And You Thought It Would Fail / Live-Action TV

• 24 initially began its existence as a romantic comedy-drama about the planning of a wedding over the course of a single day^note The idea would later be reworked into a 2006 ABC show called Big Day, which only lasted twelve episodes before it was canceled. — before being reworked by producers Joel Surnow and Robert Cochran into an action-thriller about a government agent trying to rescue his family during a Presidential primary election in Los Angeles. The series wasn't expected to last a full season. FOX executives ordered 13 episodes and aired it with virtually no promotion whatsoever (and in a Tuesday timeslot, which was uncharacteristic for an action show). It was only due to lead actor Kiefer Sutherland winning a Golden Globe Award for his work on the first ten episodes that made executives order an additional 11 scripts to fill out the season. However, the series become much more critically-lauded, was a smash hit on DVD (so much so that it increased viewership of the second season by a full 25%) and eventually led to a franchise that lasted eight seasons (and a TV movie), with tie-in materials and a proposed feature film continuation, in addition to a sequel mini-series in 2014.
• In the autumn of 2006, NBC premiered two primetime shows that took place behind the scenes of a sketch comedy show that airs live every week: Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip and 30 Rock. It was widely expected that 30 Rock, helmed by a former writer and actor on SNL who'd never been a Show Runner before, wouldn't last past the first fifteen minutes of episode one, while Studio 60, which came with the pedigree of Aaron Sorkin behind it, would go on to success and acclaim. A year later, Studio 60 was the one dead in the water, seen as a Follow-Up Failure for Sorkin after the success of The West Wing, and 30 Rock had picked up the Emmy for Best Comedy. Two more years later, 30 Rock had three Emmys for Best Comedy and Studio 60 is yet another forgotten, short-running show that lives on chiefly in the minds of die-hard Sorkin fans.
• ABC started garnering a few tentpole series from midseason replacements, which in general are held for midseason because they're not considered good enough for the fall schedule. The first midseason replacement to become a hit was Grey's Anatomy. The second was Castle. The third, though not as big as the other two, was Body of Proof.
• The AMC network was never considered in the same league as HBO, with original shows not being up their alley... until the double-whammy of period drama Mad Men and dark comedy/drama Breaking Bad. Once the two shows were joined by the sci-fi megahit The Walking Dead, AMC became the most desirable network for drama on cable television.
  • Breaking Bad was a particularly unexpected success for the network. When it was first greenlit, nobody thought that it would amount to anything. Even its creator, Vince Gilligan, didn't know if it would work. One executive even described the idea of a high school chemistry teacher turning to dealing crystal meth as "the single worst idea for a television show [he'd] heard in [his] whole life". When it aired, despite getting mediocre ratings for most of its run, it was critically adored and the acclaim increased every successive year, with help from Netflix and good word-of-mouth getting new fans into the series. Finally, the last eight episodes of the series saw an astronomical increase in ratings in addition to almost universal acclaim, seeing the show go out in a blaze of glory both critically and commercially, with one of the most watched series finales in the history of cable television, firmly securing it a place in discussions of the best television dramas ever.
    • Character-wise, Peter Gould was reportedly very anxious about introducing the character Saul Goodman to the show, as the writers felt it needed some levity as it was growing darker while Gould was worried it would be like "putting Bozo the Clown into Scarface". Not only did Saul become an Ensemble Dark Horse, but he also got his own spin-off series, which is also held in high regard.
    • Speaking of which, the aforementioned Spin-Off/sequel/prequel series Better Call Saul was met with similar skepticism prior to its launch, with some critics feeling that Breaking Bad was such a Tough Act to Follow that Better Call Saul would invariably seem inferior by comparison, while others felt it was just a bad idea, period. Despite a similarly slow start, Better Call Saul ended up being just as acclaimed as its parent show and by the end, it's seen as being just as good if not better than its parent series.
    • In an ironic reversal, within Better Call Saul itself, Vince Gilligan refused to allow the introduction of the character of Lalo for years, against Peter Gould's protests, due to believing that introducing a second character from a single line of dialogue from a previous series would feel like cheap, unnecessary fanservice after the introduction of Ignacio "Nacho" Varga. Once Gould got full creative control, he proceeded to introduce the character, and Lalo Salamanca is now seen as one of the franchise's best villains. Gilligan has since admitted to feeling embarrassed by his initial resistance to the character.
