The vast majority of Netflix subscribers can probably only name a handful of original shows that have been created for the streamer. Despite Netflix’s massive budget for originals every year, it’s the established shows like Suits and NCIS that pull in casual fans who just want to revisit their favorite series. As a result, the vast majority of Netflix originals have short runs and the cycle continues over and over again.
Our roundup of the best hidden gems on Netflix is meant to put a spotlight on these shows that might otherwise be lost among the glut of content on the streamer. This month, we’re putting the spotlight on two Netflix shows that ended prematurely, Archive 81 and The End of the F***ing World, as well as a tennis documentary called Break Point. If you’re looking for more options, you can find the rest of our picks below.
Want to watch something with more buzz? Check out the best movies on Netflix and the best shows on Netflix right now. For a much-needed laugh, peruse the best stand-up comedy on Netflix right now.
Archive 81 (2022)
73%
7.3/10Archive 81 is based on a horror podcast of the same name and stars Mamoudou Athie as Dan Turner, a man who is hired by Virgil Davenport (Martin Donovan) to restore videotapes of a project run by Melody Pendras (Dina Shihabi) years before. It could have been just a standard job, but weird things keep happening. Dan even discovers that his late father, Steve Turner (Charlie Hudson III), appears on Melody’s tapes.
Dan’s friend, Mark Higgins (Matt McGorry), convinces him to stay with the project to discover how his father is connected. But as Dan learns more about the cult connections to Melody’s work, he may not be able to escape with his newfound knowledge.
The End of the F***ing World (2017)
77%
8.0/10Despite the title, The End of the F***ing World is not about an apocalypse. Instead, it’s a black comedy that follows James (Alex Lawther) and Alyssa (Jessica Barden), a pair of teenagers who go on the run together out of a desire to escape their lives.
Unbeknownst to Alyssa, James shows some psychopathic tendencies and he only runs away with her to get a better opportunity to murder her. And yet even James starts to feel something real for Alyssa as they get into a lot of trouble on the road. Once they go down this path, James and Alyssa may never be able to go home again.
Break Point (2023)
Maestro in Blue (2022)
8.2/10
If Maestro in Blue were simply a steamy romance series, that might have been enough for this Greek show to break out on Netflix. Series creator and star, Christoforos Papakaliatis, sets up the show to be like that when he steps into the leading role as Orestis, a musician who is hired to organize a music festival on a small island in Greece. Soon after his arrival, Orestis catches the eye of Klelia (Klelia Andriolatou), an aspiring musician who is 19 years old.
The age gap between Orestis and Klelia does come up a few times as they try to deny their growing attraction. Orestis also builds larger bonds with the small town. But once someone winds up getting murdered, Maestro in Blue becomes an entirely different show. And the unfolding mystery may be more compelling than the love story.
Wildfire (2005)
7.5/10Wildfire was an original series on ABC Family in 2005 before the channel was renamed Freeform. The story follows Kristine “Kris” Furillo-Davis (Genevieve Cortese), a teenager who is just getting out of juvenile detention when she gets a chance to rebuild her life by working at a ranch.
Kris’ passion for animals leads her to prevent a horse named Wildfire from being slaughtered. Their mutual bond also allows Kris to pursue a new destiny as a race jockey with Wildfire as her steed. But even Kris’ newfound celebrity may not be enough to keep the ranch open.
School Spirits (2023)
69%
7.6/10There’s nothing like solving a murder, especially when it’s your own murder. That’s an afterlife that Maddie Nears (Peyton List) never asked for in School Spirits. But one day, Maddie simply woke up and discovered that she was dead and haunting her high school alongside other students who had met untimely ends years earlier.
As Maddie attempts to discover what happened to her, she runs up against the limits of what she can do as a ghost. This show is on loan from Paramount+, which is where School Spirits season 2 will eventually premiere.
Night Stalker: The Hunt for a Serial Killer (2021)
70%
7.5/10For over a year, Richard Ramirez terrorized the Los Angeles area as the Night Stalker. And then the people of Los Angeles fought back. Night Stalker: The Hunt for a Serial Killer is a four-part true crime series that rolls back the clock to the mid ’80s, as the public and the police realized that there was a serial killer in the City of Angels.
