1. Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Buffy is sorta the poster child for "Great TV show with a nigh-unwatchable first season." Pretty much all TV shows need to take a little time to work out the kinks, figure out what works and what doesn't, and find a good groove for the storytelling. But in 1997 WB, the stakes were a LOT lower than they are today - there were no Breaking Bads or Game of Thrones's back then, so TV shows could be given a little more leniency.

Still, Buffy season 1 is pretty terrible - but thankfully, it's only 13 episodes. Within those 13 episodes are great moments and great characters, much of which is the groundwork for what comes later, but there's also plots about hyena spirits possessing teenagers and making them eat their principal, a living wooden dummy (think Goosebumps) who's also a demon hunter, a demon borne of the Internet, and some really really regrettable things involving a praying mantis teacher.

 

2. Angel

Angel is a weird show - each season feels pretty weirdly distinct from the other, and it actually really only reaches its full potential in its final season, when Spike crosses over from Buffy on a permanent basis and Angel joins the bad guys (kinda). But what's definitely true is that its first season is kinda a mess.

The initial planned status quo for Angel - that the squad would be Angel, Cordelia, and an Irish dude who had 'visions' - only lasted for the first 9-ish episodes, when the Irish dude was killed off and replaced with Wesley Wyndam-Pryce. Still, the rest of Team Angel - Gunn, Lorne, and Fred - don't really come into play until season 2, when the show starts to actually become the semi-watchable Buffy spinoff it was destined to be.

 

3. Parks & Recreation

Parks & Rec pretty quickly grew into one of the funniest, sweetest, and most heartfelt comedies on the air - which is why revisiting the first season (cut short thankfully at 6 episodes) is so jarring. Leslie's a completely different character (basically a blonde Michael Scott), the show is much meaner to its characters, and it's just...not that funny, unless you're SUPER into Mark Brendanawicz.

4. The Office (U.S. version)

The Office started off on the exact wrong foot, trying to re-do the first episode of the British version of The Office, but with the new American cast and setting. And while it's a very funny script, the tone and rhythms of the American version are so different that the awkwardness overshadows a lot of the jokes.

On top of that, there were a lot of growing pains, with the writers and cast trying to figure out how to maintain what worked with the UK Office while also trying to create something fresh and new. The first season clearly showed signs of the greatness that would awaken, but were weighed down by a not-yet-fleshed out supporting cast (which soon became the show's secret weapon) and the sense that they still didn't know what this show WAS yet. Also, Michael Scott's slicked back hair is really, really weird.

Thankfully, this was another 6 episode season - so it's badness was short-lived. And really, you can dive straight into season 2 and not really miss anything (except - SPOILER! - Jim is pretty into that Pam girl).

5. American Dad

Seth Macfarlane has so thoroughly salted the soil of his work, that anything with his name associated with it tends to send a chill down the spine of anyone who comes in contact with it. And for good reason - Family Guy is a mishmash of completely random unrelated jokes and wild shifts in character behavior, The Cleveland Show is basically just a blander version of Family Guy, and that western movie he made was...well, I don't know. I didn't see it, because it looked pretty dumb.

But American Dad is actually GREAT. Like, not just great for something associated with Seth Macfarlane, but genuinely great on its own. The problem is that it began its life as something pretttttty legitimately terrible.

It's important to remember that it was created, in part, to fill the void for Macfarlane after Family Guy was initially cancelled after 3 seasons. It had a boorish husband, a hot wife, a nerdy son, and a butt-of-every-joke daughter, a megalomaniacal evil little harmless thing (a baby for Family Guy, a fish for American Dad), along with a faux-urbane thing-that-shouldn't-talk-but-does (a dog for Family Guy, an alien for American Dad). The main differentiator for American Dad was that it would tackle political issues - with father Stan taking the neoconservative perspective against his daughter Hailey's hyperliberal one. Needless to say, it plays like a less funny Family Guy that doesn't age well, due to its reliance on politics of the day.

But Family Guy WAS brought back, and it distracted Seth Macfarlane. While he still provided several key voices, he became basically completely uninvolved with the writing for the show, and by mid-season 2, the show was pretty great. By mid-season 3, the show had completely found its footing as one of the weirdest but well-written shows in primetime.

No one in this office believes me but I swear to god it's true. TELL THEM. TELL THEM ALL.