• Avatar: The Last Airbender (2024): Despite the negative-leaning mixed reaction from the fanbase (a good chunk of it out of derision for it being a Live Action adaptation of one of the most beloved animated series' ever, not to mention the creators of the original show walked out of the project), the show did very well, remained in Netflix's Top 10 for both February and March 2024, and the Rotten Tomato's score is a very respectable 60% Fresh Critical Score, and a 74% Audience Score, proving those who doubted wrong. The show made a lot of changes to characterization, scenes, and story beats, some that fans liked, some that have been more controversial, and it even did well enough to be greenlit for two more seasons not even a month after it had started streaming on the platform, suggesting that Netflix sees it as a success.
• J. Michael Straczynski had tremendous trouble getting Babylon 5 on the air. He shopped the concept around to multiple networks but it was rejected by all of them for, essentially, being too different from Star Trek, which at that time was believed to have set an unbreakable standard for live-action TV science fiction. It was finally picked up by the teeny-tiny "network" Prime Time Entertainment Network ("network" because it was essentially a syndication block operated by Chris-Craft the boat company and Warner Bros.) and proved to be popular enough to keep the troubled "network" afloat single-handedly. Granted, the franchise did not achieve the spectacular popularity of Star Wars or Star Trek, but it left an indelible stamp on the sci-fi landscape even as every single critic predicted it would fail before its second season, but instead, albeit with a lot of compromises and a last-minute Channel Hop, it achieved its goal of a five season run, making it the longest running SF space drama of its time.
• Buffy the Vampire Slayer initially faced rejections because of it being a TV adaptation of the badly reviewed 1992 film version that came before. After being accepted to the WB network, the show became one of the network's biggest hits, with the main character being a pop icon and paving the way for more female-led, supernatural series.
• When the Doctor Who revival was launched in 2005, the idea of reviving a cult science fiction series that had been off the air for sixteen years (with one failed revival) and was infamous for its at times campy tone and laughable production values starring an actor known for social-realist dramas (who bailed after one season) and a former pop star was deemed laughable. In fact, Russell T Davies later said that Christopher Eccleston was only given a one-season contract because they genuinely had no idea if they would even get another season. Davies also told the crew that even if the revival failed, at least they'd have the DVD boxset to show for it. Sixteen years and thirteen seasons later and it's still going.
• When the Sci-Fi Channel first aired the Battlestar Galactica (2003) pilot miniseries, fans of the original absolutely tore it to shreds, complaining about the changes to the characters (Gender Flipping Starbuck and Boomer for starters), making humanoid Cylons, a stronger emphasis on political and religious themes, the Darker and Edgier tone and more, to the point it was popular to call the reimagined series Galactica In Name Only. Others were turned off by the name and the association to what was perceived as a hokey Star Wars rip-off from the '70s. Better yet, the first season of the show was broadcast in the U.K. months before it aired on American television, and fans continued to tear into it - then, the show started to receive massive critical acclaim from critics across the world, and when the show debuted on Sci-Fi, it garnered some of the highest ratings for any sci-fi show in history. It lasted for four seasons, got two tie-in films, supplementary comics and novels, and resulted in two spin-offs (Caprica and Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome).
• Cobra Kai: When a series taking place 34 years after The Karate Kid featuring Ralph Macchio and William Zabka reprising their roles as Daniel and Johnny was announced, it was dismissed by many as yet another unnecessary Hollywood revival of a long dead franchise trying to cash in on its nostalgic value and that it would flop. The fact that it was premiering on YouTube Red, a service which has struggled to gain traction against streaming giants Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Prime also didn't help. When it premiered, critics praised it for being a well-written series that manages to balance the nostalgia from the films while also expanding on the film's concepts in the modern age and bringing new energy and dynamic characters to the mix. Audiences agreed that it was a worthy new installment to the franchise and the first episode wound up being watched by 5.4 million viewers on its first day. The series was quickly renewed for a second season as a result and the show's popularity has only continued to grow following a Channel Hop to Netflix prior to the release of season three.
• The Conners had a massive uphill battle to climb. It initially started off as the second season of the revival of Roseanne... then its star, Roseanne Barr, was fired from her own show after getting caught up in a racist Twitter spiel. When the series was retitled The Conners, fans of Barr were sure that the series would flop, even going so far to review bomb various sites to try to destroy any chances of success. While it was nowhere near as popular as Roseanne's revival ratings-wise, the fact that it either surpassed or kept up with The Voice proved that it had the chops to continue despite everything and earned itself a second season, making it probably the most durable of the 2010s class of '80s/90s sitcom revivals.
• Many big-name networks (ABC, FOX, NBC) turned down the pilot for CSI because they felt its medical jargon and investigative procedural would alienate audiences. After it was accepted on CBS, it became a global success, becoming the most watched TV show six times during its run and having four successful spin-offs.
