When you’re looking for a great miniseries to binge over a weekend, your first stop is most likely HBO Max for shows like Watchmen and True Detective, or Netflix, for the likes of The Haunting of Hill House and Midnight Mass. But while Disney Plus has not been one to brand itself as the home of great limited series, there are still some truly perfect miniseries on the streamer.
Thanks to Disney owning the likes of Hulu, Star Wars, Marvel, and numerous other properties, it boasts a pretty impressive array of limited series under its umbrella. Here are seven miniseries that are absolutely perfect from start to finish.
1 WandaVision
The Marvel Cinematic Universe’s output on Disney Plus has been so fraught with duds that it's hard to remember how bright the prospects were when it all began. Lasting nine episodes, WandaVision follows the story of Scarlet Witch/Wanda Maximoff (Elizabeth Olsen) after the death of Vision (Paul Bettany) in Avengers: Infinity War. While the details of the series don't become clear until the end, the show features Wanda and Vision starring in their own sitcom. Each week, the show jumps forward to the next era of television. So while it begins with something that mirrors the black-and-white sitcoms of the 1950s and early 1960s, it ends as a Modern Family-like mockumentary series.
After WandaVision, most MCU shows felt like they could have been better served had they been mid-budget movies of two hours or less, rather than six dragged-out hours of television. WandaVision, however, reveled in the limited run TV show format. Every episode represented a different era of television, which made the show feel fresh and different each week. Little clues along the way offer hints at what is actually going on. Especially impressive in the show were Olsen and Bettany, who managed to pull off every era’s different acting style with sharp comedic chops.
2 Toy Story Toons
Image: Disney/Pixar
While I am convinced that the Toy Story films will never again reach the heights of the first three movies, Toy Story 5 is a delight. That said, it's pretty clear that Pixar doesn’t know what to do with its many, many Toy Story characters, as many of them get shortchanged time and time again. Especially frustrating is the fact that the creative minds at Pixar figured out a solution to this problem 15 years ago.
Toy Story Toons is a three-episode series of shorts that Pixar released after Toy Story 3. Perhaps because Toy Story 3 felt like an ending, Pixar wanted to show that these characters were still active, so they made these shorts that focused on side characters.
All three are excellent.
“Hawaiian Vacation” is about Barbie and Ken trying to stow away in Bonnie's backpack for a trip to Hawaii, only to end up in Bonnie’s bedroom with Woody and the gang. “Small Fry” is about a Happy Meal toy of Buzz Lightyear who tries to pass himself off as Bonnie’s Buzz, despite the fact that he’s just two inches tall. Then there’s “Partysaurus Rex,” where Rex goes to play with some bath toys and ends up flooding the whole house. While I’m sure Toy Story 6 will come eventually, I’d love some more Toy Story Toons right now.
3 Muppets Mayhem
Image: Disney
Jim Henson always intended for the Muppets to be for adults, but it’s still pretty surprising to see a story which involves the Muppets tripping in the desert, especially now that they’re a Disney property. Yet, that’s precisely what happens in the fifth episode of Muppets Mayhem, the 2023 series about the Muppets house band, the Electric Mayhem (granted, it was with expired marshmallows, not mushrooms, but the results were the same).
If the new Muppet Show special with Sabrina Carpenter proved anything, it's that a variety series is the best outlet for the Muppets on the small screen. Yet, Muppets Mayhem also illustrated that there's potential in deeper exploration of the side characters. Throughout the 10-episode series, a junior executive at a record company (Nora Singh) is working to get the legendary Electric Mayhem back together to make an album, something they’ve never done before despite being a band since the 1970s. With great needle-drops covered by the Electric Mayhem and a solid story, the series rocks for all 10 of its episodes.
4 Silver Surfer
Image: Marvel
In 1998, Fox Kids released Silver Surfer on Saturday mornings, and while it lasted just 13 episodes, it is truly something to behold. The show covers the origin story of the Silver Surfer (Paul Essiembre), a man from the planet of Zenn-La who stops the giant planet-eating Galactus (James Blendick) from devouring his homeworld by agreeing to be his herald. As the herald of Galactus, Silver Surfer seeks out worlds for Galactus to devour, but an encounter with the people of Earth causes him to betray Galactus. Now he wanders through space looking to return to his homeworld, which Galactus has hidden from him.
The show has Japanese Ronin vibes, with the Silver Surfer cast as a heroic traveler who helps people with various issues before moving on, ever longing for his own home. In these stories, he came in contact with some deep-cut characters from the cosmic side of Marvel, like Drax and Thanos, the kinds of characters that wouldn't be seen again outside of Marvel comics until The Guardians of the Galaxy came out in 2014.
Especially impressive and ambitious is the show’s Jack Kirby-inspired artwork, which blended 2D animation with 3D elements used for planets, spaceships, and Galactus himself. While most attempts at blending 2D and 3D animation during the 1990s looked terrible, the fact that Silver Surfer was set in space really made it work, and the story structure made for a great episodic series.
5 Devs
Devs began as a miniseries on FX created by Alex Garland (Civil War). It then moved onto Hulu which means it was eventually shunted onto Disney Plus. The show is about a woman investigating a mysterious quantum computing company that develops a machine capable of accurately predicting the future. Similar to Garland’s film Ex Machina, Devs takes a heady sci-fi concept and explores its darkest possibilities. In the case of Devs, it’s all about the nature of free will versus determinism. Just eight episodes long, the story is tight and full of really satisfying twists.
Also, Nick Offerman, who plays the CEO of the company, is downright terrifying in this series.
6 Star Wars: Clone Wars
Image: Lucasfilm
Before the 2008 CG-animated series Star Wars: The Clone Wars became the first great Star Wars TV show, the concept of the series was born out of a 2D-animated series from a few years prior. Produced by Samurai Jackcreator Genndy Tartakovsky, the similarly-named Star Wars: Clone Wars began as a series of 25 shorts ranging from three to five minutes in length. They were released from 2003 until 2005, during the gap in between Attack of the Clones (2002)and Revenge of the Sith (2005). Eventually, the shorts were combined into two one-hour episodes on Disney Plus, allowing for binging without having to push “next episode” every five minutes.
Stylistically similar to Samurai Jack, the series mostly consisted of vignettes of the Clone Wars with Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi as the main focus, but characters like Yoda and Mace Windu show up as well. Again like Samurai Jack, Star Wars: Clone Wars was very action-forward, and the direction was flawless. Eventually, this series would be expanded and reimagined as The Clone Wars which went much deeper with its characters. That iteration came with its flaws. The original, however, is absolute animated perfection.
7 Andor
Star Wars: Clone Wars was the first great Star Wars TV show. Then The Mandaloriancame along and demonstrated how that Star Wars magic could be captured on the small screen in live action. Then came Andor, which stands as the greatest, most mature Star Wars series to date.
Andor tells the story of Cassian Andor (Diego Luna), a member of the Rebellion that we met in Rogue One: A Star Wars Story. Over 24 episodes spanning two seasons, Andor follows Cassian Andor’s unlikely story from thief to freedom fighter. The 2022 series also shows what it's like to live under the draconian rule of the Empire in greater detail and with more sophistication than even the Star Wars films have covered. And, if you follow up your Andor binge with Rogue One, you’ll experience what might be the greatest-ever Star Wars character arc.