Many 1980s TV shows are exuberant and experimental — but that doesn’t mean you’d enjoy watching them now.
The following shows are different — turn them on now, and they’re still intoxicating.
Here we go.
But First
What do we consider a 1980s TV show?
Of course we’re including shows that aired entirely in the ’80s, but we’re also listing shows that aired mostly in the ’80s, even if they extended into the ’90s. If a show started in the ’80s but aired mostly in the ’90s, we consider it an ’90s show.
And now, on with the list.
Knight Rider
David Hasselhoff may best be known for his days on the beach on Baywatch in the ’90s, but he’s beloved by many fans for his role as Michael Knight in the ’80s crime drama Knight Rider.
The show had a very 1980s TV show premise: an unlikely crime-fighting duo tries to do the right thing. But this time one member of the duo is … a car.
KITT, voiced by William Daniels, is a super-powered talking Pontiac Firebird Trans Am. Somehow its still cool, even in a time when so many cars can drive themselves and talk.
Produced by Glen A. Larson, who also produced Magnum P.I., Knight Rider aired on NBC from 1982 to 1986.
Also, the theme song was such a classic that everyone from Doja Cat to Busta Rhymes has sampled it.
Cheers
Were you team Sam and Diane? Or Sam and Rebecca? It didn’t really matter, because the ’80s megahit Cheers was watch-worthy throughout its entire 11-season run. Starring Ted Danson, as a Boston-based bar owner, the show followed a series of iconic characters as they poured their souls out as Sam and his team poured them drinks.
The show’s cast included Woody Harrelson, Kirstie Alley, Shelley Long, Rhea Perlman, George Wendt, John Ratzenberger and Kelsey Grammar, among many others. It also spawned Grammer’s hit ’90s series Frasier.
After premiering in 1982, Cheers was nearly canceled during its first season when it ranked almost last in ratings for its premiere. However, the show went on to land in the ratings Top 10 for eight of its 11 seasons and spent most of its run on NBC’s Thursday night “Must See TV” lineup.
And it had one of the best sitcom casts in TV history.
Cheers is available to stream now on Paramount+
Moonlighting
Before his ’80s breakthrough blockbuster Die Hard, Bruce Willis was best known for starring with Cybill Shepherd in the private detective dramedy Moonlighting. The series focused on the duo investigating cases at their Blue Moon Detective Agency. It also starred ’80s omnipresent righteous dude Curtis Armstrong.
In 2007, the series was listed as one of Time magazine’s “100 Best TV Shows of All-Time“
It ran for five seasons on ABC, starting in 1985. It’s available to stream now on Hulu.
Hart to Hart
Bruce Willis and Cybill Shepherd weren’t the only sexy, crime-fighting duo of the ’80s. In Hart to Hart, Robert Wagner and Stephanie Powers starred as a jet-setting married couple who also just happen to solve crimes.
The show was one of the final ones for ’70s television powerhouse Spelling-Goldberg Productions. Spelling would go on to produce many highly pleasurable shows of the ’90s, including Melrose Place and Beverly Hills, 90210.
Hart to Hart ran for five seasons on ABC and concluded in 1984. It the 90’s, Wagner and Powers reunited for eight TV movies. Its available to stream now for free with ads on Tubi or The Roku Channel
Golden Girls
Built around the cheesecake loving quartet of Betty White, Bea Arthur, Rue McClanahan and Estelle Getty, The Golden Girls may well be the most enduring show of the ’80s.
A timeless, endlessly lovable show that proved that growing older can mean growing better, the series ran for seven seasons on NBC, starting in 1985, and was created by Susan Harris.
You don’t even need to have seen the show to have seen the memes and merch, which remain popular to this day.
Miami Vice
There was a time when 10-year-old boys dressed in pastels and had frosted tips: Such was the influence of Miami Vice.
There’s a TV legend that NBC Entertainment chief Brandon Tartikoff pitched the show with the two words “MTV cops,” but the show’s creator, former Hill Street Blues writer Anthony Yerkovich, disputes that account.
Either way, executive producer Michael Mann and his team delivered MTV cops, week every week. The smoldering duo of Sonny Crocket and Rico Tubbs (Don Johnson and Philip Michael Thomas) took on drug smugglers accompanied by the music of Phil Collins, Glenn Frey, Chaka Khan, and many, many more. Jan Hammer provided the synth-driven, often-imitated instrumentals.
It’s still worth watching for the soundtrack alone, but the visuals remain stunning as well. So do the performances by Edward James Olmos and many more in the cast.
Miami Vice ran for five seasons, starting in 1984. Mann released a film version in 2006, and another is in the works.
