Image via Starz
Published Jun 27, 2026, 8:53 AM EDT
Jiminna Shillingford is an avid reader and a passionate storyteller. She is obsessed with all things TV, from anime and romantic fantasy to action-packed series. With that deep affection, Jiminna longs to share her excitement with all her readers through the Collider platform as a TV author. Through her writing she has created stories and blog posts of amazing book recommendations, showcasing her love of writing. Jiminna's goal is to inspire others to discover and embrace their love of stories in all of its forms.
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Sometimes, the finest action shows don't always have the mainstream attention they deserve. Despite being quite underrated, these masterful action-filled watches are worth returning to over and over again. In fact, some of the best shows of the genre aren't just fun because of the spectacle and violence; they work because their worlds and all it consists of make it rather easy to revisit.
Action shows like the often-overlooked gem Alice in Borderland, which transforms brutal survival games into something clever, emotionally gripping, and incredibly tense, and Banshee, a violent crime drama with a wild premise, fantastic intensity, painful fights, and nonstop consequences, are just two series in the genre that prove underrated action television can be just as rewatchable as anything circling mainstream channels. On this list are incredibly addictive action shows that are absolutely worth watching over and over again.
8 'Wayne' (2019)
Image via YouTube PremiumWayne has to be one of the most underrated action masterpieces that no one seems to know about. The clever teen action drama follows the young Wayne (Mark McKenna), who hits the road after his father's death to reclaim a stolen Trans Am, dragging Del (Ciara Bravo) into an incredibly funny, violent, and heartwarmingly romantic fugitive trip.
Wayne is practically built to be rewatched by the lucky few who come across it. The series is creative and quite surprisingly deep. It's a teen drama that's so incredibly rewatchable because every episode feels extremely charged with promising momentum. Wayne, despite being criminally underrated, stands as the perfect series to revisit time and time again, as it moves with the confidence of a comic-book bruiser and wields the heart of a scrappy road romance. It's a sweet, nasty, weirdly sincere, action-filled watch that is structurally tight and worthy of anyone's time, making it a great addition to this list.
7 'Hanna' (2019–2021)
Image via Prime VideoThis often-overlooked Prime Video thrill ride has quite the emotional hook. Hanna centers on the titular character, a young girl, ignorant of the normalcy of the world, due to being raised off-grid by her father to survive pursuit, only to find herself stalked by a powerful government organization as she begins uncovering the truth about her origins.
Hanna is the type of action series that definitely rewards rewatches, with its tense cat-and-mouse storytelling, carefully layered character development, and emotional detail that becomes more captivating on repeat viewings. Not only is the show's action clean and purposeful, but the emotional hook is a young girl learning just how to be ordinary while, at the same time, she's dismantling extraordinary organizations. Hanna is unique and worthwhile because of its compelling story, action, and deep emotional stakes, cementing it as a tense, stylish watch that's far greater than it often gets credit for.
6 'Alice in Borderland' (2020–2025)
Image via NetflixAlice in Borderland is an underrated sci-fi banger that is a rather addictive viewing experience. The action thriller focuses on the directionless gamer, Arisu (Kento Yamazaki), and his close friends as they're dropped into an emptied-out Tokyo where survival depends on deadly games.
Alice in Borderland is quite a captivating series to indulge in, and only gets better for audiences on a second viewing. The series, unlike most survival thrillers, doesn't entirely rely on shock value; instead, it leaves its mark because it depends on its action being tied to grief, tragedy, loyalty, and fear. Alice in Borderland is genuinely masterful, the perfect series to watch time and time again, because it never gets boring. Simply put, the sci-fi wonder's mechanics are only half its appeal when it comes to replays. In fact, once viewers are aware of the rules, they are able to better appreciate the show's foreshadowing, character work, and emotional decisions that make rewatches all the more enthralling.
5 'Nikita' (2010–2013)
Image via The CWThis action drama is much too underrated, a genuine good time that deserves far more credit than it's ever received. Nikita follows the assassin Nikita (Maggie Q), who returns to destroy Division, the covert program that turned her into the killer that she's become.
