Worst pilot episode of a critically-acclaimed series?

Ray Donovan’s got to be up there, surely?

A season’s worth of storylines in one episode, no subtlety whatsoever, every cliché in the book.

thought the firefly pilot sucked on first watch, too long and found it a bit boring. liked it a lot more second time round though as I was by then invested in the characters I guess

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Bojack Horseman’s first episode wasn’t particularly good. Or rather, it didn’t really indicate just how amazing it was going to be.

(not sure if it’s really a pilot though)

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The first episode of Freaks and Geeks is a bit shakey.

Twin P-

Whole first season of Parks and Rec sucked until they stopped trying to replicate The Office

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Okay now I’ve been forced to clarify I was not being serious. The TP pilot is one of the best episodes of TV ever.

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Pilot Seinfeld was bad

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US Office pilot was a bit of a car crash. Show is great though

first episode of Arrested Development is fairly crap, all about setting up the characters and plot but feels very stilted and very few funny bits. then the second episode is one of the absolute best. strange.

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didn’t realise we were including shows where every subsequent episode is also bad

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Simpsons

Friends

The first half of the series is really poor IMO. Then it gets amazing obvs.

Decided not to watch any more of House of Cards after seeing Spacey’s character kill a dog for no reason in the first scene.

He killed it because it was badly injured, I thought.

will never watch that show because the name is so stupid it makes me angry

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weren’t you including Arrested Development? :wink:

seems to remember the first episode of star trek TNG being pretty bad

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which is of course the greatest TV show of all time

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