Ranked: All of the decade's Emmy hosts

You want the gold standard for this century? Ellen DeGeneres, whose post-9/11 stint in 2001 will be very hard to top. As for the nadir, that's equally clear: The five reality hosts from 2008, a group mistake we can only assume the Emmys will never repeat.

With those benchmarks in place, how do the hosts of the last decade rank? In this order, with commentary from the original reviews.

1) Jane Lynch (2011, Fox)

Lynch kicked off the broadcast with one of the Emmys' more entertaining opening numbers. True, as Lynch sang in the lyrics, it was overly long, but it had enough funny high points to justify the time spent.

From there, she went on to be a jovial host — more efficient, perhaps, than warm, but likable nonetheless. Every line may not have been a gem; every clipped bit may not have been hilarious. But Lynch put each one across like the pro she is and then moved on, generally managing to be amusing without getting in the way or wearing out her welcome.

2) Andy Samberg (2015, Fox)

Wearing what seemed to be a permanent yet unforced goofy grin, Samberg rolled through the show with a minimum of friction and a great deal of fun — starting with a terrific opening number built around the difficulty facing anyone — even an Emmys host — who hopes to keep up with the current flood of new TV shows. He did, however, let us know why he was the ideal choice: "'Cause I done watched every damn show ... and I'm white."

Jokes about Bill Cosby, Kentucky court clerk Kim Davis and Donald Trump mixed with sight gags built around Jane Lynch, Adrien Brody and Girls. They didn't all land; they never do. But enough worked to carry Samberg through — and the smile worked when the jokes didn't.

3) Jimmy Kimmel (2016, ABC)

You always get mean from Jimmy Kimmel. This time, you also got funny.

It was clear from the start he'd have a smoother, softer evening than he did in 2012, thanks to an opening taped bit that climaxed with a shockingly funny cameo by Jeb Bush as a limo driver. That was followed by a monologue that  was short and, for Kimmel, almost sweet — one where the jabs were more good-natured than nasty. It was a pattern that held out through the show, from a very amusing bit with Matt Damon, who came out to mock him for losing to John Oliver in the talk-show category, to a more pointed yet still funny joke built around using Bill Cosby as a presenter. That alone was an excellent example of why this Kimmel hosting stint went so much better than the last one: He had a better sense of where the “too much” line lies, and other than yet another ill-advised in memoriam joke, he avoided crossing it.

4) Seth Meyers (2014, NBC)

As Seth Meyers has said himself, he's not exactly the world's most versatile performer. He doesn't sing. He doesn't dance. He doesn't do skits. He tells jokes -- short, topical, one-liner-type jokes.

And that's precisely what he gave you. Nothing fancy: Just Meyers, telling the kind of jokes that kept him on Saturday Night Live and won him his own late- night talk show.

Surely it came as no surprise that most of the jokes were about television; they always are at the Emmys. But unlike jokes from some other Emmy hosts, none of Meyers' were mean or unsuited to the occasion. He may not have been the most exciting host, but he was good-natured and efficient. Those are qualities we don't always see at the Emmys.

5) Jimmy Fallon (2010, NBC)

In the midst of Emmys frenzy stood — or sang — an equally desperate Fallon, a host who lived and too often died by his guitar. It was appropriate and funny when he opened the show with a glee-filled production number; this was, after all, a season fueled by music, from Glee to the still top-rated American Idol. It was far less funny when he kept singing all night, doing little strummed bits with stars in the audience that almost invariably fell flat.

The only real upside to the singing? It was better than a running Twitter bit in which he accepted (or pretended to accept) witless tweets from the viewing audience. If that's really what happens when viewers participate — please, don't.

There's a gentleness to Fallon, a boyish eagerness to please, that could have worked for him as a host had the material been better and had he looked more comfortable delivering it. Instead, his amiability translated into a willingness to disappear, even when he was on air.

6) Jimmy Kimmel (2012, ABC)

As he proved this year at the Emmys, Jimmy Kimmel can be a very funny man.

Unfortunately, 2012 was not the time -- and the Emmys were clearly not the place. Even had Kimmel been at his best -- and he wasn't -- the outsider act that works so well for him on his own show was out of place in a job that makes you, like it or not, the ultimate insider.

Anyone who watches his talk show no doubt entered the Emmys with high enough hopes to carry them through a good but not great opening monologue. But with each odd dismissive introduction of a presenter, with each strained bit, hope sank.

The bar for awards-show hosts is set fairly low — don't embarrass yourself, don't annoy us and get out of the way — and Kimmel did manage to hurdle it.

But from a man this talented, we should expect more than a flat social-media prank starring a disheveled Tracy Morgan, or a spoof of in-memoriam salutes that served only to remind us that he had already done a borderline bad-taste joke about The Andy Griffith Show.

7) Neil Patrick Harris (2013, CBS)

Maybe too much of a good thing really is too much.

Granted, it was probably naive to hope that Harris' stint as host of this broadcast could top his Emmy-winning turn as Tonys host. But we did expect him to come closer to the mark.

Instead, he was as dull and off-kilter as his oddly downbeat show — a talented man who seemed trapped between his desire not to repeat himself and our desire to be entertained. If you don't want to do an opening musical number because you're afraid it will draw Tonys comparisons, fine, but don't make us miss it by substituting a faux battle among former hosts that only reminded us of how ill-served the broadcast has been over the past few years. And don't drop in a "Number in the Middle of the Show" that felt like a lesser version of those numbers you did on, yes, the Tonys.