Nikita is a true network TV action staple. The series is exactly what spy thriller fans want, from undercover missions and sleek action to heartbreaking betrayals and a strong kickbutt heroine. Nikita can admittedly be a bit pulpy, but even the most outrageous turns feel earned. The show's attack-defense rhythm makes it extremely bingeable as every setback, victory, and countermove naturally pushes viewers into the next installment, ensuring repeat viewings feel quite rewarding. Nikita is an underrated work of perfection that wields its stylish and intense action narrative with remarkable confidence, delivering the kind of gripping espionage drama that stands as a strong pick for action fans looking for something overlooked.
Collider Exclusive · Action Hero Quiz
Which Action Hero Would Be
Your Perfect Partner?
Rambo · James Bond · Indiana Jones · John McClane · Ethan Hunt
Five legends. Five completely different ways of getting out alive — with style, with muscle, with charm, with luck, or with a plan so intricate it probably shouldn't work. Ten questions will reveal which action hero was built to have your back.
🎖️Rambo
🍸James Bond
🏺Indiana Jones
🔧John McClane
🎭Ethan Hunt
FIND YOUR PARTNER →
01
You're dropped into a dangerous situation with no warning. What do you need most from a partner? The first few seconds tell you everything about who belongs beside you.
ASomeone who already has three contingency plans running and is calmly working through all of them. BSomeone who reads the terrain instinctively and knows exactly how to use it against the enemy. CSomeone who keeps their nerve and their sense of humour when everything is falling apart. DSomeone who knows the history of wherever we are and what we're walking into. ESomeone with the right contact, the right cover identity, and the right exit already arranged.
NEXT QUESTION →
02
You have to get somewhere dangerous, fast. How do you travel? How you get there is half the mission.
AOn foot through terrain no one else would attempt — I move where vehicles can't follow. BOn a motorcycle, a cargo plane, or anything else that gets me there before I think too hard about it. CIn something that belongs to someone else — borrowed, stolen, or improvised under fire. DFirst class, with a cover identity and a gadget that does something I won't explain until it's needed. EBy whatever means are available — I've driven, flown, and once arrived by camel. The destination matters, not the method.
NEXT QUESTION →
03
You're pinned down and outnumbered. What does your ideal partner do? This is when you find out what someone is really made of.
ADisappears into the environment, flanks them silently, and ends it before I've reloaded. BCracks a one-liner, grabs a fire extinguisher or a chair, and improvises something that somehow works. CProduces a gadget specifically designed for this exact scenario and uses it with infuriating precision. DPulls out a whip, a pistol, and an archaeological insight that somehow gets us out alive. ENeutralises the threat with maximum efficiency and minimum words — they were already three moves ahead.
NEXT QUESTION →
04
The mission is paused. You have one evening to decompress. What does your partner suggest? Who someone is when the pressure drops is who they actually are.
AA bar with terrible lighting, cold beer, and absolutely no questions about feelings. BThe finest restaurant in the city, a bottle of something expensive, and a conversation that is equal parts brilliant and exhausting. CA local dig site, a museum after hours, or a long story about why that particular artefact matters to human civilisation. DPizza. Bad TV. Falling asleep halfway through a movie neither of you were watching anyway. EA debrief that turns into three hours of contingency planning that somehow becomes the most fun you've had all week.
NEXT QUESTION →
05
How do you prefer your partner to communicate mid-mission? Good communication is the difference between partners and a liability.
APrecise and minimal — tell me what I need to know and nothing else. Every word has a cost. BDeadpan and dry — keeping it light keeps me sharp, even when everything is on fire. CEnthusiastic and slightly chaotic — but always with useful information buried somewhere in the noise. DCalm and controlled through an earpiece, with a plan that covers every variable I haven't thought of yet. EBarely at all — silence is a language and they speak it fluently.
NEXT QUESTION →
06
Your enemy is powerful, well-resourced, and has the upper hand. How should your partner approach them? The approach to the enemy defines the partnership.
AInfiltrate their inner circle, learn everything, and dismantle them from inside out before they know we're there. BStudy the historical pattern — every villain of this type has a weakness written somewhere in the past. CGet them talking. The more they monologue, the more time I have to figure out how to beat them. DGo through them. Directly. With as much force as the terrain allows. EFind the one thing they haven't accounted for — there's always one thing — and make sure we're holding it.
NEXT QUESTION →
07
Things go badly wrong and you're captured. What do you trust your partner to do? Who someone is when you need them most is the only thing that matters.
