What are you going to be watching in August? The Spinoff rounds up everything that’s coming to streaming services this month, including Netflix, Lightbox, Neon, Amazon Prime and TVNZ on Demand.
Click here to read our listings for July.
The Biggies
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pt0QuaQ0huk
Veronica Mars (Neon, Seasons 1-4 + Movie, August 2)
Praise be, because our Veronica Mars drought is over: NEON have not just picked up the rights to the much-buzzed about fourth season, but to the first three seasons and the movie. The show has a vaunted place in local NZ culture, partly due to its bizarre placing on primetime television and partly because it’s genuinely one of the best shows of the aughts. The latest season promises to be more of a good thing: Veronica cracking wise with her dad, kicking asses of people whose asses basically have a target painted on her back, and being one of the most believably, internally conflicted people on television. / Sam Brooks
The Wire (Neon, Seasons 1-5, August 23)
By now, entreaties to watch The Wire are so commonplace as to become a cliche. “Oh, you haven’t seen it? It’ll change your life!” exclaim the irritating devotees of a television show. The problem is, they’re right. It really is that good. Yes, it’s a show about big themes, and the ugly conclusions it draws about policing in America, political corruption and the media itself will probably stick with you a long time.
But the show really stands on compelling, richly drawn characters who grow and reveal more of themselves, the more you come to understand the world they inhabit. If you haven’t seen it, set aside a few hours for an initial binge. And if you have seen it, watch it again to see the things you didn’t pick up on the first time around. / Alex Braae
GLOW (Netflix, Season 3, August 9)
The Gorgeous Ladies of Wrestling are back, and they’re heading to Las Vegas. Having spent two seasons building their fanbase in the drab backstreets of 1980s Los Angeles, the gang’s move to America’s capital of kitsch is set to raise the show’s tongue-in-cheek flamboyance to a whole new level (if there isn’t a Siegfried & Roy appearance, I’ll riot). Haven’t given GLOW a go yet? Take the imminent arrival of season 3 as a sign to catch up on this wildly entertaining show about super badass women, starring Alison Brie, Marc Maron and the fantastic Betty Gilpin. The campy premise is easy to dismiss, but it’s so much more than just high-cut leotards and hairspray. / Catherine McGregor
Carnival Row (Amazon Prime, August 30)
According to the synopsis, Carnival Row “follows mythical creatures who have fled their war-torn homeland and gathered in the city, where tensions between the inhabitants and immigrants flare up”. The trailer tells me that it stars Orlando Bloom (Lord of the Rings, Katy Perry’s beau) and Cara Delevingne (uhhh, things?) as a detective and a fairy duo who may or may not have some kind of romantic past together. Basically, it appears to be Jack the Ripper but steampunk and fantasy, which is bonkers enough that I, unfortunately for my schedule, am 100% here for it. / SB
Gentleman Jack (NEON, August 15)
Based on the the story of a real-life lesbian trailblazer, Gentleman Jack follows Anne Lister (played by Doctor Foster‘s Suranne Jones, an absolute legend) and her quest to restore her family estate Shibden Hall through coal mining. The year 1832 wasn’t a time that an androgynous, forthright lesbian should have succeeded, but Anne didn’t let that stop her. She also found time to have several relationships, the sweetest and most notable being with the shy Ann Walker, her future wife. It’s part drama, part comedy, part biography, and full of heart. / Sam Rutledge
The Notables
Succession (NEON, Season 2, August 12)
If you reckon your own family is dysfunctional, then get a load of the Roys, the bunch of delightfully spoiled brats battling for control of their family’s media empire in HBO’s Succession. When ageing patriarch Logan Roy refuses to step down from the family business on his 80th birthday, his four pampered children have to team up to try and push him out.
Think the Trumps, think the Murdochs, think King bloody Lear, because Succession is one big power struggle where the complicated Roys fight to come out on top. Best of all, it’s funny as hell. Who knew watching people behave badly could be so entertaining? / Tara Ward
Veep (NEON, Season 7, August 8)
There’s not much for me to say here: Veep is the funniest, darkest, and most prescient show of the past decade. It predicted Trump when people were predicting Hilary, and when Trump happened, Veep didn’t comment on what was happening; instead it looked forward into the dark void that awaits us all. Also, Julia Louis-Dreyfus’ work as Selina Meyer, a testament to the banal villainy present in every human who wants, stands as the best work of an already storied career. / SB
Derry Girls (Netflix, Season 2, August 2)
The final moments of Derry Girls’ first season are amongst my favourite conclusions to a season ever, in part because they come so unexpectedly. For the majority of its run the show seemed content to be just another brilliant teen dramedy, one which contained universal elements (crushes, horniness, boredom, misbehaviour) against an extraordinary backdrop (Northern Ireland during the Troubles) which was played as ordinary life.
