The 32 best things to watch on Netflix US right now

Jurassic Park

Chances are we’re not telling you anything you don’t already know here, but the original Jurassic Park is a near-perfect blockbuster. Steven Spielberg’s mastery of pacing, camera, editing and sound is on full display as the resurrected attractions in a dinosaur theme park take advantage of a cascading series of disasters to turn on their captors. This movie pioneered CGI effects without them becoming mere cinematic spectacle – and the digital dinos are so beautifully rendered that they fully hold up 30 years on.

The uninspired sequels have shown that there’s much more to making a great movie than a great concept (what if dinosaurs and humans could interact?), but this first one is one of those rare occasions when a mega-budgeted, marketed-to-hell box office smash feels full of heart.

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Society of the Snow

In 1972 a plane carrying 45 passengers, including a Uruguayan rugby team, crashed in the Andes. The survivors find themselves trapped on a glacier, hopelessly far away from civilization – and presumed dead by the authorities. What lengths will they go to to survive the cold and lack of food as they wait for the spring thaw?

This real-life catastrophe was previously dramatised by the 1993 Ethan Hawke movie Alive, but Society of the Snow is a Spanish-language retelling that sticks much more closely to the actual events. Made in collaboration with the survivors and victims’ families and uses a full Uruguayan and Argentinian cast, it comes with an air of authority and authenticity Hollywood’s version cannot match.

Director J.A. Bayona has fine form, having previously helmed horror film The Orphanage and The Impossible (the excellent Ewan McGregor/Naomi Watts disaster movie about the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami). Here, he gives a harrowing but inspirational true story the weight it deserves.

Watch Society of the Snow on Netflix USA

John Wick

Keanu Reeves sparked yet another career renaissance playing elite assassin John Wick. Wick was once a very bad fellow: a hyper-efficient hitman working for the worst of gangsters; the guy “you send to kill the boogeyman”. Then he found love and decided to quit killing in favour of a quiet life.

Inevitably, Wick’s retirement goes horribly awry, culminating in the untimely death of the cute puppy left to him by his late wife. That’s the cue for vicious, vengeful retaliation in the form of some of the finest gunplay ever committed to silver screen. They don’t make many action movies like this anymore. Well, they do, actually – but they’re the John Wick sequels.

Watch John Wick on Netflix USA

Oldboy

To describe Oldboy as intense is like saying Piers Morgan is unpalatable – an enormous understatement, in other words. To watch it is to be visually assaulted for 120 mins, your emotions squeezed, stamped on and tossed about the room until you’re left thinking that a quiet lie down in the dark might be in order.

Loosely adapted from a Japanese manga, Park Chan-wook’s thriller follows a man who’s been locked in a room for 15 years with no idea why, before being released to seek vengeance on his captors. While never exactly fun viewing, this film is absolutely riveting. Story-wise it’s sharp and packed with action, the acting is outstanding and at the end you’ll be left battered and bruised but still wanting more. Brilliant.

Watch Oldboy on Netflix USA

Band of Brothers (S1)

There’s a strong argument to be made that our current so-called ‘Golden Age of Television’ began with this glorious 2001 World War II miniseries made by HBO (with help from the BBC, Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks).

With immense production values (at the time of its making, it was the most expensive TV show ever), a cast of dozens and an impeccable script, Band of Brothers follows airborne Easy Company’s war, from jump training to their deployment on D-Day to the very end of the European conflict. With most of its ten episodes bookended by interviews from the real-life veterans on which the story is based, it’s compelling from start to finish, and will likely leave you in floods of tears by the end.

Watch Band of Brothers on Netflix USA

Blue Eye Samurai (S1)

Set in 17th-century Edo-era Japan, when the borders were shut, foreigners expelled and any hint of racial difference regarded with fear and revulsion, this animated series follows a young orphan seeking to hunt down and kill the handful of white men left in the country. Why? Because one of them may be the father – from whom she inherited the blue eyes that mark her out as a half-breed and make her a reviled outcast in her own homeland.

With stunning visuals, a compelling cast of characters (not to mention voice actors) and some of the goriest fight scenes on Netflix, Blue Eye Samurai is a scintillating show that seemingly came out of nowhere.

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It Follows

It might adhere to one of the main horror movie rules outlined in Scream – having sex more often than not ends in your grisly demise – but the stylishly shot low budget shocker It Follows is anything but formulaic. The film’s killer curse stalks its victims slowly but incessantly, disguised as a normal passer-by, a family member or a trusted friend, and that gives the movie a sense of helpless dread that doesn’t let up until the final credits roll.

