Terrible TV Shows That Never Made It To Air

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Television may have recently experienced a golden age thanks to high-quality programs like "Mad Men," "Breaking Bad" and "Game of Thrones." On the other hand, there have also been many shows filmed over the last few decades that threatened to destroy the medium altogether. Fortunately, some of them never made it to air, leaving them destined to live on in internet lore. These are the shows that were simply too bad for networks to air.

The rise of ABC's "Desperate Housewives" in 2004 set every other network on a mission to find their own version of a female-driven primetime soap. "Cashmere Mafia" and "Lipstick Jungle," anyone? Also on that gut-wrenching list: Lifetime's "Blonde Charity Mafia," a reality series of sorts that followed a bunch of D.C. socialites who were, like, totally charitable and stuff. The show was apparently so bad that Lifetime shipped it off to the equally low-rated channel, The CW, which also decided it wasn't worth adding to their list of programs. Eventually, "Blonde Charity Mafia" aired on MTV New Zealand and a few other international networks for audiences with an apparently very ironic sense of humor. 

Of all the shows featured on our list, Fox's "Our Little Genius" may be the most controversial. The trivia show, which featured a bunch of whiz kids way smarter than you, was supposed to air after "American Idol," setting it up to be one of TV's biggest reality shows ever. Of course, that never happened. The reason: it got caught for allegedly feeding answers to those adorable little geniuses before they went on to tape. Sad, no? Though maybe not as sad as the fact that the whole show was hosted by actor Kevin Pollak.

Since reality television hit big in the early 2000s, a lot of bad decisions have been made: "The Swan," "Who Wants to Marry a Multimillionaire," and every iteration of "Flavor of Love" are just a few examples. So maybe that's why we were so pleasantly surprised when VH1 opted not to air "Liza and David," a reality series that reportedly documented the recent nuptials of Liza Minnelli and her then-husband, David Gest. Only one episode was reportedly filmed, which, considering the craziness that went down at Liza and David's wedding, shouldn't surprise anyone.

In the early 2000s, The WB — the network we now know as The CW — was enjoying success with its proto-"Superman" teen drama "Smallville." By 2006, the series was in its sixth season and had included some major superhero guest stars including Impulse, Cyborg, the Green Arrow, and Aquaman. The latter hero appears in the fifth season episode "Aqua." It wasn't long before The WB decided to spin the character off into his own series, and in 2006, they moved forward with a pilot for a proposed "Aquaman" series.

The show was never given the green light past its first test episode which starred Justin Hartley — who debuted as Oliver Queen on "Smallville" that same year — as Arthur Curry. Though it never made it to the airwaves, the studio made it available as a download on iTunes that year for $1.99, probably hoping comic book fans would shell out few bucks for a glimpse of what might have been. 

Sadly, 2006's "Aquaman" couldn't even satisfy those diehards. A literal decade would go by before DC found a live action version of their ocean-dwelling avenger that clicked with audiences. But during the mid-'00s when Jason Momoa was only famous to fans of "Stargate: Atlantis," not even Hartley and the rest of the minds behind TV's "Aquaman" could figure out how to make the character work. Poorly written, with stuff dialogue and a ho-hum plot with a mediocre cast — with the exception of Ving Rhames who gives a limp performance himself — IGN called the pilot "dead in the water."

Over the past decade, it seems the biggest trend on TV is bringing back hits from the '80s and '90s for revivals. "Full House," "Roseanne," and "Will and Grace" all received major relaunches in recent years, with the original stars returning to their fan-favorite roles. In 2015, it wasn't much of a surprise when NBC announced they'd be bringing back the '90s sitcom "Coach" with original stars Craig T. Nelson and Bill Fagerbakke set to star, as the college football-based comedy seemed perfectly poised for a comeback.

The new series was designed to catch up with coach Hayden Fox (Nelson) roughly two decades after the events of the original "Coach." According to The Hollywood Reporter, the plot of the new "Coach" would follow Hayden after he's called out of retirement to help advise a newly founded college team alongside his adult son. Unfortunately, it doesn't sound like the filmed episodes turned out so great, because the series was scrapped before completion. 

The Hollywood Reporter notes that in August of 2015, just five months after the show was announced, the show was canned midway through filming its 13-episode season because production "was not going well." Industry insiders noted that the network didn't even have high hopes before the cameras rolled, and apparently their fears were quickly confirmed, so they pulled the plug. TV Insider later published an interview with series creator Barry Kemp, who chalked up the show's failure to creative differences.

In the 1980s, the Garbage Pail Kids was a series of off-the-wall and decidedly off-color sticker cards traded by kids everywhere. Banned on schoolyards for their outrageous and offensive artwork, they were the must-have item for kids of the era, depicting everything from snot-covered brats to babies smoking cigarettes and drinking alcohol. Because they were the hottest thing going at the time, of course Hollywood came calling, and in addition to a live action movie, an animated series was planned for 1987.

