The Masters Of The Air
Well we’ve officially almost made it through the month of January. The last weekend of the first month of the year is upon us, and it’s the perfect wintery weekend to kick back inside in the warmth and coziness of the indoors and watch some new shows and movies on whichever streaming services you subscribe to. There is no shortage these days, and they’re all getting more expensive.
Several new TV shows drop this weekend and a couple ongoing ones are worth checking out as well. Be sure to check out my top upcoming shows of 2024 list as well. Some great stuff lands in February also.
You can also find all the other top releases of January in the links below.
Alright, let’s dive in, shall we?
What better way to dive into a streaming guide than with the “Bloody Hundredth”? Masters Of Air is a new WWII drama from Steven Spielberg and the creators of Band Of Brothers and The Pacific. The series stars Austin Butler, Callum Turner, Barry Keoghan, Ncuti Gatwa, Lauren McQueen and lots of other young, attractive people. Early reviews are mostly positive, though not as glowing as those for the previous two series I mentioned (though it’s always hard to top classics). The show has an 83% rating on Rotten Tomatoes with critics, and 93% with audiences. I’ll be watching and reporting back here on this blog (be sure to subscribe!)
It’s going to be hard for me—and probably some other viewers—to not think of Modern Family when you see Sofia Vergara in her new Netflix drama Griselda, but the two shows could not be more different. Griselda is a six-part drama about the ruthless Colombian drug lord, Griselda Blanco, who was given the title Cocaine Godmother (hey there’s a movie idea to go hand-in-hand with Cocaine Bear!) in the 1970s. Should be a nice companion series to Narcos.
This is officially the best trailer of this weekend’s streaming guide. I am a kid in the 80s’ again watching this thing. I loved He-Man when I was young and even had quite a few Masters Of The Universe action figures, including ones where you could spin the chest to show a “dented” version of He-Man’s armor. Masters Of The Universe: Revelation wasn’t very good and was far more controversial and divisive than a He-Man show has any right to be, but by all accounts this is much better and I’m excited to give it another go.
The first two episodes of the Nicole Kidman-led Hong Kong drama about a group of expatriots land on Amazon Prime Video this Friday. Based on the book The Expatriates by Janice Y.K. Lee, the series is getting a “Fresh” but just barely 69% on Rotten Tomatoes, though very few critics have reviewed it so far. I’m not sure that a story about a bunch of privileged rich expats in Hong Kong is really my cup of tea, but it might be yours!
I didn’t know they were making a TV show about me! Just kidding, this is about some other sexy beast. The British crime drama looks a bit funny, quite intense and more than a little glitzy. It serves as a prequel series to the 2000 film Sexy Beast, which starred Ray Winstone and Ben Kingsley, and by the looks of it (and the early reviews) it doesn’t live up to the source material (50% on Rotten Tomatoes compared to the film’s 87%). Ah well, so it goes.
A semi-animated stop-motion comedy satirizing NPR. That’s about the gist of In The Know which stars Zach Woods (Silicon Valley) as Lauren Caspian, the “third-most popular” NPR host. The show is quite unique looking. The characters interview live-action celebrities like Mike Tyson and Ken Burns, so it’s a weird blend of mediums. It looks pretty funny, especially if you’ve spent a lot of time listening to NPR.
I’m a little late to watching this—busy busy busy, so many things to watch!—but I’ve heard lots of great things about the mystery series which debuted in the UK last year and has made its way to Showtime, premiering last week. I’m all about the mysteries lately, so I’ll be tuning into this one soon. Another recommendation for a great mystery series is Mare Of Easttown, which I just recently wrote about.
I’m still not sold on True Detective: Night Country, though I’m trying to keep an open mind. It’s just so . . . off. The characters are almost universally unlikable, the story is too busy by half with far too many subplots to keep track of, and the tie-ins to Season 1 feel forced—but while I haven’t been impressed by the first two episodes, I’m willing to be proven wrong. I hope I’m wrong and the mystery ultimately pays off.
What are you watching this weekend? Let me know on Twitter and Facebook.
Leave a Reply