TV Moms have been depicted in every stereotype possible. They are not just role models, they also represent the mothers we know in real life. To commemorate Mother's Day, which is celebrated every second Sunday of May, the Parents Television Council (PTC) came up with their own list of Top 20 TV Mothers for 2015. The PTC said that they have chosen these 20 influential and noteworthy mother characters on TV from the last two decades to celebrate the group's 20 years.
The piece's writer, Melissa Henson, notes how much TV moms have evolved in the past decades as they are no longer the moms "whose hair was always perfectly coiffed, whose clothes were always pressed and pristine, who managed their home and family with ease and grace." Instead, the PTC's list features a wider scope of TV mothers to including divorced moms, single moms, step moms, adoptive moms, and aunts.
It also shows just how much society's view of mothers have changed over the years, as the list has some female characters who are not necessarily biological mothers but still exuded maternal influence. However, the group admits that their list of TV mothers is flawed but they characterized these mothers as someone "constantly striving to do better."
The list, noted John Eggerton of Broadcasting and Cable, is hardly culled through a scientific process or a proper data gathering method and it may also receive criticism from viewers and TV pundits alike, said MultiChannel. However, idealizing TV moms is a tradition that is honored every year, much like Mother's Day. Every generation grew up with a TV mom they love.
So, here is the PTC's Top 20 TV Moms of the last two decades:
- Jessie Beckett from "Second Noah"
- Jill Taylor from "Home Improvement"
- Harriette Winslow from "Family Matters
- Jerry Peterson from "The Parent Hood"
- Dr. Mike from "Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman"
- Amy Matthews from "Boy Meets World"
- Dee Mitchell from "Moesha"
- Hilda and Zelda Spellman from "Sabrina the Teenage Witch"
- Annie Camden from "7th Heaven"
- Claire Greene from "Promised Land"
- Lois from "Malcolm in the Middle"
- Marge Simpson from "The Simpsons"
- Bonnie Malloy from "Life with Bonnie"
- Martha Kent "Smallville"
- Helen Girardi "Joan of Arcadia"
- Tami Taylor "Friday Night Lights"
- Frances Heck "The Middle"
- Erin Reagan-Boyle "Blue Bloods"
- Rainbow Johnson "Black-ish"
Is your favorite TV mom on this list? Or do you have your own?
