Shows that should have been better

[Locutus of Bored]

Everything after the fantastic first season of Heroes (except for the S1 finale, which foreshadowed the coming decline in quality), which is the gold standard for squandered potential.

Minority Report. A fantastic premise that should have lent itself well to a series format, but it wasn't effectively executed.

Fear the Walking Dead. It's still got potential to improve and does some interesting things occasionally, but it's hard to overcome the fact that it was advertised as the series that was going to show us the outbreak and breakdown of society right from the start in detail and then they did a time jump and left the city to skip past all the difficult stuff. Now it's just Walking Dead Lite.

Almost Human. A charismatic and likeable partnership developed between the two leads, and the show had room to break out from the usual procedural tropes given its premise and future setting, but the disjointed presentation of episodes with stories shown out of order and multiple major plot points raised and dropped at random really hurt when it came to building a loyal fanbase.

Falling Skies has been mentioned already, but yeah, they really screwed the pooch on that one. The constant resets, poor and inconsistent characterization, the starchild plot, ugh.

 

[Turd Ferguson]

Fear the Walking Dead. It's still got potential to improve and does some interesting things occasionally, but it's hard to overcome the fact that it was advertised as the series that was going to show us the outbreak and breakdown of society right from the start in detail and then they did a time jump and left the city to skip past all the difficult stuff. Now it's just Walking Dead Lite.

Agreed about Fear the Walking Dead. The show started off as a bit of a slow burn, with maybe two/three zombies per episode (as well as YouTube footage that people thought was faked of people being shot and still coming toward them) to the civil unrest, then jump nine days into the future, and everything is abandoned, just like The Walking Dead.

I also watch The Strain, and while it's a little unbelievable at times that we're shown a city under constant siege by the Strigoi, while also fully functioning with night life, it's still an enjoyable show. This is the kind of show I was hoping Fear the Walking Dead would be. The SLOW breakdown of civilization.

 

[Gaith]

I've never seen any Walking Dead, but was genuinely curious when the Fear show was announced, since short of some kind of IQ-lowering flu outbreak, I just don't see how slow-moving zombies could actually cause an apocalyptic breakdown of society. (Massive problems, yes; total collapse, no. See: Last Ship, The.) And neither did the showrunners, I guess! I only wonder if the time skip was the secret plan from the start, or if they genuinely tried and failed to live up to their premise.

I had a great idea of a show to add here the other night, but I can't recall what it was. So, I'll say... Relic Hunter should have been better? "Sexy female Indiana Jones" should be nothing but trashy fun, but, as I recall, I tried watching the pilot once, and could barely make it to the second act - positively tortuous dialogue, one-dimensional characters (if that), and a pervading sense of depression-inducing shabbiness, and, worse, bland wholesomeness. Sad!

 

[Rock'n'Roll Sengok]

Star Wars Clone Wars.

 

[cultcross]

I've been trying to watch it from the beginning. I heard it has a rough start, and everyone wants another season.

But the first season is 13 episodes, the second season is 13 episodes, the third season is 5 episodes and the fourth is 10.

So out of 41 episodes only 5 are good? I mean really that is insane! Why do people want more of this garbage!? I spent $10.58 on this garbage.

Torchwood: Children of Earth is brilliant. Miracle Day is pretty decent, and almost every other second of TV they made with that branding is terrible beyond belief. I really don't know what went wrong, it was a great idea to start up spin-offs in the Doctor Who universe, they spent a whole season of Doctor Who setting up the Torchwood Institute, they set up Captain Jack well, the flirty, sexualised thing worked OK in Jack's appearances on the main show, but somehow it all just crashed and burned into cringeworthy awfulness when turned into its own show. It's difficult to say it couldn't have worked, because they proved with Children of Earth that they had the ability. But the direction the series proper took went wrong pretty much from day one.

 

[bigdaddy]

Torchwood: Children of Earth is brilliant. Miracle Day is pretty decent, and almost every other second of TV they made with that branding is terrible beyond belief.

I find it funny because for years online people kept wanting more of it. Now that I have seen it and go 'This is garbage" everyone seems to agree. So what happened to the people that wanted more of this garbage?

Also you are the only one I have ever seen that called Miracle Day decent. One person said it was the worst thing ever put to film.

 

[Asbo Zaprudder]

I watched Miracle Day. I wish I could unwatch it, especially the depiction of what appeared to be a gigantic arse crack in the Earth. What a waste of the available acting talent, especially the Star Trek alumni, that appeared.

 

[Captain Shaw]

I think I saw the 1st ep. I could not believe they went from children of the earth to that shit. If it was up to me I would never let the BBC and starzs play together ever again.

 

[cultcross]

I find it funny because for years online people kept wanting more of it. Now that I have seen it and go 'This is garbage" everyone seems to agree. So what happened to the people that wanted more of this garbage?

