TV has never topped the original will-they, won’t-they couple -- Sam and Diane from Cheers

Vox

The versatility of Ted Danson and Shelley Long "gave every episode of the show an unpredictable, electrifying quality," says Emily VanDerWerff. "At the core of the series is the question at the core of many great love stories: Can these two people make each other better? And will either of them change enough to benefit the other person? Relationships are about give and take, and neither Sam nor Diane was particularly good at giving anything up. The strength of this relationship is most evident across the series’ first two seasons, which are among the best seasons of TV ever made. As Sam and Diane inevitably move toward getting together then just as inevitably move toward breaking up, Cheers underscores how good they are together and how tragically inept they are at figuring out how to maximize what works about their pairing. Every time they come close to solving these core issues, one of them (usually Sam) does something to screw it all up."