Hello friends,
And greetings from Singapore! I am in town for a local festival and was more than delighted to visit a theater called The Projector (although I am forever partial to Projektor spelled with a “k”).
The lineup is great—edgy, urgent, and inventive, as festival films should be—but tonight I’m turning in with my favorite Thanksgiving watch, which isn’t actually one movie but a double feature of The Meyerowitz Stories and Pieces of April. There’s something about how, in these films, families use holidays as a pretense to bring up old wounds that always gets me. It makes for a stirring drama that always ends in catharsis, in one way or another.
As always, I hope you have a nice weekend.
OUR TOP TV SHOW OF THE WEEK
Wednesday
New on Netflix 🍅 rating: 70%
You may already know of the Addams, the perennially black-clad family that revels in all things odd and macabre, but the latest Netflix series shifts the focus on the Addams's daughter, Wednesday, and doubles as a murder mystery and coming-of-age story.
Directed by Tim Burton (who passed on helming the 1991 Addams Family movie to work on Batman Returns), Netflix’s eight-part series Wednesday follows the titular character as she tries to settle into her new school and carve an identity outside of her family. Things get even more complicated when she gets entangled in a murder case, which she attempts to solve (albeit reluctantly) with her new friends. Wednesday can sometimes veer into generic teen territory at times, but if you don’t mind that sort of fare, then you’ll surely enjoy the series.
Also: Jenny Ortega as Wednesday is a revelation; anyone else might’ve turned into a caricature, but Ortega stays grounded throughout the heightened parts of the story, never forgetting to tap into the (soot-black) heart of her character.
OUR TOP MOVIE OF THE WEEK
Good Night Oppy
New on Amazon Prime 🍅 rating: 85%
In 2003, NASA launched twin rovers Oppy (short for Opportunity) and Spirit into Mars expecting them to last for only 90 days. But equipped with almost human-like perseverance and personality, the rovers lasted for years, tracing terrain and reporting extraterrestrial findings back to Earth until Oppy’s final goodbye in 2018.
Good Night Oppy follows the rovers and the team who made their journeys possible, finding warmth and emotion in the daunting task that is finding life on Mars. It’s as informational as it is inspirational, a gratifying watch on all accounts.
Top picks outside of Netflix and Amazon Prime
Our first pick outside of Netflix and Amazon Prime is Fleishman Is in Trouble, a new series starring indie-comedy greats Jesse Eisenberg, Claire Danes, Lizzy Caplan, and Adam Brody. Set in New York, it tells the story of Toby and Rachel Fleishman (played winningly by Eisenberg and Danes), an ex-couple navigating their lives as new divorces, single parents, and ambitious career people. The slice-of-life premise is cleverly dramatized by Toby’s writer friend Libby (Caplan), who narrates the series with all the clever wit and easy charm of your favorite essayist (makes sense given that the series is based on a bestselling novel of the same name). It’s my favorite thing on TV at the moment, and if you have a liking for the movie Stranger than Fiction and the works of Noah Baumbach, I have a feeling it will be yours too. Streaming on Hulu.
Another top pick outside Netflix and Prime is the third and latest season of Mythic Quest, a workplace sitcom following the fictional video game studio Mythic Quest HQ. Created by the people behind It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, the series is equal parts sentimental and funny, and with each episode running at more or less 30 minutes, it’s also a breeze to watch. Gaming enthusiasts will surely find an instant liking to the series, but even those who aren’t familiar with the technicals (such as myself) won’t have any trouble connecting to the show’s sweet center. Streaming on Apple TV+.
New titles worth your time
All three seasons of Documentary Now! are new on Netflix. It’s a great series that at once satirizes and pays tribute to the documentary format. Also new are the refugee film The Swimmers, about how two Syrian sisters swam their way to literal safety, the miniseries Reign Supreme, about the rise of hip-hop band NTM in France, and season 2 of the series Inside Job, a workplace animated comedy about the American deep state.
Meanwhile, on Amazon Prime, the Sylvester Stallone-starring mafia series Tulsa King and the British whodunnit show Glue are new and worth checking out on the platform.
Great titles that will soon expire
On Netflix, the action films Collateral and The Italian Job, as well as the war thriller The Hurt Locker, all expire on November 30.
Over at Amazon Prime Video, notable movies leaving on the same day, November 30, include the award-winning drama American Beauty, submarine thriller Crimson Tide, gothic horror Bram Stoker’s Dracula, and the mystery classic The Usual Suspects.
That’s all for this week. This edition of the newsletter will be back on Friday, December 2.
Till then,
Renee
What to Watch
I agree, Jenna Ortega does the absolute best with the lines she was given!