\u201cIt\u2019s not you, it\u2019s me.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n\t\u2018Enlisted\u2019 (2014)<\/p>\n
\t\t\t![\"ENLISTED](\"https:\/\/www.hollywoodreporter.com\/wp-content\/themes\/vip\/pmc-hollywoodreporter-2021\/assets\/public\/lazyload-fallback.gif\")
\n\t\t\t\t\tImage Credit: Everett\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\tThis midseason replacement starring a trio of TV journeymen actors playing military brothers could have come and gone with no notice, but the combo of family comedy and positivity struck a chord with the small number who tuned in. In a post-Ted Lasso world, Enlisted could have made a real go of it, but Fox gave the sitcom an honorable discharge after just 13 episodes. It was almost revived by Yahoo Screen, but your head-scratching at the mention of that platform tells you all you need to know about how that went \u2026<\/p>\n
\t\u2018The Finder\u2019 (2012)<\/p>\n
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\n\t\t\t\t\tImage Credit: Jordin Althaus \/ Fox \/ Courtesy: Everett Collection\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\tFancy meeting you here, Geoff Stults. A year before his ill-fated tour on Enlisted, one of TV\u2019s most familiar one-and-doners \u2014 see other axed freshmen Happy Town (2010) and Guilty Party (2021) \u2014 starred in this quirky and incredibly loose spinoff of Fox drama Bones. A show about a guy with a knack for \u2026 finding things \u2026 that also featured the late Michael Clarke Duncan, The Finder was fun and far better than most procedurals being churned out at the time. But it was cursed by the fact that it could never match its parent series\u2019 surplus of charm or the network\u2019s decision to air its 13-episode order while Bones was on hiatus. Any loose connection to its sibling series was lost on audiences.<\/p>\n
\t\u2018Firefly\u2019 (2002-03)<\/p>\n
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\n\t\t\t\t\tImage Credit: Everett Collection\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\tNo single-season series conversation would be complete without mention of Firefly, the space Western from Joss Whedon. Fox pulled it after airing 10 of the 14 episodes produced by then-corporate sibling 20th Century Fox, but it was so beloved by its fans and creator that a feature length film (Serenity) was ultimately made to wrap up storylines. That\u2019s correct. A rival studio (Universal) greenlit a $40 million sci-fi movie based on a show that performed so poorly that its network didn\u2019t even see it fit to air the episodes it had already paid for and filmed. At least it broke even! But, oh, how Hollywood has changed.<\/p>\n
\t\u2018Freaks and Geeks\u2019 (1999-2000)<\/p>\n
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\n\t\t\t\t\tImage Credit: NBC \/ Courtesy: Everett Collection\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\tAnother quintessential \u201cgone too soon,\u201d Freaks and Geeks was an \u201880s-set high school dramedy with one of the most stacked casts in TV history. No, they weren\u2019t famous at the time, but Linda Cardellini, John Francis Daley, James Franco, Seth Rogen, Jason Segel, Martin Starr and Busy Philipps all went on to big things. Behind the scenes, it was equally impressive, with Paul Feig serving as creator, Judd Apatow as executive producer and Jake Kasdan as go-to director. So while it\u2019s sad it didn\u2019t last, its demise unleashed a whole crew who\u2019d help dictate Hollywood\u2019s comedy trajectory in the years that followed \u2014\u00a0and make another show on this list.<\/p>\n
\t\u2018Grosse Pointe\u2019 (2000-01)<\/p>\n
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\n\t\t\t\t\tImage Credit: Kwaku Alston\/ Darren Star Productions \/ Courtesy Everett Collection\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\tThe WB really started eating its own proverbial tail with this one,\u00a0a tongue-in-cheek satire from Darren Star about the dysfunctional stars of a fictional primetime WB soap. It was thinly veiled spoof of Star\u2019s time on Beverly Hills, 90210, but it was also smart, silly and just cynical enough. Unfortunately, it was also too meta for the late network \u2014\u00a0which couldn\u2019t find a place for it among its roster of teen-targeted dramas and schlocky comedies. Hollywood took this lesson to heart and never parodied itself in TV or film ever again \u2026<\/p>\n
\t\u2018High Fidelity\u2019 (2020)<\/p>\n
