This went so-wrong-so-very-fast. There was a lot of buzz surrounding the Oscar-winning actor's horse racing drama...and even more controversy after HBO pulled the plug in the wake of three equine deaths. The Midnight Cowboy star didn't help matters when he sounded off on his disappointment about the network's decision, citing "distorted" claims by PETA. Long story short, Hoffman probably won't be visiting the small screen again anytime soon.
Oof. That's all we can say about the lovable star's short-lived Fox drama, which was canned after a few episodes. One of the most sought-after stars of the 2013 season, Kinnear's decision to tackle the role of Keegan Deane, an attorney with more problems than most of his clients, in this predictable procedural was just baffling.
After stealing every single scene she was in in comedies such as Bridesmaids and Pitch Perfect, audiences were buzzing about her ABC sitcom, which she also created and wrote. Then we all actually watched it and realized it was not good. Like, at all. Though ABC aired the entire first season, they decided not to continue the fun and we're totally OK with that. We still have Pitch Perfect 2, people!
The Alien star tackling the juicy role of Secretary of State and former First Lady Elaine Barrish Hammond (a sassier and sexier Hillary Clinton, if you will) in an even juicier political soap? Sounds like the perfect role, right? Unfortunately, USA Network's miniseries just never seemed to work, with the network ultimately opting not to bring it back for another term.
The beloved comedian returned to network TV fulltime for the first time since starring in Mork & Mindy in the '70s in CBS' The Crazy Ones, where he played a father-daughter ad exec duo alongside Sarah Michelle Gellar. While the show premiered to strong numbers, the network ultimately decided to cancel the series after just one season.
It all started off so promising. The Following had arguably one of the best pilots in recent history, with many predicting a sure-fire Emmy nom for the Footloose star. And while his work has been consistently solid on the serial killer thriller, the show quickly took a turn for the predictable and insane...and sometimes laughable.
We all know you can't judge a show by its pilot, so we're not gonna lie, we feel a wee bit dirrrrrty already giving Halle Berry a ranking, since CBS' Extant just premiered. But based on that first hour, we can say, we're fairly certain that the show is slightly...beneath her. Halle, per usual, brings her A game, and we are instantly sucked into the weird and inexplicable world that is her character, astronaut Molly Woods. But Goran Visjnic doesn't seem like the exact right casting (just us?), a few of the lines are laughable, and the show overall feels a bit clunky and slow. Here's hoping Extant picks up in subsequent episodes, and we can run back to this list and bump Halle on up to the high ranking she deserves to be.
The star of films like The Black Dahlia, Lucky Number Slevin, and Pearl Harbor decided to make a move to the small screen in Showtime's horror Penny Dreadful, which was recently picked up for a second season. Bloody good decision, Hartnett!
Sheen has a history of playing real people, so portraying a real-life scientist and sex researcher (in this case Dr. William Masters) isn't all that new for him, and proved to be successful as Masters of Sex was one of last season's breakout hits and earned the British actor a Golden Globe nomination. So it looks like sex does sell!
Though the Dumb and Dumber star earned an Emmy for his turn as Will McAvoy, the newcaster who never met a monologue he didn't love, the series has been one of TV's most polarizing since its 2012 debut. Still, some critics' disdain for the show didn't seem to get to Daniels, who infamously fell asleep during a TCA panel. The Aaron Sorkin-penned drama is set to come to an end after its upcoming third and final season.
The star of films like Elf and 500 Days of Summer already feels like a tried-and-true TV star after three of her Fox sitcom, probably because the character is basically her. "Jess, my character, is a part of myself. There are other parts to me, but she is a really distinct part," she said in a 2011 interview with Alan Sepinwall, "so when I see the scripts, it's like I completely understand who she is and how to do this character in the way that I feel she's meant to be played. I feel like she is me when I was 13."
And it's clearly working for Deschanel, whose portrayal of the adorkable Jess Day has landed her Golden Globe and Emmy noms, though season three of the Fox sitcom was uneven, at best, and downright silly, at worst.
Like many movie stars before him, Costner decided to dip his toe in the TV pool rather than cannonball in by starring in a miniseries. It turned out to be a good decision for the two-time Oscar winner as his portrayal of William Hatfield earned him an Emmy, a Golden Globe and a SAG Award. Plus, Hatfields & McCoys shattered ratings records for the History Channel.
