Farscape:
The first 4 episodes of the first season get progressively better, but it’s when you hit episode 5 “PK Tech” girl that the show hits its stride. Sure there are weak episodes after 5, but overall the show just gets better the deeper you go.
My go-to example for this is Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. Season one is overall quite rough, however s01e19 “Duet” (second-to-last episode of the season) is IMO the first episode that shows true glimmers of promise. In season two the series starts to find its footing, by season three it’s proven itself to be Star Trek gold, and then the series manages to maintain its quality through to its seventh and final season.
Season 1 of DS9 was rough? Cries in TNG… 🤣
It is rough compared to the later stuff but, man, it got off to a WAY better start than TNG did… I mean, Riker had to grow a beard for the show to get good!
Sisko’s beard also improved DS9
He also had reverse Samson syndrome, had to lose his hair to gain power.
Very true!
IMO DS9’s s1 is way worse than TNG’s, but that might be because TNG has a nostalgia factor for me from watching random episodes as a kid, and so by the time I did a full start-to-finish watch-thru I already knew the characters well and understood that the series would get better, whereas I was an adult when I first watched DS9 and went into it completely blind (after watching the first two-parter episode I nearly cried, because I was on a mission to watch all of the 20th century Star Treks, and there were seven seasons of this to slog through!? And now it’s my favorite Star Trek series of all time.)
I think you mean episode 18, that one is the second-to-last of the season.
And that is exactly the episode I was thinking of, too. I didn’t know which episode number it was, I just remember when I was watching DS9, there was an episode with the filing clerk, and I thought, “Oh, this show is actually going to be great if it stays like this.” I just looked it up on IMDB, and it’s S1 E18.
Apparently it depends on whether you consider the series premiere as one episode or two; Wikipedia (which I used for reference) lists it as two separate episodes, providing a total s1 episode count of 20, vs imdb which lists it as one single episode, providing a total s1 episode count of 19. Memory Alpha lists the episode as s1e19, and I’m inclined to trust those nerds. At any rate I edited my comment to include the episode title for clarity.
Regardless, yeah, I think it’s probably a turning point episode for a lot of folks, and it’s the first of many war introspection episodes that help make the series timeless.
Oh, interesting. I’d go with Memory Alpha too, then. But yeah, definitely a pivot point in the series, and the first one that really took the post-war setting seriously.
Parks & Recs season one was pretty different from the rest of the show - not necessarly bad, just different, e.g. several popular characters didn’t exist yet. TBH I don’t remember when exactly they introduced substantial changes, but I think it was the start of season two.
I feel like season one was trying too hard to be The Office, and then in season two it sheds that to become its own entity. I’ve heard that the writers sincerely considered s1’s less-than-stellar critical response and made changes to s2 accordingly (e.g. making Leslie Knope more likable and less dumb). It’s definitely a “don’t judge it until you’ve gotten at least part way through season two” series.
Most people say the start of Season 3 as Mark is off the show at the end of season 2 and Chris and Ben become full time characters, but the first Tammy episode is in season 2 so that’s my vote. It’s just too damn funny to pass over.
The Venezuela sister city episode season 2 episode 5 is where it showed its true potential.
The humor lands, the characters have some consistency, and the vibe is consistent with the rest of the show. Yes, it was firing on all cylinders with Ben and Chris, but this episode is where it showed its stuff.
If you disagree, right to jail. Right away. No trial, no nothing. I have the best opinion… because of jail.
Disagree? Straight to jail.
Agree, but so strongly it seems rehearsed? Surprisingly, also jail.
We have the best agreements in the world, because of jail.
Parks & Recs is a very typical show that evolves from edgy comedy into feel-good romcom. American The Office did the same, Schitt’s Creek did the same, Superstore did it. At this point I’m not even sure if it’s by accident (the shows responding to what the audience wants) or if it’s by design (“let’s make typical show that goes from edgy to romcom”).
New girl did it too
Its because writing jokes forever gets harder and harder with every new season
But any old chump can write the characters falling in love and having their goals come to fruition and blah blah
I think it’s also because quirky characters get boring fast. So you can either keep making everyone crazier and crazier (like Veep or Archer) or you pivot into a romcom.
Archer was great for the “let’s start of the rails and see how far we can get from them” factor
That’s a crazy point. Huh. Yeah I can’t think of any examples of that kind of show that doesn’t besides the absolute unit that is Always Sunny.
