7 Greatest War Miniseries That Nobody Talks About
Remus is a writer, editor, journalist, and author with an eye for detail and an extremely active imagination. He is an enthusiast of everything to do with the graphic medium, whether it's Western comics and their adaptations or manga and anime. Remus is also the author of the sci-fantasy novel Once Upon a Time in Hyperspace and several works of short fiction in the mystery, comedy, and horror genres.
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As much as war is a horrific and disturbing affair, it is evidently a highly rewarding genre in film and television. While cinema has explored war stories across all lengths and breadths, it was only classics like Combat! that made war a popular subject on television. Since then, several war series have grown into the greatest in television history and paved the way for the genre's future.
Across multi-season shows and miniseries, titles like Band of Brothers or M*A*S*H became global icons, but several others went overlooked. Even though some of these miniseries were popular and/or critically acclaimed during their original broadcast, their impact was never really felt in mainstream conversations, and thus they were forgotten far too soon. Despite their lack of a significant cultural footprint, however, these forgotten war miniseries still outshine some award-winning films and even long-running television productions. With that in mind, here’s our selection of some of the greatest war miniseries that no one talks about
1 ‘Catch-22’ (2019)
Developed by Luke Davies and David Michôd, Catch-22 is a series adaptation of Joseph Heller’s classic 1961 novel of the same name, which introduced the titular term to describe an inescapable paradoxical situation. The show stars Christopher Abbott as Captain John Yossarian, a U.S. Army Air Forces bombardier stationed in Italy during World War II, who tries various tactics to get relieved of his duty, but finds himself stuck in the titular bureaucratic paradox. The series also features Kyle Chandler, Hugh Laurie, Lewis Pullman, Daniel David Stewart, and more, as well as a notable performance by George Clooney, who also directs a few episodes.
A fantastic satire of the bureaucratic insanity of the military, Hulu’s Catch-22 is clever and darkly tragicomic. Though not as razor-sharp as the original influential novel and certainly not the most faithful adaptation, the six-episode series soars high on its eccentric characters and Abbott’s brilliant depiction of the tormented soldier. During its premiere, Catch-22 was highly praised and earned various accolades, but eventually fell under the radar, which is a shame because it’s easily one of the most surprisingly moving war shows of the 21st century.
2 ‘We Were the Lucky Ones’ (2024)
Created by Erica Lipez, We Were the Lucky Ones is a miniseries adaptation of Georgia Hunter’s bestselling novel, which is inspired by the story of her own family's struggle to survive the Holocaust and WWII. The series follows the Kurcs, a Polish Jewish family who get torn apart as the war begins, with the five siblings and parents getting displaced, setting off an ordeal of a lifetime to survive and reunite. The series stars Joey King, Logan Lerman, Henry Lloyd-Hughes, Amit Rahav, Hadas Yaron, Lior Ashkenazi, and Robin Weigert in lead roles.
Horrifying and hopeful at the same time, We Were the Lucky Ones is an emotionally charged depiction of life during the 20th century’s darkest moments. As cinematic and dramatic as its production is, the Hulu original is remarkable for its grounded, sensitive approach to the horrors of its time, which makes the show profoundly human. Told through multiple perspectives and opinions, rather than any singular view of real-life events, We Were the Lucky Ones became a critical darling upon its release and ranked among the best Hulu shows of 2024, but has since been largely forgotten.
3 ‘The Narrow Road to the Deep North’ (2025)
Created by Shaun Grant and Justin Kurzel, and starring Jacob Elordi and Ciarán Hinds as the central character, The Narrow Road to the Deep North is a five-part Australian war drama miniseries adapted from Richard Flanagan’s novel. Told across three timelines, the series follows Dorrigo Evans, a doctor and war hero, who goes from being a young medical student to a WWII soldier, a prisoner of war working on the Burma Railway, and a renowned surgeon in his final years. Odessa Young, Olivia DeJonge, Heather Mitchell, Show Kasamatsu, and Simon Baker also star in notable roles.
A masterful translation of the original award-winning novel, The Narrow Road to the Deep South presents a deeply human narrative on the inhumanity of war and the enduring power of compassion. Headlined by Jacob Elordi’s stellar performance, the show is simultaneously fierce and grounded, and often difficult to watch. Despite being one of the most recent shows on this list and earning universal acclaim at its premiere, The Narrow Road to the Deep North never reached the heights of the most popular shows and is still heavily underrated.
