If you've ever watched a television show that stumbles as it tries to extract season after season of material from a creative reservoir that has already been drained, you'll have a fresh appreciation for the much rarer format of the limited series. Their definitive narrative endpoints offer viewers closure, or at least a tidiness that can't always be found in long-running programs. Often adapted from celebrated novels or works of non-fiction, the best limited series can be appreciated years or even decades after they air.

'Roots' (1977)

ABC's adaptation of Alex Haley's bestselling 1976 novel was a "social phenomenon" as well as a "potentially important benchmark in U.S. race relations," said Time . The show followed Kunta Kinte (LeVar Burton), who is kidnapped from present-day The Ga

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