Season 2, Episode 23 is the “real” start of the show IMHO. It’s the episode where Chris and Ben arrive, Mark takes a job somewhere else, and the gang celebrates April’s 21st birthday at the Snakehole Lounge. Also, most of the show’s eventual couples are also paired up in that episode - Leslie/Ben, Ann/Chris, April/Andy, and even Tom/Lucy.
Both Parks&Rec and Office were kinda rough in S1 and got significantly better is S2 I think.
i saw some clips of that show, went to watch it, and realised the rest of the epilodes were just padding around the clip-worthy stuff. it was so hollow.
I found that it had a lot of substance. Great show.
This is how I feel about it. I remember loving it when it was first airing. I did a rewatch a couple years back and couldn’t stand it. Can’t say I like a single character outside of Andy.
BoJack Horseman. I don’t have an exact episode for you, but the first few seem to be mostly world building and introducing a few themes that will come back later. Later half of s1 is where it starts to get good, and with s2 the show “properly” starts.
Episode 8, The Telescope.
I can narrow it down to one line, too. When Herb tells BoJack, “I don’t forgive you.” It flouted the usual sitcom formula, and marked a turn to more complex characters and darker themes.
Years ago i saw someone do a breakdown of what you’re talking about and if memory serves it’s the Herb episode that changes the vibe of the show. Until that point bojack feels like every other crude comedy on air but from that point on it breaks the traditional format. Its the first time on screen, and possibly in bojacks whole life(outside of family issues), that he faces consequences for his actions that have a serious negative impact on him and the fix is out of his control. In the face of this truth he spirals into a world of indulgence and avoidance and we the viewer begin to see the impact that has on those around him.
I think the comedy and overall quality of the early episodes is pretty solid, making those not bad episodes per se but rather deceptive ones. I personally enjoyed how the series takes its time in settling into its drama, and suspect it was an intentional metaphor for how the surface glitz and glamour of Hollywood obscures its dark underbelly.
Hmmm, that would make another good asklemmy thread: series with deceptive beginnings that obscure their true genre…
Yeah, there are some solid jokes in the early episodes, such as the paparazzi being unable to blackmail Bojack, because he’s too nihilistic, depressed, and numb to care.
And I also like the more subtle ones, such as Diane having one decent sibling, and he’s literally the black sheep of the family.
Must have been after I lost interest. I had always heard great things, but only made it a few episodes in.
I tried the first episode and it just felt depressing, not funny at all. Never looked back.
It’s depressing in a good way. It handles the telling of depression as a central theme really well. But holy fuck does “The View from Halfway Down” (towards the end of the series) really make it uncomfortable in this regard. Do not watch it unless you’re prepared for an overload of self reflection and existential dread.
well it is about mental health disorders…handles it really well imo.
Which is why I appreciate this thread, knowing that it gets better will help me give it another chance.
The Good Place really takes off at the end of the first season.
Personally I consider The Good Place one of the rare shows that is solid all the way through without a single bad or weak episode, however the end of season one is certainly where it goes from great to fantastic.
For me, the twist at the end of season one retroactively makes the rest of season one better
alsimoneau figured it out? That’s a new low…
Ted Danson’s reaction to that scene is too perfect… That one hurts
No way. Episode one was a banger.
American Dad is a fantastically funny show, but season 1 is basically unwatchable. Season 2 is a mixed bag. I’d recommend people just start watching from season 3 onward and only check out the earlier episodes as a curiosity.
American Dad is so underrated. Seth McFarlane is very funny, but you can tell that Fox saw Family Guy taking off and basically took it away from him, and he knew there was no sense in fighting it. But he started American Dad, and that’s where you can really see his comedy come through.
So many great episodes. In Country… Club is probably my all-time-favorite. So many others though, Irregarding Steve, The Abusive Terrestrial, The Vacation Goo, Spring Breakup, and Shallow Vows. And really anything with Roger
I thought McFarlane had very little to do worth American dad, other than the voice, after the first few seasons?
Regardless it’s amazing. It turned from a critique of Republicans to some surrealist nonsense, it’s great.
‘In Country… Club’ is the example episode I use to get people to try the show. It is so good and commits to hard to the premise.
We were kids, man!
I remember watching American Dad’s premiere and being excited for the concept but disappointed by the execution. You can tell there’s aspiration to be a good parody of the contemporary political climate in the first episode, but iirc it’s undermined by its crassness.
