Canceled FX Shows We Want to Return

FX is home to some of the all-time TV greats, like Justified, Sons of Anarchy, It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, The Shield, American Horror Story, and plenty more. But for every show the network gets right, there’s a couple it got wrong. Here’s five shows FX should bring back from cancellation.

Man Seeking Woman

A surreal and absurd romantic comedy that opens with the protagonist’s girlfriend leaving him for Adolf Hitler (played by Bill Hader) right before he’s to attend a friend’s wedding in hell might be a hard sell for a lot of people. It’s a miracle, then, that this heartfelt meditation on the nature of relationships lasted for three seasons before cancellation. But when you take a look at the glowing reviews and the knockout cast—Jay Baruchel, Eric Andre, Britt Lower, Tim Heidecker, Fred Armisen, Jon Daly, Carrie-Anne Moss, just to name a few—you wonder why FX didn’t keep this one going forever.

Terriers

This one still hurts. Ted Griffin, a writer on Ocean’s Eleven and FX’s megahit The Shield, quietly revolutionized the detective genre with this scrappy comedy-drama about two private investigators in San Diego. Full of wild plot twists and hilarious moments, it launched to rave reviews and feels like the kind of series that would provoke endless discussion online had it come out today. Unfortunately, poor marketing and a bad title led to very few viewers, prompting FX to cancel it after just one season. Producer Shawn Ryan said in 2023 that Terriers was too “ahead of its time” to succeed.

Y: The Last Man

This adaptation of Brian K. Vaughan’s legendary graphic novel was hotly anticipated and enjoyed by fans and critics alike. Unfortunately, the double whammy of the COVID-19 pandemic and the WGA strike of 2023 led to ballooning costs to keep the cast on retainer, forcing FX to pull the plug at the series’ halfway point. At least we’ve still got the comic.

The Riches

Another show way too ahead of its time, The Riches was like if you combined Shameless and Parasite. Eddie Izzard and Minnie Driver played the leaders of a family of Irish con-artists, who travel to Baton Rouge and “steal the American dream” by adopting the identities of a dead rich couple they found in a car wreck. And just like the previous show on the list, it was a casualty of a WGA strike all the way back in 2007.

The Bastard Executioner

Writer/director Kurt Sutter’s follow-up to Sons of Anarchy wasn’t everyone’s cup of tea. A dark and brutal period piece about 14th century Wales and the fallout from the revolt of 1294, the series centers around a knight-turned-executioner in a baron’s castle. Filled with plenty of court intrigue, secret plots, backstabbing, and gory medieval battles, it’s the progenitor to a type of show that FX viewers now love; Shogun, for example. This one, however, was axed after one season.