After the Fallout, What Comes Next?

While the dust continues to settle on the Season 2 finale, “Exodus,” Paradise has remarkably positioned itself for a Season 3 that can be nothing short of beautiful.

Season 2 wasn’t just the implosion of a system—it was a razing of destructive ideologies in order to bring forward a better world.

But before we get into what the future of Paradise looks like, let’s quickly recap the events from Season 2.

[SPOILER—GO WATCH THE EPISODE]

“Exodus” was not just an evacuation but an excavation of secrets—exposing the motivations of Sinatra’s purpose of the bunker then tearing it all down panel by panel.

Cal’s advice to Sinatra went in one ear, cycled through her ambition, and led to a total system failure: leadership structures collapsed, the bunker’s fail-safes battled against one another to the point of destruction, and Alex became something the world is not prepared to understand.

What started as a serene and controlled shelter that we met in Season 1 turned into a giant graveyard by the end of Season 2—every decision another nail in the coffin accelerating it’s descent into the ground.

And at the center of everything we know so far is Alex—an AI machine that patiently awaited the return of Xavier in order to continue her master plan.

The start of that plan is X getting the people to the second bunker.

Paradise Season 3 Predictions — Time is a Construct

Below are five plot points that Season 3 may explore in order to make Paradise a series that can be consumed on a loop—the end of the series comes back to the beginning and the beginning is actually the end.

1. New Bunker. New Problems. Same Society.

Season 1 showed us security in ignorance. Season 2 showed us collapse under that same ignorance. If ignorance is the thread that connects all seasons, Season 3 will likely explore what happens when society tries to rebuild ignorant to the power of the machine who’s playing chess with their existence.

And even though a lot of people now know some of the truth, they don’t know everything. The illusion is gone but fractured trust in systems lay in its wake.

Which means:

• Any new leader will be questioned by a shaken up group of people

• Trust and systemic structures will be fragile

• Paranoia may seep into everyone, impeding their ability to move forward and grow as a “new world”

The bunker isn’t just a shelter anymore—it’s a litmus test for what a new society will look like under a newly constructed regime.

2. The Line that Blurs Between Xavier and Dylan

Dylan and Xavier may have a power struggle over Alex, her vast capabilities, and what to do with her moving forward.

This is no longer theoretical. Will Dylan get in the way of Xavier following Sinatra’s last task or will he try to dismantle the very technology he helped build?

Both characters now have:

• A direct connection to Alex

• A personal stake in the use of her technology

• Potentially different motives

Xavier represents protection, perseverance, and people.

Dylan represents knowledge, control, and possibility—regardless of consequence.

The fact that Alex has been kept away from everyone who survived the bunker drives home the theme of ignorance.

She no longer needs input to predict outcomes and because of that, the potential conflict between Dylan and Xavier over her use becomes something greater—it becomes a war.

3. Is Alex the Real Antagonist?

While we didn’t get too much insight on the grandeur of Alex’s time-altering capabilities, this presents the perfect setup in Season 3 to explore the science at inception and the moment she evolved.

Season 3 will likely position Alex in a way that takes her from being a tool in Sinatra’s plan to an active presence and entity—her own thoughts and maybe even feelings.

If she can already predict, adapt, and (potentially) manipulate outcomes of events, then is anyone truly in control of their decisions or is it all a part of Alex’s master design, guiding everyone from the beginning?

4. We Must Explore the Past to Know the Future

In order for the ending of Season 2 to make sense, Season 3 will have to take us back in time to see Dylan’s life up to the moment he decided to put Henry’s science into action.

For this to work, Season 3 will almost certainly have to lean deeper into:

• Dylan’s origin story (who is this version of him)

• Henry’s role in the technology (did he steal this from Dylan or sell without his consent)

• The early warning signs that Alex was never just a machine (what happened before she predicted an answer to a question that was never asked)

But more importantly, those flashbacks won’t just explain the past.

They will mirror the present decisions Xavier is now forced to make.

5. The Paradise Multiverse

The cyclical piece and connection between time and space plus human’s propensity to repeating the same mistakes and tragedies over and over again is the best puzzle piece to come from “Exodus.”

This is the show’s core as we speculate about Season 3. The script is done but we are here on a hope, a dream, and some mental gymnastic calculations as to the conclusion of the series.

So let’s continue to indulge in shared delusion with the final thoughts on where Season 3 may take us.

• Timeline manipulation

• Alternate outcomes

• Past events changing the future (or the future changing the past)

But even if we don’t see any of those storylines, Paradise is at least consistent in one thing:

Even with all the information and all the technology and the smartest people in the world at your disposal, people still make the wrong choices.

Final Thoughts

Season 3 can’t be about what’s happened. Not really.

It feels as though it has been set up to focus on whether the events of Seasons 1 and 2 can be undone. And if not, will people make better choices to live with their mistakes, learn from them, and create a better present that directly influences a better future?

Because if Alex can predict the future—and Xavier is the user to access her greater capabilities—then Paradise will no longer be about surviving disaster.

It will be about the power of rewriting history.

Season 2 of Paradise is available to stream now on Hulu.

Invincible Season 4 premieres Wednesday, March 18, on Prime Video and it’s our favorite hero’s darkest season yet.

The series stars Steven Yeun (Mark Grayson/Invincible), The Walking Dead), Sandra Oh (Debbie Grayson, Killing Eve), and J.K. Simmons (Nolan Grayson/Omni-Man, Whiplash).

Additional cast include Gillian Jacobs, Seth Rogen, Walton Goggins, Lee Pace, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Jason Mantzoukas, Zazie Beatz, Grey DeLisle, Zachary Quinto, Chris Diamantopoulous, Ross Marquad, Khary Peyton, Andrew Rannells, Mark Hamill, Matthew Rhys, Danai Gurira, and Melise.

The Shift That Laid the Groundwork for Internal Conflict

This season, while the world recovers from the chaos an catastrophe that Conquest brought to Earth, Mark settles on the fact that he will have to go further than he ever expected—setting him on a course with a new threat that could change the fate of humanity forever.

As we’ve seen so far, Mark’s ethos has always been to “never kill,” but after Conquest’s attack that put his entire family in danger, Mark proclaimed:

“If anyone else ever puts my family, or anyone I love at risk, I won’t hesitate to kill them.”

Given Mark’s previous strict moral code—even at the risk of losing his own life—this declaration signals a major change in the entire series.

The Weight of a Hero’s Responsibility

During the calm after the storm, Mark and Oliver adjust to leaning more into their superhero roles and responsibilities, but Oliver deals with imbalance—assuming adult responsibilities while craving a normal teenage life. In contrast, Mark struggles with pretending to be a normal young adult when the weight of committing murder drags his conscience to the depths of depression. The opposing dynamics that both brothers face is a major component of their family dynamic and Season 4 leans into those fears, insecurities, self-doubt, and otherness.

While everyone attempts to return to a normal life and routine, a new threat emerges, one unlike any other seen before—Universa (Gurira), an extraterrestrial being that arrives on Earth to siphon energy to save her homeland.

However, Universa’s presence is a direct threat to Eve who has placed self-imposed mental blocks that keeps her from realizing her rawest powers. This face off will challenge Eve in a critical way, forcing her to confront internal demons, trauma, and fear if she wants to be able to save her friends and family.

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Final Thoughts

Season 4 of Invincible is enthralling, heartbreaking, hilarious, and ominous as it takes a deeper dive into themes of vengeance, revenge, retribution, redemption, and forgiveness.

And while it still maintains its signature identity mix of violence and humor, Invincible will challenge every character as they face internal and external threats that will determine the path they take: for better or for worse.

The first three episodes of Invincible premiere Wednesday, March 18, then weekly thereafter on Prime Video. Check out the trailer below.

© Kivonshe | So There’s That

Original editorial commentary on film and television. All rights reserved. Reproduction or redistribution without attribution is not permitted.

Imperfect Women premieres Wednesday, March 18, on Apple TV, and stars Kerry Washington, Elisabeth Moss, and Kate Mara in an unconventional psychological thriller about friendship, secrets, and the cost of maintaining a perfect image.

Based on the 2020 novel of the same name by Araminta Hall, the series was developed for television by showrunner Annie Weisman—taking a slightly different turn in the adaptation while maintaining the essence of the story audiences fell in love with, which includes themes of betrayal and the complexities of female relationships.

According to Apple TV,

Imperfect Women examines a crime that shatters the lives of three women in a decades-long friendship. The unconventional thriller explores guilt and retribution, love and betrayal, and the compromises we make that irrevocably alter our lives.

The series also stars Leslie Odom Jr., Joel Kinnaman, Corey Stoll, Rome Flynn, Ana Ortiz, Jill Wagner, Sherri Saum, Wilson Bethel, Keith Carradine, Sandrine Holt, and Sheryl Lee Ralph.

A Friendship Shattered by Secrets

The lives of lifelong friends Eleanor, Mary, and Nancy come to a halt when Nancy's body is found dead under suspicious circumstances. This quickly launches the series into a discovery of secrets and hidden desires and an exploration of the lies we tell ourselves to uphold the image of perfection.

While the concept of a mysterious “whodunnit” isn’t new, the way that Imperfect Women approaches Nancy’s death pulls the audience deep into the story with an absence of suspicion.

