TOP 5: The best TV series debuts of 2013

Here's our list of our top 5 this year television series debuts. These rankings were not based upon critical assessments or box-office performance but the actual pageviews by unique monthly users of newseasonsseries.blogspot.com.

1. Elementary

Original air date: February 3, 2013
Detective Sherlock Holmes, along with his sober companion, Dr. Joan Watson, uses his uncanny ability to read people and analyze crimes to assist the NYPD on some of their more difficult cases.

Elementary, Season 1. Episode Guide

Cast: Lucy Liu, Jonny Lee Miller, Aidan Quinn, Jon Michael Hill

2. Under the Dome

Under the Dome, Season 1. Episode Guide

Original air date: June 24, 2013 on CBS.
Under the Dome tells the story of the residents of the small town of Chester's Mill, who suddenly find themselves cut off from the rest of the world by a mysterious, impenetrable (but semipermeable) barrier that surrounds the town. As the town begins to tear itself apart through panic, a small group of people attempt to maintain peace and order while also trying to uncover the truth behind the barrier and how to escape from it.

Cast: Mike Vogel, Rachelle Lefevre, Natalie Martinez...

3. Devious Maids

The series follows the lives of five Beverly Hills Hispanic maids as they navigate through the messy lives of their wealthy and snobbish employers. Rosie (Dania Ramirez), a single mother who left her son back in Mexico when her husband died, works as the housemaid/nanny for a pair of self-absorbed and successful actors, Peri and Spence. Aspiring singer Carmen (Roselyn Sanchez) hopes that her new pop star employer Alejandro can help kick start her career, but Odessa, his very loyal and humorless Russian housekeeper and her boss, will stop at nothing to stand in the way of her dreams. Zoila (Judy Reyes) is the senior maid for Genevieve, a co-dependent, drug-addicted, emotionally unstable wealthy woman. She works alongside her teenage daughter Valentina (Edy Ganem), who has a crush on Genevieve's son, Remi. Newcomer Marisol (Ana Ortiz), whose appearance, knowledge and lack of a Spanish accent does not fit the description of the four aforementioned maids, is hired to clean the home of Taylor, the insecure second wife to a wealthy man, named Michael, whose ex-wife is stalking him. The maids turn to one another for support when their friend and fellow maid Flora (Paula Garcés) is brutally murdered at the home of her employers, the shallow and secretive Evelyn and Adrian Powell, at the biggest society event of the year just moments after she was supposedly raped by Adrian, which Evelyn believed was an affair and blamed Flora for having seduced Adrian.
Cast: Roselyn Sanchez, Edy Ganem, Ana Ortiz, Dania Ramirez and Judy Reyes

4. Vikings

Filmed in Ireland, Vikings is inspired by the tales about the Viking Ragnar Lodbrok, one of the best-known Norse heroes and notorious as the scourge of France and England. It portrays Ragnar as a Viking farmer who pioneers the first daring raids into England with the support of fellow warriors, his brother Rollo, and his wife, the shieldmaiden Lagertha.
Stars: Travis Fimmel, Katheryn Winnick, Clive Standen

5. Hannibal

 

Original air date: June 24, 2013 on CBS.
The series is based on characters and elements appearing in the novel Red Dragon by Thomas Harris and focuses on the budding relationship between FBI special investigator Will Graham and Dr. Hannibal Lecter, a forensic psychiatrist destined to become Graham's most cunning enemy.
Cast: Hugh Dancy, Mads Mikkelsen, Caroline Dhavernas