7 Unloved Netflix Shows That Are Actually Pretty Good

7 The Eddy

In 2020, The Eddy was released, telling the story of a US expat named Elliot Udo who lives in Paris and tries to keep his jazz club afloat. However, they face struggles like poverty, organized crime, and creative burnout. The show has big-name creatives, including actor Andre Holland (Moonlight) and screenwriter Jack Thorne (Adolescence), attached, but it still flew completely under the radar, failing to get the love it deserved.

The show has fewer than 100 audience reviews on Rotten Tomatoes, and Reddit threads about the show have almost no comments. However, the musical drama deserves a lot more love than it gets. The Eddy is a slow burn and functions more like a series of character studies than a story. That doesn’t make it any less interesting, though. The characters are well-developed, and the actors knock their performances out of the ballpark.

On top of everything else, the actors are performing The Eddy's original soundtrack live, an incredibly ambitious feat they pull off (via Men's Health). The Eddy might have flaws, such as unnecessary side plots and a glacial pace. I’d also rather they cut the crime plot. Still, the positives make it worth watching.

6 Pretty Smart

Starring Emily Osment, Pretty Smart follows a booksmart character named Chelsea who moves in with her sister and three other roommates. The sitcom Pretty Smart had such a small audience that it only has 5 critic reviews and 23 audience reviews on Rotten Tomatoes. On social media, viewers commented that the show had nothing new to offer and relied too heavily on sitcom staples. Even people who enjoyed the show complained about the laugh track. For the most part, these criticisms are warranted.

Anyone going into the show expecting something new will be disappointed. Pretty Smart doesn’t even attempt to reinvent the wheel. It falls back on tropes and clichés from late-90s and early-00s sitcoms.

However, the show still subverts expectations by making the simple-minded characters smart in different ways. For instance, Grant offers plenty of wisdom, even if he isn’t booksmart. On top of that, the actors do a great job with their roles, even if the characters are relatively flat. Ultimately, I think the key to enjoying Pretty Smart is not hoping for anything new. The sitcom is entertaining, so long as viewers keep their expectations tempered.

5 Maniac

Netflix’s Maniac is a dystopian techno-thriller with a stacked cast. The story follows Owen Milgrim (Jonah Hill), a man with paranoid schizophrenia, and Annie Landsberg (Emma Stone), a woman with severe depression, who join a pharmaceutical trial that claims to cure mental illness permanently. However, things go wrong, linking Annie and Owen together in a surprising way.

Stone, Hill, Sally Field, Justin Theroux, and Julie Garner bring eccentric characters to life in a visually stunning and high-concept sci-fi show. When it first came out, Maniac was lauded. Despite this, it has been virtually forgotten after eight years, and those who still remember Maniac have extremely divided opinions. It feels like a story that people either love or hate.

The same thing that makes it great – its weirdness – is also what draws criticism. The bleakness of the dystopian world and the characters is balanced by its whimsicalness and surrealism. The characters go hopping through dreamscapes. Audiences will see a mashup of sci-fi, romantic comedy, dramedy, neo-noir, and thriller. Maniac’s weirdness will be too much for some, but the oddities will also make it a masterpiece for others.

4 My Life With The Walter Boys

Whenever fan fiction and Wattpad stories are adapted for the screen, they are heavily critiqued, and My Life With the Walter Boys is no exception. The story follows Jackie Howard, a teenage girl whose entire family dies in a car crash. She moves from New York City to a small town in Colorado, where she lives with the massive Walter family. She gets stuck in a love triangle between the quiet, bookish Alex and the bad boy, charming Cole.

The writing is inconsistent, with some scenes being completely bad. The acting isn’t the best, though it improves throughout the first two seasons. Unfortunately, the Netflix original show also uses tropes, including the brother love triangle, the picturesque location, and the big city girl in a small town.

Because of the clichés used, My Life with the Walter Boys is compared to the very similar teen drama The Summer I Turned Pretty, despite the former not being based on the latter. However, the show is actually pretty good when viewed in isolation from the hit Prime Video show and as a teenage soap opera.

3 Bodies

Bodies is a mix of mystery and time-travel sci-fi that flew under the radar. The story follows four detectives, each in a different time period, who find themselves investigating the same murder. The TV show received multiple critiques from fans and critics, some of which were valid. Big complaints were that it ran too long and had plot holes.

Truthfully, they could have cut the show down by about 2 episodes and tightened up the writing. That said, other criticisms came from viewers who openly admitted they didn’t like sci-fi or time travel, making it odd that they would watch Bodies to begin with. What’s more, the positives actually outweigh the negatives.

The characters in Bodies are well-written and engaging, showcasing the strength of the cast. The storyline is absolutely mind-bending, making it perfect for fans who like “WTF” sci-fi that’s better with every rewatch. On top of that, the four time periods have their own genre. As such, it feels like multiple shows woven into one.

2 First Kill

Many TV shows and movies have attempted to resurrect the teen vampire genre. One that tried and failed is First Kill. The Netflix original show was panned by critics and audiences alike for its bad CGI, inconsistent writing, and bad acting.

The story follows star-crossed lovers Juliette and Calliope. Juliette is a young vampire, born rather than changed, who must complete a major milestone, her first kill, despite her aversion to killing. Calliope is a vampire slayer born to a famous monster-hunting lineage who wants to prove herself to her family.

The criticisms aren’t unwarranted, though they’re overblown. The CGI stays bad throughout, but the writing and acting improve halfway through. What’s more, First Kill has some strengths that make it a pretty good show. The teen fantasy is campy and cheesy in a very intentional way. It never takes itself too seriously, setting it apart from prestige TV. The hunter and slayer relationship is pretty fun to watch. For a show with bad writing, it has shockingly well-developed lore. Ultimately, the Sapphic fantasy romance is so bad that it’s good, making it the perfect guilty pleasure show.

1 The Åre Murders

One of Netflix’s most unloved shows, The Åre Murders, is a Nordic noir show that completely flew under the radar. A Stockholm detective named Hanna goes to the town of Åre, planning to unwind at a resort. However, she jumps into action when a young girl disappears. The first three episodes adapt Hidden in the Snow by Viveca Sten, while the last two adapt Hidden in the Shadows by the same author.

Unlike Jo Nesbø’s Detective Hole, the 2025 show didn’t get much attention or a massive fanbase. Despite this, The Åre Murders was renewed for season 2, giving the show the opportunity to develop a bigger fanbase. What’s more, it deserves more viewership because it’s a wonderful show.

The story features a realistic, slow-burning mystery that gets better halfway through season 1. Hanna is a strong main character whom viewers can root for despite being morally complex. She might be flawed, but she’s still likable. On top of that, the desolate but gorgeous winter landscapes heighten the feeling of isolation and bleakness. Netflix’s The Åre Murders is truly something special, despite not getting the love it deserves.