ACome in alone, quietly, and get me out before anyone knows they were there. BHave already been working on the extraction since the moment I disappeared — the plan is already running. CCome in loud, come in fast, and worry about the collateral damage later — I'd do the same for them. DUse every resource, every contact, and bend every rule until I'm out — they don't leave people behind. ECharm their way in somehow, bluff through the hard part, and still manage to look good doing it.
NEXT QUESTION →
08
What does your ideal partner bring to the table that you couldn't replace? A great partner fills the gap you didn't know you had.
ATechnology that shouldn't exist yet and the training to use it under any conditions. BSurvival instinct so refined it borders on supernatural — and the scars to prove it's been tested. CKnowledge of history, language, and culture that makes them invaluable in places where force is useless. DThe ability to walk into any room in the world and immediately become the most trusted person in it. EStubbornness that refuses to accept a situation is hopeless — and the improvisational skill to back it up.
NEXT QUESTION →
09
Every partnership has a cost. Which of these can you live with? No one comes without baggage. The question is whether you can carry it together.
AA partner who never fully switches off — always watching exits, always calculating threats, even at dinner. BA partner who gets the job done brilliantly but has the emotional availability of a locked filing cabinet. CA partner who makes everything ten times more complicated than it needs to be — but who always comes through. DA partner who gets personally attached to every relic, ruin, and artefact we encounter, which slows everything down. EA partner who was not built for this and knows it — but shows up anyway, every time, without being asked.
NEXT QUESTION →
10
It's the final moment. Everything is on the line. What do you need from your partner right now? The last question is the most honest one.
AOne line. Absolutely dry. Delivered like the world isn't ending. Then we move. BNothing said at all — just a look that means we both already know what has to happen. CA plan I don't fully understand that somehow accounts for everything, delivered in thirty seconds flat. DA piece of historical context that reframes the entire situation and tells us exactly what to do next. ESomeone who steps forward instead of back — because that's who they've always been.
REVEAL MY PARTNER →
Your Partner Has Been Assigned Your Perfect Partner Is…
Your answers have pointed to one action hero above all others. This is the person built to have your back — for better or considerably, spectacularly worse.
Rambo
Your partner doesn't talk much, doesn't need to, and will have assessed every threat in your immediate environment before you've finished your first sentence. John Rambo is not a man of plans or politics — he is a force of nature shaped by survival, loyalty, and a capacity for endurance that goes beyond anything training can produce. He will not leave you behind. He has never left anyone behind who deserved to come home. What you get with Rambo is the most capable, most quietly ferocious partner imaginable — one who has been through things that would have broken anyone else, and who chose to keep going anyway. You'll never need to ask if he has your back. You'll just know.
James Bond
Your partner will arrive perfectly dressed, perfectly briefed, and with a cover story so convincing it'll take you a moment to remember what's actually true. James Bond is the most professionally dangerous person in any room he enters — and the most disarmingly charming, which is the point. He operates in a world of layers, where nothing is what it appears and every advantage is used without apology. You'll never be bored. You'll occasionally be furious. But when it matters — when the mission is genuinely on the line and the margin for error has collapsed to nothing — Bond is exactly the partner you want. He has survived things that have no business being survivable. He does it with style. That is not nothing.
Indiana Jones
Your partner will know the history, the language, the cultural context, and exactly why the thing everyone else is ignoring is actually the most important thing in the room. Indiana Jones is brilliant, reckless, and occasionally impossible — but he is also one of the most resourceful, most genuinely knowledgeable partners you could find yourself beside. He approaches every situation with a scholar's eye and a brawler's instinct, which is an unusual combination and a remarkably effective one. He hates snakes and gets personally attached to objects of historical significance, both of which will slow you down at least once. It doesn't matter. What Indy brings is irreplaceable — and the adventures you'll have together will be the kind people write books about. Assuming you survive them.
John McClane
Your partner was not supposed to be here. He does not have the right equipment, the right information, or anything approaching the right odds. He has a sarcastic remark and an absolute refusal to accept that the situation is as bad as it looks. John McClane is the greatest accidental hero in the history of action cinema — a man whose superpower is stubbornness, whose contingency plan is improvisation, and whose capacity to absorb punishment and keep moving would be alarming if it weren't so useful. He will complain the entire time. He will make it significantly more chaotic than it needed to be. And he will absolutely, unconditionally, without question come through when it counts. Yippee-ki-yay.