The Orville also struggled to get its footing in the early episodes; maybe Seth MacFarlane just does better once his series gets established?
I think they struggled early on for different reasons.
American Dad was too laser focused on being a political satire show and I just don’t think the writers were equipped to write a good political show. It just comes off as angry and with unlikable characters. Once it loosened up a little bit, having that political satire premise as a foundation gives the characters a baseline to work from and they all feel distinct because of it.
The Orville feels like Seth didn’t want to make a comedy. It feels to me like he just wanted to make Star Trek, but because he’s “a comedy guy” a lot of the humor, especially early on felt like it was put in to meet some expectation of Fox that a Seth show be a comedy.
I forgot the exact episode, but I felt The Expanse was pretty mediocre until one of the last episodes of S1. I stuck with it because I was told prior to starting that it takes a while to get going. I’m glad I stuck with it, as it’s my favorite sci-fi show.
For me its’ the opposite, it started strong (complex politics, realistic space travel) and by the end it turned into just another space opera about hardy space ship crew fighting space battles.
Damn, I watched the first two seasons before moving and never got around to finishing but those things were exactly what I was into. I thought the interplanetary politics were awesome
From what I understand there’s a lot of material from the books that didn’t make it into the show. I bet the politics were more extensive too.
The authors actually have cameos in the show. They were very involved in its conception and making. The books had a lot more details, little sub-stories, etc. The show made a few substantial changes, but IMHO they all made for better TV (like making Arwin a major character in Jackson’s LotR).
Fun fact: the authors initially intended for The Expanse to be a table top game.
Expanse is a slow burn start. I personally think it was great from the start but will tell anyone to watch at least until E3 or 4 (episode called CQB). At that point if you don’t want to keep watching it’s likely not a good fit.
Yes absolutely 100%. That is my usual advice as well. If you get through episode 4 and you aren’t completely fucking hooked you might as well shut off the tv and sit in the dark and question your life choices.
Yeah, I was about halfway through S1 and I was thinking “why do people rave about this show?”
Also glad I stuck with it.
King of the Hill is pretty dry in the first season. It has some good jokes, sets up the premise, but it’s hard to “get it”. The humor is very dry, and to some I assume it’s easy to take it as “It’s some uptight white guy who likes his job I guess”.
Texas City Twister is when all of a sudden the humor just made sense to me. Still very dry humor, but it was so funny. So many great jokes.
Sir if you’re calling me a liar you better be holding something stronger than an umbrella. 9 iron …Y’all have a nice day
I can’t live in a beer can I can live in a trailer but I don’t have a trailer because the trailer tipped over!
Speaking of Hell, if I wasn’t so in control of my emotions I might be so inclined to suggest that’s the sort of place making a… a visit towards!
Fuel Filters?! Honey quick that jackass is buying all the fuel filters! I need a fuel filter what are they for I need one!
I love you! And Bobby! And Luanne! To a lesser extent!
All of these are 100% out of context, but it just hits everything that makes king of the hill funny. Everything is so tongue-in-cheek
I recently rewatched King of the Hill, and I definitely did not appreciate the humor when it originally aired. It is a truly funny - but definitely dry - show about a decent man and his family. He’s conservative, but he is not a hateful man. He wouldn’t like MAGA. He takes care of his neighbors like they’re family - including immigrants - and the community around him looks up to him as a leader.
I wasn’t super prepared for how much I would come to love the show now that I’ve watched it as a middle aged dude.
Mike Judge did a great job with the show, and I genuinely enjoyed the new season too.
Hank is an annoying boomer but he lives his values, which makes him endearing. There’s an episode where he notices the tile in his bathroom is faded and says it was guaranteed for 20 years and its only been “what 17, 18 years? Where’s that receipt?” That’s an annoying and obnoxious boomerism. On the other hand, if Hank guaranteed something for 20 years, even as an unofficial offhand comment, and somebody called him on it, he’d go take care of it.
Same thing with tools. Many boomers pretend to have any idea what they are doing when really they don’t have any tools or skills. Hank had enough tools and skills to teach an entire shop class in his garage.
He believes in the idealized idea of America. That means he works hard and to a high degree of craftsmanship and honesty. It also means he can get scammed and taken advantage of with his expectation that other people are doing the same.