The show focuses on the detectives who pursued Ramirez’s true identity, the media frenzy, and what happened once Ramirez was exposed and hunted and pursued by ordinary citizens.
Goodbye Earth (2024)
What would you do if you knew for certain that the world was going to end in 200 days? Hopefully, we’ll never have to answer that question. The same can’t be said of the people in Goodbye Earth, a Korean drama that deals with the impending destruction of the planet due to an asteroid hurtling toward the planet. And there’s no chance of anyone going up in space to blow it up, as they did in Michael Bay’s Armageddon.
Jin Se-kyung (Ahn Eun-jin) has come up with an answer for herself. For whatever time Se-kyung has left, she intends to dedicate it to protecting the schoolchildren in her care. But as society falls apart around her, this may be a promise that Se-kyung can’t keep.
Our Living World (2024)
Netflix has a number of wonderful nature programs in its lineup, but Our Living Planet takes a different tack than most. As narrated by Cate Blanchett, this four-part miniseries stresses the interconnectedness of the human and animal worlds in some surprising ways.
But the core message of the show is clear: We need the animals, and they need us to help protect the ecosystem while we still can. There aren’t any easy answers to be found here, but it’s far from just doom and gloom about the future of the world. Where there’s life, there’s hope.
The Good Cop (2018)
53%
7.0/10The Good Cop feels a lot like Netflix’s take on Castle, with a little bit of Monk thrown in. Tony Danza stars as Anthony “Tony” Caruso Sr., a former cop who did seven years behind bars for corruption. Tony’s son, Anthony “TJ” Caruso Jr. (Josh Groban), is so by the book that he’s the polar opposite of his ex-con father.
Because Tony Sr. wants to prove that he’s changed and reformed, he risks violating his parole to help his son solve murders. Some of TJ’s cases even revolve around his father in unexpected ways.
HAPPY! (2017)
6%
8.1/10Law & Order: Organized Crime star Christopher Meloni headlined the Syfy original series Happy!, based on the comic of the same name by Grant Morrison and The Boys co-creator Darick Robertson. Meloni plays Nick Sax, an alcoholic ex-cop who has fallen so far that he now works as a hitman.
Sax’s life is changed when he meets Happy (Patton Oswalt), an imaginary friend of a young girl named Hailey Louise Hansen (Bryce Lorenzo). Hailey has been kidnapped, and she sent Happy to bring help. What Sax doesn’t initially realize is that Happy is not only real, but he can see Happy because Hailey is his daughter. And it will take a leap of faith for Sax to follow Happy back to the man holding Hailey captive.
Fisk (2021)
7.9/10You’ll have to excuse the title character of Fisk for being a bit of a misanthrope. In short order, Helen Tudor-Fisk (Kitty Flanagan) has had her husband run off with another woman and watched while her legal career has gone down the drain. Can you blame her for souring on people after that?
To avoid dealing with clients, Helen takes a job at Gruber & Gruber, an Australian law firm that specializes in probate cases. But much to Helen’s disappointment, working on behalf of recently deceased clients is even more taxing than she anticipated.
The Guardians of Justice (2022)
5.1/10You may find the characters in The Guardians of Justice to be very familiar, especially since this show is a dark parody of DC and Marvel’ superheroes. Marvelous Man (Will Yun Lee) has kept the world at peace for decades with his Superman-like powers. But when Marvelous Man commits suicide during his annual address, the world slips into chaos.
Knight Hawk (as played by former wrestler Diamond Dallas Page) believes that Marvelous Man was murdered, and he is helped in his investigation by The Speed (Shami Vinson). However, Knight Hawk won’t like the answers he finds, and The Speed may come to question whether the Guardians are actually heroes at all.
The Vince Staples Show (2024)
77%
7.8/10The tagline for The Vince Staples Show notes that its main character is “kind of famous and sort of rich” thanks to his career as a rapper, which may draw comparisons to FX’s Dave. But this particular series is closer in tone to Donald Glover’s Atlanta or even The Chris Isaak Show from two decades ago. You may not have heard of him, but Vince Staples is a real rapper who is playing himself in slightly exaggerated and comedic situations.
For the most part, Staples’ fame is just large enough to create some awkward interactions with his family, friends, and strangers. He’s also stuck somewhere between having a normal life and having people paying too much attention to him.