She guest-starred on Alias and was chief of the ER in the final season of the long-running NBC drama, but Bassett has never been quite as enchanting as she was playing the infamous voodoo queen Marie Laveau on this season of American Horror Story. The acclaimed actress hadn't watched much of the show before, but in an interview with the Huffington Post, she said she was attracted to "the big, epic stuff. That's going to remind me of theater, where I am just fearless and big and bold, and yet it's all very truthful and honest. And then sometimes [on AHS] it's contained, and you're small and quiet, so you get to have both. But I love the theatrics that this world offers." Bassett will be back for American Horror Story: Freak Show.
While she terrifed all of us as the delightfully evil and horribly racist Madame LaLaurie on this season of American Horror Story, it wasn't Bates' first foray into television. Along with guest roles on Six Feet Under, The Office, and Two and a Half Men, Bates starred on Harry's Law, an NBC show about a group of misfit lawyers that ran from 2011 to 2012. She'll return to the world of American Horror Story for the upcoming Freak Show. Somehow, she still has time to continue her film career, with at least two movies set for release in 2014.
Good old Haymitch has been acting in movies since the '70s, and starred on Cheers from 1985 to 1993. After that, aside from an arc on Will & Grace, Harrelson has generally stayed away from TV until True Detective, which earned his BFF Matthew McConaughey a bit more praise than him, but still, it became a pop culture phenomenon.
While Spader has a long history of movie-stardom (and, fun fact, was revealed to be a celebrity crush of Buffy Summers, in the Buffy the Vampire Slayer pilot), he's also no stranger to TV. He guest-starred on The Practice and co-headlined its spin-off, Boston Legal, with William Shatner. He also guest-starred as the delightfully insane Robert California on The Office before NBC gave him his own well-deserved show. And man are they ever-so-glad that they did as The Blacklist was the breakout show of the 2013 season, and was the seventh most-watched show of the year, due in large part to Spader's deliciously sinister turn as Red Reddington.
The long-time film actor adjusted quite well to life on TV with roles on The Sopranos and 30 Rock and of course Boardwalk Empire. "I've never worked on something that went on this long...This is like working on an extended film that you don't know the script to, and I like it—I like being surprised," he said in an interview on the HBO website. But the surprises will come to an end soon. Boardwalk Empire's fifth and final season kicks off this fall.
Remember when you heard Kevin Spacey was going to star in a show for Netflix and you were like "What? Kevin Spacey...on Netflix?" Then you saw House of Cards and everything made sense. His portrayal of Frank Underwood is one for the TV history books. Welcome to TV (even if it's not in the traditional sense), Kevin Spacey. Please stay forever.
Alright, alright, alright, talk about a McConaissance! After starring in a string of romantic comedies, McConaughey staged an epic comeback with his turns in films such as Mud, The Wolf of Wall Street, and of course, Dallas Buyer's Club, which landed him his first Oscar. But the well-muscled star's dominance also extended to the small screen as his one-season turn in HBO's True Detective as the damaged detective Rusty Cohle was arguably the most gushed-about TV performance of the year. Plus, the show was just as good as he was. So why isn't he ranked number one or two? He isn't coming back for season two! How rude!
The actress started out playing Angela Chase on My So-Called Life, then stuck to movies for years—including the acclaimed and Emmy-winning TV movie Temple Grandin—before being offered the career-refedining role of Carrie Mathison on Showtime's hit drama, before it was trendy for film actors to turn to TV. While Homeland received some serious backlash in its third season, Danes has earned nothing but praise, and two Emmy awards, for her work.
The Oscar winner, who has an affinity for playing larger-than-life Southern women, had been offered roles on television before, but she never had the time, until Ryan Murphy came to her with a juicy roll on a show with only 13 episodes per season. Lange has starred in three seasons of American Horror Story—to the delight of viewers every where—and will come back for a fourth in the fall of 2014, but that could be it. "I'm going to do the next season of this and hopefully a play and then maybe one or two movies and then I think -- I feel like maybe then it's time to start something brand new in life," she told The Huffington Post. "Maybe it wouldn't be that far away, maybe it would be directing a film or something." All we know is...There is no one better. And we will cherish her TV stay for however long it lasts!
PHOTOS: 2014 fall TV preview