The peculiarities of the language, culture and attitude toward England are mined for specific veins of comedy, but somehow the fact it operates within mostly familiar tropes is what makes the closing so powerful: shows like this don’t end like that. It also leaves a big question hanging over season two – whether that resonance was a harbinger of things to come, or simply its creator Lisa McGee showing off her extraordinary range. Either way, it presents as one of the year’s most exciting returns. / Duncan Greive
Tiffany Haddish Presents: They Ready (Netflix, August 13)
These comedy lineup shows on Netflix can be a bit hit or miss, but if there’s one person I trust to know funny, it’s Tiffany Haddish. Not only is her own stand-up hilarious and severely underrated (I implore you guys to check out She Ready) but she seems exactly like the kind of person who doesn’t give a crap how famous someone is, so long as they’re funny. So a six-person line-up show, including five women of colour and a trans woman, curated by Haddish? Sign me up. / Sam Brooks
Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance (Netflix, August 30)
Chuck on your leg warmers and neon leotards, because the ‘80s are back. Jim Henson’s groundbreaking but creepy as heck 1982 film Dark Crystal has been rebooted for 2019, returning as a 10 episode series on Netflix called ‘Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance’. It’s a prequel that “returns to the world of Thra, where three Gelfling discover the horrifying secret behind the Skeksis’ power, and set out to ignite the fires of rebellion and save their world”.
I don’t know what any of that means, but what’s not to love about a nostalgic puppet extravaganza voiced by stars like Helena Bonham Carter, Eddie Izzard, Sigourney Weaver, Alicia Vikander and Simon Pegg? Executive produced by Lisa Henson (daughter of Muppets genius Jim), Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance will be a winner for fantasy and puppet fans alike. / TW
Mindhunter (Netflix, Season 2, August 16)
Two years ago, Mindhunter’s first season ended with an exceedingly creepy episode – directed by David Fincher, natch – revealing clear signs that FBI agent Holden Ford (Jonathan Groff) was slipping into the same kind of psychopathy he’d made a career of investigating. Season 2 focuses on a real-life series of 28 killings between 1979 and 1981 known as the Atlanta child murders, with cameo appearances from David Berkowitz, aka Son of Sam, and man of the moment Charles Manson. Unsurprisingly given its subject matter, Mindhunter is gruelling viewing, and certainly not for everyone. But the exploration of the early days of criminal profiling is careful and detailed, and the slow degradation of Ford’s psyche as he immerses himself in depravity is utterly gripping. / CM
The Movies
Falling Inn Love (Netflix, August 28)
“When city girl Gabriela (Christina Milian) spontaneously enters a contest and wins a rustic New Zealand inn, she teams up with bighearted contractor Jake Taylor (Adam Demos) to fix and flip it.” If there’s anything that lights my eyes up like nothing else, it’s an international film set in New Zealand, using New Zealand actors, making fun of what international people think New Zealand is like. Combine that with early aughts one-hit-wonder Christina Milian and the abdominally-endowed Adam Demos, and you’ve got something I’ll be watching at 2am on a Sunday morning this month./ SB
Rocko’s Modern Life: Static Cling (Netflix, August 9)
What’s up, fellow kids! Who remembers Rocko, the Nickelodeon wallaby with a clearly fake Australian accent? He and his friends, Heffer Wolfe the cowardly cow and Filburt the nerd turtle, have been lost in space since they went off the air in 1996. Now, they’ve crash-landed back on Earth and are acclimatising to the scary new 21st-century world; it’s “Rocko’s post-modern life,” if you will. / Josie Adams
Detective Pikachu (Lightbox, August 21)
Detective Pikachu is the best film I’ve seen in the cinema all year – although I’d have to note that, at the halfway point in the current film festival, I have yet to even crack open the programme, so take all the grains of salt in this shaker. I’ve also been playing Pokemon for nearly two thirds of my life, so take even more salt. But what seemed like a kitschy, uncanny valley abomination from the first trailer turns out to actually be a surprisingly mature, yet extremely lively, film noir that just happens to feature an electric rat voiced by Ryan Reynolds. I cried, I laughed, I felt things. / SB
I Love You, Now Die (NEON, August 18)
Buckle in because this is some bleak stuff. In 2014, 18 year old Conrad Roy committed suicide after being encouraged to do so by his 17 year old girlfriend Michelle Carter. The documentary I Love You, Now Die follows the ensuing trial, and investigates the level to which Carter was culpable for her actions, and her defence of what she did. It’s a complex case that serves as a perfect microcosm to our modern-day relationships with communication and identity, and will scratch that problematic true crime itch that we’ve all developed over the past decade or so. / SB
The Rest
What follows is a list of what is coming up on every streaming service this month.