While a lot of people like to point to Hank as a caricature of conservative values, I really feel like that misses the mark. Hank is a great example of someone who doesn’t compromise morals for values. A big part of the show revolves around Hank being subject to things that sit far outside his limited world view. Each time he goes through an arch of emotions, initially reacting with the confusion and fear you’d expect from a middle aged white Christian man finding out that his wife’s new friend is a prostitute or that his friend’s dad is fabulously gay, before having a contemplative moment where he either talks openly with peggy before bed or works on something mechanical. He then ultimately recovers from the situation and while he may still feel uncomfortable with the topic he always resolves to approach it from a place of earnest understanding. He does not let his political, religious, or societal values trump his moral imperative to treat people with the respect they deserve and to help a person in need.
Watching in its entirety for the first time as an adult, I made the other common mistake in thinking hank was a bad character because despite being conservative coded he frequently makes what I recognized as being incredibly progressive and left leaning decisions. I couldn’t decide if it was the writer’s secret goal to try an reeducate the bigots of the right by tricking them into relating to a man who can be ok with drag queens. That is the common folly of trying to understand a creature while you stand beside the monster wearing its corpse as a disguise. Conservative doesn’t mean what it used to, it doesn’t mean anything. None of our political terms do. But King of the Hill came out when they still did mean something and was made by people who lived through time when it actually matched the definition of the word. Conservative used to mean Hank Hill. Conservative used to mean hating the idea of Walmart killing local businesses. It used to mean focusing on your community. It used to mean striving for a simple world, not fighting against anything that expands it. There is a lot that the show can teach us about political discourse but I honestly don’t think anyone is ready to really learn it.
Well fucking said!
It’s nice to see that show get more appreciation these days. I always loved it when I was young, thought it was hilarious, like the meme of Hank with the big can of WD-40 that won’t open, but he’s prepared for that and just pulls out the smaller WD-40 was representative of the whole show, not just a funny moment.
Like Dale, the character defined by his paranoia and lack of trust, not even considering his wife was so obviously cheating on him.
Or Boomhauer, by far the wisest character on the show once you learn to understand him, except no one on the show can, though Hank often pretends he understands and that Boomhauer just said what he wanted/needed to hear.
And the writing that respected its viewers. Jokes that just happen and then it moves on whether you notice them or not, like Luanne trying to do highlights for Connie but instead wrecked the hair she was highlighting and it came off with the cap. Only thing it shows you are Luanne seeing it, panicking for a moment and hiding the cap, followed up by one confused “isn’t it supposed to be more noticeable than this?” (or something similar) and then it’s never mentioned again.
It was as funny as South Park just way more subtle about it. Tbh I’m kinda surprised it lasted as long as it did with how many people didn’t get it until later.
the meme of Hank with the big can of WD-40 that won’t open, but he’s prepared for that and just pulls out the smaller WD-40 was representative of the whole show
And he had the WD-40 to fix the squeak in the door of a place he was staying in on vacation. It wasn’t even his house.
I think the premise is solid, and so rooted in his values has to come to terms with the world around him, and he slowly opens up to things that are outside his worldview. He may not understand them, he may be horrified, but he’s always caring and open to admitting he was wrong.
RIP Brittany Murphy. Luanne was annoying at first but as soon as they let her spread her wings she took that character to incredible places.
I feel like her getting with Lucky and having a baby near the end was complete character assassination. I recall hearing the Fox pushed for certain things in the last couple of seasons and I suspect the push for her to get with Lucky, and Lucky becoming a reoccurring character was part of that.
In my mind, Luanne taking over Jack’s barber shop was the end of her character arc in the show. She’d finally found her calling and become a success. (Then suddenly we never see that Barber shop again and she backslides into just being a one dimensional dummy, but now pregnant and with Lucky to be annoying with in every scene.)
The reboot is great, but she was definitely a missing piece
Puella Magi Madoka Magica. Starts like the average random magical girl anime until episode 3, then suddenly deconstructs everything giving you an amazing whiplash. I had to beg a friend of mine to watch until ep3 because he absolutely could not stomach the first episode. He thanked me later
Madoka is like a blend of Sailor Moon, Made in Abyss and a drop of LSD for the artists
Every one I have forced to sit through the first 3 episodes of Red Dwarf has gone on to watch every episode and now incorporates quotes from the show in normal conversation.