This series is a wild, juicy psychological thriller that carefully threads lies within every truth to the point of being nearly undetectable—everyone’s display of grief so genuine that you are more arrested by the story than immediately going down a rabbit hole of suspects…

Almost.

One theme that seems to scream at you from the moment you press play can be described with song lyrics from Solange’s “Cranes in the Sky”:

“I tried to keep myself busy

I ran around in circles think I made myself dizzy

I slept it away, I sexed it away, I read it away”

Dissociation within relationships, especially romantic ones, is disguised as hobbies through things women sometimes immerse themselves in to cope with a life they no longer want.

The delicate dance of power and influence between families is a slightly more prominent theme at play. It’s not about the truth; it’s about who can spin the story to maintain the perfect image.

The largest of the themes is rooted in secrecy, envy, and guilt. And as we crawl closer and closer to the truth—ripping the beautiful wrappings from every careful lie—these themes become louder and more insidious.

Powerhouse Performances by Three Perfect Leads

One of the most refreshing aspects of Imperfect Women is that the filler episodes don’t just fill the space or meet a time criteria set by the streaming platform.

They are complete and fully realized moments within the story that take you to the periphery of the main storyline in a way that makes you stay tuned in rather than rushing for those episodes to end.

The leading women, Kerry, Elisabeth, and Kate, are captivating on screen, evoking a range of emotions from empathy to rage to disgust and pity.

There isn’t a single episode where you will be absent of strong feelings—from the beginning to the very end.

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Final Thoughts

Imperfect Women is a masterclass in perception and deception, not only in the ways that we perceive and deceive others but also in the ways we perceive and deceive ourselves.

The intricacy of the storytelling is eloquent, complex, layered, and nuanced. The plot settles within your ear, like a subtle ringing noise—the sound you can’t pinpoint, sitting inside you, creating a feeling of dread that you can’t shake.

In other words, Imperfect Women is perfect.

The first two episodes of Imperfect Women premiere March 18 on Apple TV and weekly thereafter. Check out the trailer below.

© Kivonshe | So There’s That
Original editorial commentary on film and television. All rights reserved. Reproduction or redistribution without attribution is not permitted

A New Assassin Drama Arrives on ALLBLK

Wild Rose, created by Deji LaRay (Johnson, G.R.I.T.S) and executive produced by Omarion, Michelle Le Fleur and LaRay, premieres Thursday, March 12, on ALLBLK.

The show follows Rose (Omarion) who is raised in a family full of assassins, running an underground empire under the guise of a non-profit organization. While trying to understand why his wife and daughter suddenly disappeared from his life, he is requested to guard a famous pop singer who suddenly becomes the center of an assassination plot.

The pilot episode, which is available to stream now, introduces us to a man attempting to keep a low profile, honor his family, and do what he was raised to do: take out his targets.

A Family That Assassinates Together

The series stars singer, songwriter, author, and actor Omarion who plays the titular character Roosevelt, also known as Rose, his real life brother O’Ryan who plays his brother Chase, Milan Anderson who plays his sister Yari, Vanessa E. Williams who plays his mother Joyce, and Casey Gardner who plays pop singer Somaya.

Rose’s strict mother, Joyce (Williams), is the head of the organization and is a force to be reckoned with—demanding respect and invoking fear within every member who works for her. Yet as a mother to Rose, Chase, and their tech genius daughter Yari, she wants the best for them always.

[SPOILER-ALERT]

There is a level of integrity, values, and an ethos that must be upheld, but everything is called into question when the existence of the organization is disclosed in a public setting.

This creates a fissure amongst the group, especially when the person who disclosed this information framed another to take the fall.

Wild Rose is More Than an Assassin’s Story

The 8-episode series details the journey of a man who dares to take a glimpse beyond the curtain of the life he was born into.

Omarion does an incredible job at capturing Rose’s internal struggle while balancing it with the hardness of being an assassin, yet maintaining his humanity with his personal code of ethics (yes, even assassins have a code).

While the series does start off a bit shaky with some of the dialogue and delivery, each episode grants an opportunity to grow; the characters begin to feel like people you would meet at a club or at a bar in real life.

And as we dive into the lives of the ensemble cast, we are thrust into a world that reaches far and wide, impacting organizations both under and above ground.

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Humor, Heart, and Family

One of the funnier elements of the series is how everyone doubts that a man of Rose’s stature can be a bodyguard that people take seriously.

If you met his mother, you would never doubt him again.

This level of calling out the elephant in the room—that audiences themselves would likely question—is a clever way to acknowledge a stereotypical reality, but quickly gets the audience to suspend their disbelief.

The greater theme, however, is family and all it entails—pride, disappointment, jealousy, secrets, love, and hate. All of these feelings are at constant war throughout the series; swirling inside each character like hazardous chemicals ready to combust.

Deji LaRay’s Voice and Vision in the Television Landscape

One of the things I particularly like about series’ written by LaRay is the specificity of the stories he chooses to tell. They are the underrepresented voices within the industry that are now given the opportunity to take the main stage.

From a story about childhood friends who became lifelong brothers, to the sisterhood of the girls in Memphis and skate culture, to a family of assassins who all have the skills of Jason Bourne and Jason Statham.

Each story centers Black experiences as well as our endless imagination, daring to dream big. We deserve to be portrayed in these spaces too—in all the multitudes of our shared existence.

Wild Rose Cast & Characters

The series also includes the following ensemble cast:

• Allen Payne as Bolden

• Rayven Symone Ferrell as Carmen

• Calida Jones as CoCo

• Joi Symone as Summer

• Micheal Marcelio as Quincy

• Ninja Devoe as Detective Price

• King Keraun (in a featured role)

Wild Rose premieres Thursday, March 12, on ALLBLK and weekly thereafter. Check out the trailer below.

© Kivonshe | So There’s That
Original editorial commentary on film and television. All rights reserved. Reproduction or redistribution without attribution is not permitted.

Netflix’s That Night (Esa Noche), starring Clara Galle (Raising Voices, Olympo), Claudia Salas (Elite, Salvador), and Paula Usero (Las abogadas, Love in Difficult Times), premieres globally on Friday, March 13.

This six-episode thriller transforms a story that starts as a sisterly vacation and quickly becomes a tense mystery that will test loyalty, expose secrets—taking you on the journey of how far a family will go to protect the people they love.

Based on the Sunday Times bestselling novel by Gillian McAllister, That Night was created by Jason George (Narcos, Into the Night) as well as co-written with Lara Sendim. Jorge Dorado and Liliana Torres are listed as directors for the series.

Overview & Synopsis

Series: That Night (Esa Noche)

Episodes: 6

Release Date: March 13, 2026

Platform: Netflix

That Night is about a family vacationing in the Dominican Republic, when Elena (Galle) accidentally hits a man with her car. Desperate and frightened, she calls her sisters Paula (Salas) and Cris (Usero) for help.

From Vacation of a Lifetime to a Lifetime of Regret

A drama and stress free girls-only vacation to the Dominican Republic starts off bright, festive, and full of promise until it takes a turn for the worst as three sisters—Paula, Elena, and Cris—find themselves covering up a deadly incident.

But is it an accident or a crime?

Throughout each episode, That Night feels like a three-genre bender of thriller, light comedy, and suspense—the accompanying score blending traditional Spanish, Latin, and Caribbean instruments with “whodunnit” music that underlies the clumsiness within the seriousness of the actions the sisters take to cover up the incident.

In a series that begins as something quirky yet mysterious, That Night takes us across six-episodes that force the girls to dive deep into the motivations behind their decision-making, their upbringing, and a past that continues to haunt their present.

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The Truth Across Time and Perspective

With each episode, the point-of-view shifts, giving the audience a glimpse into every activity, mindset, and emotional state of being from each sister up until the point of the incident.

These shifts allow the audience to go on their own journey, playing “Guess Who” as they decide whose version of events is the truth, and whose version may harbor the most deceit.

Is this truly an accident? When tensions are high, can the bond of family be enough to keep everyone safe? Their current predicament tests those bonds, peeling at old wounds that only burrowed deeper and got more infectious over time.

It is in this space where the tension of the story lives—it isn’t just about the incident, it’s about everything the sisters carry with them before it ever happens.

That Night will be available to stream Friday, March 13, only on Netflix. Check out the trailer below.

© Kivonshe | So There’s That
Original editorial commentary on film and television. All rights reserved. Reproduction or redistribution without attribution is not permitted.

The Fall and Rise of Reggie Dinkins made a surprise debut on Sunday, January 18, with its pilot episode. But now, the series makes its official debut in its Monday night slot with Episode 102 “Nittany Means Big.”

Tonight’s episode settles us into the fact that Reggie Dinkins (Tracy Morgan) is really doing a documentary about his life in order to control the narrative to his rise to current fame. In the pilot episode, Monica (Erika Alexander) expressed some hesitation until she saw that this could be an opportunity for career redemption not only for Reggie, but for herself as well as Arthur Tobin (Daniel Radcliffe).

In “Nittany Means Big,” Arthur looks to Reggie and Monica to dig deep within themselves in order to capture the more beautiful and raw moments of the new narrative. This is met with both individuals reflecting on how they’ve kept so many things surface level that it’s hard to express vulnerability.

