A lot of countries have countless TV shows about key historical events, that made it to the international scene, but I’ve never heard of a an American TV show that featured important American events such as the revolutionary war or the civil war. Historical dramas being a guilty pleasure of mine, it would be nice to have some recommendations that will teach me more about your history!
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John Adams was an HBO drama that I thought was good.
I liked Turn. It’s a bit slow though.
Boardwalk Empire for prohibition era. Great show.
Manhattan? (About the making of the atomic bomb)
Go read up what’s in production and what’s available at [Kenburns.com](https://kenburns.com/the-films/)
For the Civil War, the two mini-series, Gettysburg and Gods & Generals.
M.A.S.H. took place during the Korean war
Watch documentaries by Ken Burns. He has done Baseball, the Civil War, and short biographies on important American’s.
The Civil War series is the one you want to watch if you truly want to begin to understand America. It isn’t perfect but a great place to start.
The classic would be Little House on the Prairie, but that isn’t focused on a major event.
There’s TV shows but there are a million historical drama/action movies.
Deadwood.
Do you want fiction or documentaries? For documentaries, anything made by Ken Burns. For a dramatization, Band of Brothers is incredible.
A lot of recent shows (or really, miniseries – the distinctions are blurring lately) have focused on elements of American history, very lightly fictionalized.
“Mrs. America” is about the unsuccessful fight for the Equal Rights Amendment in the 60s/70s and focuses on people like Gloria Steinem and Phyllis Schlafly.
“When They See Us” is about a famous court case in the 1980s referred to as “the central park five” and is about the racial politics of that time period. It was really good.
There’s a brand new one that I haven’t seen called “The First Lady”, about the lives of Eleanor Roosevelt, Betty Ford, and Michelle Obama.
There’s another brand new one that I haven’t seen but really want to, called “Gaslit”, which is about the Watergate scandal told from the perspective of one of the participant’s wives.
Another new one I haven’t seen is called “The Gilded Age” and is about the Gilded Age (duh) but I’m not sure how much its based on actual historical figures/events.
Roots, both the [original](https://www.amazon.com/Roots-The-Complete-Miniseries/dp/B000SLTU02) (1977) and [updated](https://www.history.com/shows/roots) version (2016).
It’s tells the story of slavery in America to current day and how slavery has affected generations of families. It’s a fantastic show that everyone should watch imo.
If you watch Band of Brothers, I’d also watch its later-made counterpart, The Pacific. It’s a bit darker as it was a different type of fighting and I think it’s more about the horrors of war and its affect on people. It’s also a lot closer to the type of fighting done in Vietnam and other guerilla campaigns. How historically accurate do you want it? There’s some good documentaries, many by Ken Burns, that would be perfect. In regards to his Civil War documentary, the biggest criticism I’ve heard is that it relies a lot on one particular historian who seems to express some Lost Cause sympathies. The Lost Cause being bullshit that the Confederacy was fighting a noble fight and just happened to lose. It was used to justify racial discrimination and still gives us trouble.
Other shows are The Men Who Built America about the robber barons. Like many things, it’s not perfect, but it’s an interesting look into the influence of industry tycoons of the time. America: The Story of Us is good if you want a very oversimplified look at all of American history.
I enjoyed “[The Men Who Built America](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Men_Who_Built_America)” quite a bit. It focused on Ford, Rockefeller, Carnegie, Morgan, and Vanderbilt.
I can’t speak to the quality of the follow-ons: “The Men Who Built America: Frontiersman” and “The Titans That Built America.” There’s one about our food industry as well called “The Food that Built America.” I liked the first season but haven’t watched the second yet.
The Knick on Cinemax is one of the most engrossing shows about medicine I’ve every seen.
Staring Clive Owen and directed by Stephen Soderbergh, it takes place in the year 1900 and is about a hospital in New York City that was the cutting edge of medical advancements at the time. Only two seasons long but really gives you the feel of an American city in the process of great change and turmoil.