• The Drew Barrymore Show premiered in 2020 to mixed reviews and middling ratings, with many critics arguing that its titular host, an actress by trade rather than a TV presenter, came off as too manic and weird to be relatable to daytime viewers and too reliant on her celebrity friend guests to carry the show. Overall, it was dismissed as a Vanity Project for an actress whose film and TV roles had dried up and was trying to copy the success that Kelly Clarkson had with her own daytime Talk Show the prior year, and after two seasons, it was very nearly canceled, only saved by a retool that saw the hour-long show split into two half-hour blocks. It was here that the show's ratings turned around in a big way, skyrocketing 60% in its third season and making it the fourth-biggest talk show on television, behind only the longtime stalwarts Live with Kelly and Ripa and Dr. Phil as well as The Kelly Clarkson Show, to which it was within spitting distance. Barrymore's more intimate and emotionally open style of hosting also grew on viewers who embraced it as an alternative to the colder and more distant style of other talk show hosts, to the point that some argued for her as the Spiritual Successor to Oprah Winfrey in terms of how she presented her show.
• Prior to release, Elementary received heavy criticism for being seen as an American ripoff of the BBC adaptation of Sherlock, and that's not even getting to the accusations of homophobia the producers got for gender-swapping John Watson. When it aired, however, it ended up becoming very successful, and while it doesn't have quite as large a fandom as the BBC show, Elementary gathered a decently sized and loyal fanbase and came to be considered a worthy adaptation of Arthur Conan Doyle's stories, if not one of the best modern Sherlock Holmes adaptations on TV.
• In the fall of 1994, ER and Chicago Hope premiered on NBC and CBS, respectively, in the identical Thursday at 10 pm time slot (and both set in the same city). While not exactly expecting ER to fail, many critics deemed Chicago Hope the better show and assumed that it would win the ratings battle. Instead, ER trounced Hope so thoroughly that within weeks the latter show moved to another time slot and was off the air in six seasons (perfectly respectable, but nothing compared to ER's fifteen).
• Fallout (2024): Leading up to the premiere there was much grumbling and speculation over the quality of the series, with diehard fans worried about it being a similarly lackluster and divisive adaptation like the Halo TV series. After the premiere was wildly well received by audiences and critics alike, the same fans were pleasantly surprised (though some had issues concerning the lore aspects).
• The Swedish Children's series Fem Myror Arfler An Fyra Elefanter (Five ants are more than four elephants). When the series premiered in 1973, nearly all children's shows produced in Sweden had a highly (nearly always Left-wing) political or social realistic overtone, commonly concerning capitalism and the Vietnam War, with many scenes that would be considered shockingly mature for a program aimed at children today. Then this series dumped down, nearly as an antipole against that kind of show, with its glamorous furnishings and carefree tone. Therefore, it was at first met with severe criticism, as many denounced the show as over-polished and unnecessary. 40 years later, the series is still watched and beloved by young audiences who are learning to read and count, while its contemporaries with their deeply political and somber tone are largely forgotten.
• Game of Thrones: Apart from being an adaptation of a book series that, while a bestseller, was largely obscure to most of the mainstream, early reviews were not kind to the show's first few episodes due to the Fantasy Ghetto, expansive setting, and the large cast of characters, to the point that several critics decried that HBO (a channel whose previous original programming — outside of Rome — leaned towards gritty urban dramas and showbiz comedies) was heading straight into Network Decay. However, Thrones would ultimately get the last laugh, as it would go on to gather a massive fanbase (as well as create a Newbie Boom in readers for the original novels), earn nigh-universal critical acclaim, winning several awards, and brought back interest in the Dark Fantasy genre, along with inspiring other networks to make their own big-budget medieval/fantasy shows (Vikings, The Witcher, See, The Last Kingdom, The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, and so on).
• House of the Dragon: There were many skeptical that the series would be any good, much less successful, given Game of Thrones's infamous Audience-Alienating Ending being a major sore spot on the franchise. The number of viewers was still very high on HBO Max and other HBO platforms long after its end, not to mention the home video and merch sales, but the cancellation of its first spin-off Bloodmoon with an unaired pilot starring Naomi Watts wasn't a good sign. However, the House of the Dragon premiere ended up with 10,000,000 viewers in North America alone, a number that grew to to 20,000,000 by the end of the week. The numbers were even higher for the second episode and steadily increase with every new episode, and the overall reception among critics and audiences was very positive, with it being considered among the best shows of 2022. A second season was greenlit a mere week after the premiere.
• Gardeners' World has been running since 1968, has its own magazine, and is practically an institution in its own right. But when it was first proposed, commissioners at the BBC didn't believe there would be an audience for a program about gardening and were even more skeptical that anyone would be able to find enough material to keep it running. ^*This was in spite of the fact that Gardeners' Question Time had been running on the radio since 1947.