Watch It Follows on Netflix USA

The Deepest Breath

This absorbing feature-length documentary explores the sport of freediving, in which swimmers descend to incredible depths without scuba equipment – merely the air in their lungs.

It’s an extreme sport by any definition – potentially deadly but also meditative, mindful and transcendent – and it attracts a certain type of personality. Two such people – champion freediver Alessia Zecchini and expert safety diver Stephen Keenan – form the narrative heart of the film, and their shared story is inspiring, emotional and ultimately heartbreaking. A riveting and moving window into a strange, deep and dangerous sporting subculture.

Watch The Deepest Breath on Netflix USA

Beef (S1)

Netflix’s best show of 2023 (so far) stars Ali Wong and Steven Yeun as two LA residents who, over a wonderful scene in the opening episode, turn from total strangers into mortal enemies. Ostensibly, this hostility springs from a minor road rage incident, but as the series goes on and we get to know the characters, the true motives behind their rage and spite start to emerge – even as the pair’s lives start to unravel as a result of the ongoing feud.

If this all sounds a bit heavy, don’t be put off; Beef is also witty, stylish and ultimately ends in a very different place to where it begins. A welcome reminder that Netflix can still occasionally make a great original TV show. More of this, please – although that’s not to say we need a second season; this first one is perfect just as it is.

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Community (S1-6)

Dan Harmon’s sitcom about a diverse and quirky group of students attending an American community college is packed with exactly the sort of clever pop culture references, smart subversion of cliché and memorably over-the-top characters that film and TV geeks adore.

It’s small wonder it quickly established itself as a cult favourite (despite failing to attract the sort of ratings creators NBC might have desired). Why not find out what all the fuss is about yourself by binging the entire thing? All six seasons and 110 episodes are available for streaming on Netflix.

Watch Community on Netflix USA

Derry Girls (S1-3)

All three seasons of this raucous sitcom (first shown on Britain’s Channel 4) are now available on Netflix, giving you the opportunity to be whisked away to early 1990s Northern Ireland and into the lives of four Catholic girls (and one English boy) as they navigate their teenage years against the background of the province’s sectarian Troubles. Not that Derry Girls takes itself in any way seriously – the sectarianism is merely another source of humour to be mined in this joyous, hilarious coming-of-age comedy.

Watch Derry Girls on Netflix USA

Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio

Incredibly, Guillermo del Toro hasn’t made a single animated movie in his illustrious career. Until now, that is. For his debut animated feature, the Mexican master of the macabre has tackled something a little less disturbing than his usual fare: a musical adaptation of the classic fairy tale about a wooden boy, rendered in gorgeous stop-motion.

Reportedly a lifelong passion project for del Toro, the film proves an intriguing counterpoint to Disney’s recent (and frankly unnecessary) live-action remake of its own Pinocchio adaptation. It’s much, much better too, with plenty for grown-ups to enjoy as well as kids. Ewan McGregor, Tilda Swinton and Stranger Things’ Finn Wolfhard are among the voice cast.

Watch Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio on Netflix USA

RRR

The most lavish and expensive Indian film ever made, this historical epic is an absolute blast. Fictionalising the lives of two (real) pre-independence revolutionary heroes, it’s far more interested in action, excitement, emotion and ‘vibes’ than it is historical accuracy – and make no mistake, there’s plenty of all of the above packed into its three-hour running time.

The portrayal of India’s British colonial overlords couldn’t be called nuanced (they’re all sneering, murderous bullies or worse), but that makes seeing them getting their comeuppance at the hands of our heroes all the more enjoyable.

Watch RRR on Netflix USA

The Great British Baking Show (S8-14)

Before being snapped up by Channel 4 – much like a cooling apple pie being snatched from a windowsill by a passing opportunist – The Great British Baking Show (known as The Great British Bake-Off in its native land) was the jewel in the BBC’s reality TV crown, an international export that wowed audiences at home and abroad with its tasty mixture of quirky humour, tense competition, mouth-watering cakes and, of course, schadenfreude at the contestants’ many disastrous bakes. Even judge Paul Hollywood’s somewhat sinister presence wasn’t enough to ruin the resulting pudding.

All five Channel 4-made series of the nicest show on television are available on Netflix US, which might be the perfect audio-visual comfort food for anyone enduring a dreadful hangover/breakup/cold (delete as appropriate).

