This week's list features Adam Sandler in space with a spider, Disney's new huge samurai epic and Noel Fielding wearing a little hat. Photo / The Spinoff
This week's list features Adam Sandler in space with a spider, Disney's new huge samurai epic and Noel Fielding wearing a little hat. Photo / The Spinoff
We round up everything coming to streaming services this week, including Netflix, Amazon Prime, Disney+, Apple TV+, ThreeNow, Neon and TVNZ+.
For fans of Adam Sandler being serious: Spaceman (Netflix, March 1)
Not only is Adam Sandler being serious, but he’s being serious in space. And not only is Adam Sandler being serious in space, but he’s joined by a giant emotional support spider? Based on a trippy Czech novel and directed by Johan Renck (Chernobyl), Spaceman puts an absurdist twist on a proud cinematic tradition of blokes floating about alone in space (Matt Damon, Brad Pitt, George Clooney RIP). Also starring Carey Mulligan and Isabella Rossellini, this frankly looks like an even weirder and riskier outing for Sandler than anything he did in Jack and Jill – and that’s saying something.
For fans of serious historical epics: Shōgun (Disney+, February 27)
If giant bajillion-dollar historical epics and sword-wielding samurai are your jam, look no further than Shōgun. Based on the James Clavell novel of the same name, Shōgun navigates power, class and political struggles in 17th century Japan. After an English ship is marooned, sailor John Blackthorne (Cosmo Jarvis) collides with Lord Toranaga (Hiroyuki Sanada) and mysterious female samurai Lady Mariko (Anna Sawai). It scored a perfect 100 per cent on Rotten Tomatoes, with critics calling it “the most engaging, impressive shows of the year”, “an engaging tale of duty, political power, and legacy” and a “genuine masterpiece”. Also, Napoleon is also coming to Apple TV this week, you lucky old-timey ducks.
For fans of unserious historical epics: The Completely Made Up Adventures of Dick Turpin (Apple TV, March 1)
Britophiles rejoice: Noel Fielding! Greg Davies! Tamsin Greig! Hugh Bonneville! Very loosely based on the myths and murmurs around a 1700s Essex criminal affectionately known as “The Dandy Highwayman”, this looks like a must-watch for fans of The Great, Our Flag Means Death, and any other show that injects the olden days with some good old-fashioned laughs. “I’m a classic dick,” said Fielding in a recent interview about the series. “He’s a classic dick,” concurred Bonneville, “and it’s certainly one of the most interesting dicks I’ve ever seen.” Crack up!
For the fan of biting satire: American Fiction (Prime Video, February 27)
There’s a lot of awards buzz and near-universal acclaim for American Fiction, a withering satire about what happens when a Black author gives in to the industry’s endless appetite for narratives of trauma and poverty from his community. It’s been heralded as “a cagey, cerebral dramedy” by The New York Times and a “satisfyingly prickly satire on race and hypocrisy” by The Guardian, received five Oscar nominations earlier in the month and won a BAFTA for Best Adapted Screenplay just last week. And if that’s not enough to get you interested, Barack Obama even put it on his hallowed Best of the Year list in 2023.
For fans of fixing the climate crisis: Dynamic Planet (Neon, out now)
Once you are done with Alice Snedden’s Bad News Saves The World(first episode out Tuesday 27, second episode Thursday 29), Dynamic Planet is the perfect chaser for those looking to still find some hope re: the state of our collective future on Earth. Filmed over three years and on all seven continents, this four-part documentary series meets the extraordinary folks living and working on the front line of climate change. It will delve into “how science, nature and traditional knowledge can prepare us for a fast-changing future”, and sounds like exactly the kind of thing that climate-anxious types (everyone?) need to watch right now.