One Day (2024)
76%
8.2/10You may recall that there was a film adaptation of David Nicholls’ One Day in 2011 with Anne Hathaway and Jim Sturgess in the leading roles. That movie is more of an abridged version of the novel, while the updated version of One Day extends to a whopping 14 episodes, which is a lot more than Netflix shows tend to get.
The series follows Dexter (Leo Woodall) and Emma (Ambika Mod), two strangers who meet and almost hook up on their last day in college. Although they don’t immediately become lovers, their bond with each other is powerful enough to keep them in each other’s orbits for the next two decades. From the highs to the lows, Dexter and Emma keep crossing paths as they try to determine what they want, and if they’re meant to be together.
The Tourist (2022)
81%
7.0/10The title character of The Tourist is a man played by Jamie Dornan who has no idea who he is or why he’s in Australia. The audience only initially gets to see the incident that landed the man in the hospital, but without any context as to why someone tried to kill him.
Without many leads to go on, the man visits a café where he encounters Luci Miller (Shalom Brune-Franklin), a waitress who knows a lot more about the man than she lets on. But she may be one of the only allies that he has. Eventually, the man is going to get his answers, assuming that he doesn’t get himself killed in the process.
Detective Forst (2024)
5.6/10Fans of detective dramas will recognize a lot in Detective Forst, especially the lead character Wiktor Forst (Borys Szyc). He’s just got no time for the rules as laid down by his boss, Chief Inspector Edmund Osica (Andrzej Bienias), and Forst takes being thrown off of his latest case as more of a suggestion than an order. As long as there’s a serial killer running around, Forst isn’t backing down.
What separates this show from the pack is the Polish setting and culture, as well as a mystery that isn’t immediately obvious. The killer is sending a message, but even Forst needs some help making sense out of the clues that were left behind.
Boy Swallows Universe (2024)
68%
8.2/10Despite the name, the Australian drama Boy Swallows Universe is not about some eldritch horror that’s gobbling up galaxies. It’s about a boy, Eli Bell (Felix Cameron), whose world is coming apart at the seams. Eli’s mother, Frankie (Phoebe Tonkin), is hopelessly addicted to drugs and in jail, leaving Eli and his older brother, Gus (Lee Tiger Halley), who struggles with selective mutism, to live with their stepfather, Lyle Orlik (Travis Fimmel).
Lyle’s no saint himself, as he’s dealing drugs out of the misguided idea that it’s the only way he can provide for his family. Eli wants a way out for both Lyle and his mother, which leads him to a local crime boss, Bich (HaiHa Le), who brings Eli into her employ. But the deeper he goes in the criminal underworld, the harder it will be for Eli to get out.
Killer Soup (2024)
6.3/10Swathi Shetty (Konkona Sen Sharma) has ambitions of owning her own restaurant in the Indian dark comedy, Killer Soup. And Swathi isn’t going to let little things like a lack of culinary talent or her recently deceased husband, Prabhu Shetty (Manoj Bajpayee), get in her way. As it happens, Swathi’s lover, Umesh (Bajpayee), looks so much like her late husband that she’s able to pass him off as the real thing.
However, the shortcuts and crimes that Swathi commits along the way always seem to come back to haunt her, and Umesh can only keep up the deception for so long. Eventually, this house of cards is going to fold.
The Deep State (2023)
6.5/10The Deep State is a true rarity, even on Netflix. This is a Kuwaiti political thriller that seems destined for an American remake down the line. Bashar Al-Shatti and Khalid Al Muthafar co-star as intelligence officers Bashar and Khaled, neither of whom is sure that they can trust each other. The one thing that Bashar and Khaled have in common is their shared belief that National Security Minister Adnan (Faisal Al-Ameri) is innocent of criminal culpability in a plane crash that claimed the life of a pilot.
Proving Adnan’s innocence turns out to be dangerous for both Bashar and Khaled. Once they leave the country to get answers, they may find coming home to be much more difficult.
The 100 (2014)
64%
7.6/10During its seven-season run on The CW, The 100 inspired a passionate fanbase, but the series hasn’t fully crossed over into the mainstream. The show has a digital afterlife on Netflix, and it’s worthy of another chance to bring people into the story. The series is set in the future after Earth has been rendered nearly uninhabitable. With the remnants of humanity now living in orbit on the Ark, the future of the human race is in peril.
