{"id":139490,"date":"2025-11-18T08:41:10","date_gmt":"2025-11-18T08:41:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/139490\/"},"modified":"2025-11-18T08:41:10","modified_gmt":"2025-11-18T08:41:10","slug":"20-underrated-tv-shows-you-need-to-watch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/139490\/","title":{"rendered":"20 Underrated TV Shows You Need To Watch"},"content":{"rendered":"

From The Comeback to Station Eleven, there are certain TV shows that deserve to be classics, but hardly anyone has heard of them. Shows like Seinfeld<\/a> and Breaking Bad and M*A*S*H are rightly considered to be masterpieces that everyone has at least heard they need to watch.<\/p>\n

But not every must-watch TV show<\/a> is lucky enough to become a beloved classic. Shows like Girls5eva and The Returned deserve so much more attention.<\/p>\n

Crashing<\/p>\n

\"Pete
\n Pete Holmes and Artie Lange in a subway station in Crashing<\/p>\n

From Seinfeld to Louie, we\u2019ve seen plenty of semi-autobiographical sitcoms where a famous standup comedian plays a version of themselves. But Pete Holmes\u2019 show Crashing is different, because it goes back to a time before Pete was famous, when he was still starting out, so we get a fresh perspective on the comedy scene.<\/p>\n

In Seinfeld, Louie, Maron, Mulaney, and every other show like this, the title character is already successful. But in Crashing, we see Pete go from an open-miker to a barker to a college comic, and we see just how hard it is to hone your craft and make it as a comedian.<\/p>\n

Possessed<\/p>\n

\"A
\n A poster for Possessed<\/p>\n

A lot of great K-dramas have caught on and become international hits, but Possessed remains an underappreciated gem. It\u2019s a curious blend of comedy and supernatural thriller in which a detective teams up with a psychic medium to vanquish the ghost of a murderer. The acting is incredible, the music fits the tone perfectly, and the romance between the central characters rings true.<\/p>\n

Superstore<\/p>\n

\"Jonah
\n Jonah talking and gesticulating in Superstore season 6<\/p>\n

Superstore should be in the same conversation as The Office, Parks and Recreation, and Brooklyn Nine-Nine. It\u2019s just as hilarious, just as feel-good, and just as bingeable as any of those shows, but it doesn\u2019t have nearly as many fans. As a workplace comedy set in a big-box store, Superstore is both a delightful ensemble sitcom and a razor-sharp satire of soulless corporate America.<\/p>\n

With a lovable will-they-or-won\u2019t-they couple and a supporting cast with no dead weight, Superstore is the ultimate comfort show. But it also has a subversively dark and edgy sense of humor for a brightly lit network sitcom; it touches on timely political issues, it\u2019s full of outrageous, out-of-pocket one-liners, and there\u2019s a running gag involving a local serial killer severing feet.<\/p>\n

Girls5eva<\/p>\n

\"Sara
\n Sara Bareilles as Dawn, Paula Pell as Gloria, Busy Philipps as Summer, and Renee Elise Goldsberry as Wickie in Girls5eva season 3 episode 4<\/p>\n

Girls5eva is both a love letter to cheesy late-\u201890s\/early-2000s pop music and a perfect comedic vehicle for women of a certain age, who are rarely given the opportunity to lead a TV show. More than 20 years after their brief initial success, the eponymous girl group reunites and attempts to launch a comeback when one of their songs is sampled by a popular rapper.<\/p>\n

The central quartet is brought to life by hilarious actors \u2014 especially Paula Pell as the brash, no-nonsense Gloria \u2014 and the show switches seamlessly between self-deprecating humor and uplifting drama. Both Peacock and Netflix canceled Girls5eva prematurely, but it\u2019s a great show that\u2019ll hopefully find an audience yet.<\/p>\n

The Knick<\/p>\n

\"Clive
\n Clive Owen gesturing in The Knick<\/p>\n

Most medical dramas are set in a nice, clean, modern hospital with the benefit of all the life-saving surgical technologies that have been developed over the years. But the creators of The Knick asked, what if we went back to the early 20th century when medical science was still very crude and primitive?<\/p>\n