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\n\t\t\t\t\tImage Credit: hillip Caruso \/ \u00a9Hulu \/ Courtesy Everett Collection\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\tA lot of shitty things happened in 2020, OK? And I\u2019m not here to rehash or rank them. However \u2026 the sting of Hulu executing its Nick Hornby adaptation (already a 2000 film) has not lessened much over time. Though it exhausted the central premise of Zo\u00eb Kravitz\u2019s Rob revisiting exes by the end its 10-episode run, it also created a trio infinitely watchable characters played by Kravitz, David H. Holmes and future Oscar winner Da\u2019Vine Joy Randolph. Their lives in and outside of that Crown Heights record store could have gone on for five seasons.<\/p>\n
\t\u2018John From Cincinnati\u2019 (2007)<\/p>\n
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\n\t\t\t\t\tImage Credit: HBO\/Photofest\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\tThis one deserves noting, if only for the absolutely unreal auspices of the time. Co-created by surf novelist Kem Nunn and, in his immediate Deadwood follow-up, David Milch, this SoCal-set family drama introduced a dysfunctional family to a mysterious stranger named John (Austin Nichols). He could read minds and perform astral projection. He may or may not have been Jesus. The dialogue was often confounding, and it really struggled to pick a lane, but it sure was an interesting watch. Unfortunately, HBO was hoping for something a bit more than interesting. And despite giving it the biggest platform possible \u2014\u00a0it literally premiered out of The Sopranos series finale\u2019s famous cut to black \u2014\u00a0John could not find an audience.<\/p>\n
\t\u2018Lovecraft Country\u2019 (2020)<\/p>\n
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\n\t\t\t\t\tImage Credit: Eli Joshua Ade\/HBO\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\tThis one is complicated now, knowing what we do about what later happened in real life with male lead Jonathan Majors, so let\u2019s just focus on how this bonkers, expensive and often deeply scary fantasy drama was an incredible showcase for three actresses. Starring Jurnee Smollett, Lovecraft Country also included future King Richard Oscar nominee Aujenue Ellis-Taylor and Sinners scene-stealer Wunmi Mosaku, the three of them forging one of the stronger female ensembles in recent TV history. It ended with enough closure for the one season to stand on its own, but you can\u2019t help but wonder what else they could have done \u2026<\/p>\n
\t\u2018My So-Called Life\u2019 (1994-95)<\/p>\n
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\n\t\t\t\t\tImage Credit: Danny Feld \/ABC \/ Courtesy Everett Collection\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\tTo be real, do we even want to live in a world where My So-Called Life lasted three or five seasons? We would have gained a lot, sure, but what might we have lost? The angsty ABC drama\u2019s abbreviated existence set off a butterfly effect on pop culture that put Claire Danes on track to have one of the most compelling TV careers of any actress her age and inspired countless millennials and Gen X-ers to make their own series and films inspired by the show that everyone agrees was gone too soon.<\/p>\n
\t\u2018The Night Of\u2019 (2016)<\/p>\n
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\n\t\t\t\t\tImage Credit: Courtesy of HBO\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\tWhether they wanted to keep going with the remaining killer cast \u2014\u00a0John Turturro, Bill Camp, Jeannie freakin\u2019 Berlin \u2014\u00a0or just spin it off into an anthology mystery about another seriously effed-up evening, HBO would not have been wrong to try to make more of The Night Of. And, who knows, maybe one day it will. It was never canceled, so much as put on ice when Richard Price and Steven Zaillian never pitched a path forward. At the very least, this show helped make Riz Ahmed a star \u2014\u00a0something for which we\u2019ll all be eternally grateful.<\/p>\n
\t\u2018The No. 1 Ladies\u2019 Detective Agency\u2019 (2008-09)<\/p>\n
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\n\t\t\t\t\tImage Credit: Keith Bernstein\/HBO\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\tThis show was just so far ahead of its time. Shot in Botswana and starring Jill Scott and Anika Noni Rose, it was a procedural with heart and humor that followed the kinds of characters that you simply never saw on American TV. And, sadly, it wasn\u2019t that seen. Despite massive storytelling potential, HBO canceled it citing low ratings. It now has to settle for just being No. 1 in my heart.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\t\u2018Now Apocalypse\u2019 (2019)<\/p>\n