One hundred teenagers, including Clarke Griffin (Eliza Taylor), Bellamy Blake (Bob Morley), and Octavia Blake (Marie Avgeropoulos) are expelled from the Ark and forced to determine if it’s possible to reclaim the Earth. The group soon discovers that there are other factions of survivors on their homeworld, and there may not be a safe haven for anyone when the Ark itself is threatened with destruction.
Friends from College (2017)
44%
6.9/10There are few sitcoms that can boast a star-studded cast like the ensemble that Friends from College put together. Two decades after their time in Harvard, Ethan (Keegan-Michael Key) and Lisa Turner (Secret Invasion‘s Cobie Smulders) move to New York City and reconnect with their friends and classmates Samantha “Sam” Delmonico (Annie Parisse), Nick Ames (Nat Faxon), Max Adler (Fred Savage), and Marianne (Jae Suh Park).
However, those bonds of friendship are tested by time and emotional distance as they navigate their own lives and ambitions. Ethan and Lisa’s marriage may also be stressed by his recurring affair with Sam, which could have major consequences for all three.
Cunk on... (2018)
If you remember Sacha Baron Cohen’s Ali G and Borat, then you may have a better idea of what to expect from Cunk on Earth. This is a mockumentary produced by The Black Mirror creator Charlie Brooker that features Diane Morgan reprising her role as Philomena Cunk, a blithering idiot who interviews real experts on the show.
This series has a really dry sense of humor, and much of the comedy comes from Morgan’s ability to keep herself from breaking character in the face of some of her incredulous interview subjects. This is a parody of nearly every documentary you’ve ever seen, which makes it so much fun to watch.
Last Chance U: Basketball (2021)
90%
8.3/10Blue Eye Samurai (2023)
86%
9.0/10Blue Eye Samurai is an unusual anime that appears to be picking up traction with fans who aren’t typically into animation. That’s because this is a series that fully embraces drama, as Mizu (Maya Erskine), a young woman passing herself off as a man, cuts a bloody path of vengeance in 17th century Japan when half-Caucasian and half-Japanese people like Mizu were considered abominations.
Mizu is accompanied on her quest by Ringo (Masi Oka), a handless man who proves to be a loyal friend. Mizu also finds an unexpected ally in Taigen (Darren Barnet), a swordsman who comes to respect her despite wanting to duel her to the death to restore his honor for a defeat at Mizu’s hands. This is an intricately plotted and executed series, which is just as compelling and interesting as any live-action series.
The Pacific (2010)
86%
8.3/10The Pacific is currently streaming on Netflix on a temporary basis, so don’t get too used to seeing it here. This was originally an HBO production produced by Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg nearly a decade after their acclaimed World War II miniseries, Band of Brothers. The Pacific returns to the same timeframe while exploring the battles in the Pacific from the point of view of PFC Robert Leckie (James Badge Dale), Cpl. Eugene Sledge (Joseph Mazzello), GySgt. John Basilone (Jon Seda), and others.
This miniseries is based on the real accounts of the men who fought in the war, and it’s an unflinching look at combat during wartime and the high cost it demands from everyone involved.
Medici: The Magnificent (2018)
Thanks to Netflix, international series like Medici: The Magnificent, which is a rare drama that is set during the events of the Italian renaissance. The Magnificent is a two-season continuation set two decades after the initial season of Medici.
Daniel Sharman stars as Lorenzo Medici, the heir to the family’s wealth and their powerful bank. Unfortunately, Lorenzo has to step up and prematurely assume control over both the family and the bank in order to prevent Florence from being invaded. But there are still plenty of enemies that Lorenzo has to deal with, both inside and outside of the city.
Good Girls (2018)
60%
7.7/10Chances are good that you missed Good Girls during its four seasons on NBC, but the series has a second chance to find an audience on Netflix. The titular good girls are anything but, yet not without reason. Elizabeth “Beth” Boland (Christina Hendricks), her sister, Annie Marks (Mae Whitman), and their friend, Ruby Hill (Retta), are all facing serious financial issues when they band together to rob a grocery store.
