Over the years, there have been several great action shows that have won awards, acclaim, and our hearts. Some of those are series that have run for multiple successful seasons, like Prime Video’s Reacher and Netflix’s The Witcher. But there is a select group of action TV series out there that have achieved similar (if not greater) levels of perfection with just a single season.
Not all of these shows were planned as one-season stories; many of them are series that were prematurely canceled despite being highly popular. But the fact remains that these masterpieces deliver more exciting action stories in their one season than most longer shows do with multiple. So, without further ado, here’s a look at some of the best single-season action TV masterpieces of all time, including both recent hits and beloved classics.
1 ‘The Brothers Sun’ (2024)
Image via NetflixThe Brothers Sun is an action comedy-drama series created by Brad Falchuk and Byron Wu, revolving around Taiwanese gangster Charles Sun (Justin Chien) and his oblivious Californian brother Bruce (Sam Song Li). After their father is attacked by a mysterious enemy, Charles travels to LA to protect Bruce and their surprisingly resourceful mother, Eileen (Michelle Yeoh), while trying to stop the attackers before they can strike again. The show also stars Joon Lee, Highdee Kuan, Alice Hewkin, Jenny Yang, Jon Xue Zhang, Johnny Kou, and more in supporting roles.
Despite an excellent critical and audience reception, The Brothers Sun was canceled shortly after Season 1, but the one season that it got to do is easily one of the best gangster action dramedies Netflix has ever released. Perfectly balancing stylish action, goofy comedy, and family drama, the series takes viewers on an entertaining journey through an underworld full of colorful and eccentric characters. The show has been widely praised for its great performances, brilliant set pieces, and striking cinematography. Its masterful fight choreography earned stunt coordinator Justin Yu an Emmy nomination.
2 ‘Firefly’ (2002–2003)
Image via FOXAn iconic space Western series set in a distant star system in the year 2517, Firefly follows the crew of the spaceship Serenity as they embark on various adventures. Created by Joss Whedon, the show is set in the aftermath of a devastating civil war between the authoritarian Alliance and the defeated Independents, balancing action-adventure stories with political and social commentary. Nathan Fillion leads the cast as Serenity’s captain, Malcolm "Mal" Reynolds, with Gina Torres, Alan Tudyk, Morena Baccarin, Adam Baldwin, Jewel Staite, Sean Maher, Summer Glau, and Ron Glass in main roles.
Despite being hugely popular with critics and genre fans, Firefly was canceled before it even managed to air all its episodes, reportedly due to conflicts with its network, Fox. But even though it had such a short life, the show has been widely hailed as one of the greatest sci-fi action series ever to grace television screens, developing an enduring fan following. And while the show itself may only have had one season, Firefly has since expanded into a successful franchise that includes comics, video games, and novels, not to mention the 2005 sequel movie Serenity.
3 ‘Watchmen’ (2019)
Image via HBODeveloped by Damon Lindelof, HBO’s Watchmen is essentially a legacy sequel to the DC Comics series by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons, catching up with its alternate history world roughly 34 years after the events of the books. The series explores an escalating conflict in Tulsa, Oklahoma, between masked police officers and a white supremacist group inspired by the vigilante Rorschach, which leads back to a decades-spanning conspiracy centered on the mysterious and all-powerful Doctor Manhattan. Regina King leads the cast as Detective Angela Abar, with Don Johnson, Tim Blake Nelson, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Andrew Howard, Louis Gossett Jr., Jeremy Irons, Jean Smart, Hong Chau, and more in notable roles.
A mind-blowingly complex series that effectively captures the spirit of the legendary comics, Lindelof’s Watchmen was a universally acclaimed hit during its original broadcast, earning praise for its compelling performances, incisive social commentary, gripping central mystery, and amazing action choreography. Easily one of the greatest superhero shows of all time, the series is a thrilling watch for both old fans and viewers who may be unfamiliar with the original comics. Watchmen earned numerous accolades as well, including 11 Emmy Awards, the most of any show released in the 2019–20 television season.
Collider Exclusive · Taylor Sheridan Universe Quiz
Which Taylor Sheridan
Show Do You Belong In?
