10 TV Shows You Were Ready To Hate

It’s a well known reality that TV shows, much like any other creative medium, can often be polarising. Whether it be down to the subject matter, those involved in the project, or unfavourable tales from the set, many productions find that there is a contingent of the audience ready to pour scorn over the material before they’ve had the chance to view the first episode.

Luckily, many of these preconceptions turn out to be false, and shows successfully win even the most sceptical of viewers over thanks to their overall quality. Yet more end up being a battleground of personal taste, where some love and some despise the material dependent on their prerogative. And then, of course, there are the few that thoroughly bomb, with an explosion of poor planning that television fans had seen coming miles off.

Whatever their eventual fate, all these shows certainly garnered their fair share of preemptive hatred prior to their launch. Whether deserved is up to you, but somehow, it seems likely there won’t be further greenlights in at least a few of these titles' futures.

The 2020s are shaping up to be the age of nostalgia. Low rise jeans and skinny scarves can be seen on fashion influencers all over Tiktok, and in the wake of the pandemic’s global uncertainty a majority of us have been settling in with the old, comforting television we know and love. Hence, the huge slate of reboots hitting our screens.

When it was announced, the bringing of iconic young-and-rich escapism fare that is Gossip Girl into the present was confusing at best. The original show only went off the air in 2012, and much of the magic surrounding it stemmed from the cultural climate it was formed in. Considering that none of the original cast would be returning, and that the titular Gossip Girl had been unmasked in the final season, many were mystified as to how HBO intended to revitalise it.

After the new iteration of the show debuted in 2021, those questions weren’t exactly answered. Gossip Girl received muted reviews that praised the cast and improved diversity, but criticised the meaningless drama supposedly driving the plot. With characters that are altogether too nice to dish dirt on, and the reveal that the teens' teachers are the minds behind the gossip blog, the show fell flat with fans of the original who bothered to see it.

Still, it garnered enough positive viewing from the fresh teenage audience who hold no unfavourable comparisons to get a second season, so who are we to sniff at a show that a new generation are having fun with?