• Glee, a somewhat weird show (even for FOX) about Midwestern high-school misfits partaking in song-and-dance competitions, was never expected to climb high enough in viewership to make an impact, let alone end up a top TV franchise. But it did, due in large part to razor-sharp plotlines (at least in the first season), impeccable musical direction, and the one-of-a-kind acting chops of Matthew Morrison, Lea Michele, Chris Colfer, and Jane Lynch.
• Goodbye My Princess: Fans of the novel Eastern Palace were unimpressed when its drama adaptation was first announced, especially because neither of the lead actors were well-known. Everyone expected it to be just another of the many Chinese period dramas that fall into obscurity within months. Instead the drama became wildly popular.
• In 1975, when Phil Redmond was touting the idea for Grange Hill around most of the UK's television companies, no one was prepared to believe that schoolchildren would want to watch a realistic drama series about children at school. Finally taken up by the BBC in 1976 and launched in 1978, the series ran for 30 years, racking up 601 episodes.
• CBS initially responded to Lucille Ball's insistence that Desi Arnaz play the husband on I Love Lucy by saying they weren't sure if audiences could believe that a celebrity like Lucy was married to an obscure Cuban bandleader. In response, Lucy and Desi gave a vaudeville tour across the country. The tour became a success, proving to the networks that a TV show of the duo would be huge. 70 years later the show is still recognized as one of the greatest and most important sitcoms of all time.
• In late 2003/early 2004, Lloyd Braun and a few other ABC executives were fired because they had greenlighted a strange project called Lost. What is Lost, anyway? A rehash of Gilligan's Island with a dramatic angle? And the enormous budget that somehow got approved for this thing... worst blunder ever! Yet despite the lack of faith from the top brass, Lost became an overnight sensation and producer J. J. Abrams became a household name.
• Monty Python's Flying Circus: In hindsight, it's almost a miracle that this show ever got made and managed to find an audience. Why would anyone want to watch a comedy show where half of the time the sketches go nowhere and punch lines are almost non-existent? In every episode, confusing things happen at random and without any sense of context or continuity. Sometimes the show appears to end but still goes on for several minutes. Other times it seems as if another show is playing. There's a lot of male crossdressing and homosexual innuendo (back in the 1960s and 1970s far more audience alienating than nowadays). Many intellectual references are made, often to very obscure stuff that would make an encyclopaedia come in handy. And several scenes are intercut with amateuristic cut-and-paste cartoons that border between the macabre and the grotesque. Indeed, the general public didn't know what to think of it. Most of the time the studio audience hardly snickers. Even the BBC tried to axe and boycott the show several times, even going so far to think of erasing all seasons in 1975 (urban legend claims that the Pythons only managed to avoid this by buying back the master tapes out-of-pocket). And how do you export this bizarre series to foreign countries? Apart from the sheer bizarreness mentioned earlier, a lot of jokes refer to things only British people would get (and only those who remember the late '60s and early '70s at that). But, despite all odds, a cult following came about and the show caught on outside the UK as well. Still, for many years they polarized a majority of the audience and the Pythons were amazed that several decades later public opinion has changed so drastically that suddenly they have become the darling boys of comedy. The cast was fully aware of this, as well. In an interview, John Cleese said he was in makeup with Michael Palin and said: "Do you realize this could be the first comedy in the history of British television where no one laughs?" Palin reportedly responded, "I was just thinking the same thing."
• Mr. Robot: No one expected anything from a show on the USA Network (not known for high-quality original content) and starring Christian Slater (a faded film star not known for his dramatic weight). Even the name didn't sound like something to take seriously. However, the show proved quite popular with critics and audiences alike.
• The U.S. adaptation of The Office was heavily criticized by both media pundits (for being an adaptation of a cult British series that lasted a grand total of 12 episodes and a Christmas special) and its original creator, Ricky Gervais (who feared that viewers would hesitate watching an American reworking of a British show — i.e. the American Coupling). The show had a six-episode first season where ratings fell sharply in between the premiere and season finale (due to NBC shuffling its timeslot around), and was in danger of being canceled (in addition to scathing reviews from major U.S. publications). However, the show quickly found a footing by differentiating itself in tone and content and found a distinct identity from the British series, and went on to become NBC's highest-rated comedy with nine seasons, launching the careers of several of its cast members and helped launch the writing career of Michael Schur.
