Best TV Show Spin-Offs

Chris Carter's Millennium was kind of a back-door spin-off. We didn't meet the lead character, former FBI agent Frank Black from The X-Files (Carter's breakthrough hit), but it was quickly established that Frank's adventures took place in the same universe. This was a much darker and stranger show, as Frank had no Dana Scully to watch his back. He was alone in a hideous world full of cults, serial killers and disturbing conspiracies. After the show was cancelled, Frank wound up on The X-Files anyway.

It's kind of amazing that it took the long-running sci-fi series, Doctor Who, so long to start knocking out spin-offs, but we're glad it did. Torchwood is actually an anagram for "Doctor Who," and the crew of the Torchwood Institute first debuted in the episode "Tooth & Claw." Plans for the spin-off were well under way by the time the episode aired, though. Because it airs later in the evening, Torchwood could push the envelope with sex and violence, and quickly became a huge hit both in England and here.

You could get away with a lot on Happy Days. The ostensibly 50s-set sitcom first introduced us to the alien Mork from Ork in an episode from the show's fifth season, where he attempted to abduct Richie Cunningham. The whole thing turned out to be a dream, but Mork was so popular that he was given his own show by popular demand. Moving forward to the 1980s, Mork (played by a then-unknown Robin Williams) crashed to Earth and moved in with a young lady in Boulder, Colorado. It was a huge success for four seasons.

One of the most tragically cancelled-too-soon series of all time was Young Americans, a spin-off of Dawson's Creek that lasted one season on the WB in 2000. No, wait, stay with me here. Dawson's was pretty schmaltzy and corny, but this was the show that did teen drama right. Set at a prestigious New England boarding school, the main character is a working-class kid struggling to keep up with the rich kids without alienating his old friends. It was remarkably astute and clever, but hampered by a gross amount of product placement.