10 Best HBO Shows With Less Than 20 Episodes, Ranked

Published Nov 8, 2026, 8:21 AM EST

Ryan Heffernan is a Senior Writer at Collider. Storytelling has been one of his interests since an early age, with his appreciation for film and television becoming a particular interest of his during his teenage years. 

This passion saw Ryan graduate from the University of Canberra in 2020 with an Honours Degree in Film Production. In the years since, he has found freelance work as a videographer and editor in the Canberra region while also becoming entrenched in the city's film-making community. 

In addition to cinema and writing, Ryan's other major interest is sport, with him having a particular love for Australian Rules football, Formula 1, and cricket. He also has casual interests in reading, gaming, and history.

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Since the dawn of television’s golden era in the late ‘90s and early 2000s, HBO has been intrinsically affiliated with the very fabric of small-screen brilliance, with such series as The Sopranos, Game of Thrones, and Succession compelling viewers year after year and season after season. However, it is easy to forget that some of the premium network’s best productions didn’t necessarily need (or get) expansive runs to present their stories.

Ranging from universally acclaimed miniseries that stand among the greatest productions in the history of the medium to criminally underrated titles that were canceled years before their due, each of these TV shows exhibits HBO’s trademark excellence with no more than 20 episodes. Spanning from war zone dramas to post-apocalyptic dystopias, period crime thrillers, and even to the awkwardness and charm of real-world romance, these 10 series highlight both the brilliance and the vastness of HBO.

10 'Raised by Wolves' (2020–2022)

Image via HBO Max

Abruptly canceled following its second season — falling victim to the merger of WarnerMedia and Discovery, Inc — Raised by Wolves never got the chance to truly thrive the way many wished it would, but the series still holds an enthralling thematic might within its high-concept sci-fi premise. After Earth is decimated by war, two androids are tasked with raising humanity’s children on a foreign planet. They find their assignment growing increasingly complex and treacherous when the colony begins to fray due to religious differences.

Buoyed by the creative involvement of Ridley Scott as both executive producer and occasional director, the series delivers an arresting mixture of bold world-building, unsettling atmospheric minimalism, and thought-provoking storytelling. It aired just 18 episodes across its two-season tenure, and yet it has only grown in relevance since it was axed in 2022 courtesy of its attention to A.I.’s limited view of humanity and the at-time destructive role religion plays in society.

9 'Perry Mason' (2020–2023)

Image via HBO

Ever since beginning as a crime novel series penned by Erle Stanley Gardner, Perry Mason has been a cult figure of the genre, appearing in radio shows and television films, and, most notably, a CBS series that ran for nine seasons through the ‘50s and ‘60s. Unfortunately, HBO’s bold re-imaging of said series didn’t fare quite so well, lasting just two seasons and a total of 16 episodes before being canceled by the network in 2023.

Spearheaded by Matthew Rhys’ typically sublime lead performance, it follows the origin story of the famous criminal defense attorney, Perry Mason, focusing on his humble beginnings as a low-fee private eye scouring 1930s L.A. while struggling to overcome trauma tied to his service in WWI and a recent divorce. While Season 1 occasionally feels as though it is being torn between different ideas, Season 2 finds more clarity in its storytelling, which in turn allows for the detail of the period production and the power of the performances to thrive.

8 'The Night Of' (2016)

Image via HBO

A major candidate for being the single most underrated miniseries HBO has ever produced, The Night Of evolves with magnetic precision over the course of its eight-episode run to encompass everything from murder mystery angst to courtroom suspense and prison drama. It is chiefly a scorching deconstruction of the American justice system, revolving around the trial of Nasir (Riz Ahmed), who stands accused of murdering a woman he was partying with after waking up to find her stabbed to death.

From the claustrophobic intensity of its first episode, The Night Of absorbs viewers as a relentless yet agonizingly patient descent into the darker side of the legal system, from the overwhelming power of the police department to the terrifying environment in Rikers Island. Powered by great performances from Ahmed and John Turturro, an astonishing script, and viscerally immersive direction, The Night Of endures as one of HBO’s finest ever crime productions.

7 'Looking' (2014–2016)

Image via HBO

It feels as though romantic-dramedy entertainment is having a niche moment in pop culture, with the genre’s ability to switch between awkward and confronting home truths and outrageous, resonant hilarity giving it a distinct appeal. It is a shame, then, that Looking either pre-dated this trend, or simply wasn’t picked up by it, with the grounded HBO production following video game designer Patrick (Jonathan Groff) as he navigates life and the gay dating scene with his two friends in San Francisco.