Collider Exclusive · Action Hero Quiz
Which Action Hero Would Be
Your Perfect Partner?
Rambo · James Bond · Indiana Jones · John McClane · Ethan Hunt
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 shouldn't work. Ten questions will reveal which action hero was built to have your back.
🎖️Rambo
🍸James Bond
🏺Indiana Jones
🔧John McClane
🎭Ethan Hunt
01
You're 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.
02
You have to get somewhere dangerous, fast. How do you travel? How you get there is half the mission.
03
You're pinned down and outnumbered. What does your ideal partner do? This is when you find out what someone is really made of.
04
The mission is paused. You have one evening to decompress. What does your partner suggest? Who someone is when the pressure drops is who they actually are.
05
How do you prefer your partner to communicate mid-mission? Good communication is the difference between partners and a liability.
06
Your enemy is powerful, well-resourced, and has the upper hand. How should your partner approach them? The approach to the enemy defines the partnership.
07
Things go badly wrong and you're captured. What do you trust your partner to do? Who someone is when you need them most is the only thing that matters.
08
What does your ideal partner bring to the table that you couldn't replace? A great partner fills the gap you didn't know you had.
09
Every partnership has a cost. Which of these can you live with? No one comes without baggage. The question is whether you can carry it together.
10
It's the final moment. Everything is on the line. What do you need from your partner right now? The last question is the most honest one.
Your Partner Has Been Assigned Your Perfect Partner Is…
Your answers have pointed to one action hero above all others. This is the person built to have your back — for better or considerably, spectacularly worse.
Rambo
Your partner doesn't talk much, doesn't need to, and will have assessed every threat in your immediate environment before you've finished your first sentence. John Rambo is not a man of plans or politics — he is a force of nature shaped by survival, loyalty, and a capacity for endurance that goes beyond anything training can produce. He will not leave you behind. He has never left anyone behind who deserved to come home. What you get with Rambo is the most capable, most quietly ferocious partner imaginable — one who has been through things that would have broken anyone else, and who chose to keep going anyway. You'll never need to ask if he has your back. You'll just know.
James Bond
Your partner will arrive perfectly dressed, perfectly briefed, and with a cover story so convincing it'll take you a moment to remember what's actually true. James Bond is the most professionally dangerous person in any room he enters — and the most disarmingly charming, which is the point. He operates in a world of layers, where nothing is what it appears and every advantage is used without apology. You'll never be bored. You'll occasionally be furious. But when it matters — when the mission is genuinely on the line and the margin for error has collapsed to nothing — Bond is exactly the partner you want. He has survived things that have no business being survivable. He does it with style. That is not nothing.
Indiana Jones
Your partner will know the history, the language, the cultural context, and exactly why the thing everyone else is ignoring is actually the most important thing in the room. Indiana Jones is brilliant, reckless, and occasionally impossible — but he is also one of the most resourceful, most genuinely knowledgeable partners you could find yourself beside. He approaches every situation with a scholar's eye and a brawler's instinct, which is an unusual combination and a remarkably effective one. He hates snakes and gets personally attached to objects of historical significance, both of which will slow you down at least once. It doesn't matter. What Indy brings is irreplaceable — and the adventures you'll have together will be the kind people write books about. Assuming you survive them.
John McClane
Your partner was not supposed to be here. He does not have the right equipment, the right information, or anything approaching the right odds. He has a sarcastic remark and an absolute refusal to accept that the situation is as bad as it looks. John McClane is the greatest accidental hero in the history of action cinema — a man whose superpower is stubbornness, whose contingency plan is improvisation, and whose capacity to absorb punishment and keep moving would be alarming if it weren't so useful. He will complain the entire time. He will make it significantly more chaotic than it needed to be. And he will absolutely, unconditionally, without question come through when it counts. Yippee-ki-yay.
Ethan Hunt
Your partner has already run seventeen scenarios by the time you've finished reading the briefing, and the plan he's settled on involves at least two things that should be physically impossible. Ethan Hunt operates at the absolute edge of human capability — technically, physically, and intellectually — and he brings the same relentless precision to protecting his partners that he brings to dismantling organisations that shouldn't exist. He is not easy to know and he will never fully tell you everything. But he will carry the weight of the mission so completely, so absolutely, that your job is simply to trust him — and the remarkable thing is that trusting him always turns out to be the right call. The mission will be impossible. He will complete it anyway.
