These six Netflix TV originals are the best the streamer has to offer in TV series that ran for over five seasons. Shows don’t run as long as they used to in this era of streaming, where shows are lucky to make it past even one season. Netflix in particular, has a habit of cutting its shows short.
Even the best original Netflix TV shows often don’t go for more than three seasons, which means you’re often forced to scroll through their library a little too often. However, if you want a show that you are certain isn’t going to end after only a few hours, check out these original series that went for longer than five seasons.
BoJack Horseman (2014-2020)
Six Seasons
BoJack Horseman is an adult-animated TV show made for Netflix that premiered in 2014 and stars Will Arnett as the voice of BoJack Horseman, an anthropomorphic horse and the former star of a hit sitcom. Since then, he’s become a recluse, a misanthrope, and an alcoholic.
His only “friends” include Todd (Aaron Paul), a slacker who lives on his couch; Princess Carolyn (Amy Sedaris), a pink cat, and BoJack’s agent and on/off lover; and Diane Nguyen (Alison Brie), an aspiring writer hired to write BoJack’s memoir. One by one, BoJack manages to drive everyone away.
It’s a clever and very funny series, but the show gets more and more bleak as the series goes on. Every time BoJack attempts to fix himself, he ends up failing harder, often bringing down those around him. BoJack Horseman also has some incredibly creative episodes that use the animated format like few shows have.
Grace And Frankie (2015-2022)
Seven Seasons
In Grace and Frankie, Grace Hanson (Jane Fonda) is a no-nonsense cosmetics mogul with a sharp tongue, and Frankie Bergstein (Lily Tomlin) is a hippy and an artist who likes to go with the flow. When Grace and Frankie’s husbands decide they want a relationship with one another, the two women are left in the lurch.
Though they were never particularly good friends before their husbands began dating, Grace and Frankie develop a kinship that helps get them through the upheaval and turmoil happening late in their lives. The chemistry between Tomlin and Fonda is fantastic, with the legendary actresses putting on late-career show-stopping performances.
It’s a hilarious series with a unique conceit that helps make each joke feel new and earned. Grace and Frankie is a heartwarming show filled with touching moments of friendship and the real-life moments of levity that get us through the strange and difficult parts of life.
Chef’s Table (2015-2024)
Seven Seasons
Originating from the acclaimed Jiro Dreams of Sushi, Chef’s Table is a multi-year project that has brought attention to restaurants, cuisines, chefs, cooking techniques, and whole cultures. It’s a beautifully shot show with a visual language that is so identifiable, it’s made its way into plenty of parodies.
Each episode of Chef’s Table focuses on a specific chef from around the world, observing their preparations and restaurants, listening to their philosophies about food, and learning why they do what they do. Every restaurant that appears in the series is one of the best in the world.
The way Chef’s Table films the preparation and the dishes is its own kind of art, and the series makes it perfectly clear why these chefs are so respected and their restaurants so lauded. Each episode offers something different, and you may find yourself binging a whole season before you realize what happened.
Orange Is The New Black (2013-2019)
Seven Seasons
Orange is the New Black is one of the original Netflix TV shows, premiering in 2013 and running until 2019. The series follows Piper Chapman (Taylor Schilling), a 33-year-old woman from NYC, sentenced to 15 months in a minimum security prison in upstate New York for drug smuggling a decade earlier.
In prison, the former debutante and upper-middle-class woman has to learn how to get along in a world she is unfamiliar with and unprepared for. The series features an exceptional ensemble of nearly all female actors and a particularly significant percentage of non-white actors in critical roles.
The series challenges preconceived notions about prisoners and shines a light on the bureaucratic, unfair, and sometimes brutal aspects of the American prison system. There’s a lot of darkness in Orange Is the New Black, but there’s also plenty of humor, warmth, and love, showing a different side of jail time.
Formula 1: Drive to Survive (2019-Present)
Seven Seasons
Formula 1: Drive to Survive may go down as one of the most influential sports documentaries ever made. Even people who could never care less about sporting events are suddenly F1 fans who recognize the most obscure drivers and crew members. Each season covers a World Championship progression.
Unlike a sports documentary series like Hard Knocks, we see everything in Formula 1: Drive to Survive. As viewers, we get unfettered access to the struggles, issues, conflicts, and drama that surround the high-value sport. The show brings us in close to get to know the real people who devote their lives to F1.
Drive to Survive has also not been afraid to adjust its formula when it needs to. When the series began to be criticized for manufacturing drama, it made an effort to be more realistic. Few sports have ever gotten a boost like this from a TV show, and you may find yourself tuning into actual F1 events.
The Crown (2016-2023)
Six Seasons
The Crown
7/10
- Release Date
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2016 – 2023-00-00
- Writers
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Peter Morgan
The Crown tracks the life of Queen Elizabeth II across multiple stages of her life, beginning in the early part of her reign as she learns to be a monarch and is played by Claire Foy, to the middle era where she’s played by Oliva Colman and encounters such problems as the Aberfan Disaster and Margaret Thatcher (Gillian Anderson).
The final two seasons see the Queen played by Imelda Staunton as she grapples with the changing view of the monarchy she’s worked so long to uphold. The Crown is packed with incredible actors, sometimes only appearing in an episode for the chance to play a memorable figure from history.
It’s a brilliantly produced Netflix show, filled with lavish set designs, incredible writing, and an intriguing tone. The series creator, Peter Morgan, seems to think there are a hundred issues with the royal family, but at the same time, he makes it clear that few of us would ever actually want to be in their shoes.
