We are sliding down the other side of Peak TV.
Six hundred scripted shows were available to American consumers in 2022. That number sank by 14% last year, according to FX. Given the post-strikes slowdown and other cost-cutting pressures faced by Hollywood, the contraction is likely to continue indefinitely. I don’t love that trend for shows whose runs are unfairly cut short, or for industry workers who are battling brutal economic headwinds they didn’t create. (Both Star Trek: Discovery and Star Trek: Lower Decks are ending soon, just to cite two enjoyable shows that could have run much longer while employing a lot of talented people.)
That said, the deluge slowing to a trickle may give viewers who have already worked their way through their TV backlogs time to discover or revisit some underappreciated gems. The list that follows could have been 10 times as long, but in the interest of brevity, I gave it a couple of criteria: They are (mostly) scripted shows that came out within the last 10 or 15 years, treasures that often got lost in the shuffle while other programs soaked up more buzz. Most also haven’t been mentioned in Vanity Fair’s many lists of good and great programs. Some are available on multiple streamers (and their availability may change), but I’ve cited their most high-profile homes, and here and there, I’ve thrown in a curated selection of sensational, underhyped, and/or older gems on those services. With the exception of a few shows paired due to their thematic similarities, the list is in alphabetical order.
Agent Carter (Disney+)
The big dogs of scripted Disney+ TV for adults are Lucasfilm and Marvel, and their shows—I’ll try to be diplomatic here—have had their share of challenges. But you know what was consistently delightful during its two seasons? Agent Carter, one of the first modern-era Marvel shows. It deftly mixed comedy, adventure, character development, mystery-solving, and lovely period detail, and any cast that boasts Hayley Atwell, Enver Gjokaj, and James D’Arcy is blessed indeed. Among its many good qualities, Agent Carter truly is family-friendly; anyone to whom it does not appeal may actually be deceased.
More Disney+ gems: The Mandalorian and Andor certainly have their moments, Ms. Marvel is a little uneven but a lot of fun, and WandaVision, What If…?, and the first season of Loki are pretty enjoyable. And of course, the streaming behemoth is the home of Ncuti Gatwa’s delightful turn as the lead on Doctor Who (which returns May 10).
Dark Winds (AMC+)
This series took decades to get made, and it’s impossible not to be grateful to its creative team for staying the course. Dark Winds is based on the mystery novels of Tony Hillerman, and if nothing else, its spectacular setting on a Navajo (Diné) reservation in the Southwest is a draw all on its own. But Dark Winds is also a long-overdue showcase for the phenomenally talented Zahn McClarnon, who plays a determined reservation police officer who is radically different from the mellow local cop he played on Reservation Dogs. In part because the ensemble around McClarnon—particularly Jessica Matten, Kiowa Gordon and Deanna Allison—is so strong, it’s heartening to know that this excellent drama has been renewed for an upcoming third season.
A few AMC+ gems: There’s so much more to this streamer than the various Walking Deads. Other bangers: Halt and Catch Fire, Interview With the Vampire, Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul, Orphan Black (and as of June 23, Orphan Black: Echoes), Slings & Arrows (a stone-cold classic), Rectify (ditto), Hannibal, Restless, The Heiress and the Heist, Being Human (both versions), Lodge 49, Happy Valley, Hap and Leonard, This Is Going to Hurt, Killing Eve, Mad Men, Rubicon.
Deadloch (Amazon)
If you’ve ever thought the Prestige TV genre that revolves around unsettling murders in remote communities was ripe for satire, the creators of Deadloch agree with you. This melding of Parks and Recreation plus Broadchurch (plus a million other shows that feature mismatched detectives in sad raincoats) sometimes goes a bit too broad, but the degree of difficulty here is high: It’s attempting to be a subversive commentary on scripted murder-mystery clichés and also be a pretty good murder mystery. Overall, the attempt to blend comedy and loving parody works well a lot of the time, partly thanks to a cast that expertly navigates Deadloch’s hairpin turns from wry comedy to physical silliness to serious character moments.
The Expanse (Amazon)
If you think this show is just another pew-pew-pew space adventure—a genre I love, by the way—think again. The Expanse is one of the most thoughtful and politically engaged shows of the past decade. That said, it takes the drama some time to hit its stride; the first season revolves around a cop trying to untangle a strange death in a working-class community, but as the show expands (see what I did there), it explores the backroom compromises, love stories, exhilarating discoveries, and understandable conflicts that embroil this corner of the galaxy in the not-too-distant future. If the engaging storytelling isn’t enough of a draw, you need to know that Shohreh Aghdashloo not only brilliantly plays a powerful Earth-based politician, but also, for six seasons, her character consistently wore the most jaw-droppingly gorgeous fits in the solar system. My queen!
