10 Forgotten 2010s Sci-Fi Shows Still Worth Watching Today

J.K. Simmons spent two seasons acting opposite a darker version of himself from a parallel Earth, and Starz still couldn't get enough people to watch "Counterpart" before canceling it.

It wasn't the only sci-fi series to lose its battle for viewers in the 2010s. Throughout the decade, ambitious shows arrived but failed to last in an era when streaming services and cable networks unloaded more television than anyone could reasonably keep up with. Because of that, good, and even great, content got lost in the shuffle and slid into virtual oblivion.

These 10 shows deserve better than that. Whether they received the satisfying send-off they deserved or got cut off before they could find an audience, all of them are worth a rewatch.

In "Travelers," only a mind can make the trip back through time. Humanity has been nearly eradicated, and those still alive have only one option left: time jump into the bodies of present-day individuals and prevent the disaster ahead.

Behind the action, "Travelers" is a workplace show where everyone has specialized roles and nobody can quit. Take Grant MacLaren (Eric McCormack), who inherits his host's job as an FBI agent along with a marriage to Kat (Leah Cairns), who can tell something about Grant has changed. The longer he keeps up the deception, the more it costs her. By the final episode, Grant effectively lets her go so she can find love with another man.

"Travelers" ran three seasons before resetting the timeline with a title card promising a second version of the Travelers program (translation: another season) that, sadly, never came.

Deep in Berlin, an office building hides a secret passage to a parallel world where alternate versions of its people exist. This became the premise behind Starz's espionage drama "Counterpart," where J.K. Simmons played dual roles: Howard Silk, a mild-mannered man who works a low-ranking job at the Office of Interchange, and also Howard Silk Prime, a tougher and more ruthless version of the same man from across the divide. Watching Simmons play both men became the very reason to watch this short-lived show.

As two versions of Emily, Olivia Williams also turns in compelling performances, and Harry Lloyd brings real bite to Peter Quayle, a strategist who learns his own wife was swapped out for her double from the other side. The show's dual-world premise becomes a lens for the show to ask existential questions about selfhood, the roads not taken in life, and what might have been.

Starz canceled "Counterpart" after two seasons, collapsing that entry to an alternate Earth. It remains one of the more painful cancellations on this list, but also one of the easiest to recommend to those who missed it the first time.

Kiera Cameron (Rachel Nichols) never wanted to travel back in time. But that's where "Continuum" sends its time-tripping heroine after her mission in 2077 as a Protector to monitor the execution of anti-corporate group Liber8 goes wrong. Pulled 65 years into the past, Kiera and Liber8 land in Vancouver. With a communications implant that only reaches young Alec Sadler (Erik Knudsen), and the help of Detective Carlos Fonnegra (Victor Webster), she tracks Liber8 while working to return to her own time.

Part of the appeal of "Continuum" lies in its moral ambiguity and its refusal to portray the future in black and white. Sure, Liber8 is a terrorist org, but the corporate-controlled future Kiera defends is also deeply imperfect. "Continuum" lasted four seasons, wrapped its story properly, and has arguably aged into a smarter series than it probably set out to be, offering a glimpse at a surveillance state where there are no easy answers around who's on the right side of justice.

Every good alien abduction story needs its own skeptic, and one of Peak TV's hidden gems, "People of Earth," found one in Ozzie Graham (Wyatt Cenac), a journalist who shows up in the small town of Beacon, New York, to write an article about a support group for alien abductees who refer to themselves simply as "experiencers." The twist, which the show goes on to reveal, is that Ozzie was also taken, which he slowly learns as memories of his own return.

Led by Gina (Ana Gasteyer), the support group becomes the show's heart, but there's also real tenderness in how "People of Earth" depicts aliens. They're not cold, ruthless invaders so much as bumbling bureaucrats hashing out internal politics. TBS originally renewed the show for a third season, then changed its mind months later and canceled it. But "People of Earth" warrants revisiting for its special brand of gentle, warm comedy.

Over a decade before anyone began having heated debates about AI and its place in society, "Humans" explored a scenario in which those conversations already happened. In this world, families are clamoring for robotic servants called "synths," and the Hawkins family buys one to help around the house. Laura (Katherine Parkinson) is uneasy about the newest addition to their home from the beginning. She has every right to be, it turns out, because the synth her family names Anita (Gemma Chan) is secretly Mia, a conscious synth trapped beneath the obedient persona.

The show doesn't rush its story, with each season pushing further into what happens to a society once its machines start wanting things for themselves, including legal rights and autonomy. By the third season, the show erupts into an open conflict between humans and a self-aware synth population. "Humans" ran three seasons before getting canceled with plot threads left hanging. Watching it now — with so many questions about AI still unresolved — may bring about a strange sense of déjà vu.

