The most anticipated TV shows of spring 2024

Flowers are blooming, allergies are coming back with a vengeance — spring has officially sprung.

The “spring season” in entertainment isn’t quite as flashy as the summer one (if you can even tell the difference between the two come May). But even if it’s a bit less classically blockbuster, the spring TV season is nothing to sneeze at — in fact, there are some big titles coming to television screens soon.

Bridgerton has a new season with new, torrid love affairs as it works its way through the Bridgerton alphabet, while Star Trek: Discovery does one more turn about the room with its fifth and final season. There are heavy hitters coming to TV for the first time, like the star-studded The Sympathizer adaptation from Park Chan-wook coming to Max, or Knuckles — still voiced by Idris Elba, a role he was “eager” to get right — getting his own time to shine in the titular role of Knuckles. And as the saying goes, April showers bring the long-awaited Fallout TV show to Prime Video.

All that and more in our roundup of the best TV shows to watch this spring:

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Renegade Nell

Release date: March 29 on Disney Plus

From Gentleman Jack creator Sally Wainwright, Renegade Nell follows a young woman named Nell Jackson (Derry Girls’ Louisa Harland) in 18th-century England. After she finds herself accused of murder, Nell takes to a life of plundering and thieving. If that wasn’t exciting enough, there’s also some supernatural shenanigans going on, granting her superhuman abilities that make her very, very hard to kill. —Petrana Radulovic

Fright Krewe season 2

Release date: March 29 on Hulu and Peacock

Five teens in New Orleans learn all the spooky myths and folktales are true, accidentally awaken an evil spirit, and then get some sick powers from Voodoo loas. It’s an animated show aimed for slightly older kids, which means the scares can be scarier, walking that fine line between spooky and spoopy. —PR

Taskmaster series 17

Release date: March 29 on YouTube and Taskmaster SuperMax Plus

One of TV’s funniest shows returns with a brand new cast of panelists and plenty of hijinks. This series’ contestants are comedian Joanne McNally, comedian John Robins, Ted Lasso actor Nick Mohammed, Alma’s Not Normal actress Sophie Willan, and Inside No. 9 writer and actor Steve Pemberton. —Pete Volk

A Gentleman in Moscow

Release date: March 31 on Paramount Plus with Showtime

Ewan McGregor stars as an aristocrat count placed under house arrest after returning to his native Russia following the Bolshevik revolution of 1917. The original novel has a very interesting structure, first doubling the time period between chapters (one day, then two, all the way up to 16 years) and then halving it, so it will be interesting to see how the TV adaptation (led by All Creatures Great and Small writer Ben Vanstone) handles it. Mary Elizabeth Winstead co-stars. —PV

Breaking News season 7

Release date: April 2 on Dropout

Dropout’s “make ‘em corpse” series, in which staff comedians are placed on a mock TV news set and challenged to do everything the teleprompter tells them to without laughing or smiling, continues this April. A trailer for the new season boasted a new set, more comedians, sports “coverage,” and generally more vengeful roasting of company CEO and host Sam Reich. —Susana Polo

American Horror Story: Delicate part 2

Release date: April 3 on FX, April 4 on Hulu

Maybe… American Horror Story is good again. At least, the first half of this season was absolutely stellar, with a slow drip of unease escalating to some absolutely eerie moments. Emma Roberts stars as Anna Victoria Alcott, an actress navigating the perils of awards season while also trying to get pregnant. But there’s something more ominous happening, as sinister figures follow her and she begins to exhibit increasingly unsettling pregnancy symptoms. Yet when Victoria asks for help… no one seems to believe her. —PR

Ripley

Release date: April 4 on Netflix

Patricia Highsmith wrote five novels about the con artist Tom Ripley, the most famous being The Talented Mr. Ripley — previously an acclaimed 1999 film starring Matt Damon and Philip Seymour Hoffman. Netflix’s Ripley looks to make a slicker impression, a stark black-and-white take starring Andrew Scott of Fleabag and All of Us Strangers fame as Tom Ripley, the handsome man who will charm his way into the life of the wealthy Dickie Greenleaf (Johnny Flynn) to disastrous results. —Joshua Rivera

Star Trek: Discovery final season

Release date: April 4 on Paramount Plus

Since launching the new wave of Trek television back in 2017, Discovery has had many proponents and detractors, but pretty much everyone can agree: For better or worse, the show has always gone for it, with big swings in its narratives and character choices. The fifth season of Discovery will be its last, closing out the journey of Captain Michael Burnham and the rest of her crew. Battlestar Galactica vet Callum Keith Rennie joins the cast this time around. —PV

Chucky season 3 part 2

Release date: April 10 on USA Network and Syfy, April 11 on Peacock

Arguably the most deliriously fun show running right now, Chucky finally returns to close out the madcap third season that has seen the murderous doll age like Dorian Gray’s portrait and also attempt to take over the White House. Will Chucky be our next commander in chief? Anything is possible, but only one thing is certain: Devon Sawa will die horribly, as he has in every season of this show so far. —PV

Fallout

Release date: April 11 on Prime Video

Video games! They’re not just for video games anymore! Sometimes they’re TV! Prime Video’s Fallout is the next big contender for Actually Good game adaptation following The Last of Us, and the third one set in the post-apocalypse. But mostly? It’s the latest place to find The Righteous Gemstones phenom Walton Goggins, and that’s good enough for me. —JR

The Sympathizer

Release date: April 14 on HBO and Max

A crackling-looking adaptation of a whip-smart satirical novel, HBO’s The Sympathizer takes Viet Thanh Nguyen’s labyrinthine thriller about a nameless spy (dubbed the Captain in the series and played by Hoa Xuande) for the North Vietnamese army that has infiltrated South Vietnamese forces toward the end of the Vietnam War and gives it the prestige miniseries treatment. And what prestige! Recent Oscar-winner Robert Downey Jr. follows his Oppenheimer win by playing multiple roles, and acclaimed director Park Chan-wook co-showruns alongside Canadian avant-garde polymath Don McKellar. This might be one of the best shows of the year. —JR