 

6. The Simpsons

The Simpsons is probably the defining show of the last 30 years of TV. Although a lot of this could be clouded by nostalgia, the early seasons of the show were probably the best seasons of TV ever produced, period. But - while there are hints of the greatness to come - that first season of the Simpsons is really, really weird.

The animation quality was all over the place (mostly bad), Homer's voice still had that vague Walter Matthau tone, and the writing staff hadn't quite nailed the rapid-fire jokes and huge roster of characters that would define the show later on. Instead, the episodes are hyper-grounded and most of the characters aren't all that comedic - Homer is a stern dad who's a little irresponsible, but he's nowhere near the buffoonish guy Smithers would one day make Head Bee Guy. Episode plots range from Lisa suffering from depression, Homer nearly committing suicide - only to be pulled from the brink by his sincere belief in the importance of safety (which led to Homer becoming the Nuclear Power Plant's safety inspector, something that would become a joke pretty much instantly in later seasons), Homer worrying that everyone ELSE in his family is too embarrassing, and Marge and Homer's marriage nearly falling apart TWICE (via the bowling instructor and the stripper).

It's certainly not BAD, but it's pretty wildly different from what The Simpsons would be best known for, and is definitely skippable. There are a few gems in there, but generally no one ever gets excited when they're watching Simpsons reruns and it's the Babysitter Bandit episode.

 

7. Agents of SHIELD

Agents of SHIELD (I refuse to type the periods) is still a pretty young show, but the difference between seasons one and two is stark (MCU reference!). The first season feels a whole lot like stretching things out unnecessarily, go-nowhere plots, and dull freak-of-the-week plots...because that was exactly what was going on.

The problem really came down to this - at the same time Marvel decided to start muscling their way into TV, they were also plotting out the next Captain America movie, The Winter Soldier, which - as a huge plot point - revealed SHIELD had been corrupted by HYDRA elements and ended with SHIELD as a concept completely destroyed. So, simultaneously making a show about the coolest agents of SHIELD was probably...ill-advised.

However, the tie-in between Winter Soldier and AoS was where the show finally found its footing - by finally being able to nudge their plot forward after stalling for nearly 20 episodes. And with far, far more freedom - or, at least, not being weighed down by revelations saved for a big screen movie - the second season has been a massive improvement over the first.

Although Project TAHITI is still pretty stupid.

 

8. Star Trek: The Next Generation

To be fair, this is an issue with pretty much every modern Trek series - terrible first season, followed by some okay seasons that are deemed the best thing ever by anyone who discovered them when they were 12. That being said, Star Trek: TNG is the BEST THING EVER (unbiased source here), but WOW that first season really sucks hard - amateur-ish, awkward, and boring as hell.

It's so bad that EVEN MEMBERS OF THE CAST hated it.

 

"[Code of Honor, the 3rd episode, was] a racist piece of shit." - Jonathan Frakes

 

"The writers didn't know what the show was about; the actors didn't know their characters. Some of those first-season episodes are really bad." - Wil Wheaton

 

Even star Patrick Stewart had to actively fight over terrible scripts in the first season - most notably over the overtly sexist Angel One - which, even after he gained some concessions to make it less awful than originally intended, was still pretty garbage.

 

9. Fringe

Season 1 of Fringe is actually sorta fine - except that the ACTUAL show doesn't even start until the final moments of the first season (and really actually kicks into gear starting with season 2). As a result, Season 1 feels like some kind of weird, hyperextended pilot, with lots of elements that are totally redundant once we learn what's ACTUALLY going on (and what's actually going on is so goddamn cool it feels insulting that they hid it from us for that long). Plus, lots of elements - like Olivia's sorta-dead fiance ghost - were dropped completely, making the whole thing feel extra pointless.

There are good episodes and great things in there, but c'mon ALTERNATE UNIVERSES WITH ZEPPELINS LET US SEE THAT YOU DICKHOLES

 

10. Supernatural

There's no denying Supernatural was something truly great through about season 5 (after that it gets a little messier and HOLY MOTHER OF GOD IT'S STILL ON THE AIR??) - a show that was self-aware and funny and scary and heart-breaking and delightfully weird. But the first season? Lots of random (and not very good) monsters of the week, some thin plotting, and - oh yeah - THE RACIST GHOST TRUCK. Hell, every other episode could have been perfect but the Racist Ghost Truck alone makes season one pretty cringeworthy.