Every single week, our TV and film experts will list the most important ten streaming selections for you to pop into your queues. We’re not strictly operating upon reviews or accrued streaming clicks (although yes, we’ve scoured the streaming site charts) but, instead, upon those selections that are really worth noticing amid the churning sea of content. There’s a lot out there, after all, and your time is valuable.
TIE: 10. Bodies (Netflix series)
There’s nothing quite like a sleeper series for the element of surprise. This twisty, turn show dives headfirst into a mind-melting take on multiple detectives who try to solve (and stop) the same murder in different decades. This show was only intended to be a limited series and is based upon a Si Spencer graphic novel, but given the audience turnout — and how the show actually leaves the door slightly ajar — it wouldn’t be a total shock if Netflix put another round into motion. In the meantime, enjoy this clear story that will keep you guessing, even after you find out the identity of the killer.
TIE: 10. Long Shot (Lionsgate movie streaming on Netflix)
Seth Rogen took a little downtime from his endless array of chillin’-out pastimes/businesses (a weed empire, his pottery wheel) to star alongside an underappreciated movie with Charlize Theron, but a whole new audience has now caught wind. Here, she’s the Secretary of State, and he’s a journalist who just crossed paths with his old babysitter. As well, never forget that, even though Theron is an Oscar winner and one of the greatest action stars of this era (of any gender), she can still be funny as hell when as the project suits.
9. The Fall Of The House Of Usher (Netflix series)
Mike Flanagan is back. Granted, he never left, but he did slightly divert with The Midnight Club and has returned to his Carla Gugino-wielding, horror-master roots. Speaking of which, who is Verna, anyway? This show is so brazenly up in the Edgar Allan Poe references with so many macabre happenings that we put together a death ranking. Also, this isn’t a literal telling of the Poe story but one that successfully incorporates modern ills while skewering the concepts of wealth, privilege, and power.
8. Scavengers Reign (Max series)
This animated series follows pockets of survivors (including not only humans but a robot) who somehow ended up on an alien planet following the destruction of their interstellar freighter ship. They find both gloriously beautiful flora and fauna but plentiful danger, too. Each group takes a different strategy, and what surfaces is a meditation of sorts about humanity’s effect on a previously flourishing and relatively untouched planet. The series stars Wunmi Mosaku, Alia Shawkat, Bob Stephenson, and Sunita Mani.
7. Old Dads (Netflix movie)
Bill Burr plays it safer than usual here, but this film still manages to be mildly offensive while pulling punches. Yes, audiences have been divided after watching, but that’s also good for viewing numbers. Bokeem Woodbine and Bobby Cannavale are other doofus dads, and you might as well accept that someone at your family holiday celebrations will want to watch this after dinner. Maybe twice.
6. Saw X (Lionsgate movie streaming on VOD and Amazon Prime)
The most critically-acclaimed Jigsaw movie in the franchise went toe-to-toe with Taylor Swift and lived to tell the tale. The same cannot be said for those who land in these telltale traps, however. This film takes a lengthy voyage back to the earlier days of this horror franchise where Tobin Bell gets to show off his range for days. This is quite unlike any other Saw movie but also doesn’t totally skimp on the requisite gore quotient that fans are used to seeing.
5. Gen V (Amazon Prime series)
The season finale (to quote Bill Murray in Ghostbusters) came, saw, and kicked ass with a short but highly impactful cameo from the original series to top things off. Fortunately, we will receive a Season 2 about the hierarchy of Godolkin University, and the promises made by the creatives of this spinoff weren’t messing around. This debut season provided an ideal jumping-off point for The Boys Season 4. We sure wouldn’t mind hearing about a release date soon. [Cough]
4. No Hard Feelings (Sony Pictures movie streaming on Netflix)
Jennifer Lawrence has done the fancy Oscar and hefty blockbuster thing into infinity already, and thank goodness that she wanted to do something different here: be raunchy as hell and bring back R-rated comedies with a vengeance. She portrays Maddie, a total fail-hard young woman who needs to make some money, fast, so she answers a Craigslist ad from parents who would really like a nice woman to “date” (i.e., boink) their awkward 19-year-old son. This is a firmly R-rated movie that also has heart, and Lawrence enthusiastically participated on both fronts.
3. Pain Hustlers (Netflix movie)
A whole lot of “taking on Big Pharma” TV shows and movies have landed on streaming in recent years, but this one has Emily Blunt and Chris Evans. Oh, and Andy Garcia portrays an eccentric boss, but it’s a wild sight to see Blunt and Evans rise to the top of a racketeering scheme that’s also partially responsible for one of the greater ills — the scourge of opioid-based painkillers — in contemporary society. This is a dramatized version of the rise and fall of Insys Therapeutics, and you will definitely find out why that company ceased to exist.
2. Invincible (Amazon series)
Hoo boy. I did not expect the second season to begin with Mark Grayson (Steven Yeun) on that side of things, but hey, his dad is Omni-Man (J.K. Simmons), so do not expect everything to be so straightforward with these superheroes. Speaking of which, Amazon is absolutely crushing these comic-book adaptations better than the major film studios who previously dominated the scene. This season, Sandra Oh gets an even bigger spotlight for her talents, and the sheer presence of Walton Goggins is always a joy to behold, even when you cannot see him.
1. Five Nights At Freddy’s (Blumhouse film streaming on Peacock)
This film simultaneously scared up box-office and streaming success on the same weekend. The timing was perfect, given that this film not only fit the spooky time of year but also blossomed as yet another successful video-game-to-screen adaptation. Josh Hutcherson did not have the quiet little evening at work that his character imagined, since this no ordinary pizzeria. Animatronic horror villains are no less scary than horrific and homicidal dolls like M3GAN and those sporting ski masks and chainsaws, as it turns out. And now, the wait for the green lighting of a sequel shall begin.