Yellowstone · Landman · Tulsa King · Mayor of Kingstown
Four worlds. All of them brutal, complicated, and built on power, loyalty, and the price of survival. Taylor Sheridan doesn't write heroes — he writes people who do what they have to do and live with the cost. Ten questions will reveal which one of his worlds you were made for.
🤠Yellowstone
🛢️Landman
👑Tulsa King
⚖️Mayor of Kingstown
FIND YOUR WORLD →
01
Where does your power come from? In Sheridan's world, everyone has leverage. The question is what kind.
ALand, legacy, and a name that's been feared and respected for generations. BKnowing the deal better than anyone else in the room — and being willing to walk away first. CReputation. I've earned it the hard way, and everyone in the room knows it. DBeing the only person both sides will talk to. That makes me indispensable — and dangerous.
NEXT QUESTION →
02
Who do you put first, no matter what? Loyalty in Sheridan's universe is always absolute — and always costly.
AFamily — blood or chosen. The ranch, the name, the people who carry it with me. BThe company — or whoever's signing the cheques. Loyalty follows the contract. CMy crew. The men who stood with me when it counted — I don't abandon them for anything. DMy community — even when my community is a powder keg and I'm the only thing stopping it from blowing.
NEXT QUESTION →
03
Someone crosses a line. How do you respond? Every Sheridan protagonist has a line. What matters is what happens after it's crossed.
AQuietly, decisively, and in a way that sends a message to everyone watching. BI outmanoeuvre them legally, financially, and politically before they even know I've moved. CDirectly. Old school. You cross me, you hear about it to your face — and then you deal with the consequences. DI absorb it, calculate the fallout, and find the move that keeps the whole system from collapsing.
NEXT QUESTION →
04
Where do you feel most in your element? Sheridan's worlds are as much about place as they are about people.
AWide open land — mountains, sky, silence. Somewhere you can see trouble coming from a mile away. BThe oil fields of West Texas — brutal, lucrative, and indifferent to whoever happens to be standing on top of them. CA mid-size city where the rules haven't quite caught up yet — fertile ground for someone with vision and nerve. DA rust-belt town built around a prison — where everyone's life is shaped by what's inside those walls.
NEXT QUESTION →
05
How do you feel about operating in the grey? Nobody in a Sheridan show has clean hands. The question is how they carry the dirt.
AI do what has to be done to protect what's mine. I'll answer for it eventually — but not today. BGrey is just business. The line moves depending on what's at stake, and I move with it. CI have a code — it's not the law's code, but it's mine, and I don't break it. DI've made peace with it. Keeping the peace requires compromises most people don't have the stomach for.
NEXT QUESTION →
06
What are you actually fighting to hold onto? Every Sheridan character is fighting a war. The real question is what they're defending.
AA way of life that the modern world is doing everything it can to erase. BMy position — and the leverage that comes with being the person everyone needs to close a deal. CRelevance. I've been away, I've been written off — and I'm proving that was a mistake. DWhatever fragile order I've managed to build — because without it, everything burns.
NEXT QUESTION →
07
How do you lead? Authority in Sheridan's world is never given — it's established, maintained, and constantly tested.
ABy example and force of will. People follow me because they believe in what I'm protecting — and because they know what happens if they don't. BThrough negotiation and leverage. I don't need people to like me — I need them to need me. CBy being the smartest, most experienced person in the room and making sure everyone quietly knows it. DBy being the calm centre of a situation that would spiral without me — and accepting that nobody thanks you for it.
NEXT QUESTION →
08
Someone new arrives and tries to change how things work. Your reaction? Every Sheridan show has an outsider disrupting an established order. Sometimes that outsider is you.
AThey'll learn. Or they won't. Either way, the land was here before them and it'll be here after. BI figure out what they want, what they're worth, and whether they're an asset or a problem — fast. CI was the outsider once. I give them a chance — one — to show they understand respect. DNew players destabilise everything I've built. I assess the threat and manage it before it manages me.
NEXT QUESTION →
09
What has your position cost you? Nobody gets to where these characters are without paying for it. The bill is always personal.
AMy family's peace — maybe their innocence. The ranch demands everything, and I've let it take too much. BRelationships, time, any version of a normal life. The job eats everything that isn't nailed down. CYears. Decades in some cases. Time I can't get back — but I'm not done yet. DMy conscience, mostly. And the ability to ever fully trust anyone on either side of the wall.
