Throughout the history of television, people have loved superhero stories. While the genre has its roots in George Reeves's Adventures of Superman in the 1950s, it's exploded in recent years. This has led to some shows with tremendous potential, like Watchmen and The Tick, that simply died after one or two seasons.
Unfortunately, many incredible superhero series ended way sooner than fans would have liked. Some were designed as miniseries, which explains their brief runs, but others were canceled because of poor ratings or problems behind-the-scenes.
10 Watchmen (2019)
1 Season, 9 Episodes
Watchmen was a far better show than many others in its genre because of its relevance to modern times. Rather than dwell in fantasy, the miniseries explored racial discrimination and the criminal justice system through a storyline that involved a White supremacist organization targeting the (costumed) Tulsa Police Department.
This Max project wasn’t just a blow-by-blow adaptation of Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons's Watchmen. Instead, it was more of a sequel, occurring 34 years later. A strong performance by Regina King also boosted the overall quality, and the choice to acknowledge real-life events, like the Tulsa race massacre of 1921, grounded the series in difficult discussions often absent even in the real world.
9 Constantine (2014)
1 Season, 13 Episodes
DC’s Constantine was always fighting an uphill battle, given that it was competing with the much more popular Supernatural. However, the two shows had plenty of parallels, with their emphasis on antiheroes who hunted supernatural entities. Even so, the series was delightful for fans who gave it a chance.
Constantine’s strengths lay in its visual effects and its redoubtable protagonist, John Constantine, who was never short on confidence or optimism. Any narrative flaws were quickly concealed by neatly choreographed action sequences and unique magical powers. Thankfully, cancelation didn’t mean Constantine left TV entirely, as John Constantine became a recurring character in the Arrowverse.
8 The Tick (2016 – 2018)
2 Seasons, 22 Episodes
Ben Edlund's The Tick was one of the greatest superhero parodies of all time and, while it had been brought to television as a live-action and an animated series, its two seasons on Prime were the character's greatest adaptation. Not content to be just a trope-filled satire, The Tick embraced the ridiculous cliches and heart that drove the original comics and developed Tick's classic villain, The Terror, in ways that were previously inconceivable.
Superhero stories are inherently ridiculous and heartfelt at the same time and The Tick understood this fully. In two short seasons, fans got to know Tick and Arthur as try-hard heroes with a complex dynamic. They came to understand Tick's struggles with mental health as more than a joke. They even got to see the series end on multiple, immense cliffhangers, with an invading alien fleet approaching Earth's moon and an interdimensional horror called Thrakkorzog teased in the final episode. One more season would have given The Tick's fans the closure they craved.
7 The Flash (1990 – 1991)
1 Season, 22 Episodes
The Flash of the '90s is often forgotten because of the more recent Arrowverse series featuring the speedster. However, The Flash was undoubtedly one of the best 90s superhero shows. For a project of its era, it had very good effects, and it featured some terrific performances from John Wesley Shipp as the hero and Mark Hamill as returning villain, The Trickster.
This early version of The Flash knew how to embrace the camp of superheroes. Its version of Barry Allen was a pleasant jock-in-nerd's-clothing and by letting Mark Hamill and other villains chew the scenery in bizarre costumes, it invoked the '60s Batman series while also giving The Flash real stakes and believable threats. It wasn't tonally consistent, combining jokes with episodes about saving innocent prisoners on death row, but it was a lot of fun.
6 The Gifted (2017 – 2019)
2 Seasons, 29 Episodes
Superheroes often have deep, complicated backstories but The Gifted skipped this tradition and got straight to business. The Marvel series started when two parents discovered their children had mutant powers and decided to hide them in an underground community. From there, the fun never stopped.
As tense as The Gifted could be, it was also full of memorable burns and one-liners, one of showrunner and Burn Notice creator, Matt Nix's specialties. The show also addressed themes of discrimination and persecution rather convincingly through its villain, Sentinel Services, who focused on hunting down mutants.
5 Mighty Morphin Power Rangers (1993 – 1995)
3 Seasons, 145 Episodes
A lengthy run for Mighty Morphin Power Rangers would have made sense, given the size of the franchise it spawned. Its ascendance into a cultural phenomenon might have surprised its developers since much of the series was a weird repurposing of video from the Japanese Super Sentai series, but its colorful characters and mecha-inspired battle sequences obviously filled a hole in America's media landscape..
The likable protagonists aside, the show had a formidable villain, the alien sorceress Rita Repulsa, and a perfect giant mech in Megazord. The fictional Angel Grove was also a perfect fantasy setting, combining silly high school drama with giant monster battles. It was both for younger audiences and of its time but its short run changed superhero TV forever.
4 Night Man (1997 – 1999)
2 Seasons, 44 Episodes
At a glance, Night Man felt like a Batman rip-off, but there were several distinctive things about it. Unlike the DC character, the series’ titular hero had powers and could telepathically detect evil thoughts in criminals. He was also a jazz saxophonist rather than a billionaire. Instead, his nemesis, Kieran Keyes, was the wealthy one.
Still, Night Man adopted the same modus operandi as Batman. He primarily dealt with criminals at night and avoided killing them whenever possible. Because the villain was wealthy, the show focused on capitalism and greed in interesting ways. Night Man never really got the chance to stand out from other nocturnal superheroes but a couple more seasons would have cured that.
3 Birds Of Prey (2002)
1 Season, 13 Episodes
Birds of Prey presented a strange scenario where Michael Keaton’s Batman from 1989 had abandoned Gotham, creating a vacuum that needed to be filled. Oracle, Huntress, and Black Canary stepped in to deal with the numerous miscreants causing havoc around the city.
By sharing continuity with the Tim Burton Batman movies, the series gave potential viewers a reason to invest their time. Using familiar characters like Alfred Pennyworth and Dr. Harleen Quinzel/ Harley Quinn helped fans forget about Batman’s absence. Obviously, the absent Dark Knight was the elephant in the room but given a little more time, fans would have forgotten about him and focused on the heroes they had.
2 Legion (2017 – 2019)
3 Seasons, 27 Episodes
Legion was another standalone Marvel series focused on mutants, and like The Gifted it was unusually ambitious. Focused on a hospitalized hero dealing with mental health issues, it still managed to be hilarious while not trivializing or demonizing its hero or his problems.
Comics have long used mental health issues and Disassociative Identity Disorder as vehicles for weird stories instead of treating them with the dignity they deserve. Legion wasn't perfect but it tried to grapple with the problems that could come with a combination of superpowers and mental illness, while also bringing fan favorites like Charles Xavier into the picture. The project could have been truly important and seeing it cut short devastated its fans.
1 The Punisher (2017 – 2019)
2 Season, 26 Episodes
The Punisher was ideal for fans who prefer action movies to superhero stories since it focused on a hero who, theoretically didn't have superhuman powers. The vengeful and ruthless Frank Castle, aka The Punisher, was a lethal vigilante who relied on guns, training, and determination to take out his opposition.
The Punisher's notable fight scenes were almost on par with its Netflix predecessor, Daredevil, but it didn't rely solely on action to get its point across. With stellar performances from John Bernthal and Debra Ann Woll, the series missed its opportunity to pair Castle with his most iconic villain, The Kingpin. Vincent D'Onofrio's portrayal of Wilson Fisk in Daredevil is legendary and if the series had reached a more natural conclusion, he would have been incredible her as well.