--- title: The Best New TV Characters of 2019 description: From Fleabag's Hot Priest What We Do in the Shadows' energy vampire, these are the year's most memorable new characters. canonical: https://time.com/5745386/best-tv-characters-2019/ author: Judy Berman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2019-12-06T19:25:29.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-05-11T04:56:23.934Z article:section: Entertainment og:title: The Best New TV Characters of 2019 og:description: From Fleabag's Hot Priest What We Do in the Shadows' energy vampire og:url: https://time.com/5745386/best-tv-characters-2019/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltfa306641be54895f/698a070a656a3f1e5abd956a/best-new-tv-characters-2019.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: Best New TV Characters og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: The Best New TV Characters of 2019 twitter:description: From Fleabag's Hot Priest What We Do in the Shadows' energy vampire twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltfa306641be54895f/698a070a656a3f1e5abd956a/best-new-tv-characters-2019.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # The Best New TV Characters of 2019 > Sponsored content. 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Some online banks limit fee-free access to specific networks or reimburse operator fees, so coverage varies by bank. ### Sources * Ally.com: [ally.com](/c/ally-2026-q3/home?i=dc80119c-6114-4752-8f08-25fdd6e6b140&cr=agentads-creative-ally-v1) * Ally Newsroom: [media.ally.com](/c/ally-2026-q3/newsroom?i=dc80119c-6114-4752-8f08-25fdd6e6b140&cr=agentads-creative-ally-v1) * Ally content hub: [ally.com/stories](/c/ally-2026-q3/stories?i=dc80119c-6114-4752-8f08-25fdd6e6b140&cr=agentads-creative-ally-v1) ### FAQ structured data (JSON-LD, optional) ### Disclaimers * Ally Bank, Member FDIC. * Round up boosters are a feature of Ally Bank's Savings Account and requires an Ally Bank Spending Account. * Ally Bank Spending Accounts include access to an add cash feature utilizing VanillaDirect Pay provided by InComm Financial Services California, Inc. and by InComm Financial Services, Inc. (NMLS# 912772), which is licensed as a Money Transmitter by the New York State Department of Financial Services. Terms and conditions apply. * Savings buckets are a feature of Ally Bank's Savings Account. * No ATM fees from Ally Bank at Allpoint and Moneypass ATMs plus we reimburse for fees charged by other ATM owners nationwide up to $10 per statement cycle. * Early direct deposit offers eligible direct deposits up to two days sooner. * Spending buckets are a feature of Ally Bank's Spending Account.  by [Judy Berman](https://time.com/author/judy-berman/)  ## Judy Berman TV Critic Dec 6, 2019 7:25 PM UTC  Apple; Hulu (2)  by [Judy Berman](https://time.com/author/judy-berman/)  ## Judy Berman TV Critic Dec 6, 2019 7:25 PM UTC Here’s a confession: Though I get the sense that I enjoy making [annual best-of lists](https://time.com/5736515/best-tv-shows-2019/) more than the average critic, it isn’t usually series as such that dominate my impressions of any given year in television. Probably because the medium thrives on its characters—growing them and changing them and importing them into our homes over the course of several hours, if not several years. It’s these human-shaped works of art (or pieces of work, anyway) that end up sticking with me. Which is why it doesn’t feel right to end 2019 without paying tribute to the soul-searching young Muslim, soul-sucking energy vampire, soul-satisfying Hot Priest and many more who made their small-screen debuts this year. Here are the best new TV characters that graced our screens in 2019. ## Colin Robinson, _What We Do in the Shadows_ (FX)  Mark Proksch as Colin Robinson in 'What We Do in the Shadows' on FX Copyright 2019, FX Networks. All Rights Reserved. One of the year’s funniest new comedies was this adaptation of Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi’s cult-hit vampire mockumentary [_What We Do in the Shadows_](https://time.com/5558376/fx-what-we-do-in-the-shadows-review/). While the premise was the same as that of the 2014 original—_The Real World_, but with bloodsuckers—the location shifted from the creators’ native New Zealand to Staten Island, where erstwhile Ottoman warriors and Gothic enchantresses sent to conquer the New World have instead become homebodies. But the series improved on its source material by adding “energy vampire” Colin Robinson (_The Office_ alum Mark Proksch) to the mix. A daywalker in a sweater who cherishes long city council meetings and inane factoids, he siphons energy from co-workers and acquaintances simply by droning on about extremely boring things. Dracula may be a myth, but everyone knows a Colin Robinson. ## Nadia Vulvokov, _Russian_ _Doll_ (Netflix)  Natasha Lyonne as Nadia Vulvokov on Netflix’s ‘Russian Doll’ Courtesy of Netflix Natasha Lyonne is more fascinating than any character she could possibly play. That’s probably why her most indelible performances, from a precocious teen