While some television shows arrive at the perfect time, others are destined to be forgotten because they aired a little too early for mainstream appreciation. In recent decades, many underrated television shows have been reappraised by critics and viewers alike. While Arrested Development and Firefly were critical darlings through their original runs, both shows barely made any impact on the cultural zeitgeist. However, in the years since they ended, cult hits like these two shows received their flowers as showrunners, writers, and reviewers praised their prescient work. In Arrested Development's case, this even left to a Netflix revival.
As such, it is tough to call these shows “underappreciated.” While they may have been missed by audiences upon their initial release, Firefly’s impact and Arrested Development’s influence on the sitcom genre are both pretty considerable a few decades later. Underappreciated is a more accurate term for shows that remain in the unenviable position that Arrested Development and Firefly occupied by 2010. Not yet reclaimed, but barely recognized when they originally aired, these television shows were simply saddled with the release date equivalent of “Wrong place, wrong time.“
10 Harper’s Island
The 2009 mystery series Harper’s Island would have been right at home in the slasher TV boom that started in the 2010s. A self-contained whodunit, Harper’s Island introduced a large cast of cartoony characters and began picking them off one by one from the pilot episode. The show’s blend of dark humor, tense set-pieces, and occasional moments of gore left Harper’s Island feeling like a long, great horror movie, and its influence on later horror TV shows is palpable. Unfortunately, Harper’s Island aired years before 2015’s Scream TV series and Scream Queens, 2016’s Dead of Summer, 2021’s I Know What You Did Last Summer, and Shudder’s horror anthology show Slasher.
Available To Stream On Apple Tv
9 Sit Down Shut Up
2009’s Sit Down Shut Up only lasted 13 episodes, but few critics bemoaned the loss of this Mitchell Hurwitz sitcom. While Hurwitz’s earlier effort Arrested Development has been reclaimed as a cult classic for decades, its animated follow-up remains critically derided and otherwise forgotten. However, the short-lived cartoon comedy’s influence can be seen in Big Mouth, Velma, Community, and Solar Opposites, all of which borrowed from Sit Down Shut Up’s relentlessly meta, self-referential humor. Meanwhile, stars Will Arnett, Nick Kroll, and Will Forte have all gone from strength to strength professionally.
8 Pushing Daisies
2007’s eccentric dramedy Pushing Daises would likely have fared better if the series arrived a few years later. The quirky show was ittedly a hard sell, a mystery/drama/fantasy/comedy about a baker who can revive the dead with one touch. However, producer Bryan Fuller’s impressive career since Pushing Daises proves that the show was an underappreciated gem in its time. The second Kristin Chenoweth project listed here, Pushing Daises also benefited from career-best turns from Lee Pace and Anna Friel as its lovable lead characters.
Available To Stream On Prime Video
7 Sledgehammer
Nowadays, Sledgehammer is almost entirely forgotten. However, the short-lived cop comedy’s influence on American television and movies is surprisingly massive. Full of killer gags, Sleddgehammer’s comedy stylings were too fast-paced for TV viewers. However, the cop show parody went on to influence the Hot Shots movies and the Scary Movie series. Meanwhile, in of small-screen impact, the critically acclaimed Angie Tribeca was a love letter to Sledgehammer’s gleefully absurd cop show spoof.
Available To Stream On Prime Video
6 Penny Dreadful
The gothic horror drama Penny Dreadful lasted two seasons from 2014—2016, ending just before the horror TV boom of the late 2010’s. While Mike Flanagan’s horror shows prove that there is a huge audience for tragic horror dramas, Penny Dreadful arrived at the worst time to capitalize on this. Just a few years later and this sumptuous series would have survived a lot longer. Instead, like 2015’s acclaimed flop Crimson Peak, this period horror project was cursed with the wrong release date.
5 Suburgatory
2011’s Suburgatory lasted only 3 seasons, but its sharp satire of suburban life still feels as fresh as ever over a decade later. The sitcom did at least jump-start star Jane Levy’s career, but her central role as the sardonic Tessa was far from the only highlight of this surprisingly sharp sitcom. While Suburgatory’s blend of comedy and drama was outshone by its contemporary Glee, the more consistent series proved influential as the 2020s saw another string of Stepford Wives-style satires of suburban life.
Available To Stream On Apple TV
4 Nathan Barley
With the miniseries Nathan Barley, satirical legend Chris Morris and a pre-Black Mirror Charlie Brooker made a searing satire of hipster culture for the British broadcaster Channel 4. Unfortunately, Nathan Barley aired in 2005, years before the public knew what a "hipster" was. If the series had arrived in the mid-2010’s, its brutal takedown of hipster culture and its vacuous acolytes would have been a roaring success. Instead, Nathan Barley was confusing for most mainstream viewers and went unappreciated for years.
Available To Stream On Apple TV
3 Barney Miller
While Sledgehammer was a full-blown spoof of cop shows, Barney Miller was more of a subtle deconstruction of the genre. The underrated sitcom was set in a precinct and was shockingly progressive for the ‘70s, proving a huge influence on Brooklyn Nine-Nine. However, unlike Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Barney Miller never got credit for the show’s impact on sitcoms. The series was largely forgotten until the creators of Brooklyn Nine-Nine highlighted it as an influence on the later show.
Available To Stream On Apple TV
2 Tiny Toon Adventures
While Animaniacs got a lot of well-earned praise, it was Tiny Toon Adventures that recaptured the tone of classic Looney Tunes cartoons. Not only that, but the kid’s cartoon also added a relentless infusion of self-aware comedy to the mix. Few shows could get away with referencing their own status as TV shows without feeling pretentious, but the anarchic Tony Toon Adventures managed to mock network censors as early as the show’s opening title sequence. Unfortunately, Tiny Toon Adventures never received much credit for just how clever its writing was.
Available To Stream On HBO Max
1 Scooby-Doo: Mystery Incorporated
2012’s Scooby-Doo: Mystery Incorporated brought Lovecraftian horror into the world of Scooby-Doo, adding real darkness to the kid’s show franchise. Unfortunately, this was a few years before Lovecraft mania seized the mainstream imagination. While 2023’s Scooby-Doo spinoff Velma tried to revisit this idea, that disastrous dud did so without any serious scares. In contrast, Scooby-Doo: Mystery Incorporated kept the original show’s cartoon comedy roots while taking its horror elements and character drama seriously. In the process, Scooby-Doo: Mystery Incorporated offered a more mature spin on the television show years before viewers were interested in such a thing.