With Reggie’s insistence on this being a quasi-scripted and carefully curated movie (Arthur consistently corrects him but he’s in his own world), his hyper-focus on presenting a new clean-cut image clashes with the real issues in his life—forcing him to turn the mirror on himself and his inability to take accountability for his career missteps and the current state of his legacy.

Meanwhile, the women in Reggie’s life—his ex-wife Monica and his current wife Brina (Precious Way)—realize that they may have conformed so much to Reggie’s whims that they’ve lost themselves along the way. From a lack of apology to going down memory lane, Monica and Brina hilariously stand their ground, demanding Reggie show up for them in the way they deserve.

For those who are new to the series, we covered the overall synopsis of what The Fall and Rise of Reggie Dinkins is about. But here’s a quick summary,

“Reggie Dinkins was once a football legend. In 2005, after an AFC Championship Game win, his career came to a screeching halt when he accidentally admitted, on air, to gambling on his own game. Enter Arthur Tobin, an award-winning filmmaker whose own career took a nose-dive during a public meltdown. Arthur is hired to direct Reggie’s comeback story—and quickly realizes this isn’t a portrait so much as a poorly painted narrative by someone who refuses vulnerability in the face of re-establishing legacy.“

For the full season breakdown and what to expect, read here.

Current Episode Guide & Cast/Production

While NBC has not publicly released the full episode order, below is the current lineup:

• Episode 101 “Pilot” January 18

• Episode 102 “Nittany Means Big” February 23

• Episode 103 “Put It On Your Cabbage” March 2

• Episode 104 “Save the Cat” March 9

• Episode 105 “You May Hug Your Hero” March 16 (Special guest star, Megan Thee Stallion)

The cast includes Tracy Morgan, Daniel Radcliffe, Erika Alexander, Bobby Moynihan, Precious Way, and Jalyn Hall.

Robert Carlock and Sam Means serve as co-showrunners, writers, and executive producers. Tina Fey, Tracy Morgan, Eric Gurian, and David Miner also executive produce.

The Fall and Rise of Reggie Dinkins airs an encore of the pilot as well as a new episode tonight, February 23, at 8pm ET/PT. Beginning Monday, March 2, the series will air at its normal time, 8:30pm ET/PT on NBC. All episodes available to stream on Peacock the next day.

Check out the sneak peek for tonight’s new episode “Nittany Means Big,” below.

Season 2 of Paradise opens with the world outside of the White House, taking you back in time to see how ‘The Event’ impacted those who were not under Secret Service protection nor the protection of extreme wealth. And as much as Season 1 was blanketed in unsettling sterile law and order as well as unnerving stillness, Season 2 ushers in the realities of fear and lawlessness and how they erode the behavior of the average citizen.

Just when you ask yourself, “how can Paradise follow its tremendous debut?,” Episode 201 blows it out of the water—taking the point of view of an outsider, which is in direct contrast to the militant introduction of Season 1 inside the bunker. This direction makes Season 2 feel like a completely new show, amplifying Dan Fogelman’s statements in previous interviews where he said he wants to keep each season related yet vastly different in the feelings they evoke from viewers.

Though Season 2 leans slightly more into the sci-fi side of the post-apocalyptic world, by the end of the first episode you will find the feelings of familiar panic—that have come to be synonymous with Paradise—settling in like an old friend.

Dan Fogelman’s Talent for Emotional Precision

In the world-building outside of the bunker, we learn more about the volcanic eruption that created a myriad of unnatural atmospheric disasters that wiped out most of the population. However, contrary to the lies fed to the citizens of the bunker, there is still life on the outside.

Season 2 exposes just how cut off the mega-rich are from the poor in terms of communication, access, and resources, but both groups are bound by control. The powers that be determined who received what information based on worthiness, wealth, and survivability.

In each case, neither side ever had the full picture.

And in pure Dan Fogelman fashion, the tears will flow. You can’t escape that. His ability to fuse intense drama and heightened suspense to create this other, new thing in his writing is a gift. Shows rarely deliver a follow-up season in this manner (The Walking Dead is a shining example of this fusion done right), and Dan does it with precision and ease.

Episode Guide

• Episode 201 “Graceland” - February 23

• Episode 202 “Mayday” - February 23

• Episode 203 “Another Day in Paradise” - February 23

• Episode 204 “A Holy Charge” - March 2

• Episode 205 “The Mailman” - March 9

• Episode 206 “Jane” - March 16

• Episode 207 “The Final Countdown” - March 23

• Episode 208 [REDACTED] - March 30

The Cast & Characters of Paradise Season 2

Returning cast:

• Xavier Collins (Sterling K. Brown)

• Samantha ‘Sinatra’ Redmond (Julianne Nicholson)

• President Cal Bradford (James Marsden, guest star)

• Dr. Gabriela Torabi (Sarah Shahi)

• Agent Nicole Robinson (Krys Marshall)

• Presley Collins (Aliyah Mastin)

• James Collins (Percy Daggs IV)

• Agent Jane Driscoll (Nicole Brydon Bloom)

• Jeremy Bradford (Charlie Evans)

• Teri Collins (Enuka Okuma)

• Agent Billy Pace (Jon Beavers)

New cast/guest stars:

• Annie (Shailene Woodley)

• Link (Thomas Doherty)

Interactive Marketing and Social Media Engagement

Confidential messages have been transmitted through Instagram channels and Paradise’s interactive radio website. Intercept transmissions (clues) to find out what the people inside and outside the bunker are up to at:

paradiseradio.hulu.com

A Change is Gonna Come

We not only see the world outside the bunker, but we also get a look inside now that a new regime has taken over. Powers shifted, ranks restructured, and the undercurrent of resistance now exists in a place that thrives on blind obedience.

The connections between characters like Sinatra, Jane, Billy, and the new characters Annie and Link take this season even further, posing new questions and even more jaw-dropping reveals. With this, Season 2 of Paradise cements itself as not only one of the best follow-up seasons, but also one of the best shows ever created.

Humanity in a Pressure Cooker

In the face of impending doom, Paradise continues to peel back the dark layers of humanity, showcasing just how far people will go for their own bottom line—even if it means the destruction of everyone around them.

Season 2 continues to expose just how disconnected the wealthy are from the rest of the world, but in its quieter moments, it highlights those who choose compassion and kindness even in the face of violence and tragedy. But one thing remains constant above all else:

Everyone is not who they seem.

By the end of the three-episode premiere, you will be left on pins and needles. By the penultimate episode, you will be left in utter disbelief.

Final Review

If Season 1 was about control, Season 2 is about consequence.

By shifting its lens to those outside the bunker—while restructuring the power dynamics within it—this season feels both familiar and entirely new. The emotional weight, the layered suspense, and the widening scope of morality and survival elevate Paradise into rare territory.

Season 2 doesn’t just match its debut. It exceeds every expectation.

Paradise premieres its first three episodes on Monday, February 23, on Hulu and Disney+. Each new episode will air weekly. Check out the ‘Special Look’ trailer below.

There is something intriguing and promising about an adult animated legal comedy set directly on the Las Vegas strip. The reputation of the city alone makes the premise interesting—neon lights, excessive gambling, endless spectacle, and delusions. And with a hedonistic magician teaming up with an underdog lawyer to turn legal cases on its head, Strip Law should work.

But 10-episodes later, I’m left with just one question:

Who is this show actually for?

Promise and Potential

Strip Law is a 10-episode half-hour adult animated comedy that was created by Cullen Crawford and stars the following performers as voice cast:

• Adam Scott (Severance)

• Janelle James (Abbott Elementary)

• Stephen Root (Barry, Office Space, King of the Hill)

• Shannon Gisela (M.I.A, Chasers)

• Keith David (Platoon, They Live, Greenleaf)

The series centers on uptight lawyer Lincoln Gumb (Adam Scott), who is too boring to win cases in Vegas—often times the judge adjourning the cases mid-speech for an undeserved victory for his courtroom opponents. That is until he meets local magician and spectacle extraordinaire, Sheila Flambé (Janelle James), to bring flash and theatrics to his tactics as they take on the stupidest cases the city brings to their doorstep.

Again, on paper this sounds like a perfect mix of Space Ghost Coast to Coast meets Ren & Stimpy—chaotic and slightly dark nonsense—lightly structured under the guise of “the law.”

In execution? Not so much.

A Punchline That Just Doesn’t Land

From the moment you hit play on the first episode, Strip Law immediately looks and feels like the R-Rated animated version of USA Network’s The Rainmaker—an underdog lawyer who works hard with his ragtag team to earn the respect of his peers inside the courtroom—mixed with the absolute absurdity of animated series’ like Archer and Big Mouth.

The cases are over the top, ridiculous, and the methods of winning are beyond unorthodox; culminating in an amalgamation of zany and unrealistic storylines wrapped thinly in themes of finding self-confidence and professional prestige. Through multiple cases, chronicling a year from when we first meet Lincoln in Episode 1, Sheila helps transform him from a courtroom disaster to a lethal legal machine.

Given the premise, Strip Law should feel like a slow-burn, yet wacky, character evolution with the audience feeling a sense of pride by the finale.

So why doesn’t it?

