We asked some of this year’s notable authors, actors and showrunners about the TV they enjoyed most in 2016. Their responses will run through next week. Come back to Watching, The New York Times’s TV and movie recommendation site, to read them all.

Jenni Konner

Favorite TV Series: ‘Atlanta’ (FX)

I’ve been obsessed with Donald Glover since we cast him on an early episode of “Girls.” Lena [Dunham] and I quite literally stalked him down on his set, so impressed were we by his oddly whimsical presence on “Community” (and his alternate life as Childish Gambino). But with “Atlanta,” the obsession has risen to new heights.

Not only is he shedding light on a world so many viewers don’t know or understand (the true definition of diversity on television), but he’s also exploding the form at the same time. Let’s call him the Lydia Davis of half-hour comedies — some of his stories are long, some are short, some aren’t even stories at all, but every one leaves you gasping with laughter and surprise. (Add “Atlanta” to your Watchlist.)

— Jenni Konner is an executive producer on “Girls.”

Donald Glover in “Atlanta.” Mathias Clamer/FX

Cheo Hodari Coker

Favorite TV Series: ‘Atlanta’ (FX)

Donald Glover blows me away. The brother has so much talent, I fear for his safety. (After losing Prince, we should put him in Bubble Wrap.) He’s playing young Lando Calrissian, he made a Childish Gambino record that’s the bastard child of Funkadelic’s “Maggot Brain” and Sly and The Family Stone’s “There’s a Riot Goin’ On,” but, oh, his day job is showrunning, writing, producing, directing and acting on one of the most groundbreaking shows about the black experience I’ve ever seen? Just one of those things would be remarkable, but all three? Simultaneously? Between Donald and Issa [Rae] I need to step my rap game up. Being a mere showrunner doesn’t cut it. (smile).

What makes “Atlanta” the best show of its kind since the Richard Pryor Show or the Chappelle Show is the subtlety of the humor (“Lemon Pepper, Wet”), the specific and perfect song choices (“This Masquerade,” “Elevators”), the naturalistic acting (Lakeith Stanfield and Brian Tyree Henry are perfection), clever turns on black classism and Shade (the entire “Juneteenth” episode), and the fact that the show never explains itself. Either you get the joke, or you’re the mark. (“B.A.N.?” “Black Justin Bieber?”) I thought I’d get the Slow Clap and the Raised Black Fist for getting Wu-Tang past Marvel and Netflix. How in the hell is Donald getting away with the N-word and the F-word on basic cable and convincing sponsors to allow him to rebrand real products to fit the confines of his fictional world? Donald Glover Jedi Mind-Tricked FX into making the most subversive meditation on race since Ralph Ellison’s “Invisible Man,” and the world is his oyster. Slow Clap and Raised Fist, my brother. Eternal blackness and soul. (Add “Atlanta” to your Watchlist.)

— Cheo Hodari Coker is the showrunner on “Luke Cage.”

From left, Sasheer Zamata, Leslie Jones and Tom Hanks on “Saturday Night Live.” Will Heath/NBC

Joe Weisberg and Joel Fields

Favorite TV Series: ‘Saturday Night Live’ (NBC)

What an amazing season for “Saturday Night Live.” We felt like kids again discovering the show for the first time. When we went back and forth from the debate sketches to Trump’s tweeting about the debate sketches, the line between television and politics pretty much dropped away. The Tom Hanks episode was a particular favorite — from Tom’s putting on that sweater as “America’s Dad” to “Black Jeopardy,” everything was hysterically funny and unflinchingly topical. Forty-two years and counting … (Add “Saturday Night Live” to your Watchlist.)

— Joe Weisberg and Joel Fields are co-showrunners on “The Americans.”

Ben Whishaw in “London Spy.” WTTV Limited, via BBC America

Noah Hawley

Favorite TV Series: ‘London Spy’ (BBC America)

It was another great year for dramatic television, but I’d have to say the most unique and intriguing show I saw this year was “London Spy.” Beautifully shot, with a dark sense of intrigue, the show took the spy genre and turned it into a modern character study. Ben Whishaw’s performance as an unmoored gay man in London, who falls in love with the wrong man and finds himself pulled into a world he doesn’t understand, was compelling and pitch-perfect. (Add “London Spy” to your Watchlist.)

— Noah Hawley is the showrunner and creator of “Fargo” and “Legion.”

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Winona Ryder in “Stranger Things.” Netflix

Darren Star

Favorite TV Series: ‘Stranger Things’ (Netflix)

I thought “Stranger Things” nailed the Spielbergian trifecta of wonder, suspense and emotion. The scene when Winona Ryder obsessively strings her living room with Christmas lights to communicate with her missing son, Will, mirrors the perfect madness of Richard Dreyfuss compulsively building Devil’s Mountain in “Close Encounters.” It brought me back to the moment I fell in love with the movies. (Add “Stranger Things” to your Watchlist.)

— Darren Star has been the showrunner on “Younger” and “Sex and the City.”