NEXT QUESTION →
10
When it's over, what do you want people to say? Sheridan's characters all know the ending is coming. The question is what they leave behind.
AThat I held the line. That the land is still ours and everything I did was worth it. BThat I was the best at what I did and that no deal ever got closed without me at the table. CThat I built something real, somewhere nobody expected it, and I did it on my own terms. DThat I kept the peace when nobody else could — and that the town is still standing because of it.
REVEAL MY SHOW →
Sheridan Has Spoken You Belong In…
The show that claimed the most of your answers is the world you were built for. If two tied, both are shown — you're complicated enough to straddle two Sheridan universes.
🤠 Yellowstone
🛢️ Landman
👑 Tulsa King
⚖️ Mayor of Kingstown
You are a Dutton — or you might as well be. You understand that some things are worth protecting at any cost, and that the modern world's indifference to history, to land, to legacy, is not something you're willing to accept quietly. You lead from the front, you carry your family's weight without complaint, and when someone threatens what's yours, you don't escalate — you finish it. You're not cruel. But you are absolute. In Yellowstone's world, that combination of ferocity and loyalty doesn't make you a villain. It makes you the only thing standing between everything that matters and everyone who wants to take it.
You thrive in the chaos of high-stakes negotiation, where the money is enormous, the margins are thin, and the wrong word in the wrong room can cost everyone everything. You're a fixer — the person called when a situation is already on fire and needs someone with the nerve to walk into it. West Texas oil country rewards exactly what you are: sharp, adaptable, unsentimental, and absolutely clear-eyed about what people want and what they'll do to get it. You're not naive enough to think this world is fair. You're smart enough to be the one deciding who it's fair to.
You are a Dwight Manfredi — someone who has served their time, paid their dues, and arrived somewhere unexpected with nothing but their reputation and their wits. You adapt without losing yourself. You build loyalty through respect rather than fear, though you're not above reminding people that the two aren't mutually exclusive. Tulsa King is for people who are still standing when everyone assumed they'd be finished — who find, in an unfamiliar place, that they're more capable than the world gave them credit for. You don't need a throne. You build one, wherever you happen to land.
You carry the weight of a system that is broken by design, and you do it anyway — because someone has to, and because you're the only one positioned to do it without the whole thing collapsing. Mike McLusky's world is for people who are comfortable operating where there are no good options, only less catastrophic ones. You speak every language: law enforcement, criminal, political, human. That fluency makes you invaluable and it makes you a target. You've made your peace with both. Mayor of Kingstown belongs to people who understand that keeping the peace is not the same as being at peace — and who do the job regardless.
↻ RETAKE THE QUIZ
4 ‘Bodyguard’ (2018)
Image via NetflixCreated and written by Jed Mercurio, Bodyguard is a British thriller series that stars Richard Madden as David Budd, a Police Sergeant and army veteran suffering from PTSD. Working as a Principal Protection Officer (PPO) for Protection Command, David is tasked with guarding a controversial politician (Keeley Hawkes), whose ambitions threaten to infringe on civil rights. Besides Madden and Hawkes, the series also stars Gina McKee, Sophie Rundle, Vincent Franklin, Pippa Haywood, Paul Ready, Tom Brooke, and more in key roles.
Originally a BBC One show, Bodyguard earned worldwide recognition after its international release on Netflix, earning praise from critics and viewers alike for its approach to important issues like terrorism, PTSD, and government surveillance of private citizens. While it's certainly one of the best action thriller shows of the 2010s, Bodyguard’s real highlight is Richard Madden’s intensely compelling central performance, with his internal conflict between personal trauma and professional duty providing the driving force for its narrative. Madden’s performance earned the actor a Golden Globe Award, and the series garnered several other accolades as well, including a BAFTA and two Emmy nominations.
5 ‘Cyberpunk: Edgerunners’ (2022)
Image via NetflixAn anime prequel miniseries to the CD Projekt Red video game Cyberpunk 2077, Cyberpunk: Edgerunners was created by Rafał Jaki and Mike Pondsmith, directed by Hiroyuki Imaishi, and produced by Studio Trigger. Set in the same universe as the video game and Pondsmith's Cyberpunk tabletop game series, the show follows David Martinez, a kid trying to survive on the streets of the corrupt and dystopian Night City by becoming a mercenary outlaw. The original Japanese voice cast stars Kenn, Aoi Yūki, Hiroki Tōchi, and more, with Zach Aguilar, Emi Lo, William C. Stephens, Giancarlo Esposito, and others voicing the English dub.