Also you are the only one I have ever seen that called Miracle Day decent. One person said it was the worst thing ever put to film.

Maybe there was leftover goodwill from CofE, but I do remember enjoying it.

 

[Marc]

Star Wars Clone Wars.

How so?

 

[Rock'n'Roll Sengok]

How so?

Wild swings in tone meant it could never reach its full potential.

 

[bigdaddy]

Wild swings in tone meant it could never reach its full potential.

The full potential to be complete shit like everything else dealing with the prequels?

 

[Rock'n'Roll Sengok]

The full potential to be complete shit like everything else dealing with the prequels?

Ostrander Republic comics are damn fine books, so is the Stover Mace book. What are you talking about? Full potential = show with a consistent tone.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

Probably nobody will remember this show since it was canceled really quickly, but The Nine.

The first episode showed lots of promise. These nine people went through a bank robbery hostage situation together, set it up for the show to gradually uncover the mystery of what happened and explore how it affected the characters Lost style. Only problem is, nothing interesting happened during the bank robbery and all the characters turned dull and one dimensional directly after the pilot.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

A couple reality shows I thought should have been better.

-Expedition: Impossible
This was a one shot summer show that was basically Amazing Race, only instead of taking plane flights to different cities, teams are hiking, boating, climbing, etc out in harsh conditions in the desert. Only problem is they cast it like Amazing Race, only one team was athletic, and since there's no luck factor due to no plane flights or taxis, they won every leg, and then never gave the show another season.

-Spartan: Ultimate Obstacles
There are two ways to make a compelling show out of Spartan Race. The first is to have a format that focuses on the main consumer base of Spartan Race, unathletic people who sign up for the race as way to get in shape. That could have been a good distraction that displays why people do Spartan Races, make it an elaborate C25K program competition with teams coached by the big names of the sport. The second is to have a format that focuses on the elite runners, and make it a heat-based competition between the best runners in the sport. Instead they chose something kind of between the two that does a little of either without a satisfying amount of both.

Edit: One more quickly canceled one I thought of.

The Goode Family. King of the Hill but with liberals, what could go wrong? Except instead of mocking them and glorifying them at the same time like they did for conservatives in KoTH they just kinda mocked them. Portlandia proves they could make a similar concept good, but the few episodes The Goode Family lasted were terrible.

 

[bigdaddy]

Ostrander Republic comics are damn fine books, so is the Stover Mace book. What are you talking about? Full potential = show with a consistent tone.

The non-canon books?

 

[Phoenix219]

Everything after the fantastic first season of Heroes (except for the S1 finale, which foreshadowed the coming decline in quality), which is the gold standard for squandered potential.

I still blame Season Two on the writers strike, as the second half would have made sense of the first half's arcs that were dropped, and it seemed like there was some pretty cool stuff coming up, if you've seen any of the deleted scenes, and the ending where they *fail*..... after that, more or less agreed (but still quite willing to debate it), but IMO the show ended itself with the absolutely perfect set up for a dynamite season 5, but I still highly doubt the writer's realized it. If any Heroes fans want to discuss it (or my S5 ideas, or a small headcanon story that takes place between S2 and S3), let me know.

That reminds me, I still have to finish Heroes Season 10 or whatever the hell it was called lol.

 

[Phoenix219]

Probably nobody will remember this show since it was canceled really quickly, but The Nine.

The first episode showed lots of promise. These nine people went through a bank robbery hostage situation together, set it up for the show to gradually uncover the mystery of what happened and explore how it affected the characters Lost style. Only problem is, nothing interesting happened during the bank robbery and all the characters turned dull and one dimensional directly after the pilot.

There were a ton of Lost style mysteries that went nowhere...... so many 1 season cancellations with no endings. I'm starting to feel like shows should get an extra episode or two written into the contracts to wrap up in case of cancellation, if for no other reason then to give the show a chance for future profit on DVD or Streaming.

I remember watching a show called Drive. It got two episodes, and seemed to be setting up some type of mystery and a cross country anything goes style road competition. It seemed decent, and then disappeared. Around the same time period, I started watching another slow burn mystery show, that was like a "groundhogs day" conspiracy day-repeating plot of some type, but that one disappeared too. But, I'm getting off topic into cancelled shows in general. Sorry.

 

[Awesome Possum]

Gotham

I pretend it's a prequel to the 1966 Batman show and it sort of works. Otherwise it's pretty awful. Especially in comparison to the other DC TV shows, my favorite of which is The Flash.

 

[Gaith]

Said it before, I'll say it again: Gotham should have freed itself from the Batman prequel burden by having Bruce, not his parents, die in the alley, making Thomas a vengeful (non-vigilante), reactionary, tough-on-crime politician.

Now I kinda want to see this show Drive. Fillion and Emma Stone?!