Watch The Great British Baking Show on Netflix USA

The Nice Guys

Remember the buddy cop movies of the 1980s and 1990s? Weren’t they great? Shame they don’t make them anymore. But wait! What’s this? It’s a buddy cop (ok, private detective) movie! From Shane Black – the guy who wrote the first two Lethal Weapon films! And it stars Russell Crowe and Ryan Gosling as rival 1970s P.I.s who are forced team up to tackle a dark conspiracy within Los Angeles’ halls of power!

If that sounds like a great recipe to you, you’re going to love The Nice Guys. It’s brilliantly silly at times, gloriously action-packed at others, and the fact that it has never had a sequel is nothing short of a travesty. We’re begging you, movie studios: we don’t need more superhero films; give us more of this instead.

Watch The Nice Guys on Netflix USA

Phantom Thread

A decade on from There Will Be Blood, director Paul Thomas Anderson and leading man Daniel Day-Lewis reunite for this gothic romance story – as immaculate and precisely made as the gowns created by Day-Lewis’ character, the fastidious fashion designer Reynolds Woodcock.

Reportedly Day-Lewis’ final performance, his Woodcock is a fussy genius with an explosive temper. He’s no less obsessive than There Will Be Blood’s monstrously power-hungry Daniel Plainview but instead driven by a desire to create – and possess – pure beauty. He finds his latest muse in waitress Alma (brilliantly played by Vicky Krieps) but rather than bend to his will, she eventually pushes back and exerts power in her own way.

The direction and camera work, Jonny Greenwood’s wonderful score and the lead actors’ performance make this a worthy swan song for Day-Lewis – but don’t be surprised if Anderson manages to coax him out of retirement for another stellar turn one day.

Watch Phantom Thread on Netflix USA

I Think You Should Leave (S1-3)

Sketch shows are a bit like luncheon meat, tank tops and hostess trolleys: unwanted, outmoded relics from the 1970s. But I Think You Should Leave is proof positive that there’s life in the old format yet – it just needed a refreshing jolt of surrealism forced down its gullet. In fact, we’d go so far as to say this is the funniest thing on Netflix by a country mile.

Former Saturday Night Live star Tim Robinson co-writes and appears (along with a parade of familiar guest faces) in a collection of crude, inventive and ultimately hilarious skits that rarely end up where you expect them to. The humour usually comes from a character “committing to the bit” by taking a social miscue or personality trait to extremes; it sounds simple enough, but Robinson and co have done nothing less than reinvent the comedy skit.

Watch I Think You Should Leave on Netflix

Cobra Kai (S1-5)

A series that started life on YouTube as a giggle-worthy spin-off from The Karate Kid movies, Cobra Kai has now established itself as a fan-pleasing comedy-action-drama that arguably surpasses the films that inspired it. Back in the 80s, how many viewers could have imagined Karate Kid villain Johnny Lawrence being the nuanced, relatable protagonist of his own TV show over three decades later? And yet here we are, with several characters from the movies now firmly ensconced in this new life – and being given far more depth as a result.

Watch Cobra Kai on Netflix

Ozark (S1-4)

Featuring some of the most uncomfortably tense TV scenes since Breaking Bad (also on this list), Ozark follows Jason Bateman and Laura Linney’s squabbling Chicago couple, forced to run a money-laundering scheme for a merciless Mexican drug cartel. When Bateman’s put-upon financial advisor conjures up a risky plan to “wash” the dirty cash in rural Missouri, he and his family up sticks for a new life in one of the USA’s most deprived locations. All of a sudden, murderous narco-barons become just one of many problems for the family.

Filmed in muted, washed-out tones with bags of brooding and squalor on show, Ozark doesn’t always make for a pretty watch. But if you like your drama series perpetually balanced on a knife edge, it’ll be right up your street.

Watch Ozark on Netflix

Seinfeld (S1-9)

Forget Friends: for us, Seinfeld is the best New York-set (but clearly Hollywood-filmed) 1990s sitcom about a bunch of buddies just working their way through this crazy little thing we call life.

An absurd, hilarious and highly influential examination of the modern world’s trivialities, mores and conventions, never relying on slapstick or coddling its viewers with cheap sentimentality (most of its characters are objectively horrible, selfish misanthropes), Seinfeld is quite simply a must-watch for all fans of comedy. With each episode clocking in at a little over 20 minutes, it’s also perfect for binge-watching. So be warned: your Sundays will be slurped right up like a bowl of forbidden soup.