A few Amazon Prime Video gems: Brave its exceptionally bad interface to check out Garth Marenghi’s Darkplace (points in its favor: It has Matt Berry in it, and you sound deranged if you try to describe it), The Boys, Fleabag, A Very English Scandal (Ben Whishaw! Career-best work from Hugh Grant!), Northern Exposure, The Kids in the Hall, Newsradio, Small Axe, and the sci-fi Hall of Famer Farscape.
The Great Canadian Baking Show (DailyMotion)
I’ve already said my piece about the soothing, perfect gem known as The Great Pottery Throw Down. But when it comes to all things pastry, a different cousin of the Great British Baking Show is even more wonderful than the mothership. Let me speak my truth: The judging and hosting of the Great Canadian Baking Show has been, from its inception, more consistently excellent than that of GBBO (for one thing, the Canadian judges don’t physically recoil from any spice that isn’t cinnamon). And while stipulating that all the people in the tent-based baking shows are generally hardworking and kind, the fact is that any random half dozen contestants from the Canadian program could likely wipe the floor with a significant percentage of GBBO bakers. Our neighbors to the North are just that creative and imaginative when in the vicinity of an immersion blender.
Karen Pirie (BritBox)
The title character’s on-the-job nickname lives rent-free in my head: After the young Scottish police officer is put in charge of a reopened murder investigation, her colleagues admit that, behind her back, she’s called Ticker. As in, she ticks all the boxes (female, ambitious, intelligent, and, as it turns out, probably expendable). The force’s top brass want to seem like they are taking the cold case seriously. But are they, though? Despite this potentially superficial setup, Karen Pirie resists the urge to make anyone—even a true-crime podcaster—into a one-dimensional villain, and Lauren Lyle gives nuanced gravitas to her dogged detective character. This smart and subtle gem quietly yet thoroughly explores how hard it can be to find anything approaching justice—or closure —after a violent death.
Killjoys (available for rental/purchase)
You may be familiar with the Bechdel test, but here are the questions that make up the Ryan test: Is your show set in space? Are there space pirates or space bounty hunters? Are a goodly percentage of them queer? You’d be surprised how many shows fail this simple test, but Killjoys doesn’t! On this scrappy program, which overflows with cast chemistry and lively humor, the banter, the emotional relationships, the mission of the week, the frisky space adventures, and the subtle but unmistakable stories of recovering from trauma and assembling a loving (if fractious) found family—all of it is just the dang best. The saga of Team Awesome Force has been my favorite diverting comfort watch for the past half decade, for good reason.
Line of Duty (BritBox)
A few years back, I compiled a list of the 100 best scripted programs of the 21st century. If I were to draw up that roster today, this British drama would be on it. It evokes a holy trinity of American TV of the aughts—The Shield, The Wire and Battlestar Galactica—in its expert pacing and believably layered character journeys.
Line of Duty focuses on AC-12, an anti-corruption unit devoted to catching, as its leader, Ted Hastings, frequently barks out in his Irish accent, “bent coppers.” (Do not drink every time Hastings spits out that phrase. You will die.) But do those above the heads of Hastings and his team actually want to systemically root out corruption? Or do they just want to appear to do so while quietly enabling the dynamics that produced it? (Having covered Hollywood for a long time, I can sympathize with Hastings’s frequent frustration on this front.)
Very few programs in TV history have dug into the reasons that police corruption—and the too-common indifference to it—can run so deep. But Line of Duty doggedly examines this problem within narratives that are, for the most part, astutely observed and tightly constructed. It’s certainly easy to spot the influence of The Wire in the UK drama’s ruthless dissection of the self-preservation deployed by those on top (or those who want to get there). And like another classic, Homicide: Life on the Street, the UK drama features some incredible interrogation scenes. (Line of Duty has its share of action sequences, but more than once during the intense grilling of a suspect, my heart nearly stopped when someone removed a key document from a folder.) On top of all that, this serial from Jed Mercurio (the man behind the Netflix smash Bodyguard) showcases a who’s who of great UK actors (Lennie James, Thandiwe Newton, Keeley Hawes, and Stephen Graham among them), plus it gives great material to the excellent central trio played by Martin Compston, Vicky McClure and Adrian Dunbar. A bit of advice: Before you embark on the final season, do not miss the catch-up of seasons one through five on BritBox. That “previously” is narrated by Diane Morgan, in character as Philomena Cunk, and it is side-splittingly hilarious.