Under the Bridge

Release date: April 17 on Hulu

If the Oscars left you wondering where you could see more of Lily Gladstone’s work, Hulu’s new limited series Under the Bridge is where you should look. Based on Rebecca Godfrey’s book, the show follows Godfrey (Riley Keough) and Gladstone as a local police officer investigating the disappearance of a 14-year-old girl (based on a true story from 1997). —Zosha Millman

The Big Door Prize season 2

Release date: April 24 on Apple TV Plus

One of many under-the-radar critically acclaimed shows on Apple TV Plus, The Big Door Prize (from Schitt’s Creek writer David West Read) follows the residents of a fictional Louisiana town who discover a magical machine in a grocery store that apparently predicts residents’ destinies. In season 1, that caused a lot of people to question everything about their life choices: relationships, jobs, and plenty more. But after the finale saw a change to the magical machine, season 2 seems ready to throw a curveball. —PV

Knuckles

Release date: April 24 on Paramount Plus

Knuckles is punching his way to the small screen, ready to take on the world and teach sheriff deputy Wade Whipple how to maintain law and order (you know, the way an echidna would). As if it wasn’t enough that Sonic’s second-coolest muscle guy was coming to TV, the show also brings with it a host of talent bringing the latest chapter in Knuckles’ adventures to life: Idris Elba, Adam Pally, Cary Elwes, Stockard Channing. The show will take place between the events of Sonic the Hedgehog 2 and Sonic 3 (coming later this year). —ZM

The Veil

Release date: April 30 on Hulu

Nothing is as it seems in the world of The Veil. The thriller series follows Imogen, an MI6 agent posing as British NGO worker at a refugee camp on the border of Syria and Turkey. There she meets Adilah, who the community believes to be a cunning and notorious ISIS commander in disguise. As Imogen escorts Adilah to Paris, it’s a road trip of subterfuge with each woman trying to see through the other’s lies. One thing that is clear: It’s a great showcase for Elisabeth Moss, who plays the shape-shifting, hypercompetent Imogen. —ZM

Smartypants

Release date: April TBD

Dropout’s latest new original show looks like an absolute riot, seemingly taking the concept of “PowerPoint parties” and turning it into a show with some of the funniest people on the planet. Preview images tease Erika Ishii advocating for a personal Gundam, Jacob Wysocki asking which cryptid would be best to smoke weed with, and so much more. —PV

Hacks

Release date: May 2 on Max

One of Max’s hidden gems, Hacks follows the on-again, off-again partnership between two struggling comedians — Deborah Vance (Jean Smart), a legendary comic determined to prove she’s still got more to give, and Ava Daniels (Hannah Einbinder), a young writer struggling to get her career off the ground after some ill-advised tweets. What started as a pairing designed by agents in an attempt to keep Deborah relevant turns into one of the best prickly duos on TV. Season 3 begins with Deborah and Ava once again on the outs, and I can’t wait to see what’ll bring them together once more. —JR

Doctor Who season 14

Release date: May 10 on Disney Plus

Doctor Who has gone through some off years, but there are three words I have to anyone debating whether it’s time to get back on the horse: Ncuti Gatwa Doctor. Gatwa, the effervescent scene-stealer from Sex Education (and Barbie, though he gets less to do there), is already off to a promising start with the series of Who specials a few months ago. Now that the season is finally underway (and debuting at the same time around the world), we can really see what Gatwa can do. —ZM

Interview with the Vampire season 2

Release date: May 12 on AMC

Louis (Jacob Anderson) finally kicked Lestat (Sam Reid) to the curb, leaving New Orleans with Claudia (Delainey Hayles) to go find some real old-world vampire shit. But as his present-day retelling to Daniel Molloy (Eric Bogosian) — the titular “interview” with this vampire — has shown, life was far from simple after that. With season 2, we get to find out how Armand (Assad Zaman) came into Louis’ fold, and the consequences of their love affair. —ZM

Outer Range season 2

Release date: May 16 on Prime Video

In season 1, Royal Abbott found some giant, cosmic hole on his property. As one might expect, this registered as an issue to deal with, even with the ongoing land rights and feuding family disputes around his farm, though the first season slow-played the exact nature of the hole. But the mystery only got weirder, and ultimately Josh Brolin’s Royal was forced to contend with the otherworldly implications of the mysterious black void. With any luck, season 2 will address our questions. First and foremost: Dude, what the fuuuck? —ZM

Bridgerton season 3 part 1

Release date: May 16 on Netflix

Apparently, while filming the romance scenes in this season of Bridgerton, leads Nicola Coughlin and Luke Newton broke some furniture. So, color me incredibly intrigued and excited to see how Penelope and Colin’s love story plays out! It’s the friends-to-lovers story of the Bridgerton-verse, but with Colin being such a shitty friend in general, he’s gonna need to step up his game to prove himself worthy of Penelope’s affections! —PR

Evil final season

Release date: May

Few shows go all in like Evil does. Across three seasons, the Paramount Plus series about a team of assessors investigating claims of supernatural horror has had a field day with its central question: Is there something demonic and unique about the evil we face today, or is it something more mundane and rational? Forever — and sometimes frustratingly — playful in its refusal to pick a side, Evil has instead become a story about how to deal with bad people in a time where everything is made up, and how to find value in the truth when everyone in power lies. Yet even in a show that’s not terribly concerned with answers, I’m hoping Evil’s final season finds a way to go out with a bang — and some kind of resolution. —JR