Pounder's TV credits include the historical dramas "As Summers Die" (HBO, 1986) and "Murder in Mississippi" (1990). She was outstanding as a mother struggling for a better life for her children in the TV adaptation of J. Anthony Lukas' "Common Ground" (CBS, 1990), a nonfiction account of the strife caused by the court-ordered desegregation of Boston's public schools in the early 1970s. Pounder garnered an Emmy nod playing a skeptical FBI agent overseeing a bizarre hostage crisis on "The X-Files" (Fox, 1994). She has also appeared in the recurring roles of surgeon Dr. Angela Hicks on NBC's medical drama "ER" (1994-97), Cheryl Andrews on "Millennium" (Fox, 1996-97) and attorney Carolyn Maddox on "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit" (2001, 2004).

In 2002 Pounder was cast in the role of her career as the world-weary yet morally uncorruptable police detective Claudette Wyms in the hard-edged f/x cop drama "The Shield." As the the series' moral compass and one of the few characters (and actors) able to go toe-to-toe with Michael Chiklis without blinking, Pounder's subtle, multilayered performance branded her as the unsung hero of the show.