More gems on BritBox (which is quietly one of the best streamers, if you ignore its comically basic interface): Murder Is Easy, Inspector Morse, MI-5, Miss Marple, The Fall, Cracker, Being Human, Chewing Gum, Life on Mars and the sequel Ashes to Ashes, The Buccaneers (the 1995 miniseries, so good), Vera, Sherlock, Three Little Birds, The Night Manager, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Brideshead Revisited (still slaps), Blackadder, Absolutely Fabulous, 26 seasons of Doctor Who, and the Up documentary series.
Men of a Certain Age (Max)
It’s still impossible to believe that Andre Braugher is gone. But there’s no better demonstration of his versatility than this program, which, admittedly, does not have the sexiest premise: How do three men adjust to the indignities and ambiguous rewards of middle age? The thing is, when the writing and the ensemble are this good, and when the leads are played by Scott Bakula, Ray Romano, and Braugher, the answers to that question are often amusing and rewardingly complicated. A spin through both seasons will likely make you miss Braugher even more, but it’s worth it.
A selection of Max gems: Pennyworth, Somebody Somewhere, Warrior, South Side, Banshee, Starstruck, Gomorrah, The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency, Adventure Time, Sweet Tooth, Enlightened, Station Eleven, The Plot Against America, Peacemaker, My Brilliant Friend, David Makes Man, Jett, Sort Of, Harley Quinn, Angels in America, Epitafios, Insecure, Our Flag Means Death (RIP sob), Veneno, Flight of the Conchords, Miss Sherlock, Gotham, Regular Show, How to With John Wilson, Mosaic, Betty, Rome, I May Destroy You, Gentleman Jack, In Treatment, Togetherness, Deadwood, A Black Lady Sketch Show.
Miss Scarlet and the Duke (PBS)
If you think I can resist a show about a scrappy lady detective in Victorian London, you do not know me at all. This Masterpiece show can be repetitive at times, but the setting, the brisk pace, and the skilled cast tend to work wonders, and a season-three episode set at a remote snowed-in hotel—in which competing detectives try to catch a con man—was one of my favorite TV installments of 2023. A big draw is the chemistry between Eliza Scarlet (Kate Phillips) and London cop William Wellington (Stuart Martin), which is why it’s a drag Martin left the show prior to the upcoming fourth season. But Cathy Belton, Ansu Kabia, Evan McCabe and Felix Scott are just a few of the delightful actors in the larger ensemble (Scott’s work as an ethically flexible detective is exceptionally appealing). Whatever my occasional frustrations, I’ll charge right into season four when it’s available—like the headstrong Eliza diving into a dangerous situation and intimidating criminals (and cops) three times her size.
A few PBS gems: Endeavour (absolutely top-tier repressed detectives in this Inspector Morse prequel), Grantchester, Sanditon (but if you give up on season three, no judgment), Call the Midwife, My Life Is Murder (Lucy Lawless solving crimes!), To Walk Invisible, Wolf Hall, Worricker (Bill Nighy doing Bill Nighy things, plus one of these three TV movies features Winona Ryder).
Monsieur Spade (AMC+) / The Knick (Max)
If you’re a fan of both period dramas and Clive Owen’s contained yet potent charisma, are you ever in luck. The Knick was Owen’s underappreciated collaboration with director Steven Soderbergh for Cinemax (which churned out many diverting, pulpy serials in its heyday). As if that weren’t enough, the turn-of-the-century New York hospital drama was also a showcase for Owen’s excellent colead, André Holland. (Sadly, a longed-for third season about Holland’s character never came together.) Once you’ve sewn up The Knick’s two seasons—which, like most medical procedures back then, are not for the squeamish—you can head over to AMC+ for the solid Monsieur Spade, Owen’s collaboration with Scott Frank and Tom Fontana. Is it plausible that gumshoe Sam Spade would end up in a small town in the South of France in the 1960s? I mean, sure, why not? Owen’s flat American twang fades in and out of plausibility, but this crime drama asks a lot of the Englishman (including to speak French with an American tough-guy accent), and Owen pulls off most of it with panache. All in all, despite its talky patches, Monsieur Spade is a picturesque pleasure, partly thanks to the period detail, the French scenery, and fine work by the cast—especially Denis Ménochet as a local cop and Cara Bossom as a young girl unimpressed by Spade’s history.