Pulling off the heist wasn’t the problem. The real issue of the series is that Beth’s small gang has unintentionally come in the crosshairs of Rio (Manny Montana), a criminal who was previously using the grocery store as his money laundering front. Now, Rio wants the three women to work for him, and they don’t have the leverage to say no.
Guillermo del Toro's Cabinet of Curiosities (2022)
72%
7.0/10If you’re looking for some scary short stories this Halloween, then director Guillermo del Toro has a treat for you. Guillermo del Toro’s Cabinet of Curiosities is a horror anthology series that features eight episodes of standalone stories, including one written by del Toro himself.
Although del Toro didn’t direct any of the episodes himself, he recruited horror directors Jennifer Kent, Ana Lily Amirpour, Panos Cosmatos, Catherine Hardwicke, Guillermo Navarro, David Prior, Vincenzo Natali, and Keith Thomas to each bring to life their own visions of terror.
iZombie (2015)
74%
7.8/10Although iZombie is based on a comic, the TV series made so many changes that it became its own thing. Rose McIver stars as Olivia “Liv” Moore, a young woman who died and became a zombie under murky circumstances. However, Liv can hold on to most of her humanity as long as she maintains a steady diet of human brains. To do so, Liv throws away her career plans and gets a job in the coroner’s office.
Liv also receives flashes from eating the brains that allow her to solve open murder cases alongside Seattle PD Detective Clive Babineaux (Malcolm Goodwin). Meanwhile, Liv’s heartbroken ex-fiancé Major Lillywhite (Robert Buckley) is desperate to learn why he lost her. And as Major looks into that mystery, he may end up getting himself killed.
Everything Now (2023)
6.7/10Talk to Me‘s Sophie Wilde stars in Everything Now as Mia Polanco, a 16-year-old girl who has just been released from treatment for serious eating disorders. Mia not only feels like she’s under the microscope from her family and peers, but she also thinks that she missed far too much time from what should be the best years of her life.
In her eagerness to fix that, Mia recruits her friends Becca (Lauryn Ajufo), Will (Noah Thomas), and Cam (Harry Cadby), as well as acquaintances Alison (Niamh McCormack) and Carli (Jessie Mae Alonzo) ,to help her get through a bucket list of things that she missed. Mia wants to make up for lost time, even if she should probably slow down. But where’s the fun in that?
The Mick (2017)
50%
7.8/10Between seasons of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, Kaitlin Olson found the time to headline her own Fox sitcom, The Mick. In the series, Olson plays Mackenzie “Mickey” Molng, a woman who reenters the life of her older sister, Pamela “Poodle” Pemberton (Tricia O’Kelley), just to ask her for money. But when Poodle and her rich husband, Christopher Pemberton (Laird Macintosh), flee the country to escape tax evasion charges, Mickey finds herself stuck with their children.
On the plus side, Mickey gets to live in the family’s plush estate. Conversely, she’s less than thrilled to be responsible for Sabrina (Sofia Black-D’Elia), Chip (Thomas Barbusca), and Bean (Jack Stanton). And if she’s gonna have to take care of these kids, then Mickey is going to raise them her way.
Top Boy (2019)
85%
8.4/10The underrated British crime drama Top Boy has come to an end, and Netflix is the streaming home for both the original show and the three-season run of the revival series. But both incarnations of the show revolve around Dushane (Ashley Walters) and Sully (Kane Robinson), a pair of drug dealers in London whose friendship is sorely tested by their desires to rise in the criminal underworld.
While Dushane and Sully are initially on the same page, their goals diverge and they ultimately come into conflict with each other. Sometimes they’re even at each other’s throats, but they keep reluctantly joining forces. Yet in the end, there can only be one “Top Boy.’
Crazy Ex-Girlfriend (2015)
80%
7.8/10Don’t be too put off by the title of Crazy Ex-Girlfriend. While the name of the show is not an inaccurate description of Rebecca Bunch (Rachel Bloom), she’s not the type to go full Fatal Attraction. Instead, Rebecca is more of an unfulfilled dreamer who is prone to musical fantasies and occasional hallucinations. This show is a musical comedy, after all.