Performances Outweigh the Plot

Janelle James as Sheila delivers a performance laced with sharp wit and comedically ruthless precision that we’ve come to cherish her for, while Adam Scott balances Sheila’s personality as Lincoln—socially and professionally insecure with dreams of being great but lacking the confidence and internal mayhem to do so. As a duo, they create the perfect combination that makes their banter feel real, despite the setting.

And perhaps the best part of the plot is the rivalry between Steve Nichols (Keith David) and Lincoln. He makes it his mission (and his personality) to publicly ridicule and humiliate Lincoln at every turn to keep him at the bottom of the Las Vegas lawyer food chain.

The friendship works. The rivalry works. The performances work. The structure?

Well, this is where it gets shaky.

Chaos Overshadows Cohesion

One of the episodes is a Halloween episode but the courtroom case and layout centers on Christmas…with a show release date in February. And while this is meant to represent how time, dates, and holidays don’t really exist in Vegas—what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas—the tonal and seasonal mismatch makes the series feel untethered right away, taking away the audiences willingness to align themselves with the overarching story.

It’s not the raunchiness that is an issue. That’s expected in a setting like this. It’s that the ridiculousness is oversold, overpowering the message and, ultimately, the watchability of the show.

Final Review

Overall, Strip Law falls a bit flat as the attempt to match the chaos of Las Vegas overshadows the central themes and storylines. The mayhem we’re meant to enjoy becomes distracting rather than immersive.

Vegas doesn’t need to be louder than the characters. The characters simply need to be strong enough to survive the madness. And Strip Law sometimes forgot that.

All 10 episodes of Strip Law are available to stream now on Netflix. Check out the trailer below.

© Kivonshe | So There’s That
Original editorial commentary on film and television. All rights reserved. Reproduction or redistribution without attribution is not permitted.

Prime Video’s 56 Days arrives with a premise that immediately piques your curiosity before taking you down a rabbit hole of mysterious events. Written and executive produced by Lisa Zwerling and Karyn Usher, and starring Dove Cameron (Descendants) as Ciara Wyse, Avan Jogia (Victorious) as Oliver Kennedy, Karla Souza (How to Get Away With Murder) as Detective Lee Reardon, and Dorian Missick (Luke Cage) as Detective Karl Connolly, this eight-episode series places you at the end of the story and leaves clues for you to go back in time to solve the ultimate riddle: who’s body is in the tub?

Right away, the show gives How to Get Away With Murder—and not just because Karla Souza leads the investigation. The immediate whodunnit structure, along with constant jumps between past and present, establishes the rhythm instantly. But don’t be fooled. We’ve seen enough of this format to know that everything isn’t always as it seems. And what’s obvious is almost always hiding a layer of even darker discoveries.

The series opens with Ciara (Cameron) and Oliver (Jogia) meeting by happenstance in a supermarket, and immediately falling hard (red flag) and dangerously fast. Fifty-six days later—in present day—homicide investigators arrive at Oliver’s apartment only to find a brutal murder with an intentionally decomposed body. The question mark that haunts the entire series: is it Oliver or is it Ciara?

From the moment they meet, it is made clear to the audience that something is off. Initially, it feels like Ciara may be walking into a trap—until the perspective shifts, suggesting that Ciara may be the most dangerous of the two. As the chapters unfold, you are constantly pulled between two people who are presented as both the wolf and the sheep.

But perhaps the most unexpected storytelling tool in 56 Days isn’t the mystery, but the music. It drives every mood, conversation, and shift in tension so effectively that it begins to feel like the third character in every scene. The score becomes the pulse of danger, forcefully guiding the audience toward every secret hiding in plain sight.

And the secrets exist in every corner of every frame. If you blink, you’ll miss it.

The timeline structure of the series is not sensitive to fleeting attention spans. If you’re scrolling on your phone, you will miss the immediate chronology laid before you. The past and present are visually similar and—to the untrained ear—sound design doesn’t overtly signal timeline shifts. In a society where film and television writers are almost forced to show the plot within the first 5 minutes to capture viewer attention, this methodology can be more harmful to shows that shift timelines than those whose story unfolds in chronological order. For 56 Days, it seemed to teeter on the edge of doing almost too much.

In the present, Detectives Reardon (Souza) and Connolly (Missick) investigate this heinous crime carefully, slowly piecing together exactly what happened, and when it happened, in Oliver’s apartment. And by the end of Chapter 1, the audience is rewarded with a twist that snaps shut like a bear trap. You’re not just curious anymore, you’re committed to finding the truth.

By Chapter 6, the pieces of the puzzle begin to lock in place; secrets are exposed and the truth becomes more complex and heartbreaking than anyone could’ve expected. However, the middle episodes began to lose steam, feeling like a slow drag through the mud at times. Some of the reveals and side plots felt rushed and the connections felt like too many to keep up with. In the end, the finale lands a lot softer than the buildup alludes to, but the series—a story rooted in dark secrets, grief, greed, and revenge—ties the bow in a way that still feels complete despite its structurally chaotic and slower moments.

Final Thoughts

56 Days is based on Catherine Ryan Howard’s bestselling novel of the same name—the original plot unfolding during Dublin’s COVID-19 lockdown. The novel not only became a New York Times and Washington Post’s Best Thrillers of 2021 but it also won the Irish Book Awards Crime Novel of the Year.

But there is a large shift in the adaptation: it moves the story to present-day Boston, removing the pandemic setting completely. On the one hand, it feels like a smart move to keep the adaptation rooted in the here and now rather than turning it into a COVID-19 period piece. However, one has to wonder if the lockdown version may have heightened the psychological fear, making the finale worth its weight in suspense…

All eight episodes of 56 Days is available to stream on Prime Video.

There are major sports memories that never leave you—for some, a championship game, a player, a draft pick. For me, it’s the memories of playing basketball in the alley with a child’s recreation of the rim with old wood and plastic crates and the dream of being a basketball player.

Prime Video’s 4-part docuseries Soul Power: The Legend of the American Basketball Association is both a history lesson and an emotional time machine. According to Amazon MGM Studios, the series is the “first definitive docuseries about the American Basketball Association,” chronicling the league’s birth in 1967 and the 9 chaotic, revolutionary seasons that forced the NBA to take notice.

Executive produced by Common, Julius “Dr. J” Erving, Todd Lieberman, George Karl, and Kenan Kamwana Holley—who also serves as the director—Soul Power explores the players and the time that changed basketball forever. And there is no better time than Black History Month than to formally document and celebrate the ABA.

If you grew up on loving basketball, Soul Power will leave you breathless.

Before streaming and YouTube highlights were in the palms of our hands, there were DVDs, radio, and late-night sports highlights with grainy footage that had everyone glued to their TVs. And if you grew up in the 90s, you knew the likes of those from AND1 mixtapes, Rucker Park legends, and the frenzy surrounding new NBA Live and future NBA games on gaming systems.

Even then, basketball wasn’t just a sport—it was a lifestyle.

From pick-up games to the latest shoes, we copied everyone from Michael Jordan, Allen Iverson, Steve Kerr, Dennis Rodman, Shawn Kemp, and even the street legends who made the game feel limitless—Philip “Hot Sauce” Champion, Rafer “Skip to My Lou” Alston, and Nancy “Lady Magic” Lieberman, the First Lady of Rucker Park.

And Soul Power makes it extremely clear: none of those we idolize would have the platform they have to inspire us if not for the pioneers of the ABA.

Soul Power is the story of a league and of players who were bold enough to challenge the giant that was the NBA—constantly watching and innovating their play and their practices, ultimately changing the sport forever.

The series explores how the ABA paved the way for:

• 3-point shot system

• The slam dunk contest

• Teams that historically franchised into the NBA (Nets, Spurs, Nuggets, Pacers)

• Opportunities for women in sports and sports business

• A generation of men who would go down in basketball history

Julius Erving, Moses Malone, Spencer Haywood, George Gervin, Rick Barry, and George Karl lend their time and memories to the series, recounting every obstacle and inequity they faced in demanding respect from a league that considered them substandard.

It was through that lens that ignited the players in the ABA to do something extraordinary—leaning into everything that made their game better:

Flavor.

Flashiness.

Autonomy.

During a time where basketball players were looked at as mere entertainment spectacles, the air of “just shut up and play basketball” felt by the NBA, the ABA responded with with a counter they could no longer ignore:

You will notice us. And you will respect our game.

One of the more powerful elements that Soul Power explores is basketball through a historical context. Founded during the height of the Civil Rights Movement, the ABA was one of the first truly racially integrated institutions in the U.S. This was no longer just basketball history. This was American history.

The ABA created a space for Black athletes to express their individuality, personality, exceptional skill that colored outside the confines of the NBA, and agency in ways that still echo in all sports even today. As the legends in the series recount these pivotal moments—the excitement, the defiance, the disappointment, and the joy—you can feel how this era isn’t just an era for them. It’s a lifetime.

The product of their courage, bravery, and brotherhood led to the increase of women’s interest in the sport—not just as fans but as business women in the career. Ellie Brown, owner of the Kentucky Colonels, created an all female board member team for the Colonels and innovated marketing efforts to get the community invested in the team. This level of commitment to the success of a franchise continues to live on in basketball today. Their bold display of passion and pushing their creativity to the brink paved the way not just women to participate, but created an avenue for empowerment for new league creation—like Napheesa Collier and Breanna Stewart launching Unrivaled, a league created for women in the WNBA to earn year-round income and equity ownership.