Set in a fictionalized version of New York\u2019s Knickerbocker Hospital, The Knick stars Clive Owen as a renowned surgeon who spends his days ingesting cocaine and his evenings passed out in a Chinatown opium den. The Knick is a delightfully grisly surgical thriller, but it also touches on social issues like racism and class warfare.<\/p>\n

Hello Ladies<\/p>\n

\"Stephen
\n Stephen Merchant talking to two women in Hello Ladies<\/p>\n

Stephen Merchant brought the disastrous dating stories from his standup comedy into the sitcom format with HBO\u2019s brilliant but short-lived Hello Ladies. Merchant plays an awkward Englishman<\/a> bumbling his way through the glamorous L.A. dating scene, humiliating himself at every turn despite his best efforts.<\/p>\n

Hello Ladies only lasted for one season, but it was a really promising debut outing. Merchant is one of the best in the business when it comes to capturing a painfully mundane slice of life and leaning into the cringe. Hello Ladies is a really funny show, but it\u2019s also a poignant look at how hard it is to be single.<\/p>\n

The Returned<\/p>\n

\"People
\n People walking through a mist in Les Revenants, also known as The Returned<\/p>\n

Adapted from the movie They Came Back, The Returned is set in a small French mountain town. One day, a bunch of its residents return home to find that they\u2019ve been dead for years, and everyone they know has since moved on with their lives.<\/p>\n

Like Twin Peaks, it\u2019s both a chilling supernatural thriller and an engaging small-town soap opera. The setup is deeply disturbing, but you get swept up in these characters\u2019 lives, regardless of the paranormal activity that envelops them.<\/p>\n

Poker Face<\/p>\n

\"Charlie
\n Charlie smiling in her car in Poker Face Season 2 Ep 12-6<\/p>\n

Peacock has quietly canceled Poker Face after two seasons<\/a>, and it\u2019s a real shame, because it\u2019s one of the greatest shows on the air. It\u2019s a modern update of the Columbo formula, opening each episode with a murder and then following an intrepid sleuth\u2019s quest to solve it. It\u2019s not a whodunit, it\u2019s a howcatchem.<\/p>\n

But the sleuth in this case is no standard detective. Charlie Cale is just a happy-go-lucky drifter with an uncanny ability to tell when somebody is lying. It was the perfect role for Natasha Lyonne, combining biting wit and one-liners with real pathos and loneliness, and it\u2019s a crime that she only got to play her for two seasons.<\/p>\n

Somebody Somewhere<\/p>\n

\"Bridget
\n Bridget Everett as Sam in Somebody Somewhere, arms open wide and singing into a mic<\/p>\n

Bridget Everett is known for her provocative, loud-and-proud, cabaret-inspired standup comedy, but her HBO series is a much subtler, more humanistic look at everyday life. Somebody Somewhere picks up after a middle-aged woman has moved back home to take care of her dying sister. Her sister has passed away, and now she\u2019s caught in a limbo between two different lives.<\/p>\n

Somebody Somewhere is a beautiful show<\/a> following the ups and downs of a bunch of people\u2019s lives. It accurately reflects the mundane flow of real life as its characters navigate the foibles of grief and friendship and romance.<\/p>\n

Mr. Inbetween<\/p>\n

\"Ray
\n Ray pointing a gun in Mr. Inbetween<\/p>\n

Scott Ryan expanded his movie The Magician into a series with Mr. Inbetween. It\u2019s a pitch-black comedy about a hitman-for-hire with a complicated personal life. Ray Shoesmith is a freelance crook living in the suburbs of Sydney, doing the dirty work for various gangsters without batting an eye, and he\u2019s also a loving single father.<\/p>\n

That conceit alone would\u2019ve been enough to get plenty of dark laughs out of the show, but Ryan went a step further. Mr. Inbetween works beautifully as a comedy, but there\u2019s also a healthy dose of drama. It takes Ray\u2019s relationship with his daughter and his childhood trauma and his care for his terminally ill brother seriously. He\u2019s not an archetype; he\u2019s a real human being.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"From The Comeback to Station Eleven, there are certain TV shows that deserve to be classics, but hardly…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":139491,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[146,85,46,411],"class_list":["post-139490","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tv","tag-entertainment","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-tv"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139490","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=139490"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139490\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/139491"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=139490"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=139490"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=139490"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}