1. Michael Scott - The Office
Since discovering The Office, Steve Carell has quickly become one of my three favorite actors of all-time. The range he showed in that series still continues to amaze me, and he's been off the show for two years. In the early years of "The Office", the show relied heavily on subtle humor, and few people are better at that than Carell. Whether it be facial expressions, looks to the camera, or little comments, pretty much everything Michael Scott did was absolutely hilarious. He played it a lot differently to the skin-crawling awkwardness of Ricky Gervais' David Brent, but with no compromise on the success of the character, and indeed that choice has proved inspired, in avoiding direct comparison. When he left toward the end of Season 7, the show fell apart, which speaks volumes about how much the series relied on him. I strongly believe Mr. Scott is the best television character of all-time, and nobody but Carell could have pulled it off.