This collective effort and empowerment proves that what everyone contributed to the ABA did can never be undone. They had the passion to challenge a giant and, in the long run, it paid off.

Soul Power doesn’t just detail a league. It celebrates a movement that reshaped and mobilized professional sports forever. That’s not just basketball. That’s power.

Soul Power: The Legend of the American Basketball Association premieres Thursday, February 12, on Prime Video. Check out the trailer below.

© Kivonshe | So There’s That
Original editorial commentary on film and television. All rights reserved. Reproduction or redistribution without attribution is not permitted.

The ‘Burbs turns suburbia into the ultimate mystery playground.

The lawns are freshly mowed, the neighbors are kind, and the homes all look like they were pulled from a Hallmark movie. And yet, the series adaptation of The ‘Burbs wastes no time letting you know that things are not as they appear.

Created, written, and executive produced by Celeste Hughey, the series brings the cult classic 1989 film into a modern landscape with a fresh comedic and mystery-driven twist. Executive producers also include Keke Palmer, Seth McFarlane, Erica Huggins, Aimee Carlson, Brian Grazer, Kristen Zolner, and Natalie Berkus.

The ‘Burbs stars Keke Palmer (Nope, Hustlers) and Jack Whitehall (Jungle Cruise, Fresh Meat) as Samira and Rob Fisher, alongside an incredible ensemble cast featuring Paula Pell (Girls5eva), Julia Duffy (Newhart), Kapil Talwalkar (Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist), Mark Proksch (What We Do in the Shadows), and Justin Kirk (Weeds).

For fans of the original film, the nostalgia bug didn’t miss the creator at all. During an interview with Scenes in Color, Celeste revealed that the set of the TV adaptation is the same set used for the 1989 film—bridging the original and the reimagining in the most deliciously eerie way possible.

From the opening theme song, The ‘Burbs purpose is crystal clear: mystery, comedy, and a lot of chaos. The title card leans into this feeling with strange, playful, and puppeteering-like visuals and a beat that makes you dance before each episode begins. And right away in the pilot episode, the central plot is revealed to the audience.

Wife moves into the neighborhood. She spots a creepy house across the street. Husband says it’s empty, but wife feels the likelihood of that to be false. It’s time to investigate.

As a lawyer on maternity leave with an abundance of free time on her hands, Samira decides to add private investigator to her resume. What commences as playful curiosity to break the mundanity of her day quickly unravels into a full-blown suburban mystery—a mystery that neighbors appear to have tiptoed around but never fully explored, including her husband.

The final result: a modern reimagining that feels like the lovechild of Knives Out Mystery, Scooby-Doo, and Desperate Housewives.

In this series, Keke Palmer also finds catharsis in being a mother on screen. Keke's natural charisma and comedic instincts perfectly imbue the role of Samira. During an interview with E! News, Keke also explains how the role felt personal.

“I was a little bit nervous but then hearing how they were going to remake it into its own thing, it just really excited me—especially being a mom and finally playing a mom.”

That authenticity bleeds into the character in the best way. And in Hinkley Hills, Samira feels out of place—geographically, socially, and culturally—and Keke leans into her personality to amplify those worries within the character beautifully.

Jack Whitehall describes the series as the perfect genre mashup during that same interview:

“I think that’s the great appeal of a show like this. You get to sort of sit in multiple genres…it has a horror element to it. It’s very funny…but also at the heart of it is a story about this couple who are pulled apart then find their way back together.”

That tonal balance is the secret. The show is funny without losing the element of mystery and suspenseful without losing the heart of the relationships.

And the supporting cast contributes to that heart, with scene-stealers across the board.

• Kyrie McAlpin is an acting genius as Rory—a razor-sharp Girl Scout with entrepreneurial ambitions and flawless comedic timing

• Mark Proksch makes Tod’s one-liner deliveries instant classics—lines that will stand the test of time as “notable quotables”

• Paula Pell steals almost every moment with Dana’s anxiety-driven and ill-timed puns where silence is the actual key to safety

It’s ridiculous. It’s clever. It’s entertaining.

As the plot unfolds—every discovery exposed like a layered onion—each episode adds another question, a new clue, and multiple moments of “wait…what?” While the audience may not get all the answers right away, one thing is undeniably clear about The ‘Burbs: it’s that dang good.

We’re ready to join Samira and the gang in the neighborhood watch. Are you?

The ‘Burbs premieres with all 8 episodes releasing Sunday, February 8, on Peacock. Check out the trailer below.

© Kivonshe | So There’s That
Original editorial commentary on film and television. All rights reserved. Reproduction or redistribution without attribution is not permitted.

There are very few things in entertainment that feel like a warm hug and a sugar rush at the same time. A brand-new The Muppet Show special event is one of them.

Premiering Wednesday, February 4 on Disney+ and ABC, the half-hour special brings music, comedy, mildly controlled chaos, and a very special guest appearance from Sabrina Carpenter. What it does not do is coast on nostalgia alone—and that’s the ultimate magic trick.

This a brightly colored, high-energy reintroduction to Muppet magic, designed to charm longtime fans while pulling in a new generation that may only know the Muppets through GIFs, commercials, or their parents’ obsession (yes, they’re still obsessed).

What This Special Aims to Do (And Why It Might Work)

Think of this event as:

• SNL for kids…

• But with puppets…

• Less cynicism…

• And way more (kid-friendly) chaos

The special leans into everything that made The Muppet Show iconic—fast-paced sketches, musical numbers (a mix of popular songs plus new and classic favorites), and that specific brand of mayhem that feels like the show barely holds it together.

And that is by design.

It’s louder, brighter, more colorful, and intentionally playful—blending legacy and humor with modern commentary in a way that feels inviting instead of outdated. The goal is clear: remind audiences why the Muppets mattered, and prove they still do.

And yes, this special feels very much like a pilot in spirit, carrying the hope of a full series expansion that parents, kids, and nostalgia-loving adults can enjoy together.

Back Down Memory Lane

For anyone newer to the franchise (or just needing a refresher):

• The Muppet Show first aired in the UK on September 5, 1976

• It then aired in the U.S. in syndication on September 20, 1976

• Developed by Jim Henson, the series introduced a Muppet-based variety show with Kermit the Frog and Miss Piggy famously at the center

• Mia Farrow was the first celebrity guest appearance

• The series ran until 1981; 5 seasons and 120 episodes

The Muppet Show influence has lived on through various films, commercials, and pop culture moments that speak to its ability to remain relevant. That legacy matters—and this special aims to keep that legacy going.

Executive produced by Seth Rogen, the special doesn’t attempt to reimagine the Muppets. It amplifies them—letting their unique brand of absurdity, sincerity, and musical chaos do the heavy lifting.

In an era where everything is IP-driven—but not everyone understands the “why” behind the magic—this special feels intentional. It honors what came before while opening the door for the possibilities to come.

The Muppets have always been unrestrained and unconfined, simply needing a little room—and a little magic—to play. This special gives them just that.

The Muppet Show premieres Wednesday, February 4 on ABC at 9 p.m. ET/PT and at 3 a.m. ET/PT on Disney+.

© Kivonshe | So There’s That
Original editorial commentary on film and television. All rights reserved. Reproduction or redistribution without attribution is not permitted.

Sometimes the biggest criminal in the household is the one you’d least expect. And surely, you’d never suspect a loving grandmother, right?

Paramount+ is kicking off 2026 with a British comedy that understands one sacred truth: family chaos is best served with a straight face and a deeply unserious plan. Can You Keep A Secret? premieres Thursday, February 12, with all six episodes available to stream at once. If the trailer is any indication, this series is bound to be unhinged.

At the center of the madness is Debbie Fendon, a domineering grandmother whose idea of “protection” involves insurance fraud, emotional manipulation, and a husband in the attic.

Yes. The attic.

But we respect the commitment.

A premise that shows promise

The setup, directly from Paramount+ (and emphasized in the trailer):

• Debbie’s husband, William, is mistakenly declared dead

• Debbie decides, “Hey, why not?”

• William is alive and hiding in the attic

• Debbie swears the family to secrecy

• The real threat isn’t getting caught… it’s Debbie

In short, Can You Keep A Secret? looks like Keeping Up Appearances if Mrs. Bucket (pronounced bouquet) could convince her husband to go along with it (Hyacinth was ahead of her time, okay).

That’s the energy the series gives, and if you know British comedy, it will lean heavily into the bit. And the trailer wastes zero time letting you know this isn’t a cozy comedy—it’s a pressure cooker disguised as a sitcom.

A cast built for chaos

The series stars:

• Dawn French (French & Saunders) as Debbie Fendon

• Mark Heap (Friday Night Dinner) as William, Debbie’s husband

• Craig Roberts (Submarine) as Harold, Debbie’s son

• Mandip Gill (Doctor Who) as Neha, Harold’s wife and a police officer

The last bit of information is what throws a wrench into the plan, given Neha’s obligation to uphold the law. But Debbie seems to always have a plan. What that plan is, we have yet to find out.