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Moonhaven (Hoopla)
This show premiered in 2022 and its promotion should have revolved around this question: Would you like to see Dominic Monaghan and Kadeem Hardison play buddy cops on the moon? Of course you would! Especially because in this show’s textured, crunchy vision of the future, they are not “cops” so much as “caring, empathic locals who want to improve the vibe.” Moonhaven revolves around an AI doing rogue stuff, and there are plot threads of varying effectiveness that delve into those doings. But mainly, this is a weird, dreamy hippie of a sci-fi program, and I loved it a lot. If you liked Station Eleven or Raised by Wolves (another freaky fave), you’ll enjoy this bittersweet and genuinely strange program, which now lives in unfair obscurity on Hoopla. That service, by the way, boasts a lot of excellent films and TV—and you may have access to Hoopla through your library system. It can’t hurt to ask!
Poirot (BritBox)
David Suchet is a legend—that’s all. All right, if you need more: I’ve read every Poirot mystery more than once, and Suchet effortlessly embodies everything that the legendary Belgian detective needs to be. He’s fussy, exacting, ferociously intelligent, witty, and more than capable of using his status as an outsider to get those who sneer at his foreignness to lower their guard. But be aware: Like Taylor Swift’s tour, the Hercule Poirot TV saga has several different eras. The earlier stages tend to be lighter; later installments are somewhat darker and more somber. (Some of those more cerebral takes work, but I still often missed Poirot’s secretary, Miss Lemon, and Poirot’s sweetly dim pal Hastings, because nothing beat Hastings exclaiming, “Steady on, old chap!”) Not every episode has the kind of real estate that allows it to meaningfully go, as Poirot would put it, into “the psychology.” But you’ll never stop appreciating the show’s snazzy Art Deco stylings, Suchet’s thoughtfulness and subtlety, the appearances of a murderers’ row of UK actors, and the number of times the production managed to make the same rented house look like the site of many different murders.
Rutherford Falls (Peacock) / One Mississippi (Amazon Prime Video/Hulu)
One of the most exciting boomlets within peak TV was the explosion in half-hour comedies from creators who’d previously been locked out of the system. (Then most of those shows didn’t get enough seasons, because the gatekeepers only opened the gates a little bit.) Rutherford Falls and One Mississippi have quite different tones, but they’re both set in small, tight-knit towns; they’re both amusing and amiably rebellious; and they both definitely have distinctive points of view. One Mississippi is comedian and Star Trek: Discovery standout Tig Notaro’s riff on what surviving—and thriving—looks like after a series of mind-melting medical and familial disasters. Notaro frequently channels her wry stand-up style but expands capably into deeper and more complex emotional terrain as well. As siblings, she and Noah Harpster (For All Mankind) play beautifully off each other. Rutherford Falls very much has a Parks and Recreation vibe, but its core characters are Reagan Wells and Terry Thomas—two members of the Minishonka Nation—as well as the hapless Nathan Rutherford, a Waspy descendant of the town founder who goes through it when he finds out his ancestor wasn’t who thought he was. Rutherford Falls explores the nuances of the lived experiences of Native Americans, the idea of who gets to write the official histories, and what meaningful legacies really look like—all while supplying romance, pratfalls, sharp banter, and many other comedic delights. I remain salty about RF’s short run; you should have renewed this one, Peacock!
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Silo (Apple TV+)
Dad TV is not about gender—it is a state of mind. It’s earnest, focuses on problem-solving, and often involves science, teamwork, diligence, and the occasional injection of genial sarcasm (though Gary Oldman gets to do lethal sarcasm). Apple TV+ is a major hub of dad shows like For All Mankind, Ted Lasso, Slow Horses, Foundation, Severance, and this program—which is not necessarily spectacular but is well-crafted and satisfying. (My main gripe is that every non-American actor in the cast makes a wildly different attempt at an American accent, and many of those diverging accents are wonky in some way.) Rebecca Ferguson stars as a cop inside a futuristic silo that is cut off from the world—but what if everything she and her fellow residents have been told about the history and purpose of that structure is misleading? As is the case with the silo itself, each layer of this show is solidly constructed, and there are a number of excellent performances from the likes of Rashida Jones, David Oyelowo, and Hall of Fame “hey, it’s that guy” character actor Will Patton.
