In the filmmaking business, there’s an incredible high demand for new stories and narratives to entertain and amuse audiences all over the world. Some stories are so successful that their structure and plot is exported as a creative commodity capable of impacting people from different backgrounds, with minor language and cultural adjustments. At times, these stories reach greater heights than the original. Indeed, as is the case with international movies inspiring American remakes, TV series from all over the world have done the same. In fact, some of the best American TV shows found inspiration overseas.

It’s interesting and well worth noting where some of our favorite TV series originated. After all, it might be worth a shot to try and watch the original series and perhaps pick up a new language or just enjoy and dive into how stories unfold within different societies and customs. As such, here’s a list of five American TV shows that were inspired from international series.

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5 Gut Dakteo (South Korea) — The Good Doctor

     KBS

The ABC series The Good Doctor is based on the South Korean “dorama” (a typical Korean soap opera) aired in 2013 by KBS called Gut Dakteo. Both series narrate the story of an autistic doctor with Savant Syndrome — Freddie Highmore in the ABC version and Joo Won in the KBS version — and the challenges he faces to be accepted as a doctor in the industry. The difficulties are many, since colleagues and superiors consider both autism and Savant Syndrome as limiting the competent exercise of the profession by its bearer. Aside from the obvious geographical and cultural differences, The Good Doctor remains very faithful to Gut Dakteo. The pilot episode of the ABC series starts out virtually identical to the one that inspired it, with Shaun getting ready for the hospital and reminiscing about some of the traumatic moments of his childhood. The Good Doctor has ranked as one of the best TV medical drama series in recent years, and, according to Deadline, has been renewed for a sixth season.

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4 BeTipul (Israel) — In Treatment

     HOT3

In Israel, the series BeTipul was created by Nir Bergman and Haga Levi, a psychotherapist himself. BeTipul achieved incredible success through its rather simple format and minimal number of actor and featured a very strong narrative that develops inner human psychological issues through a conversation between a therapist and their patients in just 30 minutes.

Currently, 14 countries have already acquired and produced remakes of BeTipul, beyond the United States’ In Treatment. Channels from Argentina, North Macedonia, Serbia, Croatia, Slovenia, Portugal, Poland, Hungary, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Romania, Moldova, Netherlands, Japan, Canada, Russia, Italy, Brazil, and France also have their own versions of the therapist-patient series.

3 The Office (United Kingdom) — The Office

     BBC Two

Whether British or American, The Office followed a fictional format masked as a documentary (mockumentary) and opened the door to a subgenre of comedy that continues to this day. The Office (UK) is a great lab on discomfort and how we manage to deal with it. Their situations are drier and more harrowing, leading the audience to feel more pity than necessarily disgust for those characters with weak theory-mindedness. Garreth (Mackenzie Crook) and Finchy (Ralph Ineson), for example, are characters who clearly create discomfort in the office by the tone of their jokes (Finchy) and seriousness in certain matters (Garreth). Coming from an idea between two amateur BBC writers, the English series had the tone of a more acid comedy, in which the script gave very clear cues for the audience’s reaction. There was always a moment of silence after an embarrassing sentence or situation, and the reading that was made of the characters’ body communication was a trigger for the audience’s discomfort.

In The Office(US), the tone was preserved as much as possible, but with some adaptations. Discomfort was the main tool, but script cues were more accurate, which opened up more possibilities for actors and made the most impactful jokes. Body language was more apparent, and embarrassment more sudden.

However, what is interesting to note about both series is that even using discomfort as an open field, each of them followed a completely different path to conquer some empathy from their audience and provoke questions. All this being a reflection of two different approaches to comedy, coming from three different writers: on one side, Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant, and on the other, Greg Daniels.

2 Queer as Folk (United Kingdom) — Queer as Folk

     Channel 4

Queer as Folk was a British series, produced independently by Red Production Company for Channel 4 in 1999. The series originally aired in the United Kingdom for two seasons from 23 February 1999 to 22 February 2000. The show’s name is a play on an original northern British saying, “there’s nought so queer as folk”, with the term “queer” also connoting gay. Conceived by Russell T Davies, the series received this title during its pre-production at the suggestion of the British channel executives, according to The Guardian, since the initial title was Queer As Fuck. Queer As Folk tells the story of three gay men who live in the gay community in Manchester, near Canal Street: Stuart, Vince and Nathan.

From the British production, Queer As Folk won an adaptation, in a co-production between the United States and Canada, with the same name at the end of 2000. Currently, NBC Universal is producing a Queer as Folk reboot set in New Orleans, with Devin Way, Fin Argus, Johnny Sibilly, Jesse James Keitel, Ryan O’Connell, Armand Fields, Eric Graise, and others in a much more diverse and inclusive adaptation of the story.

1 Juana La Virgen (Venezuela) — Jane the Virgin

     Radio Caracas Televisión

Juana la Virgen is Venezuelan telenovela written by Perla Farias and Irene Calcaño, Cristina Policastro, Basilio Alvarez, German Aponte, and Julio Cesar Marmol Jr., and directed by Perla Farias and Tony Rodrigues. It is distributed by RCTV International all over the world. Juana is a rebellious and happy young woman who has just finished high school. Juana suffers a faint and her mother Ana Maria makes an appointment with the gynecologist. One of the nurses drops some papers and ends up mixing Juana’s file with that of another woman, the one who would be inseminated and would have Mauricio de la Vega’s child. Pregnant, Juana will have to put up with the misinformation and fanaticism of those who see in her a kind of reincarnation of the Virgin Mary, and when Mauricio discovers that there is an unknown woman who is expecting his child, a desperate search begins, until both, for professional reasons , will have their lives united, not without there being many disagreements. Juana La Virgen was adapted by The CW in the US, also with a Latinx cast, as a multiple seasons series called Jane the Virgin, which can currently be found on Netflix’s catalog and be enjoyed by both American and international audiences.