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\n\t\t\t\t\tImage Credit: Katrina Marcinowski \/ Starz \/ Courtesy Everett Collection\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\tWhew, boy, this one was sexy and bizarre \u2014 not that anybody would expect anything less from New Queer Cinema pioneer and provocateur Gregg Araki. His TV foray followed a bunch of 20-something Los Angeles social climbers (many of them played by former children\u2019s TV stars) navigating, love, work and maybe the end of the world. You\u2019re never quite sure if all the hints at the apocalypse are real or if the point-of-view character, played by Avan Jogia, is just stoned and paranoid \u2014 that is, until the unintended series finale, which ends with a recurring character being sexually assaulted by an alien. It was just too weird to go on.<\/p>\n
\t\u2018On Becoming a God in Central Florida\u2019 (2019)<\/p>\n
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\n\t\t\t\t\tImage Credit: Patti Perret \/ Showtime \/ Courtesy Everett Collection\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\tThis dark comedy starred Kirsten Dunst as an ill-fated schemer who gets involved with a pyramid scheme. And it had such a bizarre trajectory to the air that it really wasn\u2019t shocking when it became another un-renewed victim of the pandemic. It was developed for AMC, filmed for YouTube and eventually aired on Showtime, only for Showtime to dump it before it, too, was essentially canceled. We never got to see her become a swampland deity, but Dunst did earn a Critics Choice nomination for her efforts.<\/p>\n
\t\u2018Pearson\u2019 (2019)<\/p>\n
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\n\t\t\t\t\tImage Credit: Eddy Chen\/USA Network\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\tIf the Netflix-inspired Suits-issance taught us anything, it\u2019s that this spinoff probably should have been given a bit more room to breathe \u2014 if only for the afterlife it might have one day had on streaming. It wasn\u2019t revelatory. It wasn\u2019t particularly original. But it put Gina Torres at the top of the call sheet, which is where she belongs.<\/p>\n
\t\u2018Profit\u2019 (1998)<\/p>\n
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\n\t\t\t\t\tImage Credit: Fox Broadcasting\/Photofest\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\tBefore the general population started paying attention to the evils of corporate America \u2014 or TV fully embraced the antihero \u2014 future Angel writer David Greenwalt offered up both with Profit. Starring future diss album subject Adrian Pasdar<\/a> as the titular Jim Profit, part Gordan Gecco and part Richard III, the series\u2019 heavy narration and noticeable deviation from the rest of the Fox lineup didn\u2019t work for viewers. The character\u2019s lack of moral compass also incensed Bible Belt viewers, who complained to network affiliates. It was canceled after just five episodes.<\/p>\n\t\u2018Rubicon\u2019 (2010)<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\tWith early seasons of Mad Men and Breaking Bad cementing AMC as a formidable prestige player, Rubicon looked like it was going to be a three-peat for the cable network\u2019s rebranding. A thriller taking real cues from Three Days of the Condor and infused with some lingering post-9\/11 anxieties, it teased a cryptic global conspiracy over its 13 episodes with symbolism (something about four-leaf clovers, if I remember correctly), surveillance and a skilled lead in James Badge Dale. Creative issues between creator Jason Horwitch and the network \u2014\u00a0he was replaced as showrunner by Henry Bromell \u2014 did not help \u2026 nor did the fact that a week after it wrapped its one and only season to an audience of just 1 million viewers, The Walking Dead premiered to historic numbers.<\/p>\n
\t\u2018The Society\u2019 (2019)<\/p>\n
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\n\t\t\t\t\tImage Credit: Seacia Pavao \/ Netflix \/ Courtesy Everett Collection\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\tOne of many TV victims of the pandemic, Netflix un-renewed this teen mystery box under the financial duress of that very bad year. This show, which focuses on a group of teens who return from an aborted field trip to find their hometown empty and now surrounded by an endless forest, infused elements of Lost, Lord of the Flies and The Leftovers. They build their own society \u2014 cue the meme of Leonardo DiCaprio pointing at the TV in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood \u2014 and that goes about as well as can be expected. The last episode only spawned more questions. Where they in purgatory? Another dimension? On the moon? Creator Christopher Keyser has never revealed his plans.<\/p>\n
