Historical TV Shows That Actually Get It Right

Published: MAR 26, 2026

SHOGUN

Set in 17th-century Japan, it tells the story of Lord Yoshii Toranaga’s ruthless climb to power after a marooned European ship throws his world off balance. It’s prestige TV that feels like a samurai blade: sharp, deliberate, and devastating when it strikes.

CHERNOBYL

Chernobyl is five episodes of retelling the 1986 nuclear disaster with precision that leaves you rattled. The show’s genius lies in how it strips away the Soviet myth and stares straight at the cost of lies: dead workers, poisoned towns, and scientists screaming into the void.

THE CROWN

Six seasons, three queens, and a parade of scandals reminding of Buckingham Palace being world’s most expensive soap opera. From Elizabeth’s icy restraint to Diana’s heartbreak to Charles’ flailing ambition, the show captures the human cost of living inside an institution that refuses to modernise.

THE VIKINGS

Vikings is mud, blood, and the roar of longships hitting English shores. Following Ragnar Lothbrok and his descendants, it doesn’t shy away from the brutality of raiding, the strangeness of Norse rituals, or the treachery that made survival a coin toss

THE EMPRESS

Elisabeth 'Sisi' of Bavaria crashes into the Austrian court with fire and a refusal to bow to stiff tradition. Think of her as the 19th-century precursor to Diana, loved by the public, despised by courtiers, and ultimately undone by the loneliness of palace life

HOUSE OF GUINNESS

It dives into the empire built on a stout that conquered the world, mixing industrial ambition with family drama and Irish history. Think Succession meets Downton Abbey: four heirs, one empire in the shadow of their patriarch’s death. Created by Peaky Blinders

MARCO POLO

The series drags you into 13th-century Mongolia, where Kublai Khan rules with brutality and genius. Through Marco’s eyes, you see a world of silks, swords, and shifting alliances. It didn’t last long, critics were lukewarm, but there’s a case to be made for it as a flawed gem..

THE TUDORS

Jonathan Rhys Meyers plays Henry VIII less like a bloated monarch and more like a rock star with a sword, tearing through wives, cardinals, and papal authority with wild-eyed zeal. The show isn’t historically perfect, but distils one of history’s most infamous reigns into pure, binge-worthy drama.

TURN: WASHINGTON SPIES

It follows the Culper Ring, a scrappy group of spies whose back-channel intel flipped the war’s direction. What makes it addictive is how it captures the paranoia of espionage, the double-crossing, the secrecy, the blurred loyalties set against the birth of a nation.

ROME (2005)

Gritty, political, and unflinchingly raw, it follows two legionaries, Lucius Vorenus and Titus Pullo, who stumble into the corridors of power as the Republic crumbles. Think of it as history’s version of a buddy drama, only with more assassinations, orgies, and backstabbing senators.

PEAKY BLINDERS

Turning post–WWI Birmingham into a razor-sharp legend, with Cillian Murphy’s Tommy Shelby running the show like a cigarette-smoking, whiskey-drinking warlord. The politics are real, fascists, communists, trade unions, but the Shelby clan is where the show’s pulse lies.