The "Garbage Pail Kids" movie flopped hard and is sometimes considered one of the worst films ever made. The cartoon series wasn't much better, so much so that it never made it to U.S. television. Though some countries overseas got a peak at its putridness, Americans were spared, but not without much controversy. Heavily promoted ahead of its airing during the 1986 fall season, a number of TV stations across the country announced their refusal to air the show because of its disgusting subject matter.

But according to an article in the Spokane Chronicle in '86, CBS trashed the "Garbage Pail Kids" even before the stations had objected because it didn't meet their expectations. A spokesperson for the network claimed that the plan had been to ease up on the gross factor for the series, but when episodes were completed, it wasn't at all what they had envisioned. Eventually, thanks to fan pressure, the series in its entirety was released on DVD in 2006.

Though a lot of folks are only familiar with her music, country legend Dolly Parton had a long career in Hollywood. Through the late 1980s, Parton starred in several high-profile movies including "Rhinestone" with Sylvester Stallone, "Steel Magnolias" with Julia Roberts, and "The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas" with Burt Reynolds. Into the 1990s, she tried a transition to television with a handful of guest roles on other shows before getting a shot at her own series in 1994, titled "Heavens to Betsy."

The story of a self-centered music star who dies and comes back to Earth to do good deeds, the series was cursed with production issues right from the start. In a 1994 report from Entertainment Weekly, the goofy premise and unfunny episodes led to serious problems with unhappy studio folks. Most shockingly however, conflict between the show's two producers Donald Seigel and Jerry Perzigian led to actual fisticuffs, prompting the network to banish the show to the underworld of forgotten unaired sitcoms.

Whether by coincidence or perhaps a way of retooling the project, Parton later appeared in a 1996 TV movie titled "Unlikely Angel" with a very similar concept. In that film, a deceased country music star comes back to Earth to help unite a suburban family that has become estranged.

There are plenty of television shows that don't make it to the air because they are terrible, but sometimes there's an idea that comes along that's so ill advised that it never even gets a pilot. Such was the case with the planned 2016 series "Mail Order Family," a series whose very premise prompted immediate backlash upon its announcement. And while the network and showrunners offered adamant defenses of the concept, they wisely scrapped the project. 

Entertainment Weekly reported that the series would've been produced by prolific TV writer Jackie Clarke and would have been a quasi-autobiography chronicling the life of a Filipina woman who comes to the U.S. at the behest of a widowed man who wants a new wife and someone to help bring up his two daughters. Human rights activists were not thrilled about the then-upcoming program "Mail Order Family." Critics voiced concerns that the proposed series was glorifying the objectification of women, downplaying the horrors of human trafficking, and peddling offensive racial stereotypes. Within 48 hours, the network reversed course and cancelled "Mail Order Family" entirely.

Comedian Dane Cook has been on the wrong end of the news a handful of times in his career. Hopefully, that history helped him take it in stride when NBC dumped his planned series "Next Caller" before it ever made it to air.

Deadline reported on the series when it was first picked up in 2012. Had it come to fruition, it would have centered on an egocentric male radio disc jockey — a sort of Howard Stern or Opie and Anthony archetype — working at a satellite radio station. The series would have focused on a battle of sexes when Cook's character is forced into accepting a co-host in the form of uptight feminist and former NPR host played by Collette Wolf. With just a six-episode commitment, it's hard to believe they couldn't even finish filming its initial order, but this is indeed the case. After four episodes were completed, NBC gave the show the kibosh.

Though they never went into detail, studio executives were said to be unhappy with the creative direction of the show, according to industry insiders. Judging from the groan-inducing premise, we can imagine "Next Caller" making the network more than a little nervous. Series creator Stephen Falk later penned a heartfelt rant about the abrupt cancellation that serves as a reminder that showbiz life is not always as glamorous and pleasant as we sometimes imagine it to be (via Deadline).

Star of 1980s TV staples "Happy Days" and "Charles in Charge," Scott Baio might've felt like he was about to return to sitcom glory when Fox offered him a new series called "Rewind" in 1997. Unfortunately, the series was not well received by the studio or industry critics. Despite being advertised for the fall season, "Rewind" never made it to air. 

In "Rewind" Baio stars as marketing executive Rob DiPaulo, who begins to think that events in his life seem to be repeating themselves. But this is no science fiction mind-bender, just Rob's realization that his life hasn't actually changed that much since the 1970s. The show told two parallel stories, with Baio playing Rob in the late '90s dealing with grown-up problems at work and in love, and a then little-known Milo Ventimiglia as a younger version of Rob in the 1970s.

According to insiders the show was terrible, as reported in Variety when it was announced the show had gotten the axe. Promos for the show heavily marketed the '70s angle in a manner oddly reminiscent of "That '70s Show" which Fox would air a year later.