finale

Selected by Lena Waithe
The Comeback ends its third and final season with a message: No AI was used in the writing of this series. The show has always been ahead of its time, but this episode is both a goodbye and a warning. Valerie Cherish is a mirror for us, and for our society that pretends to be OK even though it’s not. AI is here and we're all pretending as if everything is OK—even though we know it's not and probably never will be again.
Waithe is a writer, producer, actor, and the creator of The Chi on Paramount+.

Kamala Harris' televised 2024 DNC speech

Selected by Phoebe Robinson
Despite the daily chaos we find ourselves in, that moment from 2024 speaks to the possibility and the potential of who we can be as a country: the positivity, hope, intelligence. It's easy to get cynical, which is why it's important to remember and celebrate what's uplifting and not just what's inflammatory.
Robinson is an actor, writer, and comedian. Her fall stand-up tour is Feral and Fired Up!

ICE agents invade HBO Max's The Pitt

Selected by Henry Jenkins 
The Pitt represents what is best about contemporary American television: a cast that reflects the diversity of today's health care workers, story lines that deal fearlessly with topical concerns, scripts that respect the intelligence of their audience, and performances that bring nuanced characters to life. The sequences during which masked and hulking ICE officers bring one battered woman to the hospital for emergency attention, causing other patients and some workers to flee out of anxiety, after which a nurse gets arrested for standing up for the rights of the patient, mirror the divisiveness that surrounds immigration policy today. The producers created this story line despite anticipating pressure from their network and backlash from more conservative fans, suggesting the ways that popular media becomes a battleground in a polarized country.
Jenkins is a media scholar, author, and professor at the University of Southern California.

Law & Order: SVU’s Season 27 finale

Selected by Peter Jankowski
We could all use more hope and heroism these days, and no one embodies these two qualities more than Mariska Hargitay. She is one of our better angels, both on and off the screen. The finale of her 27th season portraying Captain Olivia Benson on Law & Order: SVU continues to make her an indelible part of the cultural landscape—and it aired just weeks after she announced that her campaign for rape-kit reform had successfully led to legislation in all 50 states, a reminder of the connection between life and art. Mariska always delivers.
Jankowski is president and COO of Wolf Entertainment. 

The “Hot-Dog Car” sketch from I Think You Should Leave with Tim Robinson

Selected by Ali Barthwell
I know it might seem like a stretch that a three-minute sketch about a man in a hot-dog costume driving a hot-dog-shaped car into a men’s clothing store represents what Alexis de Tocqueville called “The Great Experiment.” But, honestly, what is more American than pretending we don’t know exactly who caused all this wreckage, letting that person wax poetic about the grace and leniency they should receive and the ills of society, and then watching them escape arrest? Plus, everybody loves hot dogs. 
Barthwell is a writer for HBO’s Last Week Tonight with John Oliver and the author of Reality TV Snobs: Everything You Need to Know About the Shows You’re Too Intellectual to Watch, available Aug. 25.

Will Smith slaps Chris Rock at the 2022 Oscars

Selected by Danzy Senna
Will Smith walked on stage, struck another man on live television, returned to his seat, and won the Oscar. The audience gave him a standing ovation. That's the American moment—not the violence itself, but the bystander effect writ large: our continuation of business as usual in the face of power unchecked. All of us back to our popcorn.
Senna is a novelist and essayist. Her latest book is Colored Television.

Zelensky's televised Oval Office meeting (Feb. 28, 2025)

Selected by Mary-Louise Parker
Demanding thanks from someone you’ve humiliated is the move of any sniveling lacky—a LeFou, a Smithers, or our Vice President, JD Vance, who commanded gratitude from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky during their televised meeting. "Have you said 'thank you' once?" Vance snarled. The government seemed run by two frat brothers, as it did when the President referred to Somalis as "garbage" and Vance was seen banging on the table in agreement before giving a fist pump. This moment in history needs a grown-up to challenge Trump's inhumanity, but no one calls out the head of the fraternity. They only chug what they're handed.
Parker is an actor who can be seen in the upcoming movie Young George Washington.

President Lyndon Baines Johnson signing the Civil Rights Act into law on July 2, 1964

Selected by Connie Chung 
When President LBJ signed the Civil Rights Act into law in 1964, live on television, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission was created to enforce Title VII, which declared job discrimination unlawful. That busted the barriers for women and minorities such as myself who were entering white male-dominated professions. I hope that impact carries forth today and in the future.
Chung is a journalist, author, and the first co-anchor of the CBS Evening News.

The Artemis II splashdown

Selected by Katie Couric
At a time when diversity has been demonized, the crew of Artemis II actually looked like America. Their mission unified the country, demonstrated the power of teamwork, and watching it made us believe we can reach for the stars and the moon. 
Couric is the founder of Katie Couric Media and host of Next Question.

The July 5, 2000, premiere of Big Brother

Selected by Susan Murray
This kicks off the American obsession with not just reality television but also a new type of celebrity, self-branding, a new openness to surveillance and engagement with the attention economy, and, ultimately, a new form of politician and political discourse that defines our current moment.
Murray is a professor of media, culture, and communication at New York University and the author of Bright Signals: A History of Color Television.