Spartacus (stream on Starz/buy on Apple TV+)
I have yelled about this show for more than a dozen years, and I’m going to keep squawking about it—especially now that a new spin-off of the gladiator chronicle is on the horizon. One great quality that many terrific shows share is that they’re not necessarily for everyone, and while I love it, I’ve never made the case that Sparty’s over-the-top pulpiness, bloody violence and stylized language will have universal appeal. But like Deadwood (yes, Deadwood!), Spartacus uses its most extreme elements not just to entertain, shock, and surprise, but to smartly underline the drama’s central themes about power and its abuses—and the potentials of solidarity, true friendship, and community. So yeah: This is absolutely a show with a lot of orgies and beheadings, and a core character loves to sing a song with the chorus “my cock rages on.” Sorry if you don’t think all that (and the gay gladiators who end up in a central place within the show’s unruly found family) sounds fucking awesome. But showrunner Steven S. DeKnight and Spartacus’s incredible cast (Lucy Lawless! John Hannah!) constructed gonzo entertainment that also intelligently explored the political and psychological ramifications of the following question: Does designating certain people “other,” treating them as objects and abusing them at will, end up destroying not just individuals and households but entire societies? Still a relevant question!
Torchwood (Max) / DC’s Legends of Tomorrow (Netflix)
Do you like your adventure stories with science fiction flavoring and outer space locales? Do you like the kinds of shows that don’t take themselves seriously but have meaningful interpersonal stakes? Ideally, should your escapist shows be super queer? If so, you need to dive into these frisky programs, which plausibly could have had many crossovers. Torchwood is a spin-off of Doctor Who (it’s an anagram). The long-running mothership started out as a kids show and still generally tends to be more family-friendly—but Torchwood, from Doctor Who veteran Russell T Davies, is decidedly aimed at adults. It’s sexier and much more flirty, which is what you’d expect from any show featuring swashbuckling interstellar hottie Captain Jack Harkness (John Barrowman). The show’s high point is season three, subtitled Children of Earth. Sadly, season four drops off massively in quality—but there’s much fun to be had before then, in part thanks to a game and energetic cast. As for Legends of Tomorrow, its first season is bad and nobody will be mad if you skip it. No, really! But Legends later found its groove as the sweet, funny, bananas cousin of the CW’s more serious superhero shows. Thinking about the inspired swings it took during those old-school many-episode seasons makes me deeply miss the kind of delirious yet emotionally grounded fun we had when various CW shows were on their A game. Also, a note for pop-culture historians: Legends has a sidesplitting scene involving John Noble reprising his Lord of the Rings role that should be permanently displayed in the Smithsonian.
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Vida (Hulu)
A lot of shows have used the death of a parent as fodder for both drama and comedy, but few have done it as memorably and thoughtfully as Vida. Mishel Prada and Melissa Barrera are excellent as very different sisters who return home to the east side of LA to deal with the fallout of their mother’s passing, and their journeys of self-discovery are equal parts moving, surprising, and wryly relatable. So many of the actors from this terrific ensemble—especially Ser Anzoategui (who played bar co-owner Eddy) and Roberta Colindrez (bartender Nico)—should be cast in absolutely everything. Insightful, incisive, and compassionate—not to mention unapologetically queer—Vida should have run for many more seasons, but I treasure what we got.
A few Hulu gems: Almost everything under the FX banner (especially the great recent offerings Shōgun and Reservation Dogs), Extraordinary, The Great, Friday Night Lights, M*A*S*H, Bob’s Burgers, Cougar Town, National Treasure and National Treasure: Kiri, Fresh Off the Boat, My So-Called Life, The O.C., Switched at Birth, Schitt’s Creek, Superstore, Cheers, Happy Endings, The Gordita Chronicles, Freaks and Geeks, Ugly Betty.
We Are Lady Parts (Peacock)
The wait is over! The most glorious TV news of the year may be that the second season of this comedy finally arrives on Peacock on May 30. Get ready now by watching the first season, the story of not just a band coming together but a wildly disparate and memorable group of characters finding their voices. Anjana Vasan brilliantly plays PhD student Amina, the lead guitarist for an all-female band called Lady Parts who gradually overcomes her stage fright while helping the band write bangers such as “Bashir With the Good Beard.” It shouldn’t necessarily be a big deal that most of the characters are Muslim, but given English-language TV’s history of stereotypical portrayals of that community, it actually does matter that these characters are so layered and richly entertaining. Let’s hope this energetic treasure keeps on going, and that the wait for a much-desired third season isn’t as long.
A few Peacock gems: In addition to the usual comedy suspects (The Office, Parks and Recreation, Scrubs, 30 Rock, Everybody Hates Chris, etc.), don’t sleep on The Thick of It and Psych; in the drama realm, there’s Luther, Misfits, Emma (2009 miniseries), Sense & Sensibility (2008 miniseries), Columbo, Monk and The Bletchley Circle—and every season of some obscure show called Suits.
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