Watch Seinfeld on Netflix

Squid Game (S1)

Subtitle-haters, you’re missing out if you choose to avoid this dark drama series on account of it being Korean (yes, you can watch it dubbed into English, but that just feels so utterly wrong). The gripping story of a sadistic life-or-death game show and the effects it has on its desperate contestants – each of whom willingly signed away their “bodily rights” for the prospect of a fat winner’s cheque – Squid Game has already become not only one of Netflix’s most popular foreign language series but its most popular debut series full stop.

Quite why it’s become such a phenomenon with viewers is something of a mystery to us – there’s nothing especially groundbreaking or shocking happening here – but far better for a genuinely thought-provoking series like this to become a record-breaker than yet another dire space drama or drawn-out, plodding teen thriller.

Watch Squid Game on Netflix

The Queen’s Gambit (S1)

Despite arriving out of nowhere, this was Netflix’s best original series of 2020. Anya Taylor-Joy shines as chess prodigy Beth Harmon, a child champion with a preternatural inclination for the game – as well as a tendency for self-destructive behaviour.

Set mostly in the 1960s, the magnificent period details (so many gorgeous hotel lobbies!) and soundtrack occasionally bring to mind Mad Men, but The Queen’s Gambit has a necessarily more focussed approach to telling its story. Heart-wrenching, funny, inspiring and evocative, this is a character-driven success that reminds us of Netflix’s superb early original shows, where everything the company touched felt special.

Watch The Queen’s Gambit on Netflix

Hunt for the Wilderpeople

This Taika Waititi-directed comedy-drama sees cantankerous farmer Hec (Sam Neill) and his precocious, wannabe-gangsta foster nephew Ricky (Julian Dennison) attempt to outrun and outwit the police in the wild New Zealand bush. We won’t be ruining much if we tell you that along the way the pair form an unlikely bond, but it’s the interplay between the two leads that forms the heart of this wonderful indie film. It’s an irresistible combination of sweetness and hilarity that should go down well with the whole family.

Watch Hunt for the Wilderpeople on Netflix

BoJack Horseman (S1-6)

A Netflix Original, this animated series features Arrested Development‘s Will Arnett as the titular Horseman, a, er, “horse man” who enjoyed success in a beloved 1990s sitcom but now wallows in boozy, druggy self-loathing as a washed-up former star. But don’t worry if we’ve made it sound too grim – the show’s serious:silly ratio is nicely balanced.

Set in a skewed version of Hollywood in which humans live alongside anthropomorphic animals, BoJack Horseman features a strong cast (Breaking Bad‘s Aaron Paul plays BoJack’s best friend Todd while Alison Brie plays love interest Diane) and razor sharp writing, and with six seasons and a couple of one-off specials available, it’s perfect fodder for a weekend binge-watch blowout.

Watch BoJack Horseman on Netflix USA

Chef’s Table (S1-6)

This series (now six seasons plus two spin-off seasons strong) shadows world-renowned chefs as they take viewers on a personal journey through their culinary evolution – providing an intimate, informative glimpse into what gets their creative juices flowing.

Lovingly shot in razor-sharp 4K quality (for those with the necessary Netflix subscription), Chef’s Table is so well-made that you can almost smell the aromas seeping out of your screen and tickling your nostrils. From glistening, perfectly-cooked cuts of meat to mouth-watering veggie dishes, this is food pornography of the highest order. Just try not to drool all over your TV.

Watch Chef’s Table on Netflix USA

Orange Is the New Black (S1-7)

One of the early Netflix original series that established the platform as a serious player in the TV business, this is a prison show that goes its own way: less brutal than Oz, less daft than Prison Break and more compelling than Prisoner Cell Block H, it’s a fish-out-of-water drama (based on a true story) in which a white, middle-class Brooklynite ends up in a low-security women’s jail for a crime committed almost a decade previous. Delving into the lives of its huge cast over a luxurious seven seasons, it’s a great women-driven show that managed to stay entertaining throughout.

Watch Orange is the New Black on Netflix USA

Icarus

You don’t have to be a sports fan to become enthralled by this Oscar-winning doping exposé. Icarus is effectively two documentaries in one, with the first third of the film a kind of Super Size Me for performance-enhancing drugs. The filmmaker, a semi-pro cyclist, embarks on a hardcore doping regimen to demonstrate the flaws in the drugs-testing process.