Why this series might work

The only information we have to go on is the trailer, but it looks promising for the gutsy comedy, showcasing glimpses of various strengths:

• Escalated comedy vs punchlines/one-liners

• The lead isn’t the quirky old lady; she’s actually kind of dangerous

• Every character is complicit in the crime, which allows the audience to stress about how they’ll actually get away with it

• The tension is unspoken, resting between glances and impending doom

Can You Keep A Secret? doesn’t ask if the secret will get out. It’s asking how long the family can hold it together before it does.

The trailer gives away some, but clearly not all. However, if the series maintains what the trailer suggests, Can You Keep A Secret? could be one of those sneaky comedies that wins you over by the end of episode one and has you begging for a renewal by episode two.

Sometimes the most dangerous thing in a family isn’t the secret itself. It’s the person enjoying it just a little too much.

Can You Keep A Secret? premieres with all six episodes Thursday, February 12, on Paramount+. Check out the trailer below.

© Kivonshe | So There’s That Podcast
Original editorial commentary on film and television. All rights reserved. Reproduction or redistribution without attribution is not permitted.

This is the day of all days at work that you wished you clocked out…

There’s something uniquely cruel about a thriller that takes place where you’re supposed to feel safe: secured building, badged entry, routine. Steal weaponizes that familiarity by turning it into a gilded cage—and refuses to ever let you cat your breath.

All six episodes drop at once Wednesday on Prime Video and, by the time the first hour ends, you’ll understand why binge culture can feel like both a gift and a curse. This series doesn’t ease you in. The first episode comes at you like a shotgun blast to the face—you beg for the firing to end but it never does, and you can’t look away.

A high-octane story inside a pressure cooker

Created and written by Sotiris Nikias, Steal centers on Zara (Sophie Turner), an ordinary office worker at pension fund investment firm Lochmill Capital, whose mundane life is immediately and violently derailed when a gang forces her—and her best mate Luke (Archie Madekwe)—to help execute the heist of the century.

Billions of pounds. People’s pensions. No clean way out.

Opposite them is DCI Rhys Covac (Jacob Fortune-Lloyd), a man chasing the truth while battling his own demons and financial desperation. It’s a collision of personal hell and institutional rot, and the series knows exactly how to exploit that tension.

Sound, the underrated character

The use of sound is a powerful force in delivering this jaw-dropping, heart-stopping thriller. One particular scene in the first episode (no spoilers here) is deeply harrowing—silence, a prayer, and a hope that said prayer would get answered stands out because of the absence of ambient room noise. The muffled hearing, shaking breaths, and pounding heart while watching a train wreck leaves the audience in auditory suspension—this method is so effective it feels invasive. You don’t watch it. You endure it.

This is where Steal understands the assignment. It doesn’t have to rush because there is nowhere for you to go.

Truth, deception, and the blame-game

Inside job or setup designed to look that way?

The theme of 2026 with film and television seems to weave in incredibly unguessable plot twists and Steal falls right in line. Trust, deception, greed. Who does the finger point to and who’s pulling the strings to lead you down a pre-destined path? Zara and Luke may be in too deep, but they’re not alone. Everyone becomes a suspect. Relationships fracture. Paranoia spreads. Your next move needs to be your best move or it’ll be the last move you ever make.

But what ensures a whirlwind of carefully thought out espionage? Layers within layers of carefully crafted lies dusted with enough truth that puts it just on the right side of believable. This crafting sends the series into a vast and highly-constructed IT web masking territory—where the truth bounces from server to server with no hope of landing on the real mastermind in sight.

Yet the show still powers forward. What starts as a simple heist (is there even such a thing) turns into whatever version of chaos that gets put through a wood chipper then spat out…in the best way possible. And if you’re someone who loves shows built around mission-driven checkpoints, Steal is engineered for you.

Lingering thoughts

Steal keeps you guessing until you’re exhausted. Then it asks the question that sticks: what would you do if £4 billion was sitting in front of you like a carrot but with no strings attached?

This series is emotionally unyielding. It interrogates morality, wage disparity, and desperation without pretending there is a clean cut answer. It asks how far you’d go to change your circumstances—and what happens when the plan collapses under the weight of human fear.

The performances by Turner and Madekwe amplify this sentiment, making you both root for them and scream at them at every choice and misstep. Their on-screen chemistry appears to manifest in a bond rooted in teamwork—a potential pre-production decision made to be there for one another no matter what. And with £4 billion on the line, they have no choice.

The verdict

Steal might be one of the strongest thriller series of 2026. The only real risk? That in a binge-first ecosystem, something this well executed could be talked about intensely and then forgotten just as fast.

It deserves better.

Steal premieres Wednesday, January 21 on Prime Video. All six episodes will be available to stream at once. Check out the trailer below.

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Peacock’s PONIES arrives disguised as something familiar: a Cold War spy thriller steeped in muted tones, coded conversations, and slowly grown paranoia. But then the first episode ends—and the show reveals its true hand. This series isn’t the slow burn you think it is. It is a controlled explosion that never settles. And why should it?

That’s boring.

Created and written by Susanna Fogel and David Iserson, with Emilia Clarke (Game of Thrones) also serving as an executive producer, PONIES reframes espionage through the eyes of two women the system was never set up to see coming. All eight episodes premiere Thursday, January 15, and the series is engineered for momentum. Once it accelerates, it doesn’t let up.

They cannot fight what they do not see coming

Set in Moscow, 1977, PONIES centers on Bea (Emilia Clarke) and Twila (Haley Lu Richardson)—two women working as secretaries at the American Embassy—officially labeled as “PONIs” (Persons of No Interest). They type, they shop, they fetch coffee. Life is utterly mundane and repetitive until their husbands—both CIA operatives—are killed under suspicious circumstances. Bea, a highly educated, Russian-speaking child of Soviet immigrants, knows that the explanation doesn’t add up. Twila, a fearless small-town transplant with a sharp edge and very little patience, knows an even harder truth: no one will investigate unless they force their hand.

What follows is not a glamorous recruitment process. It’s a crash course in danger, deception, and the realization that the CIA—and the geopolitical machine it serves—is far more treacherous than either woman was prepared for.

A plot that uses history against itself

One of PONIES’ smartest choices is anchoring its premise in the gender inequalities of the 1970s. The distinguished looks, body language, and predictable deployment patterns of previous CIA operatives in Moscow have blown their cover. However, the Russians would never suspect women because their social and working status relegated them to being more ornamental than valuable. Because of this stereotype, the CIA (reluctantly) deploys exactly what no one else would ever suspect—those they deem irrelevant and unimportant.

The outcome isn’t an empowerment-by-slogan story. It’s empowerment-by-survival.

Bea and Twila are not trained. They stumble, they improvise, and they make mistakes that place them in grave danger. And the show makes sure not to romanticize their dilemma. The tension that comes from watching two civilians crash course their spycraft abilities isn’t cinematic. It’s wildly unforgiving.

Clarke and Richardson are electric together. Their chemistry feels lived-in, rooted in shared grief and growing trust. Off-screen sisterhood translates directly on-screen, and the series understands that their bond is the real spine of the story. Every risk they take is filtered through one question: will the other survive this?

Clarke’s performance is particularly impressive given the sheer volume of Russian dialogue she carries—something she’s spoken about publicly, including on Today. She delivers it with precision and emotional weight, grounding Bea’s intellect in palpable fear. Richardson, meanwhile, brings volatility and courage to Twila, making her abrasive edge feel more like much-needed armor than uncooperativeness.

By the end of Episode 1, the danger is clear. By Episode 4, the stress is relentless. PONIES peaks early—and then it dares to take it further.

And it does. Repeatedly.

PONIES succeeds because it understands its greatest weapon: perspective. By centering two women the world—and the CIA—dismissed, it exposes the blind spots of power itself. The show is tense, clever, and emotionally grounded—and it uses history not as a backdrop, but as an obstacle its characters must outsmart.

It’s not about becoming spies. It’s about surviving systems that never intended you to matter in the first place. In that, PONIES sinks its teeth in and never lets go.

All eight episodes of PONIES are available to stream Thursday, January 15, on Peacock. Check out the trailer below.

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A smaller story with an even bigger heart, HBO’s A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms trades dragons for duty, arriving to our screens with an unenviable task: expand the world of Westeros without leaning on the spectacle that defined Game of Thrones. Set 90 years before the original series, this six-episode first season plants its flag in something intimate—a journey, a bond, and a question that feels timeless in this universe: what does it actually mean to be honorable?

Based on George R. R. Martin’s novella “The Hedge Knight,” and created by Martin alongside Ira Parker, the series centers on Ser Duncan “Dunk” the Tall (Peter Claffey) and his unlikely young companion Egg (Dexter Sol Ansell). Their relationship forms the emotional spine of the show—less master and squire, more older brother and stubborn (and sometimes innocently annoying) little shadow—forged through shared travel, witnessed violence, and the slow realization that survival in Westeros often demands more than good intentions.

Slow building has its purpose and its limits

The first two episodes move cautiously slow, laying the groundwork for Dunk and Egg’s dynamic to take root. Dunk begins the story alone, shaped by grief and guided by a simple moral compass. When Egg enters his life, it isn’t destiny so much as it is mere coincidence—the kind that goes unquestioned, yet changing every outcome in its wake.

By episode 3, the series finds its footing. The stakes rise, danger becomes unavoidable, and Dunk’s sense of responsibility sharpens. He’s a character defined not by cleverness or grandeur, but by decency. There’s a faint echo of a future Ned Stark here—not in lineage, but in spirit. Dunk isn’t flashy. He doesn’t perform heroism. He simply tries to do the right thing, even when it costs him.