That’s because there are no bad episodes of Red Dwarf
Idk they had me from episode 1. Best episode though imo is tikka to ride
They’re all dead
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. had to vamp for too long before “Turn, Turn, Turn” but it got better and better the loopier it got, and the farther from the canon universe. And yet it’s worth watching the early eps because things are set in place that the show runners fulfill later. In some cases much much later, and in some very satisfying ways.
I loved the second half of season 1 of that show, but then I hated season 2 so much that I refused to watch any more of it.
You should try Season 3, see if you still hate it
Perhaps someday, I will introspect to find that the name Daisy Johnson no longer makes me break out in hives.
Letterkenny, I think it gets good around the end of season 1 or beginning of 2. You still have to watch the first episodes to get an idea of who everyone is and their relationships though. Might have to do with just how strange the characters are in this random small town in Canada. It’s pretty tough at first, but once you get to the end of the first season, something clicks and the show becomes pretty hilarious.
I was hooked from the first episode
You should do a reverse one lol. For me that would be family guy: first few seasons are funny af then…a very steep drop
This is called “Jumping the Shark” after a Happy Days episode where The Fonz literally jumps a shark while water-skiing, and the show was mostly downhill in quality there and after.
The opposite, and an answer to OP’s question is “Growing the Beard” due to Star Trek: The Next Generation’s apparent increase in quality after Will Riker grew a beard.
Encounter At Farpoint was a fine pilot episode, and I’m tired of pretending its not.
Nice love the beard
For me, it was the Big Bang Theory. The first two seasons were great, third season was good, fourth season was kinda meh, and I stopped watching partway through the fifth season. From what I gathered, as the show gained popularity, they changed it from being a show for nerds, to being for “normal” people who know a nerd.
Characters strayed too far from who they were so that everyone would have their happily ever after.
I wish I’d stopped watching The Walking Dead partway through season 5, whenever Rick and friends arrive at Alexandria, but before they go inside.
Sure, there’s plenty of good episodes/moments afterward, but without spoiling anything, that’s also when a lot of the show’s bullshit really ramps up.
The Walking Dead was also the first thing that came to my mind. I think I eventually stopped in season 7-8 or something and never went back.
Recently I was thinking about rewatching the first season. Have you watched it again?
Oh, I go back to the beginning every now and again, usually for fitting background noise when I’m on a Project Zomboid kick.
I forget exactly when I’d stopped watching the first time, probably when the show made Negan’s introduction into a cliffhanger. Or whenever Carl was killed off, but I forget exactly when.
Tried to push through to the Whisperers arc once though, but I made the mistake of getting invested in a new character after the time skip, someone I thought had a lot of interesting potential… and they were killed off to make the villains’ introduction more “serious”. I thought it was a huge waste. I don’t have interest in finishing the show anymore, nor any of the spinoffs aside from Rick’s miniseries.
Ok. I never saw any of the spinoffs because horror isn’t really my genre if I am honest but I remember the first couple of seasons were quite good and interesting. Just wanted to go back and check how they aged, because I never saw them again. Definitely not going to watch the whole show, because after a while it is just more of the same thing and as you said the storylines just get more and more ridiculous.
Same for Game of Thrones
I remembered Game of Thrones being fun to watch but my memory severely downplayed the quality due to how the end went. I picked up Season 1 dirt-cheap at a thrift store and rewatched it. Gods, it was good then…
Go watch the one with brett.Kavanaugh it’s great
Not that it was bad before, but the dark comedy of Succession didn’t really click for me until the “Boar on the Floor” scene, Season 2 episode 3.
Succession really hit home for me when I realized that every single main character in the show is just awful. I kept trying and failing to find the one I should have sympathy for.
I think that was part of my initial reaction. I have a hard time getting into shows where everyone is horrible. But this scene gave me a new angle to appreciate the show, and it set the right mindset for enjoying the rest.
Huh. I never made it through season one because I just couldn’t stand every character, and didn’t want to keep spending time with them.
I loved it from Episode 1.
Not TV, but I’ve told people to skip the first two books in the Discworld series, Sir Terry doesn’t really get into his stride till a little later, but book three is where his talent starts to shine.
Yeah, though even then there’s a lot of growth. Comparing The Theif of Time, Thud, or I Shall Wear Midnight to Sourcery just feels unfair to the latter.
Or start with Small Gods, everyone who likes discworld likes Small Gods. It stands alone, it’s clever, but has some of the early book style, and it’s regularly referenced by the fans.
