10 Best Adult Swim Series Of All Time

As hard as this is to believe, Adult Swim has been around for almost two decades. It launched on September 2nd, 2001 as a late-night block of programming on Cartoon Network directed at an older demographic. Since then, it has produced some of the most insane shows ever conceptualized by a human mind.

But despite the offbeat, absurd, and often scary shows that make up Adult Swim’s roster of ridiculous programs, some truly great ideas shine through. While they’re not always the most popular shows, they are still some of the most inventive and funny series around.

10 Sealab 2021

Prior to the launch of Adult Swim, four shows produced by Williams Street debuted. One of them was Sealab 2021, with the first three episodes airing in December 2020. The series mixed archival footage from the 1970’s Hanna-Barbera cartoon Sealab 2020 with original animation. The show blew people’s minds and set the tone for Adult Swim. There was little resembling a plot in each episode, and certainly nothing close to a continuity between episodes. The characters frequently died with their base blown up almost as often. Everything returned to normal by the next episode.

9 Mike Tyson Mysteries

This is one of those shows where you keep asking yourself, “What am I watching this?” then immediately put on another episode. The series focuses on the former Heavyweight Champion, “Iron” Mike Tyson, in retirement.

Pigeons bring him mysteries to solve with the assistance of his adoptive daughter, the ghost of the Marquess of Queensbury, and a degenerate talking pigeon. This is a team that inevitably makes things much, much worse. The key to the series is the fact that Mike Tyson actually voices his character without a hint of irony.

8 Aqua Teen Hunger Force

A spin-off of Space Ghost Coast to Coast, the Aqua Teen Hunger Force pilot aired in December 2000 before launching its first full season with the arrival of Adult Swim in 2001. Theoretically, the anthropomorphic food characters who starred in the series were supposed to be detectives but that aspect of the show disappeared quickly. The next 11 seasons were focused on Frylock, Master Shake, and Meatwad trying to deal with a variety of enemies and assorted individuals who justifiably hated them, all of them completely insane.

7 The Eric Andre Show

Adult Swim’s live-action talk show starring Eric Andre and Hannibal Buress has somehow managed to survive long enough to produce 40 episodes and two specials. Depending on your frame of mind, this series is either the most offensively stupid thing on TV or absolute genius. If you pay attention to what Eric and Hannibal are up to in each episode, the answer is genius.

This surrealist program puts the celebrities who are guests in some incredibly awkward and insane situations, ones they were obviously unprepared for. Just look up his interview with Flavor Flav to see how bad it gets.

6 Frisky Dingo

While this wasn’t the most successful of Adam Reed’s creations, Frisky Dingo was one of his best. It focused on Killface, a relatively inept supervillain who was attempting to destroy the world, only to be somewhat thwarted by the even more inept superhero Awesome X, real name Xander Crews. Season one focused on Killface’s failed attempt to destroy the world while season two focused on him using the fallout from the event as the basis of his campaign to become President of the United States.

5 Rick And Morty

Justin Roiland and Dan Harmon’s animated science fiction sitcom quickly grabbed the cultural zeitgeist and tried to strangle it into oblivion. Calling Rick and Morty dark is an understatement, but it’s that darkness that draws out the comedy. Rick’s unrelenting assault on hope fuels the series as he cynically tries to take advantage of every situation to his gain.

Fortunately, he has Morty to humanize him. The unique characters and engaging plots keep fans coming back for more, as well as hitting social media obsessively to ask when a new season is coming.

4 Harvey Birdman, Attorney At Law

Re-appropriating Hanna-Barbera content was at the foundation of Adult Swim from day one, with Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law being a prime example. Like ATHF, Sealab 2021 and The Brak Show, Harvey Birdman debuted in December 2000 prior to the launch of Adult Swim. Still kind of a superhero, Birdman was now a mediocre lawyer at a law firm owned and staffed by other repurposed Hanna-Barbera characters, as were all the clients, prosecutors and judges. Even if you weren’t familiar with the Hanna-Barbera origins of the series, it was still incredibly funny.

3 Tim And Eric Awesome Show, Great Job!

When the creators describe their own show as their own “nightmare vision of television,” you know you are in for a treat. For Tim Heidecker and Eric Wareheim, there were seemingly no boundaries on this series. Its absurdist, satirical view on entertainment at large took them to some impressively strange places.

While a lot of work obviously went into every episode, the surrealism almost seems effortless at times. Plus, it’s hard to believe how many other comedians and celebrities they were able to draw into the show each week.

2 The Boondocks

Originally a comic strip of the same name that ran from 1996 to 2006, creator Aaron McGruder adapted it into an animated series for Adult Swim in 2005. The focus was on the Freemans, a black family moving into the mostly white suburb Woodcrest. Through the unflinching gaze of satire and comedy, the series examined a variety of issues related to being black in a country that often doesn’t accept you for being black. The Boondocks made you laugh while frequently courting controversy in the right way.

1 The Venture Bros.

There is an argument to be made that this is one of the most brilliant shows in the history of television. The Venture Bros. brings in a shocking amount of pop culture fuel, requiring its viewers to have more than a working knowledge of music, movies, TV, comic books, literature, video games and more to keep up. Even the most incidental characters are executed to perfection with multiple plots and ongoing arcs playing out across episodes, seasons, and the entire series. While The Venture Bros. hasn’t achieved the popularity of other Adult Swim shows, it is still the best they have to offer.