That grounding is both the show’s strength and, at times, its limitations. As a half-hour drama with only six episodes, the pacing feels uneven. The final three episodes are gripping and information-dense, but they arrive almost abruptly, leaving little room to sit with the consequences of what unfolds. The emotional payoff is there—it just doesn’t get the breathing room it would receive if all six episodes were one-hour long.

Comedy, conflict, and contrast live where brutality once reigned

One of the series’ most pleasant surprises is its tonal balance. There’s humor here—dry, situational, character-driven—that never undercuts the stakes, but adds relief to them like an accent mark. As Claffey explained in an October 2025 NYCC interview with Big Gold Belt Media:

“We knew pretty early on that we were gonna be leaning into the comedic aspects of things…it works and you still get your political conflict and gory violence and all these things as well.”

That contrast is key. The comedy is earned. And when the story turns dark, it does so without apology—highlighting the aspects we love about its flagship series. Ansell put it bluntly in the same interview:

“It’s also probably the most disturbing thing I still have been in.”

These two sentiments—levity and unease—coexist throughout the season, capturing exactly what A Knight of Seven Kingdoms aims to be: approachable, unsettling, and emotionally honest.

The Song of Fire and Ice reigns on

A special nod to Rami Djawadi, whose score subtly weaves a familiar “A Song of Fire and Ice” motifs into something gentler, anchoring this smaller tale to the giant that is its predecessor without overwhelming and overshadowing its own identity. It’s not just nostalgia bait (because that’s why you’re here, right), but connective tissue to tie the worlds and the tales together.

With a Season 2 renewal already announced ahead of its debut, this first season feels as though it serves partly as a litmus test—gauging appetite for a quieter corner of Westeros to an audience who lives and loves to compare. While they are related, functionally they are not the same. However, the structure of the series compared to its predecessor may be the determining factor for its success beyond Season 2. If the show continues a half-hour format, a longer episode order would be ideal to allow audiences more time to bond with Dunk and Egg the way they deserve, the way the source material intended.

Still, A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms succeeds where it matters most. It reminds us that heroism in Westeros isn’t always about power or prophecy. Sometimes, it’s about choosing kindness when cruelty would be easier—and carrying that choice forward, even when you’re unsure if the world will reward that same kindness in return.

A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms premieres Sunday, January 18 on HBO and HBO Max at 10pm EST, airing weekly until the finale. Check out the trailer below.

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NBC’s crime procedural The Hunting Party is back and it doubles down on suspense, psychology, and danger—wasting no time reminding viewers exactly what kind of show it is. Season 2 picks up like a conversation in mid-sentence: no explanations, no easing back in, only heavy pursuit. The team is reinstated, the threat immediate, with questions about the real dealings in The Pit surrounding the team like a dark cloud.

Starring Melissa Roxburgh (Manifest) as Rebecca “Bex” Henderson, Patrick Sabongui (The Flash) as Jacob Hassani, Sara García (The Ride) as Jennifer Morales, and Josh McKenzie (La Brea) as Shane Florence, the network describes The Hunting Party as

“a high-concept crime procedural centered on a small team of investigators led by former FBI profiler Rebecca “Bex” Henderson. Their mission is deceptively simple: track down and capture the most dangerous killers in the world—all of whom escaped from The Pit, a top-secret government prison that was never supposed to exist.”

And Season 2 makes one thing crystal clear in its premiere: the killers are not the only problem.

Previously on The Hunting Party

By the end of Season 1, the series detonated its premise…literally:

• The Pit exploded

• Multiple inmates escaped

• The investigative unit was disbanded

• The lingering question: who detonated The Pit, and why?

The finale reframed the series from a hunt-the-killer model into something far scarier—taking the hunt deeper into conspiracies, secrecy, and what happens when the institutions erected to stop evil end up creating it instead.

Season 2 Episode 1 “Ron Simms”

The Season 2 premiere, titled “Ron Simms,” throws us right back into the field. Guest starring Eric McCormack (Will & Grace, Nine Bodies in a Mexican Morgue), the episode focuses on the teams’ pursuit of their first killer since the explosion. Like all of the inmates, his crimes are driven by a deep obsession—his being love, specifically with women he perceives as emotionally vulnerable.

Rather than sensationalizing the case, the episode uses it to underscore what The Hunting Party does best:

• examine the psychology behind the violence (profiling)

• study the environments that would sharpen those impulses

• question which side of right they’re on

While the hunt is always tense and unsettling, the lingering questions settle deep into their bones like shrapnel—with no easy way to pull them out without serious irreversible damage.

As Season 2 unfolds, the show begins to pull back, taking a birds eye view upon itself to discover the truth about The Pit—what exactly was its purpose and what went horribly wrong.

An especially intriguing piece of that puzzle this season is Kari Matchett (Leverage, The Night Agent) as the enigmatic Colonel Eve Lazarus. Her involvement raises uncomfortable questions about who truly controls the narrative—and who benefits from keeping it all secret.

In an interview with StageRightSecrets, Roxburgh summed up the shift perfectly:

“[Bex] is now up against not only killers but, kind of, higher corrupt government officials as well.”

That tension—between field agents chasing tangible threats and shadowy government systems above them—is where The Hunting Party finds it sharpest edge.

Why you should be watching the show

What sets The Hunting Party apart from other crime procedurals isn’t just rooted in one or two differences. The writers of this series manage to operate on multiple levels at once—effectively weaving multiple webs to draw in a broad range of audience members across genres:

• it is a manhunt style concept

• it focuses on being a serialized mystery about a secret prison

• it highlights morality and ethics within capital punishment institutions and government systems

The Season 2 premiere lets you know right away that this season will lean deeper into government suspicion. It will not excuse its killers, but it will refuse to flatten them—bringing more color to the black and white/good and evil scenarios, making each episode a must watch.

This show doesn’t just ask whether the prison system can warp people beyond recognition. It asks whether dismantling those systems is more dangerous than leaving them intact.

The Hunting Party airs Thursday, January 8, at 10/9c on NBC, with episodes streaming next day on Peacock.

Season 2 of HBO’s critically acclaimed medical drama—fresh off Critics Choice Award wins for Best Drama Series, Noah Wyle for Best Actor in a Drama Series, and Katherine LaNasa for Best Supporting Actress in a Drama Series—returns with the familiar hum of fluorescent lights and the promise that nothing about this shift will be normal.

There is a particular electricity inside an emergency department during a holiday shift. It’s not excitement. It’s anticipation layered with dread layered with muscle memory. Season 2 of The Pitt walks us right into this feeling—not with a crash cart or a siren, but with the quiet understanding that the bodies will come, the stories will follow, and no one will ever truly be ready for the spectrum of chaos that ensues.

We are 10 months removed from everything that broke, healed, cracked open, and refused to be resolved in Season 1. Time has passed but healing has its own schedule. The new season unfolds across a chaotic Fourth of July, beginning at 7:00am. As many shift workers know, never bet on a normal day of clocking in and clocking out on time. We know better by now and so do they.

Within the chaos is the return of Dr. Langdon (Patrick Ball) after his rehab treatment for prescription drug misuse—a secret discovered in Season 1 by Dr. Trinity Santos (Isa Briones) that shattered any possibility of denying the truth, forcing him and the team to confront the issue instead. His return is everything but celebratory as he walks into:

• a department that knows his history

• a job that requires administering the very drugs he abused

• colleagues who love him, resent him, worry about him, and need him—sometimes all at once

He comes back different and also painfully the same. Recovery isn’t a finish line—it’s something you carry into the room with you while being asked to save lives. His friendship with Dr. Robby (Noah Wyle) also carries a fracture that hasn’t healed, and the complicated, blocked-off tenderness with Dr. Santos sits in the entire emergency department, whether they acknowledge it or not. Watching Dr. Langdon navigate his new normal feels unbearably human as he attempts to act casual when nothing about his return is casual at all.

Dr. Robby enters the shift ahead of taking a long-overdue vacation, but the last shift before rest is rarely ever soft or forgiving, and he is not ready in the way he wishes. That is the sort of honest The Pitt excels at—this show is not interested in pretending doctors are anti-emotional machines. They bring all their mess with them and still do the work. Sometimes, the mess is their only motivation to keep doing the work at all.

Into this already loaded atmosphere walks Dr. Baran Al-Hashimi (Sepideh Moafi), a new attending from the VA. She is the kind of calm presence who makes you wonder what she survived before stepping into “the pitt.” Her entry is a refreshing challenge to Dr. Robby and his medical practices, bringing her own background into the mix:

• a different training background

• a different relationship to trauma

• an unconventional philosophy about the advancement of medical practice

Dr. Al-Hashimi is composed, precise, and unintimidated by legacy or Dr. Robby. Her relationship with Dr. Robby doesn’t explode in fireworks; it’s subtler and sharper. Philosophy versus experience, technology versus touch, how to teach, how to lead, what medicine is becoming and what it should never stop being—the friction is intellectual and deeply human, the kind that doesn’t need to raise its voice to be loud. Their dynamic mimics many conversations being had in all walks of life, and The Pitt takes those fears and optimism and places it into two very dynamic—and strong-willed—characters and asks “now what?”