Can’t recommend it highly enough!
There is a fairly new show called *The Gilded Age* made by the same show creator from Downton Abbey.
I am fucking hooked on it.
Watch that and *Hell on Wheels* and you will get a pretty good snapshot of what life was like here in the 1800s. There was some extreme wealth and a lwhole hell of a lot of extreme hardship.
They haven’t made it to the international scene because it’s an established fact that we have “no culture”. LOL
People have no idea what they don’t know.
Not many new tv shows but a lot of movies.
Some good documentaries.
John Adams was good.
Really? There’s a bunch of em.
I might get downvoted for this, but I’ll add to the other excellent answers. I’d add the film “Oh Brother Where Art Thou?” to your playlist.
The actual plot is 100% fiction, so don’t go in thinking like it’s a documentary.
But the people who made the film were almost shockingly good at getting every detail about the dress, the mannerisms, the language, etc of the rural Southern American states during the 1930s just straight-on perfectly historically accurate.
It’s absolutely a fun plotline and a great move overall.
Deadwood. havent watched it in 10 years but i still call my dog a variation of the word “cocksucker” employed on the show
There was a TV movie called The Crossing about the crossing of the Delaware that I thought was really good
Might be hard to find but “Into the West” I enjoyed a lot when I first saw it. It was a miniseries covering multiple generations of a white and native American family during westward expansion and covered a lot of major events. Also had a huge cast, 250 speaking parts with many recognizable names. It had decent production value from what I remember as it was a DreamWorks production and was quite hyped up when it first aired.
TURN on AMC was pretty good but they got a little more dramatic with it towards the end and not as historically accurate. Still pretty decent if you’re interested in American Revolution spy craft.
There were some movies and mini series back in the day. If you don’t mind old production values or things made on video let me know.
[The American Experience](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Experience) on PBS is a documentary show that I love.
Deadwood and Boardwalk Empire are excellent historical fiction series.
If you want to watch TV and learn about American history, I’d recommend the historical documentaries made by Ken Burns.
His documentary series on the American Civil War is probably the best TV production ever made about the subject.
Try Drunk History.
Halt and Catch Fire was pretty excellent if you’re into computing in the 1980s and 1990s.
Hamilton on Disney +
The Gilded Age on hbo
Liberty Kids
Sure it’s a bit of fantasized histroy, but it’s mainly accurate
The History Channel had a three-part series on Ulysses S. Grant that was very good. Just called Grant. There’s also the Ken Burns documentaries. Those are all good.
“America: The Story of US”. It is a little older now, but still a great journey.
Little House on the Prairie is the only one I can think of right now.
Turn. It’s historical fiction series that extrapolated on the Culper spy ring but is a good look at colonial life during the revolution and talks about some of the things that contributed to major events. They take some historical liberties for storytelling purposes but generally on track.
When I was in the military I used samples of it to teach on Counter-insurgency and how well intended, reasonable actions could be interpreted negatively by local populations.
Men who built America. Or the new Lincoln mini series that just came out on history channel
If you’re looking for historical dramas, Turn: Washington’s Spies is a really good American revolution-era one.
Sons of liberty was pretty good
Turn and band of brothers,
Gilded Age is a good show.
America: The Story of Us
Obviously, dramas will always take some creative license and not be total historical, but they can act as good introductions to topics. So I will put another vote in for Turn, Gilded Age, and Oh Brother Where Art Thou? I also enjoyed a short lived show about Irish cops in NYC after the Civil War called Copper (they say Gangs of New York is similar but I haven’t seen it it).
Roots is a classic movie. For more recent black history – The Help, Selma, Hidden Figures (also movies).
There was a decent mini series about the Hatfields & McCoys (by the same name).
Outlander eventually moves to colonial America. There was a show about Jamestown recently, but it was just okay.
It really depends on what time period/topic you’re interested in, there’s so many options.