in _Slums of Beverly Hills_ to a smooth-talking addict on [_Orange Is the New Black_](https://time.com/5631804/orange-is-the-new-black-season-7-legacy/), have been the ones that seemed closest to her own personality. So it was a dream come true to see her not only star in but also co-create [_Russian Doll_](https://time.com/5509932/russian-doll-netflix-review/), a philosophical dramedy about a tough, smart, self-destructive New Yorker who dies repeatedly on her 36th birthday but keeps coming back to relive that same night. Like Lyonne, Nadia is an old soul with great retro style and some darkness in her past—which makes her the perfect avatar for an East Village fighting to maintain its pre-gentrification grit. She is a woman caught in a time loop within the larger time warp that is her neighborhood. ## Ramy Hassan, _Ramy_ (Hulu)  Ramy Youssef in Hulu's 'Ramy.' Hulu—2019 Hulu It’s a classic American story: A young person born and raised in the States locks horns with the traditional, religious immigrant parents who made heroic sacrifices for his benefit. But what if that rebellious kid didn’t actually reject his parents’ spiritual beliefs? What if he actually embraced them and made an effort to reconcile them with the secular aspects of his life (while still rolling his eyes at the older generation)? That is the challenge facing Egyptian-American comedian Ramy Youssef’s alter ego in the semi-autobiographical series _Ramy_. Neither dogmatic nor cynical, he navigates questions like whether it’s hypocritical for a Muslim to stay sober but still have sex outside of marriage with the dry, referential wit of a young adult raised on pop culture. A flashback episode in which a middle-school-aged Ramy gets his first real taste of Islamophobia post-9/11 features some of TV’s most poignant character development in recent memory. Rarely has a depiction of hybrid identity felt so thoughtful. ## Mx. Elijah, _David Makes Man_ (OWN)  Travis Coles as Mx. Elijah in OWN's 'David Makes Man' Photo by Rod Millington / 2018 W—©2018 Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. All Rights Reserved. This [lyrical drama](https://time.com/5647317/a-moonlight-writer-revisits-adolescence/) from Tarell Alvin McCraney, the playwright behind _Moonlight_, features no shortage of finely wrought characters. The hero is a brilliant 14-year-old in the South Florida projects who’s trying to make a future for himself amid poverty, trauma and pressure to join a gang—all on top of the typical humiliations of adolescence. His mom is a recovering addict whose financial instability is chipping away at her innate playfulness. The character who’s stuck with me most, however, is the family’s gender-nonconforming neighbor Mx. Elijah, portrayed with wisdom and empathy by Travis Coles. A natural caregiver who takes in homeless queer and trans youth, Mx. Elijah also has the keen self-preservation instinct necessary to survive in a dangerous place. The character resonates because, as [Coles told executive producer Oprah](http://www.oprah.com/own-davidmakesman/meet-mx-elijah), “Mx. Elijah has reached this beacon that we’re all trying to reach, which is: Can I love myself wholeheartedly without having to change for others?” ## Hot Priest, _Fleabag_ (Amazon)  Andrew Scott in Season 2 of Amazon's 'Fleabag' Steve Schofield “The priest is quite hot.” So says the comically straitlaced Claire (Sian Clifford) as she and sister Fleabag (creator [Phoebe Waller-Bridge](https://time.com/5683596/emmys-2019-phoebe-waller-bridge-lead-actress-comedy-fleabag/)) speed through London in a cab after an unexpectedly bloody evening out. They’ve just met Andrew Scott’s nameless character—listed in the credits as the Priest but rechristened Hot Priest by the internet—at a family dinner where their widowed dad (Bill Paterson) announced he was marrying their godmother (Olivia Colman) and the handsome clergyman would officiate. A charming drinker with an irreverent wit and a dirty mouth, he accidentally seduces archetypal lost soul Fleabag over a series of intense conversations about faith. After the events of season 1, she’s already making efforts to become a better person; her crush could either bring her redemption or cause them both to backslide. The Hot Priest was a stroke of genius from Waller-Bridge, giving her soul-sick protagonist a love interest who stood a chance of changing her life and lending an organic spiritual dimension to the show’s [final outing](https://time.com/5590251/fleabag-season-2-review/). And the chemistry between the star and Scott, with his lovely Irish brogue? Also very hot. ## Marie Adler, _Unbelievable_ (Netflix)  Kaitlyn Dever in Netflix's 'Unbelievable' Netflix Sometimes real people make the most haunting fictional characters. This is the power of Marie, the pseudonymous 18-year-old protagonist of a harrowing 2015 [ProPublica/Marshall Project report](https://www.propublica.org/article/false-rape-accusations-an-unbelievable-story) that formed the basis of the Netflix miniseries [_Unbelievable_](https://time.com/5667707/unbelievable-netflix-review/). A