A universally acclaimed show, Cyberpunk: Edgerunners has been praised by fans and critics alike for its spectacular animation, well-rounded characters, and evocative worldbuilding. The show is an action-packed dystopian adventure with cutting-edge technology and high emotional stakes. It’s a delightful watch that all viewers can enjoy, especially since it's a standalone story that doesn’t require any previous knowledge of the game or its universe. Though the series is intended as a complete miniseries, a standalone sequel show is currently in development as well.
6 ‘The Falcon and the Winter Soldier’ (2021)
Image via Marvel StudiosCreated by Malcolm Spellman, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier is an MCU miniseries that continues the stories of Sam Wilson / Falcon and Bucky Barnes / Winter Soldier six months after the events of 2019’s Avengers: Endgame. The show sees the two heroes go up against a terrorist group that aims to create a world without borders using a recreation of the Super Soldier Serum that gave Captain America his powers. Anthony Mackie and Sebastian Stan star as Sam Wilson and Bucky Barnes, respectively, with Wyatt Russell, Erin Kellyman, Danny Ramirez, Georges St-Pierre, Adepero Oduye, Don Cheadle, Daniel Brühl, Emily VanCamp, Florence Kasumba, and Julia Louis-Dreyfus in other important roles.
The Falcon and the Winter Soldier was one of the earliest Marvel shows on Disney+, and it earned a largely positive reception from critics and fans, earning praise for the performances and social commentary. A hard-hitting political thriller with a sharply written narrative that features one of the MCU’s most underrated villains, the series is a thoroughly engaging watch with cinematic action and a bold story that doesn’t shy away from asking tough questions about the world order. The show garnered numerous accolades, including two MTV Movie & TV Awards and five Emmy nominations, and it was followed by the movie Captain America: Brave New World in 2025.
7 ‘Moon Knight’ (2022)
Image via Marvel StudiosCreated by Jeremy Slater, Moon Knight is a superhero action thriller miniseries set in the MCU, starring Oscar Isaac as the titular Marvel hero. The story revolves around Marc Spector and Steven Grant, two alternate personalities of a man with dissociative identity disorder who becomes the reluctant avatar of an ancient Egyptian god. Isaac stars as both Spector and Grant, with the show also featuring May Calamawy, Karim El Hakim, F. Murray Abraham, Ethan Hawke, and more in key supporting roles.
Moon Knight is a gritty and hard-hitting show with amazing action, featuring both fantastical superheroics and more grounded, hand-to-hand combat. But while its action is a major highlight, and some of the best of the MCU, Moon Knight’s real triumph is its gripping psychological storytelling, exploring the complex mind of its troubled protagonist with compassion and grace. Anchored by Oscar Isaac’s brilliant performance in the central role/s, the show has been almost universally acclaimed by critics and fans, garnering praise and accolades for its deeply emotional plot, thrilling set pieces, and spectacular effects.
8 ‘Interior Chinatown’ (2024)
Image via HuluCreated by Charles Yu and adapted from his 2020 experimental novel, Interior Chinatown is an action meta-comedy starring Jimmy O. Yang as Willis Wu, a waiter at a Chinese restaurant who constantly feels like a background character. Turns out, this is literally true because, unbeknownst to him, Willis is a background character in a police procedural show, but a chance meeting with Detective Lana Lee (Chloe Bennet) puts him on a new path as he assumes various new roles and works his way up the ladder to investigate his brother’s mysterious disappearance. The show also stars Ronny Chieng, Sullivan Jones, Lisa Gilroy, Archie Kao, Diana Lin, and Tzi Ma in notable roles.
A highly inventive show inspired by one of the most imaginative novels of the decade, Interior Chinatown is an ingenious and sorely underrated work of metafiction that masterfully satirizes Asian-American stereotypes, while delivering an exciting action mystery narrative at the same time. Near-perfect in its writing, performances, cinematography, and production design, the series is unlike anything you’ve seen before, even though it hasn’t received the attention it deserves from mainstream audiences.
English (US) ·