\t\u2018Terriers\u2019 (2010)<\/p>\n
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\n\t\t\t\t\tImage Credit: Patrick McElhenney \/ FX Network \/ Courtesy: Everett Collection\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\tI never watched this show, so I\u2019m still not sure if it was about small dogs or surly private investigators \u2014\u00a0though Donal Logue\u2019s involvement certainly suggests the latter. All I know is that the entire genre of TV criticism lost its collective mind when FX binned this show after one season, so leaving it off of this list would probably be a mistake. Maybe if there had been a prominently featured canine, history would tell a different story.<\/p>\n
\t\u2018Undeclared\u2019 (2001-02)<\/p>\n
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\n\t\t\t\t\tImage Credit: Dream Works Studios \/ Courtesy: Everett Collection\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\tAnd so we come to the second Judd Apatow\/Seth Rogen collab on this list. This college drama boasted appearances by a who\u2019s who of comedy greats \u2014\u00a0and even a few fellow Freaks and Geeks (Jason Segel, Busy Phillips). God bless Fox for trying on this one, but premiering two weeks after Sept. 11 and then airing episodes wildly out of order was not the right strategy. Still, it\u2019s a nice little turn-of-the-millennium time capsule and a good reminder that Loudon Wainwright should be cast in more projects.<\/p>\n
\t\u2018The Unusuals\u2019 (2009)<\/p>\n
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\n\t\t\t\t\tImage Credit: Bob D’Amico \/ Sony Pictures Television \/ Courtesy: Everett Collection\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\tNoah Hawley had a few TV misses before he knocked it out of the park with Fargo, but none had the potential that The Unusuals did. The 2009 police procedural included a cast of present (Amber Tamblyn) and future (Jeremy Renner) luminaries and traded the usual trappings of the genre in exchange for a character study about a bunch of eccentrics who just so happened to carry NYPD badges. It was smart, refreshingly quirky and, had it continued, probably would have derailed Renner\u2019s burgeoning and extremely lucrative film career. (The Unusuals was released mere months before The Hurt Locker made him a star.)<\/p>\n
\t\u2018Wonderfalls\u2019 (2004)<\/p>\n
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\n\t\t\t\t\tImage Credit: 20th Century Fox Film Corp. Courtesy: Everett Collection\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\n\tDespite being a bit of a TV visionary, Bryan Fuller hasn\u2019t had the best luck keeping shows on the air \u2014\u00a0and the second series he created is no exception. Wonderfalls, co-created by Todd Holland, was a blissfully weird dramedy about a misanthrope with real failure-to-launch issues becoming a better person via \u2026 Joan of Arc-esque messages from talking tchotchkes that compelled her to do good deeds. It starred future Fuller collaborators Caroline Dhavernas (Hannibal) and Lee Pace (Pushing Daisies), and Fox aired only four of the 13 produced episodes. It might have stood a chance, had anyone bothered marketing it all, but it dropped to crickets in spring of 2004. Thankfully, the full run found an audience on physical media.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It is not a stretch to say that the contemporary TV audience often feels entitled: to more seasons,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":367966,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[54],"tags":[76703,88,133856,180651,151370,180652,180653,92],"class_list":["post-367965","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tv","tag-boots","tag-entertainment","tag-judd-apatow","tag-lovecraft-country","tag-paul-feig","tag-the-night-of","tag-the-society","tag-tv"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/367965","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=367965"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/367965\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/367966"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=367965"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=367965"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=367965"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}