After reuniting with her ex-boyfriend, Josh Chan (Vincent Rodriguez III), Rebecca has an existential breakdown, follows Josh cross-country, and attempts to reinvent her life on the West Coast. But Rebecca is not done with Josh, as she romantically pursues Josh’s best friend, Greg (Santino Fontana), as a way to stay close to him. Naturally, this does not sit well with Josh’s actual girlfriend, Valencia Perez (Gabrielle Ruiz).
Inventing Anna (2022)
57%
6.8/10Inventing Anna is loosely based on the true story of Anna “Delvey” Sorokin (Julia Garner), a Russian con artist who was successfully able to worm her way into New York’s high society by convincing them that she was a rich German heiress. Because her newfound friends and contacts believed that Anna was rich, they were willing to give her access to their money as well.
The miniseries also focuses on Vivian Kent (Anna Chlumsky), a reporter who is obsessed with chasing down Anna’s story as she awaits trial. While some of Anna’s victims are willing to talk, Vivian finds it difficult to get the full story.
Eat the Rich: The GameStop Saga (2022)
Thanks to the film Dumb Money, the 2021 GameStop short squeeze is once again a popular topic. Netflix’s documentary, Eat the Rich: The GameStop Saga, is a three-part look back at the tumultuous turn of events when amateur investors outmaneuvered the professional stock traders by driving up GameStop’s stock so high that the short sellers couldn’t buy back the stock without losing millions.
This documentary doesn’t quite cover all of the bases, but it’s still an intriguing look back at a Wall Street revolt that didn’t quite end the way most of the investors wanted it to.
Echoes (2022)
46%
5.9/10The Midnight Club (2022)
64%
6.6/10The Watcher (2022)
54%
6.6/10Reviews have been mixed for The Watcher, but it’s worth a watch if you’re into creepy, mystery thrillers, and/or you’re a fan of Ryan Murphy and his work. It’s based on a true story, although many liberties are taken with the depiction of actual events. Nora and Dean Brannock (Naomi Watts and Bobby Cannavale) put everything on the line to afford their dream home in Westfield, New Jersey. But the gorgeous, sprawling mansion might not be all it’s cracked up to be.
The couple and their kids notice strange behavior from the intrusive neighbors and begin receiving ominous letters from someone who calls themselves The Watcher. Should the Brannocks sell, lose money, and move back to the city or stand their ground and stay, despite the cost of their sanity and safety? With lots of twists and turns, The Watcher will keep you guessing right through to the end.
Unsolved Mysteries (2020)
Unsolved Mysteries will satisfy your desire for both true crime and docuseries about the unknown and paranormal activity. Each episode is a compartmentalized story, which means you can scan the summary and pick and choose what you’re in the mood to watch. Whether it’s the story of a successful businessman who mysteriously vanishes, UFO sightings, or a cold case murder rife with theories, rest assured every episode will leave you with tons of questions, opinions, and a desire to get to the bottom of what truly happened.
Netflix’s version is a revival of the original series that first aired in the late 1980s, and it has been resurrected multiple times through the decades. Now in its third season, the new Unsolved Mysteries presents an eclectic mix of captivating stories to keep you wanting more.
Love & Anarchy (2020)
7.4/10One Day at a Time (2017)
82%
8.1/10El Marginal (2016)
8.1/10Secret City (2016)
7.4/10Kim's Convenience (2016)
8.2/10Derry Girls (2018)
83%
8.4/10On My Block (2018)
69%
7.9/10Is It Cake? (2022)
The End of the F***ing World (2017)
77%
8.1/10Murderville (2022)
66%
6.8/10Catching Killers (2021)
7.1/10After Life (2019)
57%
8.4/10The Last Kingdom (2015)
78%
8.5/10Dark (2017)
8.8/10In From the Cold (2022)
6.2/10Gentefied (2020)
70%
7.3/10Maid (2021)
82%
8.4/10Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem and Madness (2020)
76%
7.5/10Inside Job (2021)
67%
7.7/10Bodyguard (2018)
79%
8.1/10Dirty Money (2018)
Queen of the South (2016)
59%
8.0/10Imposters (2017)
70%
7.8/10Travelers (2016)
8.1/10What/If (2019)
58%
6.3/10Seven Seconds (2018)
68%
7.7/10White Gold (2017)
7.4/10Related topics: Netflix | Hulu | Amazon Prime | More streaming services