The Morning Show’s take on current events

Selected by Retta
The Morning Show as a series is one of the more obvious reflections of where we are right now in the United States: It tackles real-world subjects like sexual misconduct and the #MeToo movement, the pandemic, the changing media landscape, Jan. 6, corporate greed, and the perils of AI. The Morning Show takes advantage of great writers and storytellers to paint a picture of some of the mess we are currently trudging through.
Retta is an actor, comedian, and the host of HGTV’s Ugliest House in America.

The 1971 debut of All in the Family

Selected by Alan Sepinwall
Norman Lear's adaptation of the British generation-gap sitcom Till Death Us Do Part transformed the way television talked about current events, as well as the kinds of characters seen on TV. (Tony Soprano and Walter White don't exist without Archie Bunker.) But in its depiction of the stubborn war of words between bigoted conservative Archie and liberal son-in-law Mike—and in the way viewers applied their own political affiliations to determine whose side they thought Lear was on—All in the Family was one of the earliest pop culture depictions of the kind of completely siloed sociopolitical hellscape in which we live today. 
Sepinwall is a television critic and author. He runs the site What's Alan Watching? His biography of Twilight Zone creator Rod Serling will be released in October. 

Broadcasts of the Artemis II mission

Selected by Ted Danson
On April 2, 2026, while traveling toward the moon during the Artemis II mission, astronaut Victor Glover reflected to Gio Benitez of ABC News, “From up here, you look like one thing: Homo sapiens…all of us…we’re all one people.” It was especially inspiring considering that, down here, there were Homo sapiens who were threatening that “a whole civilization will die tonight.”
Danson is an actor who can be seen in the Netflix series A Man on the Inside.

The Boys comes to Amazon Prime

Selected by Trixie Mattel
I read these books and watched the show, about corrupt superheroes whose crimes are hidden by a huge corporation, and they definitely spoke to this moment. This series is really deep-frying America.
Mattel is a drag queen, cosmetics entrepreneur, reality TV star, musician, and DJ.

Dr. Robby explains Ho’oponopono on HBO Max’s The Pitt

Selected by Constance Wu
In Season 1, Episode 4 of The Pitt, Dr. Robby explains Ho'oponopono, a Hawaiian phrase describing the four things that matter most when saying goodbye to a loved one. As he relays it: I love you. Thank you. I forgive you. Please forgive me. Technology's rapid growth is accelerating the death of our old ways, and so America is in a stage of grief. Noah Wyle's character’s words represent the best we can do for one another in this time.
Wu is an actor who can be seen in the series Not Suitable for Work on Hulu and Prime Video’s The Terminal List, as well as the upcoming movie Happy Hours.

The Earth setting behind the moon, filmed from the Artemis II

Selected by David Benioff 
Watching the Earthset, filmed by astronaut Reid Wiseman—on an iPhone!—made me proud of our country (and our species). Despite our deep divisions, we launched a ship that sailed behind the moon and came all the way home, carrying three American heroes. (And a Canadian one—maybe we should be friends?) In a season of bad news, it somehow made sense that astronauts showed us how to rise above the chaos and see the world anew.
Benioff is a screenwriter, novelist, and the co-creator of Game of Thrones. He is currently a showrunner on Netflix’s 3 Body Problem and recently executive produced the limited series Death by Lightning.

Coverage of Governor Schwarzenegger’s 2005 veto of California’s marriage equality bill

Selected by George Takei
On Thursday, Sept. 29, 2005, my partner Brad and I—we would not be legally married until 2008—sat in the kitchen of our Los Angeles home watching CNN as Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, a fellow actor who had courted gay and lesbian voters, vetoed AB 849, the Religious Freedom and Civil Marriage Protection Act, the first marriage equality bill ever passed by a U.S. state legislature. I was so enraged by that televised act of political cowardice and hypocrisy that I sat down with Frontiers magazine, used the interview to publicly blast the veto, and—at the age of 68, after a lifetime in the closet—came out as a gay man, knowing full well that such a disclosure could have ended my career as a working actor in an industry that was still deeply wary of out gay performers. That is what feels essentially American about where this country is going: A single cable news broadcast can still move a citizen to risk everything for the truth, and our democracy moves forward only when ordinary people decide they will no longer be silent.
Takei is an actor, activist, and author of, among other books, the graphic memoir It Rhymes With Takei.

The Biden-Trump Debate of 2024

Selected by D.B. Weiss
It’s hard to think of a television event that had a bigger impact on U.S. and world history than the Biden-Trump debate of 2024. Of course, there’s no way of knowing what would have happened had it gone differently. But within an hour—if it even took that long—the end of a sitting President’s campaign in a close re-election race became inevitable. It’s enough to make you think twice before going on television. Or even doing a magazine interview.
D. B. Weiss is a producer and screenwriter who co-created Game of Thrones. He is currently a showrunner on Netflix's 3 Body Problem and recently executive produced the limited series Death by Lightning.