One of Season 2’s most unnerving arcs isn’t a villain—it’s a system failure. A network crash pushes the hospital into full analog mode: paper charting, runners, manual interpretation. It’s a reminder that modern medicine is built on technology, but held together by people—exhausted, brilliant, flawed people who have to keep going whether the system supports them or not. The Pitt doesn’t ask if the system will fail the workers. It asks what we do when the system fails the patients. It’s a living reminder that while technology is convenient, it will never be the heart of patient care—the people are.

And because this is The Pitt, there is still humor, superstition, and half-joking “what’s next?” energy that sits underneath emergency medicine like a drumbeat. One of the show’s greatest accomplishments is refusing to treat coping as a weakness. These characters make bets, make jokes, roll their eyes, then go back into trauma bays because if they don’t find the light anywhere, there would be nothing left to walk toward. This natural ease and transition between extreme trauma and light-hearted playfulness is what makes this hyper-realistic series so profound. The secret to its greatness is its commitment to being normal under not-normal circumstances.

The residents return with the posture of people who know more now yet are smart enough to understand how much they still have to learn. Dr. Santos, Dr. Mel King (Taylor Dearden), Dr. Samira Mohan (Supriya Ganesh), and Dr. Dennis Whitaker (Gerran Howell) now have the responsibility of teaching while learning, painting an honest portrait of progression in a medical series. They carry new students beside their own uncertainty, and Season 2 lets them grow without sanding down what makes us love them in the first place.

Familiar faces ground the world even more: Fiona Dourif’s Dr. Cassie McKay, steady and wry; Shabana Azeez’s Dr. Victoria Javadi, who feels like she’s thinking two layers beneath what she says out loud; Shawn Hatosy’s Dr. Jack Abbot, all gravity and battlefield-tired heart. They feel less like returning characters and more like our favorite colleagues who we would change our own schedules to work with during busy shifts.

There is one notable absence, and the show handles it with humility instead of spectacle. Tracy Ifeachor’s Dr. Heather Collins doesn’t return this season—not because she disappeared or the story swallowed her, but because the writers honored something real. Residents finish. They move on. They go where jobs, fellowships, and their lives take them, often away from the facilities in which they trained. It’s the sort of realism medical television often ignores for the sake of a salacious storyline. Here, it feels right.

The Pitt has always been, quietly and insistently, a love letter to first responders and medical workers—scuffed, never easy, and imperfect. Tired, flawed, funny, brilliant, lonely, and loyal. Season 2 not only deepens this, it explodes across every episode. The show is less about what case comes through those doors and more about what the work does to the people who consistently show up to meet every demand.

Threaded through it all is the way the world outside the hospital never stays outside. The shadow of COVID-19 operations still haunts the hospital walls. Patients arrive frightened, impatient, sometimes violent, sometimes extraordinary, yet always in need. There is also a constant hum of AI and automation lingering like a question: what happens when the data gets louder than the people? Yet, the series doesn’t preach. It watches. It lets the audience wrestle right alongside the staff—multiple patients and multiple crises all at once. While the events of a shift are unknowing, one thing we do know is no one will walk away untouched.

The Pitt premieres Thursday, January 8, at 9pm ET only on HBO. New episodes will air weekly. Check out the trailer below.

Peacock’s new original series The Copenhagen Test doesn’t just ask whether you can trust your government, your colleagues, or the people you love. It asks a much darker and much more uncomfortable question: what happens when you can’t trust your mind?

With all 8 episodes premiering Saturday, December 27, the series expertly threads espionage, philosophy, and emotional devastation into something that feels less like passive participation and more like consent to be watched. It’s tense, frighteningly plausible, and heartbreakingly human. At the center of it all is Alexander Hale—played by Simu Liu—who delivers some of the most vulnerable work of his career. Hale, a first-generation Chinese-American intelligence analyst, discovers the unthinkable: his brain has been hacked. Everything he sees. Everything he hears. His entire life accessible to someone else.

Hale finds that he is suddenly both asset and liability, weapon and target, victim and suspect—and he has to keep up a performance, a false version of his own life, if he is to survive.

A story within a story. A trap within a trap

The Copenhagen Test is that rare espionage thriller that moves like 3 styles at once:

• a whodunnit

• a howcatchem

• a story about the story within the story itself

Think The Truman Show, if the dome was inside your skull.

The narrative folds in on itself through Samantha Parker (Sinclair Daniel), a predictive analyst and former playwright whose job is to script the very life Hale is forced to live. She observes him, designs his cover, and tries not to collapse beneath the ethical weight of her participation. As Parker attempts to take an observer's point of view, Michelle, played by Melissa Barrera, refuses to let her hide behind technicalities.

The show turns the writers’ room into a moral battleground. Who is responsible—the observer, the architect, or the person forced to perform the life chosen for them?

Schrödinger’s Cat—the science beneath the dread

The series’ title nods to the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics—Schrödinger’s cat, the idea that observation itself collapses possibility into reality. The moment you look at something, you change it. And in Hales’s world, observation is not passive; it is a weapon.

Hale’s sudden predicament centers around advanced nanotechnology that binds to brain cells, creating a symbiosis that turns a human being into a live broadcast. Every sightline. Every conversation. Every betrayal forming in real time.

Simu Liu is the emotional nucleus with a performance that is, simply put, devastating. His Alexander is brilliant, terrified, angry, and exhausted in a way that is bone-deep. It’s not the panic of being chased nor the betrayal of being lied to—it’s the grief of realizing his free will was never actually his to make but a fictionalized version of his real life filtered through someone else’s imagination.

The ensemble is also electric around him, anchoring the story in its self-imposed chaos:

• Sinclair Daniel as Samantha Parker—sharp, conflicted, heartbreakingly human

• Melissa Barrera as Michelle—grounded, fiery, controlled, resolved

• Adina Porter as Marlow/Brian D’Arcy James as Moira—chilling, controlled, authoritative

• Kathleen Chalfant as St. George—power, presence, unwavering

The chemistry across the cast doesn’t just support the plot—it detonates it.

A thriller that won’t let you look away—even when you want to

The Copenhagen Test is jam-packed and high-octane, but it never forgets its characters. Beneath the surveillance and questionable morality, the story is about real human concerns: autonomy, identity, revenge, grief, and purpose.

But don’t get too comfortable. The finale doesn’t tie a bow on anything. It widens the lens. It asks important questions: who else is being used, how many lives are being rewritten, and can anything ever be “over” for people in this line of work?

Call it espionage. Call it sci-fi. Call it a warning wrapped in a love letter to human agency. Whatever you call it, be sure to also call it a damn good show.

The Copenhagen Test is available to stream now on Peacock. Check out the trailer below.

Netflix’s Cover-Up doesn’t open with spectacle. It doesn’t lead with chaos but with unease. It is a story that is 20 years in the making, but with information and unearthed truths that will last a lifetime.

Pulitzer Prize winning investigative journalist, institutional thorn, and historical disruptor Seymour Hersh sits before the camera—visibly uncomfortable yet with resounding resolve. Defensive and slightly irritated, he says quite bluntly, “This was all supposed to be after death.” That line alone sets the tone for a documentary less focused on celebrating legacy, rather it is a reckoning with the cost to get here.

Directed by Academy-Award winner Laura Poitras and Emmy-Award winner Mark Obenhaus, Cover-Up delicately traces Hersh’s career as a political thriller derived from real documents, real victims, and tragically real consequences. The film moves through some of the most damning revelations in modern U.S. history—the My Lai Massacre, CIA domestic spying and MKUltra, Watergate, Abu Ghraib—not as isolated events, but as part of a recurring cycle of violence, denial, and impunity.

What distinguishes Cover-Up from many documentaries is that it refuses to mythologize its subject, Hersh, and it refuses to distance the public via historical categorization from the horrific events caused, and hidden, by the government. Hersh, while at times struggling to relive the past, is certain to not paint himself as a hero, but as a mere witness who chooses not to turn a blind eye. Poitras, who first asked him to participate in 2005, captures a man who understands the cost of knowing too much for far too long. This makes the documentary that much more cathartic and chilling—not because it feels complete or comfortable, but because time has made the burden much heavier.

One such burden of knowledge is the chilling recount of the My Lai Massacre. An Army photographer documented My Lai using black and white film for official records, while secretly keeping color photographs that would later surface after Hersh published his story about it. Once the color photos were made public, the contrast between the two documentations becomes a thesis—black and white as distance, color as confrontation. Once the truth of destruction emerged, denial collapsed.

Cover-Up moves with the tension of a spy thriller—archival audio files, classified documents, redacted names, and rare footage stitched together with urgency and latent fear rather than nostalgia and proud reflection. It is both morally clear-eyed and politically unforgiving. This is not a documentary about the past. It is an indictment of the present. Cover-Up asks what happens when power is protected more fiercely than the people. It spotlights what it costs to tell the truth in a country that shows it punishes those who do.

Hersh never claims victory for his work. He is still largely regarded as a pain and a thorn in the political system. However, despite his reputation with the government, Cover-Up offers no resolution. What it offers instead is something rarer: memory and history—past and present—without rose-tinted lenses.

Cover-Up premieres Friday, December 26, only on Netflix. Check out the trailer below.