Magnum, P.I.
Tom Selleck wore Hawaiian shirts like no one else in this Oahu-set crime drama where the scenery was so much a part of the show that it chewed itself.
As Thomas Magnum, Selleck surfed on seemingly boundless charm as he dealt with various island dramas. It was a consistent ratings hit, and one of the all-time most pleasurable shows to watch.
Created by Donald P. Bellisario and the aforementioned Glen A. Larson, it aired on CBS from 1980 to 1988 and inspired a CBS revival that aired from 2018 to 2024. By then Selleck had moved on to Blue Bloods.
Dynasty
No show epitomized ’80s glamour — and excess — like Dynasty, an irresistible nighttime soap that ran from 1981 to 1989 on ABC and was the very successful creation of Richard and Esther Shapiro.
Like Dallas, this 1980s TV show revolved around an oil magnate — in this case John Forsythe as Blake Carrington. Linda Evans played his new wife, Krystle, and Joan Collins arrived in Season 2 to steal scenes as his ex, Alexis.
Ratings improved with the revamp, and the show became such a cultural touchstone that Prince, in his classic “Kiss,” included the line: “You don’t have to watch Dynasty/to have an attitude”
The stellar cast also included Heather Locklear, Diahann Carroll, and many more.
Dallas
We can’t include Dynasty without including Dallas, which Dynasty imitated.
The series, which ran on CBS from 1978 to 1991, focused on the affluent, drama-addicted Ewing family, who owned both an oil company and cattle land.
Though it initially focused on Bobby and Pamela Ewing (Patrick Duffy and Victoria Principal), Larry Hagman quickly stole the show as the love-to-hate-him J.R. Ewing. (It was a reversal from his likable character on I Dream of Jeannie, which is on our list of 1960s shows that are still a pleasure to watch.
If you were alive in the ’80s, you remember that the “who shot J.R. mystery” was the cliffhanger to top all cliffhangers — and one of the defining moments of 1980s TV shows.
The cast also included Charlene Tilton, who lampooned that cliffhanger on an absolutely wild episode of Saturday Night Live.
Saturday Night Live
We know: Saturday Night Live has aired across 51 years and six decades, so it’s not exactly an ’80s TV show. But we’d be remiss to leave it off this list because no show was more exciting, or a better barometer of cultural change.
SNL started the ’80s in crisis, with the exit of Lorne Michaels and the original Not Ready for Primetime Players. But soon Eddie Murphy became the breakout star of the show (and the decade). By the end of the ’80s, Dana Carvey was the pivotal player on SNL, thanks to characters from The Church Lady to President Bush.
But many other great comedic talents vied with Carvey for viewer’s laughter, including Phil Hartman, Jan Hooks, Mike Myers, and many more. They lampooned everyone from televangelists to politicians to showbiz washouts to talk show hosts to pompous rock stars.
Other SNL ’80s vets included Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Billy Crystal, Martin Short, and many more. Michaels returned in the mid-80s and never left again.
Diff’rent Strokes
After debuting in 1978 on NBC, Diff’rent Strokes ran for eight seasons, mostly in the ’80s, and mostly on ABC. (The final season aired on ABC.)
It doesn’t get much recognition today because of the white-savior trope in its setup: rich white man Phillip Drummond (Conrad Bain) adopts his former housekeeper’s two Black sons, Arnold and Willis (Gary Coleman and Todd Bridges) to live with him and his daughter Kimberly (Dana Plato).
But respect to Diff’rent Strokes: It went hard. Though many of the laughs were about Mr. Drummond’s hopeless stodginess, or Arnold’s quick hit, the show bluntly confronted problems from sexual abuse to racism to drugs, once even hosting Nancy Reagan to give her very ’80s “just say no” schpiel.
Other prominent guests including Mr. T and David Hasselhoff, who played himself, heroically saving Arnold from an explosion on the Knight Rider set. But the most intense storyline of all is the two-parter “The Bicycle Man,” in which Gordon Jump guest stars as a predator. It taught a generation of kids to look out for strangers who seemed too friendly.
St. Elsewhere
The medical drama provided a template for shows like ER and even modern Emmy-magnet The Pitt, but may be best known today as the launchpad for one of our greatest actors, Denzel Washington.
The ensemble cast also included Ed Flanders, Howie Mandel, Alfre Woodard, Ed Begley Jr., and the voice of KITT, William Daniels.
Created by created by Joshua Brand and John Falsey, it ran on NBC from 1982 to 1988. And though it was known for gritty realism, it ended with a completely mind-bending episode that is on our list of the best TV finales of all time.
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Main image: Heather Locklear on Dynasty. ABC.