The series received high praise for its performances and its intimate mumblecore approach, both of which imbue it with a sense of unvarnished realism that is honest, nuanced, and clever enough to find the imperfect beauty in life’s ugly moments. While it does celebrate gay love, it isn’t about making a fantastical and contrived illustration of it. Instead, characters struggle with rent, job opportunities, dating mishaps, and social pressures while trying to find their own place in the world, making it a tenderly human drama, and one that deserved to go beyond its two-season, 18-episode tenure.

6 'Tokyo Vice' (2022–2024)

Image via HBO Max

Running as a biographical descent into an American reporter’s time in Japanese newsrooms in the late 1990s, Tokyo Vice is a fascinating mixture of neo-noir crime, journalism drama, and culture-clash intrigue that delivered two compelling seasons before being canceled in 2024. Ansel Elgort stars as Jake Adelstein, an investigative journalist who relocates from Missouri to Tokyo, where he is taken in by Hiroto Katagiri (Kan Watanabe), a veteran of the newspaper’s organized crime squad. From there, Adelstein begins a disturbing descent into the city’s neon-lit underbelly.

Filmed entirely on location in Tokyo, the series holds a certain authenticity that is quite palpable, especially with executive producer and pilot episode director Michael Mann establishing a simmering, slow-burn mood that revels in looming shadows and reflective glass. Both seasons received widespread praise for their setting, storylines, aesthetic, and characters, and the fact that Season 2 was a strong expansion on what the series achieved in Season 1 makes it all the more unfortunate that HBO did cancel it prematurely.

COLLIDERInteractive

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Movies/Action/Partner Assignment

Collider · Action Heroes Which Action Hero Would Be
Your Perfect Partner? Ten questions · five legends · one partner

Five legends. Five completely different ways of getting out alive: with style, with muscle, with charm, with luck, or with a plan so intricate it probably should not work. Ten questions will reveal which action hero was built to have your back. Choose your channel

Rambo

James Bond

Indiana Jones

John McClane

Ethan Hunt

Find your partner

Mission clock00:10 remaining

Question 01 of 10THE MISSION

01 You are dropped into a dangerous situation with no warning. What do you need most from a partner? The first few seconds tell you everything about who belongs beside you.

ASomeone who already has three contingency plans running and is calmly working through all of them. BSomeone who reads the terrain by instinct and knows exactly how to use it against the enemy. CSomeone who keeps their nerve and their sense of humor while everything falls apart. DSomeone who knows the history of wherever we are and what we are walking into. ESomeone with the right contact, the right cover identity and the right exit already arranged.

← Back Keys 1 to 5 or A to E · Enter to advance

Next question

Mission clock00:09 remaining

Question 02 of 10TRAVEL STYLE

02 You have to get somewhere dangerous, fast. How do you travel? How you get there is half the mission.

AOn foot through terrain nobody else would attempt. I move where vehicles cannot follow. BOn a motorcycle, a cargo plane, or anything that gets me there before I think too hard about it. CIn something that belongs to someone else: borrowed, stolen, or improvised under fire. DFirst class, with a cover identity and a gadget I will not explain until it is needed. EBy whatever is available. I have driven, flown, and once arrived by camel. The destination matters, not the method.

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Next question

Mission clock00:08 remaining

Question 03 of 10UNDER PRESSURE

03 You are cornered and outnumbered. What does your ideal partner do? This is when you find out what somebody is really made of.

ADisappears into the environment, comes around behind them, and has it finished before I have moved. BCracks a one-liner, grabs a fire extinguisher or a chair, and improvises something that somehow works. CProduces a gadget designed for this exact scenario and uses it with infuriating precision. DPulls out a whip, a bluff and an archaeological insight that somehow gets us out alive. EShuts it down with maximum efficiency and minimum words. They were already three moves ahead.

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Next question

Mission clock00:07 remaining

Question 04 of 10DOWNTIME

04 The mission is paused. You have one evening to decompress. What does your partner suggest? Who somebody is when the pressure drops is who they really are.

AThe finest restaurant in the city, a bottle of something expensive, and a conversation that is equal parts brilliant and exhausting. BA local dig site, a museum after hours, or a long story about why that one artifact matters to human civilization. CPizza. Bad TV. Falling asleep halfway through a film neither of you was watching anyway. DA bar with terrible lighting, cold beer, and absolutely no questions about feelings. EA debrief that turns into three hours of contingency planning and somehow becomes the most fun you have had all week.

