Three Shows You Probably Didn't Watch

In the past year or so I've become better acquainted with some TV shows that were prematurely dumped. All three were great shows, but had a type of humor that often doesn't appeal to a broad audience. Its unfortunate that TV often has to cater to the somewhat base humor that many Americans seem to favor. Now I can laugh along with the more "dumb" humor at times, but intelligent humor at least makes me feel smarter for laughing.

The first show is Better Off Ted, which Ross and I watched when it aired during the 2008-2009 and 2009-2010 TV seasons. It was a smart, funny, offbeat workplace show, based in the offices of Veridian Dynamics, a company that did, well, everything, and stopped at nothing to get on top. This show was very well cast, had great chemistry, and was just different than other options out there. It is available on Netflix and all over the place.

The next show is Arrested Development, which aired from 2003-2006. I watched it via Netflix Instant. Now, you probably heard about this show, as I do remember it when it was on and remember the campaign to save it. I guess I should have listed. It revolves around the crazy antics of the Bluth family, whose dysfunction leads to hilarity for viewers. The center of the family is Michael, the most normal family member, although that's stretching it a bit. It is his job to keep the family business running while his father is in jail. Over 3 seasons you do grow to care and love the Bluths, even though moral shiftiness seems to be a family trait. I truly enjoyed this show, although it did start to slip towards the end. But the Christmas episode from season 2 is one of the best 22ish minutes of television ever.

I started this blog post while watching the final episode of Freaks and Geeks. I DVR'd all the episodes from the IFC channel, but its also available on other platforms. It aired during the 1999-2000 season, and was cancelled after only 12 episodes had aired. There are 18 completed episodes floating around, all of which aired on IFC. This show was awesome. Set in the early 80's its unique capsule of the era really resonants. It portrayed high school in way that it hadn't been before, and hasn't been since. Launching the careers of several big (or biggish) names (Judd Apatow, James Franco, Busy Phillips, Seth Rogen, Jason Segel), it had a great cast, fabulous character development/interaction, and its overall feel was just good. I had a few annoyances...James Franco's character irritated me most of the time, I didn't like what they did with Cindy Sanders, and I was a bit disappointed in Lindsay in the final, unaired episode (although I do understand why she did what she did). But has there ever been a character as awesome as Bill Haverchuck? I do think he is my favorite TV character of all time.

Go give these shows some life in their afterlife. You'll be glad you did!