But when his advisor, Russian scientist Gregory Rodchenkov, suddenly finds himself embroiled in an international storm over Russia’s state-sponsored doping program, Icarus pivots into an enthralling fly-on-the-wall thriller about being a whistleblower in Putin’s Russia. Cue mysterious deaths, chilling interviews and a lots of hand-wringing as Rodchenkov goes into hiding from the new KGB.

Watch Icarus on Netflix

The Killer

Director David Fincher clearly wants to have it both ways in this fantastic-looking Netflix originals, which trots a wavy line between John Wick and I, Daniel Blake – and just about stays on its feet. Making a movie that works both as a taut revenge-thriller and a commentary on the impersonality of modern capitalism can’t have been easy, but here it works – most of the time.

Having sweet-talked Michael Fassbender out of semi-retirement as a racing driver (Google it), Fincher casts him as a fussy hitman who, following an on-the-job mishap, is pushed out of his comfort zone and forced to diverge from the rigid rules that have hitherto governed his career. Now in uncharted territory, he must take on one more job in order to outrun the consequences of his mistake.

Watch The Killer on Netflix

Better Call Saul (S1-6)

Everyone’s favourite sleazy-yet-likeable lawyer Saul Goodman (well, Jimmy McGill) returns to Netflix, in a series that throws us back seven years before the explosive events of Breaking Bad. Bob Odenkirk slips into Saul’s cheap suit with remarkable ease, and his superb performance allows his character’s desperation, tenacity and humour to seep through the screen and grab our attention with both hands.

It’s always fun to root for the underdog, and from the very first episode you’re right there alongside Goodman, wanting him to fight to the top – all while being aware of the dark things to come. Yet another belting Netflix Original.

Watch Better Call Saul on Netflix USA

Stranger Things (S1-4)

Only 80s kids will understand this. Actually that’s not true at all, but Stranger Things is a love letter to the movies, TV shows, video games and books that people who grew up in that decade will cherish: it’s packed with references to E.T., Close Encounters of the Third Kind, The Goonies, Stephen King, Dungeons & Dragons and Poltergeist, and the mood and feel is sure to dredge up nostalgia by the bucketload.

Remove the retro vibes though, and the show still stands up as a stellar sci-fi drama-thriller. And it doesn’t mess about too much – unlike a lot of Netflix Original Series, its episodes are reasonably tight (a mere 40 minutes each).

Watch Stranger Things on Netflix

Breaking Bad (S1-5)

The best TV show ever? That’s arguable, but Breaking Bad certainly belongs in the top ten: it’s an utterly, utterly compelling six-season masterpiece that’ll shock you again and again with its twists, its turns and its fantastically drawn characters.

Walter White, played to perfection by Bryan Cranston, is without a doubt one of television’s greatest characters, by turns vulnerable and menacing, pathetic and triumphant. As a cancer-stricken chemistry teacher who turns to methamphetamine production in order to pay his medical bills and safeguard his family’s future, you’ll be cheering him every step of the way… until suddenly you’re not anymore.

Watch Breaking Bad on Netflix USA

Black Mirror (S1-6)

Not only has Netflix given Charlie Brooker and his team the freedom to tell more stories and let each one run without ad breaks for as long as it needs to, it’s also handed them a budget big enough to expand the scale, scope and special effects.

A collection of self-contained cautionary tales about our relationship with technology, Black Mirror is unnerving stuff, enhanced by the fact that the stories are generally set in a very near future that’s all too recognisable. But fear not, the trademark blacker-than-black humour has also been retained, so you’ll chuckle almost as much as you’ll squirm. Must-see TV for anyone obsessed with tech.

Watch Black Mirror on Netflix

The Crown (S1-6)

Ranking as one of Netflix’s most impressive original series to date, The Crown manages to turn a decade of so of fairly recent history into enthralling, lush drama. That’s partly down to the phenomenal production values that have been instilled in this retelling of Elizabeth II’s early years starring Claire Foy and Matt Smith (and later Olivia Colman, Tobias Menzies, Imelda Staunton and Jonathan Pryce). Well over $100 million was invested in the first season alone, and that all adds up to a swanky amount of period detail.

Even those of staunch republican leanings will find themselves sucked in to the six full seasons, which chart a series of major national events as well as delve into the personal lives of the Windsors during Elizabeth’s reign.

Watch The Crown on Netflix