• Once Upon a Time. A mythology-laden show bringing scores of fairy tale characters to life with an incredibly complex backstory and mostly unknown actors? Almost every TV preview of 2011 dismissed this as a flop that would be gone in a dozen episodes. Instead, it became a massive ratings hit and would run for seven seasons.
• Upon the announcement of a live-action Netflix series based on One Piece, skepticism was immediate as American-led adaptations of manga have not been good to say the least, with the streaming platform's previous attempts still reeling in the minds of fans. One Piece also has a lot of traits that many fans saw as making it a particularly tough choice for adaptation: it's a very long series with lots of cartoonish comedy, fanciful elements, and over-the-top action. Come the release of One Piece (2023), many fans were taken aback by how good it was thanks to a combination of a fun cast, great special effects, and an overall respect for the source material that many adaptations failed to have. Thanks to positive word-of-mouth, it managed to top the charts in 84 countries and beat out the record set by fellow underdog stories Stranger Things and Wednesday.
• Before it launched, the ITV2 series The Only Way Is Essex was derided as a pointless knock-off of a more serious but otherwise similar series on Channel 4 called Seven Days. Not only did TOWIE become an unexpected hit, but who even remembers Seven Days now?
• Orphan Black was expected to bomb on BBC America because it wasn't British. Instead, it became the network's third breakout hit after Doctor Who and Sherlock and the biggest Canadian-exported show in years. It gave Tatiana Maslany worldwide recognition after years of being only known in Canada, to the point that her snub for a Best Actress Emmy nomination in 2014 was seen as the biggest of the year.
• There wasn't much hope for Seth MacFarlane's Star Trek parody series The Orville, a big-budget sci-fi series from the creator of Family Guy, airing on a channel known for not being kind to the genre. On top of that, Dueling Shows was expected, as this was coming out at the same time as the much-anticipated Star Trek: Discovery. To the surprise of practically everyone, Orville was a bonafide hit with viewers, getting praise for its smart blend of sci-fi adventure and sharp humor, as well as being accepted by Trek fans as a clear love letter to the franchise. Despite mixed critical reception, its ratings were enough to help it land a second season, which got much better reception from critics and helped bring about a third season with a Channel Hop to Hulu.
• Parks and Recreation went through a similar trial from The Office. In fact, Parks was originally planned as a spin-off of The Office before it was made into its own independent show. Reception to its six-episode first season was lukewarm at best, with critics dismissing it as a pale clone of its parent series. However, Parks would go on to Grow The Beard tremendously in its second season and found more of its own unique identity in the process. While it was mostly a Quietly Performing Sister Show in comparison to The Office (which got more attention and higher ratings), Parks went on for seven seasons, became a critical darling, and built up a loyal fanbase, with many considering it equal to, if not better than, its parent series.
• A lot of fans pre-release thought that Percy Jackson and the Olympians (2023) would not do well, especially with films being infamous for not adapting the books well and the books not being as well-known as say Harry Potter. However, while the show has not been without its controversial changes, it did incredibly well on streaming (even outperforming stuff like the Second Season of Loki (2021)), got generally good reviews from fans and critics alike, and was picked up for a Second Season not long after the first ended.
• Believe it or not, Power Rangers was pitched to American executives for years as an adaptation of the Super Sentai series already airing in Japan. But for years on end, Haim Saban couldn't find anyone who would take it until an executive at Fox Kids asked Saban for a boy-targeted action comedy show. As it turned out, said executive, Margaret Loesch, had alongside Stan Lee at Marvel Comics, attempted to bring the Marvel co-produced Super Sentai installment Taiyou Sentai Sun Vulcan to America years earlier (and been laughed out of rooms like Saban was), so she was more than willing to fight on the show's behalf against everyone else at Fox, its affiliates, and advertisers. Still, there were already plans to have it just be a clean 40 episode show, and nobody would be the wiser. And then, well, it went Kaboom into the popular consciousness of the '90s, and still manages to truck on today despite numerous Channel Hop, Executive Meddling, and Troubled Production to the series' credit.
• Thanks to the Seasonal Rot of Pretty Little Liars and the failed spin-offs Ravenswood and The Perfectionists, many expected Pretty Little Liars: Original Sin to fail. The announcements of many HBO Max Originals being canceled in August didn't help. The series ended up becoming one of the most streamed series on HBO Max while airing and received positive reviews from critics, with a second season announced not long after the season one finale.
• The Price Is Right: When Bob Stewart created the series in 1956, comedian Dick Van Dyke was asked to try out as host. He passed on it, saying there was no entertainment value in watching four people guess how much things cost. The job went to Bill Cullen, and the original lasted nine years; the CBS version has run for over 50.