Netflix
August 1
The Matrix Trilogy
Wolfblood: Seasons 1- 3
Are We Done Yet?
Failure to Launch
Ghost Town
Down a Dark Hall
Rock of Ages
Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery
The Cabin in the Woods
Black ’47
August 2
Dear White People: Volume 3
Basketball or Nothing
Derry Girls: Season 2
Otherhood
Ask the StoryBots: Season 3
She-Ra and the Princesses of Power: Season 3
August 4
Patriot Act with Hasan Minhaj
August 5
Enter the Anime
No Good Nick: Part 2
The Wandering Earth
August 7
The Wilde Wedding
August 8
The Naked Director
Wu Assassins
Dollar
The Mechanic
August 9
Sintonia
Cable Girls: Season 4
GLOW: Season 3
The Family
Rocko’s Modern Life: Static Cling
Spirit Riding Free: Pony Tales
The InBESTigators
Beyond Valkyrie: Dawn of the Fourth Reich
August 10
47 Metres Down
August 13
Tiffany Haddish Presents: They Ready
August 15
Jersey Boys
The Prestige
Cop Out
Arthur
Cannon Busters
Dumb and Dumber
Suicide Squad
August 16
Better Than Us
45 rpm
QB1: Beyond the Lights: Season 3
Frontera verde
Victim Number 8
Sextuplets
Diagnosis
The Little Switzerland
Invader Zim: Enter the Florpus
Super Monsters Back to School
Shakespeare in Love
Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy
Psycho
Blue Crush
The Shallows
Chicken Run
Cirque du Freak: The Vampire’s Assistant
American Pie Presents: Beta House
Dazed and Confused
Patch Adams
The Dilemma
What Dreams May Come
Charlie Wilson’s War
Peter Pan
Vertigo
August 20
Simon Amstell: Set Free
August 21
Hyperdrive
American Factory
August 23
Southpaw
Rust Valley Restorers
El Pepe: Una vida suprema
Hero Mask: Part II
August 24
Criminal
August 26
Gone Girl
Deliver Us from Evil
August 28
The Nice Guys
Droppin’ Cash: Season 2
August 29
Workin’ Moms: Season 3
Falling Inn Love
Kardec
August 30
Carole & Tuesday
Styling Hollywood
The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance
The A List
La Grande Classe
Mighty Little Bheem: Season 2
True and the Rainbow Kingdom: Wild Wild Yetis
NEON
August 2
On Tour With Asperger’s Are us
August 4
Beneath New Zealand S2
At The Heart of Gold: Inside the USA Gymnastics Scandal
The Nun
August 5
The Rook
Beauty and the Beast
August 6
Boy Erased
August 8
Veep: Season 7
Enchanted
August 10
Fallen
Kin
August 12
Succession: Season Two
Bad Times at the El Royale
August 13
The Sixth Sense
August 14
Mortal Engines
August 15
Gentleman Jack
August 16
Chicken Little
August 17
Bohemian Rhapsody
Old Dogs
Share
August 18
Absentia S2
I Love You, Now Die
August 19
The Righteous Gemstones
Sorry To Bother You
Years and Years
August 20
Up
August 21
Madam Secretary: Season Five
Monsters, Inc.
The Girl in The Spider Web
August 23
The Wire: Seasons 1-5
August 24
Bull: Season 3
Man Of Steel
August 25
Our Idiot Brother
August 26
Ballers S5
The World’s End
August 27
The Affair: Season Five
A Star is Born
August 29
Oz The Great and Powerful
August 30
R.I.P.D
Lightbox (All movies are pay-per-view, from $4.99)
August 5
Preacher (Weekly)
August 6
Brooklyn Nine-Nine: Season Six
August 7
Imposters: Season One and Two
Long Shot
The Curse of the Weeping Woman
Poms
The Chaperone
Iron Sky: The Coming Race
August 14
The Family
The Kindergarten Teacher
Miss Bala
Then Came You
Batman Hush
August 15
Single Parents
August 21
The Resident
Detective Pikachu
Batman Family Matters
Gloria Bell
August 23
The Girlfriend’s Guide to Divorce: Season Five
August 28
The Wedding Guest
All Is True
Red Joan
The Sun is Also a Star
TVNZ on Demand
August 1
The Price of $ex
August 6
Bachelor in Paradise
Back to Life
BossBabes
August 11
Yours Faithfully
August 20
My Mad Fat Diary: Season 1-3
Secret Diary of a Call Girl: Season 1-4
August 28
The Family Law: Season 1-3
Amazon Prime
August 2
This is Football
August 9
Free Meek
August 16
Jim Gaffigan: Quality Time
August 23
Alice Wetterlund: My Mama is a Human and So Am I
Alonzo Bodden: Heavy Lightweight
#IMomSoHard
Mike E. Winfield: StepMan
August 30
Carnival Row