Ethan Hunt
Your partner has already run seventeen scenarios by the time you've finished reading the briefing, and the plan he's settled on involves at least two things that should be physically impossible. Ethan Hunt operates at the absolute edge of human capability — technically, physically, and intellectually — and he brings the same relentless precision to protecting his partners that he brings to dismantling organisations that shouldn't exist. He is not easy to know and he will never fully tell you everything. But he will carry the weight of the mission so completely, so absolutely, that your job is simply to trust him — and the remarkable thing is that trusting him always turns out to be the right call. The mission will be impossible. He will complete it anyway.
↻ RETAKE THE QUIZ
4 'Black Sails' (2014–2017)
Black Sails may be a woefully overlooked series, but it's definitely a cult favorite that is remembered by its most loyal fans as one of the greatest action TV watches ever created. The thrilling pirate action show centers on Captain Flint (Toby Stephens), who tries to transform Nassau from pirate chaos into something sustainable, while characters like John Silver (Luke Arnold) evolve alongside him, going from opportunistic survivors into some of the most captivatingly complex figures of the story.
Black Sails does indeed start off as a captivating pirate drama, but it then gradually transforms into something far richer, rife with naval battles, politics, betrayals, and character work that genuinely rewards audiences who come back for more than one viewing. With each season, the show gets stronger, and by the end of the addictive series, it has evolved into a sweeping legend filled with tons of emotional payoffs and layered motivations. Black Sails has definitely earned itself endless rewatches as it only gets better once audiences know where it's heading.
3 'Into the Badlands' (2015–2019)
Image via AMCThis fantastic action spectacle is an exceptional series that spurs rewatches because of its brutal world that is less gun-heavy and much more martial arts-dominated. Set in a post-apocalyptic society ruled by feudal barons, Into the Badlands focuses on the lethal regent Sunny (Daniel Wu), who is desperately searching for a way out of the violent system he lives in.
Into the Badlands is a criminally underrated series that wields extraordinary action. It's actually quite a rewatchable series, simply because of its intense combat sequences. Into the Badlands' story may be quite entertaining, but most viewers tend to stick around for the sword-wielding, almost too absurd fight scenes. Those moments are incredibly addictive and genuinely remain some of the most inventive and stylish action moments television has ever produced, cementing the series as a consistently overlooked yet incredibly fantastic gem that is rather easy to resist over and over again.
2 'Banshee' (2013–2016)
Image via CinemaxFew underrated action greats are as unapologetically intense as Banshee. The series centers around an ex-con who steals the identity of a dead sheriff named Lucas Hood (Antony Starr), and lands himself in Banshee, Pennsylvania, where he collides with his former partner and lover Carrie Hopewell (Ivana Miličević).
With the impact of a brawler and the energy of a crime thriller, Banshee is incredibly easy to keep watching. It’s actually so rewatchable because it understands exactly what kind of show it is. Banshee is hardly a subtle watch, but it is enticingly consumable, with every episode pushing the intense chaos further. The series is quality revisiting material that never apologizes for its excess, marking it as a hidden action gem that stands as a great addition to this list of criminally underrated hits in the genre.
1 'Warrior' (2019–2023)
Image via HBO MaxWarrior is genuinely one of the strongest hidden gems in the action genre of the last several years. Set during the Tong Wars in late 1800s San Francisco, the series follows the martial artist Ah Sahm (Andrew Koji), who is in search of his sister, only for him to somehow become entangled in the violent power struggles of Chinatown.
Warrior wields a cinematic quality that makes it the perfect action series, one that is definitely well worth watching more than once. It isn't too well-known, making it a woefully underrated beauty that most action lovers tend to miss out on. For dedicated action fans who have stumbled across the well-hidden gem, they have lauded Warrior as an addictive, almost impossible to ignore show, once started. The series is truly the complete package with its vivid setting, incredible fight choreography, and intense drama, cementing its place as the greatest underrated action series that is definitely worth watching over and over again.
Warrior
Release Date 2019 - 2023-00-00
Network HBO Max
Showrunner Jonathan Tropper
English (US) ·