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Next question

Mission clock00:06 remaining

Question 05 of 10COMMUNICATION

05 How do you want your partner to communicate mid-mission? Good communication is the difference between a partner and a liability.

APrecise and minimal. Tell me what I need and nothing else. Every word has a cost. BDeadpan and dry. Keeping it light keeps me sharp, even when everything is on fire. CEnthusiastic and slightly chaotic, but always with useful information buried in the noise. DCalm and controlled through an earpiece, with a plan covering every variable I have not thought of yet. EBarely at all. Silence is a language and they speak it fluently.

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Mission clock00:05 remaining

Question 06 of 10THE VILLAIN

06 Your enemy is powerful, well-resourced and holds the upper hand. How should your partner go at them? The approach to the enemy defines the partnership.

AInfiltrate the inner circle, learn everything, and take them apart from inside before they know we are there. BStudy the historical pattern. Every villain of this type has a weakness written down somewhere in the past. CGet them talking. The longer they monologue, the more time I have to work out how to beat them. DGo straight at them, directly, using every inch of the terrain. EFind the one thing they have not accounted for, because there is always one, and make sure we are holding it.

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Mission clock00:04 remaining

Question 07 of 10LOYALTY

07 It goes badly wrong and you are stranded somewhere hostile. What do you trust your partner to do? Who somebody is when you need them most is the only thing that counts.

ACome in alone, quietly, and get me out before anybody knows they were there. BHave been working the extraction since the moment I vanished. The plan is already running. CCome in loud, come in fast, and worry about the collateral damage later. I would do the same for them. DUse every resource, every contact, and bend every rule until I am out. They do not leave people behind. ECharm their way in somehow, bluff through the hard part, and still manage to look good doing it.

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Next question

Mission clock00:03 remaining

Question 08 of 10TOOLKIT

08 What does your ideal partner bring that you could not replace? A great partner fills the gap you did not know you had.

ATechnology that should not exist yet and the training to use it in any conditions. BSurvival instinct so refined it borders on supernatural, and the scars that prove it has been tested. CKnowledge of history, language and culture that makes them priceless where force is useless. DThe ability to walk into any room on earth and immediately become the most trusted person in it. EStubbornness that will not accept a situation is hopeless, and the improvisation to back it up.

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Next question

Mission clock00:02 remaining

Question 09 of 10THE COST

09 Every partnership has a cost. Which of these can you live with? Nobody comes without baggage. The question is whether you can carry it together.

AA partner who never fully switches off, always watching exits and counting threats, even at dinner. BA partner who does the job brilliantly and has the emotional availability of a locked filing cabinet. CA partner who makes everything ten times more complicated than it needs to be, and always comes through. DA partner who gets personally attached to every relic and ruin we pass, which slows the whole thing down. EA partner who was never built for this and knows it, but turns up anyway, every time, unasked.

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Next question

Mission clock00:01 remaining

Question 10 of 10THE LAST STAND

10 Final moment. Everything is on the line. What do you need from your partner right now? The last question is the most honest one.

AOne line. Absolutely dry. Delivered like the world is not ending. Then we move. BNothing said at all. Just a look that means you both already know what happens next. CA plan I do not fully understand that somehow accounts for everything, laid out in thirty seconds. DA piece of historical context that reframes the whole situation and says exactly what to do. ESomebody who steps forward instead of back, because that is who they have always been.

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Reveal my partner

Partner assignedYour perfect partner is

Olive channel locked

Rambo The 1982 original You will never need to ask whether he has your back. You will just know.

Your partner does not talk much, does not need to, and will have counted every threat around you before you finish your first sentence. John Rambo is not a man of plans or politics. He is a force shaped by survival, loyalty and an endurance that no amount of training produces on its own. He does not leave people behind. What you get is the most quietly ferocious partner imaginable, somebody who went through what would have broken anybody else and decided to keep going. Why he is your partner

• He reads ground the way other people read a room.
• He will stand between you and the worst of it without discussing it.
• He says almost nothing, and never the wrong thing.

From the Collider file

• The 1982 original came from David Morrell's 1972 novel, which ends very differently.
• Stallone cut most of his own dialogue in the edit to make the character nearly silent.
• Five films across thirty-seven years, from 1982 to the fifth in 2019.

Says little Leaves nobody Built to endure

Gold channel locked

James Bond Dr. No, 1962 He has survived things that have no business being survivable, and he does it with style.

