Each week our staff of film and television experts surveys the entertainment landscape to select the ten best new/newish shows available for you to stream at home. We put a lot of thought into our selections, and our debates on what to include and what not to include can sometimes get a little heated and feelings may get hurt, but so be it, this is an important service for you, our readers. With that said, here are our selections for this week.
15. A Man On the Inside (Netflix)
SNL. The Comeback. The Office. Parks and Recreation. Brooklyn Nine-Nine. The Good Place. Rutherford Falls. What do all these shows have in common? Michael Schur. Regis Philbin’s son-in-law (it’s true) has either written for and/or created all of them. He’s one of the most important names in comedy this century, and he has a new show on Netflix. A Man on the Inside follows retired widower Charles, played by Cheers and The Good Place legend Ted Danson, who goes undercover in a retirement community to solve a mystery.
14. Creature Commandos (Max)
If you enjoy the Harley Quinn show and/or James Gunn’s The Suicide Squad, you’ll love Creature Commandos. The animated series tracks a secret team of incarcerated monsters — including Frankenstein, The Bride of Frankenstein, and G.I. Robot — who are recruited for missions deemed too dangerous for humans. “When all else fails… they’re your last, worst option,” the Max description reads. Every episode was written by Gunn, while the cast includes Indira Varma, Sean Gunn, Alan Tudyk, Zoë Chao, David Harbour, Maria Bakalova, Frank Grillo, and Viola Davis. It’s a fun introduction to the new DCU.
13. A Nonsense Christmas With Sabrina Carpenter (Netflix)
It will be a very kitschy Christmas with A Nonsense Christmas With Sabrina Carpenter, a new Netflix special starring the “Please Please Please” singer. There will be holiday covers, special guests (including a duet with Chappell Roan), and, if her live show is any indication, double entendres galore. Pair it with an espresso martini.
12. Black Doves (Netflix)
In Black Doves, the always wonderful Keira Knightley plays Helen, an undercover professional spy who has been passing on her politician husband’s secrets to the shadowy organisation she works for: the titular Black Doves. But when her secret lover Jason is assassinated, an old friend (Paddington’s Ben Whishaw!) is tasked with keeping her safe. Together, they set off on a mission to investigate who killed Jason, which, as often happens with these kinds of shows, leads them into a vast conspiracy. Pepe Silvia will be watching.
11. Carry-On (Netflix)
Carry-On makes a single-setting thriller star out of the unsung heroes of the holiday season: TSA agents. Ethan (played by Taron Egerton) is tasked with outsmarting a mysterious traveler (Jason Bateman) who blackmails him into letting a dangerous package slip onto a Christmas Eve flight. Carry-On is directed by Jaume Collet-Serra (Orphan, The Shallows, and Black Adam, but don’t hold that last one against him) with a script from Ratchet & Clank (!) writer TJ Fixman.
10. Secret Level (Prime Video)
Created by Tim Miller (Love, Death, & Robots), Secret Level is an animated anthology series with original stories set within the worlds of video games. There’s Armored Core, Mega Man, Pac-Man, Spelunky, and The Other Worlds, among others. The voice cast includes Arnold Schwarzenegger, Kevin Hart, Keanu Reeves, Gabriel Luna, Temuera Morrison, Ariana Greenblatt, Patrick Schwarzenegger, and Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje.
9. Conclave (Peacock)
Discover what all the fuss over the vaping cardinal is about. Directed by Edward Berger (All Quiet on the Western Front), Conclave is about the messy drama behind selecting a new pope. Per the official synopsis: “Cardinal Lawrence (Ralph Fiennes) is tasked with running this covert process after the unexpected death of the beloved Pope. Once the Catholic Church’s most powerful leaders have gathered from around the world and are locked together in the Vatican halls, Lawrence uncovers a trail of deep secrets left in the dead Pope’s wake, secrets which could shake the foundations of the Church.” Such drama queens.
8. Red One (Prime Video)
There’s two ways of thinking about Red One. The first: it’s an action-comedy about a jacked security bro (Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson) who teams up with a muscular hacker (Chris Evans) to locate a ripped Santa Claus (J.K. Simmons). The other: The Rock peed in bottles on set. The choice is yours!
7. Dexter: Original Sin (Paramount Plus)
The Dark Passenger-verse expands with Dexter: Original Sin, a prequel to the original series and Dexter: New Blood. This one is set in 1991 and follows Dexter Morgan (played by Patrick Gibson) as he transitions from student to serial killer with guidance from his father Harry (Christian Slater). Michael C. Hall will reprise his role, sort of, as the voice of young Dexter’s inner monologue. Will there be a treadmill? Find out!
6. Joker: Folie à Deux (Max)
My favorite review of Joker: Folie à Deux — the sequel to 2019’s Joker starring Joaquin Phoenix and Lady Gaga that landed with a thud at the box office — comes from director / camp icon John Waters. “Finally, a love story I can relate to,” he wrote for Vulture. “So insane, so well thought out, so well directed, so much smoking! It’s Jailhouse Rock meets Busby Berkeley with a 9/11 That’s Entertainment! ending that will make you shake your head in cinematic astonishment. Stupid critics. Gaga so good. Joker so right. Die, dumbbells, die!” I am now convinced it’s a masterpiece.
5. Cuckoo (Hulu)
Hunter Schafer doesn’t feel like she’s “deserving” of being called a scream queen yet. But based on her performance in Cuckoo, we respectfully disagree. The Neon horror movie follows Gretchen (Schafer), an American who moves to the German Alps to live with her father. But “something doesn’t seem right in this tranquil vacation paradise,” according to the official logline,” and “Gretchen is plagued by strange noises and bloody visions until she discovers a shocking secret that also concerns her own family.”
4. Laid (Peacock)
Stephanie Hsu, who really should have won the Oscar over her Everything Everywhere All at Once co-star, is joined by Zosia Mamet in the new series Laid. The “f*cked up rom-com” is about a woman who finds out that her former lovers are dying in unusual ways, and must go back through her “sex timeline” to figure out what the heck is going on.
3. The Six Triple Eight (Netflix)
The Six Triple Eight is the latest Netflix movie from Tyler Perry. It tells the true story of The 6888th Central Postal Directory, the only Women’s Army Corps unit of color stationed in Europe during World War II. “I felt like these women were with us in this process,” star Kerry Washington said about making the film. “You felt their spirit all the time.” The cast also includes Ebony Obsidian, Milauna Jackson, Pepi Sonuga, Sarah Jeffery, Shanice Williams, Jay Reeves, Dean Norris, Sam Waterston, Kylie Jefferson, Jeanté Godlock, Moriah Brown, and someone named Oprah. She must be new.
2. Juror #2 (Max)
Juror #2 received such a tiny theatrical release, we wrote an entire post about how to see it. It’s Clint Eastwood’s possibly final film for chrissakes! Thankfully, the film is now on Max, so more people can watch the throwback legal thriller starring Nicholas Hoult as a jury member going through a moral dilemma. It’s the most 1994 movie of 2024 (complimentary).
1. Squid Game (Netflix)
Netflix’s most-watched show is back. Squid Game season 2 sees the return of Gi-hun (played by Lee Jung-jae), a.k.a. Player 456, who has only one goal: to end the horrifying competition for good. This time, Gi-hun finds himself “locked in a tense battle” with the Front Man (Lee Byung-hun), as well as trying to survive against the other competitors. Squid Game is the rare water-cooler show in the “death of the monoculture” era. Keep up if you want to know what your co-workers are talking about.