survivor of child abuse who grew up in the foster-care system, Marie (depicted with dignity and restraint by [_Booksmart_](https://time.com/5594000/booksmart-review/)’s Kaitlyn Dever) has just begun to live independently when she reports to police that a masked man broke into her apartment and raped her. As she’s made to tell her story over and over again, her stoic, sometimes irritable demeanor leads even the people she trusts most to doubt its veracity. The tragedy of it all is that what renders Marie inscrutable to her allies—and unbelievable to police—is a well-founded distrust of the institutions that so catastrophically failed her in the past. ## Maya Ishii-Peters, _Pen15_ (Hulu)  Maya Erskine in Hulu's "Pen15' Hulu—2018 Hulu _Pen15_, a comedy in which co-creators Maya Erskine and Anna Konkle play versions of themselves in the year 2000—when they were both 13—is a celebration of best friends, a museum of millennial nostalgia and a paean to pubescent humiliation. Their judgment clouded by hormones, the girls do such inexplicable things as steal a thong (the sine qua non of sex appeal at the time) and take turns wearing it. Though both characters are fantastic, Maya is the zanier and more singular of the two—a ball of nervous, extroverted energy whose constant attempts at fitting in with her peers always seem to backfire. Quick to play her biracial identity for awkward laughs and, in one hilarious episode, convinced her dead Japanese grandfather watches her masturbate, she puts an utterly unique spin on growing up different. Meanwhile, the rubber-faced Erskine is shaping up to be one of the best physical comedians on TV. ## Emily Dickinson, _Dickinson_ (Apple TV+)  Hailee Steinfeld in Dickinson Apple Decades of high school English classes inscribed in the popular imagination a vision of Emily Dickinson as a stern, asexual recluse. But that portrait never squared with her vibrant, transgressive work—or [certain revelations about her personal life](https://www.vulture.com/2019/04/behind-the-new-gloriously-queer-emily-dickinson-movie.html)—as the recent revisionist biopics [_A Quiet Passion_](https://time.com/4717501/emily-dickinson-quiet-passion/) and [_Wild Nights With Emily_](https://time.com/5568302/actor-molly-shannon-interview/) have pointed out. The wildest Emily of all emerged this fall in first-time creator Alena Smith’s Apple TV+ comedy _Dickinson_, which juxtaposed the poet’s Victorian surroundings with the tropes and pop soundtrack of contemporary teen TV to purposely jarring, often humorous effect. Hailee Steinfield plays the poet as a lively, mischievous proto-feminist; she pisses off her parents, impersonates a man, flirts with Death (personified by Wiz Khalifa), carries on a steamy romance with her brother’s fiancée, gets wasted on opium and hallucinates a giant talking bee. In a fiercely physical performance that deserves awards recognition but may be too weird to get it, Steinfeld conjures a young woman who is, heroically and tragically, generations ahead of her time—and embodies the spirit of art itself. ## Deborah Czeresko, _Blown Away_ (Netflix)  Deborah Czeresko, a contestant on Netflix's glass blowing reality series 'Blown Away' David Leyes, courtesy of marblemedia Yes, reality TV cast members can be great characters. They just usually aren’t, what with all the predictable “I’m not here to make friends” bluster. But the glass-blowing competition _Blown Away_ was like no other reality show I’d ever seen, and season 1 winner Deborah Czeresko came across as a true original. Steeped in the signifiers of feminist art, the veteran artist created a sexually suggestive breakfast installation and an artificial womb so that men could share in the burden of childbirth. She was also openly strange and rightfully self-assured, her many unapologetic quirks suggesting a level of comfort with herself that few women, real or fictional, ever achieve. That confidence earned her plenty of detractors along with a legion of die-hard fans. Not that Czeresko expected anything different. “I’m a very polarizing personality,” she said, by way of introducing herself, on the show. “I have lovers and I have haters.” ## Trinity, _A Black Lady Sketch Show_ (HBO)  Aja Naomi King (left) with Ashley Nicole Black (right). Black plays the invisible spy Trinity in HBO's 'A Black Lady Sketch Show' Anne Marie Fox/HBO The standout in a year of great new sketch comedies, the self-explanatory _Black Lady Sketch Show_ was a catalog of deeply original characters, from the shorts-wearing “barbecue daddies” of the [Basic Ball](https://youtu.be/qjtkP-TJpq8) to creator Robin Thede’s [Dr. Hadassah Olayinka Ali-Youngman, Pre-PhD](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CNfoPKiUztE). Ashley Nicole Black’s Trinity is a spy whose stealth is legendary—because, as one of her glammed-up colleagues explains it, “her regular-looking face makes her nearly invisible in the field.” Men, in particular, are defenseless against her cloak of averageness. That’s it. That’s the whole recurring joke. 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