Your partner arrives perfectly dressed, perfectly briefed, and with a cover story convincing enough that you will need a moment to recall what is true. Bond is the most professionally dangerous person in any room he walks into and the most disarmingly charming, which is the whole point. He works in layers, where nothing is what it looks like and every advantage gets used without apology. You will never be bored. You will occasionally be furious. Why he is your partner

• He is better in the room than he is on paper, and he is excellent on paper.
• He will not explain the plan, and the plan will work.
• He treats charm as a tool, and it is a remarkably effective one.

From the Collider file

• Eon has made twenty-five Bond films since Dr. No in 1962, across six actors.
• Denis Villeneuve is directing the next one for Amazon MGM, which took creative control in 2025.
• The search for the new 007 was still running through 2026, with screen tests under way.

Charm as a tool Always briefed Unbothered

Tan channel locked

Indiana Jones Raiders of the Lost Ark, 1981 A scholar's eye and a brawler's instinct, which is an unusual pairing and a very effective one.

Your partner knows the history, the language, the cultural context, and exactly why the thing everyone else is ignoring is the most important object in the room. Indiana Jones is brilliant, reckless and occasionally impossible, and also one of the most genuinely resourceful people you could have beside you. He hates snakes and gets attached to objects of historical significance, both of which will slow you down at least once. It will not matter. Why he is your partner

• He has read the thing nobody else thought to read.
• He will risk the whole plan for the artifact, and be right about half the time.
• He improvises better than most people prepare.

From the Collider file

• The Cairo swordsman scene was improvised on the day because Harrison Ford had dysentery.
• Raiders was filmed in about 73 days, which was fast even in 1981.
• Dial of Destiny in 2023 was Ford's fifth and last outing, at the age of eighty.

Knows the history Reckless scholar Improviser

Red channel locked

John McClane Die Hard, 1988 His superpower is stubbornness and his contingency plan is improvisation.

Your partner was not supposed to be here. He does not have the right equipment, the right information, or anything resembling the right odds. He has a sarcastic remark and a flat refusal to accept that the situation is as bad as it plainly is. John McClane is the great accidental hero of action cinema, a man whose capacity to absorb more than anybody should and keep going would be alarming if it were not so useful. He will complain the entire time. He will come through. Why he is your partner

• He turns whatever is in the room to his advantage.
• He is funniest when things are at their worst.
• He has never once agreed that it is over.

From the Collider file

• Die Hard came from Roderick Thorp's novel Nothing Lasts Forever, a sequel to a book filmed in 1968.
• Nakatomi Plaza is Fox Plaza, which was the studio's own headquarters at the time.
• Bruce Willis was a television comedy actor then, and a long way down the casting list.

Pure stubbornness Improvises Complains throughout

Blue channel locked

Ethan Hunt Mission: Impossible, 1996 The mission will be impossible. He will complete it anyway.

Your partner has run seventeen scenarios before you finished the briefing, and the one he settled on involves at least two things that should not be physically possible. Ethan Hunt works at the outer edge of human capability, technically and physically, and he brings the same relentless precision to protecting his partners that he brings to dismantling organizations that should not exist. He is not easy to know and he will never tell you everything. He will carry the weight anyway. Why he is your partner

• He takes the risk himself rather than assigning it.
• He is three moves ahead and will not say which three.
• He treats your survival as the actual objective.

From the Collider file

• Cruise hung off the side of an Airbus A400M at a thousand feet for the opening of Rogue Nation.
• The HALO jump in Fallout took 106 takes, filmed at dusk for the light.
• The Final Reckoning in 2025 was the eighth film, and was sold as the last.

Takes the risk Never explains Finishes it

Field report · your top three

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Mission filed byCOLLIDERCollider.com · The Movies Desk

5 'Generation Kill' (2007)

Image via HBO

A stunning depiction of modern warfare, Generation Kill finds its dramatic pull in the realism of bureaucracy and miscommunication in combat. Based on Evan Wright’s non-fiction book of the same name, it unfolds as an embedded reporter with Rolling Stone joins the US Marine Corps’ 1st Reconnaissance Battalion on the eve of the Invasion of Iraq in 2003. Handled by the creative team behind The Wire, the war miniseries flaunts no patriotic agenda as it immerses viewers in the disorganized chaos of the battlefield.

Prying beneath the genre’s surface-level action intrigue, Generation Kill revels in the long-winded boredom that plagues soldiers between assignments. The battalion’s cynical humor and crude antics are as much an escape from inactivity as they are a coping mechanism for the horrors they witness. Featuring an impressive ensemble cast, incisive thematic ideas, and a compelling sense of ground-level intimacy, Generation Kill delivers seven episodes of eye-opening war drama that eschews Hollywood sensationalism in favor of unvarnished, unflattering reality.