• The Queen's Gambit was one of the last projects shepherded by Netflix executive Cindy Holland, and was mocked internally as "Holland's Folly" while her successor Bela Bajaria and her staff were dismissive and unpleasant to the crew. That is until the show debuted to critical acclaim and became Netflix's most-watched miniseries, earning eleven Emmys including Outstanding Limited or Anthology Series, the first time a streaming service won the award. Even the localization crew had no faith: Anya Taylor-Joy's Brazilian dubber said both she and the dub director were becoming bored recording it and thought no one would want to watch the show... only for her to be surprised at how engaging the finished series was.
• Red Dwarf was continually rejected for what seemed to Grant Naylor to be bizarre reasons; one executive claimed you couldn't have a sitcom without French windows. When they pointed out you couldn't have French windows on a spaceship he said "Exactly. And that's why a sitcom on a spaceship doesn't work."
• Resident Alien was released on Syfy in January 2021. The problem? By that point, the network had cancelled most of its scripted shows regardless of how well they were performing in terms of ratings and reviews. The only shows remaining were Van Helsing and Wynonna Earp, and both were due to end in 2021. Surprisingly, Resident Alien not only received amazing reviews, but each episode got over 1 million viewers upon premiering - a rarity in a time when cable (especially specialty cable) was losing popularity. It helps that the show was renewed for a second season 2 months after its premiere, averting the Screwed by the Network status prior Syfy shows suffered.
• Saturday Night Live was considered filler for dead airspace that was only created to replace old reruns of The Tonight Show With Johnny Carson and only appealed to stoners and insomniacs. Almost 50 years later, and the show (despite its ups and downs in quality, three threats of cancellation, and its constant changes in cast and crew members) has become a New York institution, is the longest-running sketch show in America, has old and new fans (some of which will forever argue over whether or not the show is still worth watching or if there's anything out there that can be a worthy replacement), beat 99% of the sketch shows that were put on the air to replace it^note Fridays, SCTV, The New Show, In Living Color!, Saturday Night Special, House of Buggin, and MADtv, among others. These days, the only competition the show has are Adult Swim's anime line-up, the Internet, and Comedy Central's shows, is more popular than ever in the viral video/Internet comedy era, and has accrued a vast wealth of memorable characters and moments (both funny and serious).
  • Writers were worried that the audience would respond negatively to "Lazy Sunday". Instead, the audience loved the song, it became the most popular SNL skit in years and introduced the world to The Lonely Island.
  • When Jon Hamm was announced as a guest host in 2008, the fan reaction was mostly "Huh? The Mad Men guy? Whatever." But his first hosting stint turned out to be an instant classic episode and also boosted his career by showing he could do comedy exceptionally well.
  • Kim Kardashian as a host in 2021 also got much questioned, between her flat delivery, the Kardashian family being rather controversial, and concerns that it would be in the same level of controversy as the episodes previously hosted by Donald Trump and Elon Musk. Instead response was very positive, right from the opening monologue heavy on the Self-Deprecation.
• Schitt's Creek: Despite being co-created by comedy legend Eugene Levy and starring Eugene and his frequent co-star Catherine O'Hara, the series was met with lukewarm and dismissive reviews and in the USA aired on the obscure Pop TV channel. Many viewers were turned off by the name and by some of the initial promotion, which focused more on the show's slapstick/broad humor than its more sophisticated jokes. Thanks to strong support in its native Canada and the faith Pop network executives had in the show, it was kept on the air, and show runner and co-creator Dan Levy was left to his own devices. The show, which was never bad, gradually improved over the first three seasons so that when it landed on Netflix, it became a big hit with viewers who appreciated its queer sensibilities and positive but still sharp sense of humor. When the series ended by choice in 2020, the New York Times critic who had panned it wrote a piece defending himself and giving himself permission to reevaluate the show.
• Smallville had the deck stacked against it from the very beginning before the first episode even aired. It had the unenviable task of filling the shoes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, which had left for then rival channel UPN. The WB (widely referred to as “the teen idol network”) pushed it to the moon and hoped it would become the new flagship show of the network, essentially doing for young boys what Buffy did for young girls, and there was more than a little concern that a teen drama about Superman where he doesn’t even fly or wear the suit wouldn even work. When it debuted, the show had the highest ratings of any debuting show on the WB Network and was one of the few shows on the network, other than Angel, that drew a significant male audience. Nowadays it’s widely considered one of the best Sci-Fi teen dramas ever made, ran for 10 seasons, launched several careers, and when the WB and UPN merged to form the CW, it was one of the first shows to get renewed.