4 ‘Birdsong’ (2012)
Based on the 1993 war novel of the same name by Sebastian Faulks, Birdsong is a two-part British drama by Abi Morgan and Philip Martin, starring Eddie Redmayne as the central character. Told as a flashback, the story follows the experiences of Stephen Wraysford, who recounts his time as a young English soldier in World War I, with alternating memories of his passionate love affair with a young married woman he met before the war. Clémence Poésy, Joseph Mawle, Matthew Goode, Richard Madden, Anthony Andrews, and Marie-Josée Croze play other key roles.
Birdsong differs in its storytelling from the original novel and is not a family saga like the source material. The two-part adaptation is more focused on the central character’s personal journey, told as a harrowing tale. At the time of its release, Birdsong was critically praised and earned high acclaim for its visceral and unsettling narrative and for Redmayne’s impeccable performance, brilliantly capturing Stephen’s psychological desperation.
5 ‘Gallipoli’ (2015)
An Australian TV adaptation of Les Carlyon’s bestselling nonfiction book, Gallipoli depicts the titular military campaign in Turkey during WWI by ANZAC (Australian and New Zealand Army Corps) troops and their battle on the Gallipoli Peninsula, told through the lens of 17-year-old Thomas “Tolly” Johnson. After illegally enlisting in the army to join his brother, Bevan, Tolly and his fellow soldiers attempt to establish a foothold on the treacherous peninsula and spend months learning to survive. Directed by Glendyn Ivin and written by Christopher David Lee, the series stars Kodi Smit-McPhee, Sam Parsonson, Harry Greenwood, Tom Budge, and James Callis in main roles.
Released on the 100th anniversary of the Gallipoli Campaign as the Nine Network’s flagship program, the TV series suffered heavily in viewership, which is why the series is rarely heard of. However, the show was praised even then for its honest, understated depiction of WWI, contrasting with the conventional heroics that are often seen in popular genre hits. Critics have also noted that the show’s romantic subplots often dilute the sweeping original material, but it’s still a lot better than it gets credit for.
6 ‘Shaka Zulu’ (1986)
An '80s TV drama created by Ed Harper, Shaka Zulu is a South African miniseries based on the novel of the same name by Joshua Sinclair. Narrated in flashbacks by an Irish physician named Dr. Henry Fynn, the story chronicles the rise of the Zulu Kingdom under the titular leader, one of the kingdom’s most influential monarchs, who is notable for the expansion of the Zulu state. South African football player Henry Cele stars as the titular hero in his screen debut, with Edward Fox, Robert Powell, Trevor Howard, Fiona Fullerton, and Christopher Lee in other roles.
Shaka Zulu is a grand historical epic with an impressive production and a refreshing perspective on a formidable legend of African history. Enthralling and dramatic, the series has been praised for Cele’s commanding performance as the titular hero and for the sweeping cinematography, but also criticized for its characterizations and focus on violence. At its time, Shaka Zulu had polarizing reviews within South Africa but became a success overseas, and has since remained a genre-defining but ultimately underrated war drama classic.
7 ‘Generation Kill’ (2008)
Created by David Simon and Ed Burns and based on war journalist Evan Wright’s nonfiction book of the same name, Generation Kill is a fictionalized retelling of Wright’s reporting experiences from when he was embedded within the United States Marine Corps during the 2003 U.S. Invasion of Iraq. Starring Lee Tergesen, the miniseries follows Wright during the first phase of the war alongside the Marines as they face various challenges on their way to Baghdad. Alexander Skarsgård, James Ransone, Jon Huertas, Marc Menchaca, and Stark Sands portray other real-life soldiers Wright encountered.
Gritty and gripping, Generation Kill has been hailed as one of the most straightforward depictions of the war, which carefully deconstructs both the events that unfolded and how they came to be. Even though it is a classic of HBO’s prestige television era, Generation Kill has often been overshadowed by more mainstream hits like Band of Brothers and has remained forever underrated. The series earned critical acclaim and several Emmy Awards in various technical categories, and is easily one of the best war shows of the 2000s, even if it’s not as well-known two decades later.
Generation Kill
- Release Date
- 2008 - 2008
- Network
- HBO
- Directors
- Simon Cellan Jones
-
Brad Colbert
-
Josh Ray Person
-
Lee Tergesen
Evan Wright
-
Jon Huertas
Antonio Espera
KioskNews shows a cleaned-up reading view extracted from the publisher’s page — the original always lives on their site, not ours.