4 'Station Eleven' (2021)

Image via HBO Max

Yet another underrated masterpiece from HBO, Station Eleven is perhaps a victim of unfortunate timing more so than anything else. The post-apocalyptic miniseries is a hauntingly beautiful meditation on artistic enrichment, humanity’s values, and the power of community, but its setting—the ruins of civilization 20 years after a devastating flu virus decimates mankind—wasn’t what many viewers were looking for at the height of pandemic anxieties in 2021. The shame is that Station Eleven is one of the most compelling and deftly brilliant miniseries of all time.

Based on Emily St. John Mandel’s novel of the same name, it revolves around a group of traveling actors who venture between settlements to perform Shakespeare for the survivors. Between flashbacks to the outbreak and some confronting encounters with a violent cult, Station Eleven is firmly grounded in the sense of optimism and good faith that Kirsten (Mackenzie Davis) and her troupe both present to the surviving world and receive in kind from people wanting to believe in goodness. Complimented by a procession of layered performances, rich character-focused drama, and eerily gorgeous production design, Station Eleven presents 10 episodes of post-apocalyptic intrigue in a manner that it has never been seen before.

3 'We Own This City' (2022)

Image via HBO

Given its style, themes, and the creative duo of David Simon and George Pelecanos, We Own This City is easy to view as a spiritual sequel to The Wire, one that combines the classic HBO crime series’ unflinching rawness with a terrible true story of police corruption and institutional rot. Jon Bernthal is exceptional as Sgt. Wayne Jenkins, the golden boy of the Boston Police Department’s Gun Trace Task Force whose leadership is a rotten mixture of swaggering charisma, moral corrosion, and predatory enabling of his colleagues’ unlawful actions.

The six-part series is mercilessly complex, with the near 20-year span of Jenkins’ career being explored in non-linear flashbacks in the form of an FBI investigation into the GTTF’s illegal conduct. The decision to frame the story in such a way is ingenious, allowing not only for seamless transitions between different chapters of Jenkins’ career, but for an all-encompassing examination of police corruption, the cultural reasons why it thrives, and the helplessness of people who want to combat it being stranded in inefficient and failed bureaucratic systems. Furthermore, it explores how the ill-fated “War on Drugs” impacted police work and political pressures, analyses how corrupt cops can be brought to justice, and yet it covers every major character with a sense of humanity, refusing to delve into heroes and villains.

2 'Chernobyl' (2019)

Image via HBO

Not only the greatest miniseries of recent years, Chernobyl also stands tall among HBO’s finest achievements of all time. With just five episodes, the faultless limited series explores the aftermath of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant disaster of 1986, ranging from the trauma endured by the unsuspected first responders to the sacrificial heroics of many who did their part to contain the radioactive fallout, the enormity of the operation required to ensure the incident didn’t grow even more catastrophic, and the corruption and ineptitude of the Soviet leaders who tried to conceal the truth from the world.

The miniseries is laced with a visceral, horror-like tension that combines the awful historical event with an unrelenting sense of stomach-churning dread. Both the precision and the astonishing scope of the screenwriting play a hand in that, but so do the mesmerizing period production design, the thematic emphasis on truth and accountability, and the incredible ensemble cast led by Jared Harris, Stellan Skarsgård, and Emily Watson. The end result is an unblemished masterpiece of television drama, a harrowing and eye-opening examination of a horrendous tragedy and the leadership that brought it to fruition, and a truly iconic triumph from HBO.

1 'Band of Brothers' (2001)

Image via HBO

2026 marks the 25th anniversary of Band of Brothers’ premiere on the small screen, and even with how drastically television as an entertainment medium has changed in that time, the 10-part war drama has endured as a timeless masterpiece. Created by Hollywood titans Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks, it follows “Easy” Company through their campaign in WWII, beginning with their training regimen and their drop into Normandy, covering the many battlefields they fought on the front lines, and ending with their uneasy stay in Austria as the war comes to a close.

Imposing with the sheer scale and might of its production, Band of Brothers excels at realizing each of the battles it depicts with gravitas, instilling a sense of terrible awe in viewers as it combines the horrific brutality of combat with the deeply humane, character-driven emotions of the soldiers’ journey. It is often heartbreaking, oddly humorous, and always harrowing, especially with the real Easy Company veterans giving their own testimonies about their experiences in the war. It delivers 10 outstanding episodes of war drama, and it remains one of the finest feats in the history of television.