When Syfy debuted its ambitious television adaptation of "12 Monkeys," it loomed in the shadow of the 1995 film, which in turn, was inspired by the 1962 French short film "La Jetée." But over four seasons, the show found its own distinct identity. In a plague-ravaged 2043, James Cole (Aaron Stanford) is a scavenger, picking through the ruins of his post-apocalyptic world until he's recruited by physicist Katarina Jones (Barbara Sukowa) into the time-travel initiative Project Splinter. Katarina sends Cole back several decades to find Dr. Cassandra Railly (Amanda Schull), a virologist whose audio recording sets the mission in motion. What begins as a hunt for the virus before it can spread grows into a fight to keep time itself from unraveling. Standing in their way: a shadowy organization named the Army of the 12 Monkeys, and a slew of time loops and paradoxes.

"12 Monkeys" wasn't afraid to trust its patient, eagle-eyed viewers, with episodes jumping across decades, even centuries, and clues planted in earlier episodes that didn't pay off until later. The series managed to wrap up its plot after four seasons on its own terms, twists, sacrifices, and all. For anyone burned by a show canceled prematurely, this one is a gift.

Todd Brotzman (Elijah Wood), a hotel bellhop, already has enough problems to deal with when
Dirk Gently (Samuel Barnett), an eccentric detective, unexpectedly enters his life and makes Todd his new assistant. Together, they make for an unlikely duo: a crime-solver who believes that everything in the universe is somehow connected, and his wary sidekick. The pair tackle mysteries that embrace the strange and rarely lack in originality.

The first season alone features a murder, a stray dog, and psychic vampires, and somehow ties them all together. The second season, meanwhile, took a surprise left turn, seeing Dirk exploring the magical world of Wendimoor. BBC America canceled the series after the second season, so "Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency" never received a proper ending. But its 18 episodes strike that careful balance few shows of its kind truly manage — balancing real mystery with light comedy.

Los Angeles under an alien occupation sounds like the setup for a show driven largely by action sequences and visual effects, but "Colony" takes a somewhat different route. The sci-fi drama, which spanned three seasons, spends much of its energy exploring the lives of people and the decisions they make once society is irreversibly changed overnight. In this strange new world, former FBI agent Will Bowman (Josh Holloway) takes a job tracking down members of the resistance for the Transitional Authority. The job is, really, a means to an end: a way to search for Will's son, who is separated from the family and stranded in Santa Monica. His wife Katie (Sarah Wayne Callies), meanwhile, works with the resistance, a role that puts constant strain on the pair's marriage.

"Colony" was less interested in aliens and more intrigued by how people respond to their fears. USA Network canceled the series after the third season, leaving the characters' fates an open question. Still, the three seasons that do exist offer a rewarding look at life under occupation, even if that occupation is a seemingly fantastical one.

Based on Blake Crouch's novels and produced by M. Night Shyamalan, "Wayward Pines" centers on Secret Service agent Ethan Burke (Matt Dillon), who gets into a car accident while en route to a small Idaho town to investigate the disappearance of two fellow agents, then regains consciousness only to realize he can't leave. His phone calls go nowhere, the roads loop back on themselves, and an electric fence surrounds the community. Almost everyone he meets, including Sheriff Pope (Terrence Howard), has a secret, though none of them arguably compares with the show's big reveal, which arrives halfway through Season 1, long before many shows would tip their hand.

It was a gamble that paid off, as the show became a hit. But the second season, which saw Jason Patric stepping in for Dillon as the show's new lead character Dr. Theo Yedlin, failed to capture the same magic and ratings. Although Fox weighed a Season 3 plan for "Wayward Pines," it eventually canceled the series, and the show has since drifted out of the conversation despite its 20 episodes proving to be one of the more entertaining mystery shows the decade produced.

Most of the shows on this list skew dark, but "Killjoys" is one of the few that revels in a good time. Dutch (Hannah John-Kamen) is a "Killjoy," or bounty hunter, whose work spans a system of planets called the "Quad," alongside her partner Johnny (Aaron Ashmore) and his brother D'avin (Luke Macfarlane). Together, they take up "Warrants", or contracts, that run a wide range of tasks, from simple cargo retrievals to kill orders, which gives the show and its characters room to bounce between easygoing episodes rife with banter to moments with deeper, more sweeping stakes around a looming war.

Where "Killjoys" succeeds most is with its playfulness and the dynamics of its three main characters, a chosen family that carries the show both through its lighter moments and its more sprawling, mythology-heavy stretches. For anyone who missed a scrappy, big-hearted space adventure in the same spirit as "Firefly," "Killjoys" offers a similar experience, and Syfy, to its credit, gave the series five seasons, letting it work towards a fitting end.