• The fifth episode of The Sopranos, "College", was initially met with extreme resistance from HBO executives because it showed Tony committing his first on-screen murder, and they felt that the audience would never be able to feel sympathy for the show's protagonist if he remorselessly killed an FBI informant without consequences. Being early in its run, The Sopranos had yet to become the critical powerhouse that it would eventually be, and the network still worried about its ability to sustain an audience. HBO tried to convince David Chase to write an alternate version with Tony letting the informant live; Chase ultimately compromised by agreeing to make him as unsympathetic as possible. In the end, though, not only did "College" end up winning a Primetime Emmy for "Outstanding Writing", it was eventually ranked the greatest episode of the series by TIME Magazine, and it was ranked the second greatest television episode of all time by TV Guide ^note  Only Seinfelds "The Contest" beat it out for the #1 spot. To this day, fans frequently cite it as the show's Growing the Beard moment.
• Hwang Dong-hyuk of Squid Game fame reveals that he had created a draft for the show as early as 2008; however, he had to spend a decade trying to get anyone to buy his scripts, which were repeatedly rejected. When Netflix eventually bought it in 2019, the resulting show became Netflix's most-watched series of all time in about a month.
• The announcement of a Star Trek series without Kirk and co. was met with revulsion by many fans and even the Star Trek: The Original Series cast. In fact a back-up plan was that Star Trek: The Next Generation could be added on to the syndication package of the original series to recoup costs. Patrick Stewart was told by his agent that the show was likely a bust but the pay would be great, so for the first several months he lived out of his suitcases. The production issues and uneven quality of the first two seasons didn't help, but after a much stronger third season the season finale "The Best of Both Worlds" became a cultural milestone that pushed it for seven seasons, four movies and a Sequel Series in Star Trek: Picard (let alone the expansion of the franchise in general). Nowadays it is considered superior to the Original Series in quality, if not quite as iconic.
• Stranger Things was reportedly pitched to between 15 to 20 networks and rejected by all of them because they thought a group of children protagonists wouldn't entice an audience. It was picked up by Netflix and would go on to shatter viewership records and gain global fans.
• Supergirl played with this. The show had a large hill to climb, given the perceived lack of mainstream appeal for the titular character thanks to the Girl-Show Ghetto. While it had to Channel Hop to the CW because the budget was too high for its original network, it managed to gain a devoted fanbase and a spot as one of the most beloved shows of the Arrowverse.
• Twisted Metal (2023) had fans of the video games it was based on predicting disaster from the moment the first details were revealed. Not only did it have the checkered track record of video game adaptations hanging over its head, but the changes made to the source material were deeply polarizing at best, particularly its lighthearted tone (many fans of the games being partial to the Darker and Edgier treatment that Twisted Metal: Black and the 2012 reboot gave the series), the After the End setting (which the games had never had barring unused ideas for a sequel), and the lack of the series' Big Bad Calypso. The trailers and clips dimmed fans' hopes even further, between their downplaying of the games' trademark Vehicular Combat and a sense of humor that many found obnoxious. When the show finally premiered, however, while fans of the games weren't unanimous in their praise, many still found it far better than they expected, seeing it as a fun action-comedy series with a campy B-Movie flair that not only didn't take itself too seriously, but also hearkened back to the first two games in the series and Twisted Metal: Head-On. In particular, they appreciated Will Arnett and Samoa Joe's performance as Sweet Tooth^note Joe did the physical acting while Arnett did the voice acting and the numerous Mythology Gags to the games that demonstrated that the writers actually played them and did their homework, and wondered why the trailers focused on the worst aspects of the show. More importantly, it became the biggest comedy premiere that the streaming service Peacock ever had.
• The Untamed: While many fans were definitely curious — whether in the optimistic or morbid way — about how the series would fare long before it aired, nobody expected it to become the widespread multinational hit that it became in the span of less than two months.
• Walt Disney strikes again. At a time when the major studios were still fighting a desperate and doomed war against the new menace of TV, Walt embraced it; predictably, the established studios mocked. 35 years later, after becoming the first show to air on American TV's "Big 3" (ABC, NBC, CBS) and cable, the show that started as simply Disneyland finally left the air. See the Theme Parks section on the main page for more about the show's namesake.
• When it was announced that HBO would be creating a live-action Watchmen Sequel Series, to say that the initial fan reaction was skeptical is... quite an understatement, to say the least. That it was being written by Damon Lindelof only added to concerns, as his writing was most strongly associated with Lost gradually turning into a convoluted mess and Prometheus just being So Okay, It's Average. Eyebrows were also raised regarding announcements how the series would be delving into incredibly touchy and controversial subject matter, most notably the history of race in America along with criticizing the systems of power in society that aid and support white supremacy. But several episodes and positive word of mouth later? The show averaged around 9.6 million viewers by the end of the series. This made Watchmen HBO's most watched new series since Big Little Lies, with its first episode alone garnering more than 1.5 million viewers across both broadcast and streaming services according to HBO. It also garnered nigh-unanimous praise from both critics and audiences during its run, and ended up winning 11 Emmys including Outstanding Limited Series.
