12 movie TV spin-offs that turned out surprisingly good

The somewhat unexpected news of a ‘Bad Boys’ TV spin-off, centred not on Will Smith and Martin Lawrence’s central cop duo but Gabrielle Union’s character from ‘Bad Boys II,’ is just the latest of a seemingly endless list of big screen properties repurposed for the small screen in recent years.

Later this month, Netflix will host Spike Lee’s ‘She’s Gotta Have It,’ a serialised, modern day reworking of the director’s 1986 feature debut. In production now is ‘Cobra Kai,’ a comedic but canonical sequel to the ‘Karate Kid’ movies reuniting actors Ralph Macchio and William Zabka. The list goes on.

However, TV spin-offs of movies don’t necessarily have the best track record. While on rare occasions – most notably ‘MASH’ and ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’ – the small screen offshoot has managed to overtake the source material in the popular consciousness, there are many more instances when they’re almost instantly forgotten: remember the TV shows of ‘Blade,’ ‘Total Recall’ or ‘Minority Report?’ Anyone?

That being said, now and then these TV takes on well-loved movies surprise everyone by proving to be entirely watchable, and in some cases genuinely great pieces of work in their own right. These twelve shows are among the ones that surprised us the most.

Read More:
Why modern TV is better than film
UK Netflix has half the content of the US
Why adult TV cartoons should be taken seriously