TV series that have no right to be as good or as fun as they are based on their premise, or are campy and absurd and yet somehow make it work.
harvey birdman, attorney at law is a certified hood classic
Farscape
iZombie.
It’s anime, but Dandadan’s premise is absurd yet it works.
The Good Place. Did not expect it to be as good as it is.
The good place is awesome and amazing.
I turned it off halfway episode 1, didn’t look back for a year thinking it’s waaaaay too campy but then I watched it again, finished episode 1 and holy shit it’s amazing. It’s one of these shows where you can just see that everyone involved just had a blast making it too
Resident Alien
Agents of SHIELD. Full of camp but also full of heart. It also had some pretty great fight choreography at times. Its canonicity with the MCU is currently up in the air but still very much worth a watch IMO
I love a campy marvel show tbh
Futureman. This fits your description perfectly.
Is this a safe space to answer Doctor Who? 😶 It’s so campy but for some reason I’m hooked
I know I suck, I know it beyond any shadow of a doubt. I have know. It for over fifty years. Sometimes my brain is mostly silent on that subject, other times it is not.
I have a friend who heard me make the above statement. She took umbrage that I would say such a thing, and sent me this clip…
I’m not a fan of the show, but to me, that one clip was life-changing.
I have a Van Gogh action figure on my desk as a constant reminder.
Love that episode, there’s some amazing CGI scenes too
There was a show that ran on Canadian TV called Forever Knight. It was about a vampire detective who could only work the night shift and used the blood bank like a soup kitchen. It had surprising depth and rtich relationships among the the supporting cast. You had a sense that it was an actual community with a history and connections that existed outside the plotline. Also it had the best ending for a series I’ve ever seen.
This sounds similar but different to another show called iZombie about a zombie that works in a police morgue and gets brains from there (in this universe, zombies only turn feral if they go without brains for too long). Also, a side effect is that she gets flashes of that person’s memories after eating their brains and helps solve their murders lol.
I might have to check Forever Knight out.
I loved that show back in the day. Nigel Bennett is such a solid character actor. I don’t remember how it ended though, which I guess means I need to re-watch it.
Most of the shows on here that I’ve seen looked pretty good before I watched them.
So, Ghosts (U.S.).
It’s not revolutionary or anything. But I’m laughing every episode. It honestly feels like it shouldn’t be as entertaining as it is.
I had very low expectations with Mr. Robot when it first started and imagined a lot of eye-rolling. Most of this was based on it being on the USA network.
I thought Mr robot was just good, not good bad
I will suggest “The 100” which had varying quality levels throughout, full of The CW tropes but somehow managed to be fun.
I liked it until there was one massacre too many.
This was also my answer. I really wasn’t sure if I would finish that show but the more I watched the better I felt about it. Ended up being a good show.
Don’t judge off the first few episodes.
Notably though, it really did have a garbage ending.
My other suggestion is “Foundation” which was basically 3 TV series in a trenchcoat in Season 1 at least. 1 had HBO tier writing and detail. 1 had middling Amazon Prime writing and 1 was The CW garbage. It had improved somewhat in Season 2 and the plots were more balanced.
So disappointed how little respect it had for the source material. Is there any good Asimov-derived media?
I would have enjoyed it much more if it didn’t pretend to be based on Foundation. It’s not necessarily a bad show, but it’s a terrible adaptation of the source material.
Well ironically the most revered part of the show was the Cleon plotline, which they completely made up.
12oz Mouse. All of the voices are oddly soothing, and it’s just an endless absurd mystery parodying The Big O.