• The initial announcement of Wednesday was met with a lot of skepticism. For one, it heavily boasted the involvement of Tim Burton, a filmmaker then in the midst of a long Audience-Alienating Era, especially after his work directing the live-action remake of Dumbo. Longtime fans of The Addams Family also didn't like the idea of an adaptation focused only on Wednesday Addams at the expense of the rest of the family. Finally, there was a general aversion to this sort of Darker and Edgier young adult remake that reminded people of poorly-received titles like Fate: The Winx Saga and Riverdale. When it premiered, though, many critics considered Wednesday to be what these kind of remakes should've tried to be, with a dark story and an engaging mystery at the core that still managed to have fun with the premise. While many older Addams Family fans still felt alienated by the teen focus, others praised Jenna Ortega's portrayal of Wednesday as up there with Christina Ricci's as one of the definitive takes on the character, such that even those who didn't like the rest of the show felt that her performance saved it. The show became the second most-watched English-language series on Netflix, behind only season 4 of Stranger Things, and became a Fountain of Memes, particularly many fans recreating Wednesday's dance scene on TikTok.
• Word of Honor: A team on Douban (a Chinese social network site) asked users to vote on which series filmed in 2020 was most likely to flop. Word of Honor was the winner. Virtually no one thought it would be a success. Then the first episode aired and the series got a rating of 8.2 on Douban — and its rating's now increased to 8.6.
• The Wire was initially rejected by HBO, who weren't even sure that they wanted a police procedural in their programming lineup - they had to be convinced by David Simon (who had previously collaborated with them on 2000's The Corner) to produce a pilot episode. The resulting season didn't fare so great in the ratings, and the series was on the verge of cancellation - until critics started promoting the show as one of the best new series in years. The show subsequently survived multiple attempts at cancellation, lasted five seasons, and has been regarded as one of the best dramatic series produced from the 21st century.
• It's 1989 in Miami — thanks to a mini-Disaster Dominoes situation (which preceded the far messier New World/Fox deal a few years later), WSVN-7, the long time NBC affiliate, was now an independent^note they did have Fox, but Fox was so tiny at the time their affiliates were still basically independents; WSVN outright called themselves that in the leadup to the switch. People predicted that they would cut back their news operation to the bare-bones indie stations had at the time, and subsequently derided their plans to go in the opposite direction and ramp up their news coverage, keeping all the newscasts they'd had as an NBC station and adding even more; part of the reason for people not believing it would work as because, as an NBC station, WSVN was consistently a last-place station (part of the reason that NBC had left, actually). However, once they switched, they also began to focus heavily on crime and violent stories, and began going from a quiet, traditional news operation to a very sensationalistic one. Their graphics got more over-the-top, their music went to droning techno beats, and they got a massive, monitor-filled "newsplex" looming behind the anchors. All this lead to WSVN beginning to dominate the ratings in South Florida, as they still do today, and all the other stations in the area began copying their approach in some fashion; WSVN's influence spread beyond Florida, as stations around the country and the world took notes — the earliest years of the Fox News Channel took heavy cues from WSVN since at the time WSVN had been one of the few Fox affiliates that produced a significant amount of news.
• For Friday nights on their fall 1993 schedule, Fox decided to put a Western with big names up front, and some sci-fi show starring two unknowns afterwards to get the residual audience from its predecessor. The former is The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr., which only lasted one season. The latter is The X-Files, which was highly influential, acclaimed, and popular during its nine seasons, along with two revivals (a big indicator was how X-Files drew more viewers than Brisco County right in the first episode!).
• Young Sheldon: While its parent show was one of the biggest shows on TV during the 2010's, it was also very polarizing, with Sheldon Cooper himself being a major Base-Breaking Character. This made many viewers hesitant to see a Sheldon-centric prequel series. While Young Sheldon didn't earn the same level of success as The Big Bang Theory, it managed to be one of the top rated series on its network and is slated to run for at least 7 seasons. In addition, those who saw it were pleasantly surprised to see that the show avoided many of TBBTs biggest flaws (such as its mean-spirited and sometimes immature humour, Unsympathetic Comedy Protagonists, and Laugh Track), with Sheldon himself being interpreted as naive but well-intentioned rather than (in Chuck Lorre's words) bratty and annoying.

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