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- If You Missed These 16 Underrated TV Shows, Now's Your Chance! Netflix Has 'Em All
If You Missed These 16 Underrated TV Shows, Now's Your Chance! Netflix Has 'Em All
by
amanda prahl
Everett Collection / Michelle Faye
While Netflix certainly has its fair share of big, buzzy titles and creative originals, it’s also a great place to find some underrated shows that you might have missed the first time around. Thanks to Netflix, some of our favorite lesser-known shows have been able to find a bigger audience. While not every show is going to have the kind of boost that, say, Schitt’s Creek famously got from being on Netflix, it’s great to be able to find hidden gems even if it’s been months (or even years) since they first debuted on their original platforms. Ahead, we’re rounding up some of our favorite underrated shows on Netflix. How many of them have you seen?
Everett Collection / Channel Four/Courtesy Everett Collection
The Windsors
The satirical, comic counterpart to The Crown, The Windsors imagines a version of the British royal family that’s decidedly undignified. Rather than trying to be historically accurate, the comedy treats the world’s most famous family as any other sitcom characters, full of foibles to be roundly mocked.
Everett Collection / Sci-Fi Channel/Courtesy Everett Collection
The Magicians
If you’re a huge fantasy fan, you might already know about this twist on the classic “hero’s journey.” If you haven’t heard of it, you’re missing out. A group of hedonistic students at a magical grad school find themselves battling a dimension-hopping beast and discover that all the fantasy stories they read about are not only true, but much darker (and, sometimes, funnier) than they ever dreamed.
Everett Collection / ABC Family/courtesy Everett Collection
Young & Hungry
Desperate for a steady job, a young food blogger applies to be the personal chef of a wealthy tech entrepreneur. In the grand tradition of sitcoms, she finds herself in over her head, juggling supportive and not-so-supportive co-workers and an unexpected romantic spark with her new boss.
Everett Collection / Michelle Faye
Wynonna Earp
Based on a graphic novel, this supernatural series follows the title character as she returns to her hometown to inherit the family mantle of demon protector. With the help of some colorful allies, Wynonna works to take down the escaped, reanimated criminals who were previously killed by her grandfather.
Everett Collection / USA Networks/Courtesy Everett Collection
Royal Pains
Remember the “blue skies” era of USA Network shows, packed with sleek, slightly soapy dramedies? Royal Pains was the flagship of that era. After losing a high-profile patient, a hotshot young ER doctor is stuck taking a job as an on-call doctor to the rich and famous in the Hamptons, which presents him with a whole new set of professional – and personal – challenges.
Everett Collection / Sci-Fi Channel/Courtesy Everett Collection
Haven
Loosely based on a Stephen King novel, Haven is the eerie sci-fi show you never watched but should. When an FBI agent arrives in the Maine town of Haven on a seemingly normal assignment, she instead slowly begins to uncover the town’s secrets – many of which seem to have supernatural causes.
Everett Collection / BBC America/Courtesy Everett Collection
Merlin
Although the British fantasy drama became a cult favorite, it never quite broke through to the mainstream. In Camelot, where magic is banned, the young sorcerer Merlin learns of his fate to protect King Arthur. When they first meet, Arthur is a selfish, jock prince and Merlin is his new servant, but the two men and the people around them slowly grow into the figures of legend as they edge closer to their destinies.
Everett Collection / Showtime Networks Inc./Courtesy Everett Collection
Penny Dreadful
This mashup of genres plops historical and literary figures into a psychological thriller anthology, loosely connecting their stories on the streets and in the halls of Victorian England. From clairvoyants to wealthy benefactors to twisted literary legends, these characters prove that they’re much more than what you remember.
Everett Collection / Eddy Chen
Crazy Ex-Girlfriend
It was one of the lowest-rated shows on TV during its run, but don’t let that fool you. Crazy Ex-Girlfriend is a brilliantly bonkers musical comedy that takes its basic premise (a woman bails on her high-powered life to follow her former theatre camp crush to West Covina, California) and turns it into a sharp, hilarious, and heartfelt musical satire that comments on gender politics, sexuality, mental health, and more.
Everett Collection / CW Network/Courtesy Everett Collection
iZombie
While other shows like The Walking Dead take a dark and dramatic approach to zombie lore, iZombie keeps the horror but adds a side of absurd comedy as well. When a med student accidentally becomes a zombie, she takes a job at the coroner’s office to try to get her fix without a fuss or violence – but then discovers that eating the brains of the dead gives her insights into their memories and personalities.
