ON (small) SCREENS IN ORLANDO

by Steve Schneider

PREMIERES WEDNESDAY:

Invisible City — As Season 2 of the Brazilian fantasy series finally gets underway, environmental policeman Eric (Marco Pigossi) is waking up in a nature reserve, his loved ones having brought him back to life after he heroically sacrificed himself at the end of Season 1. Sounds a lot nobler than coming to at 10 a.m. on a Sunday morning and realizing you’re flat on your back at Gatorland with no idea how you got there, right? (Hope I didn’t give too much away there.) (Netflix)

The Kingdom — Season 2 is the swan song for this Argentinean entry, with Pastor Emilio finding his presidency threatened by a bunch of disaffected youngsters and their spiritual leader. Wow, who knew Marilyn Manson still had that kind of pull? (Netflix)

Rurangi — The International Emmy winner comes to Hulu for its second season. This time, transgender activist Caz Davis (Elz Carrad) finds himself at the center of a New Zealand culture war between LGBTQIA+ kids, farmers, various Maori and “ancestors from the past (that) reach out to the living with unfinished business.” Great, now you can’t even use a unisex bathroom in peace without Grandma Aroha having something to say about it. (Hulu)

Waco: American Apocalypse — Newly unearthed footage from the 1993 standoff sparks a documentary that will give QAnuts plenty to reconcile. “The gubmint was infringing upon the rights of sovereign citizens, so that’s bad. But the sovereign citizens they were coming after were pedos, so that’s … good? Thank God I already live in a constant state of cognitive dissonance, or I’d be unsure how to handle this.” (Netflix)

PREMIERES THURSDAY:

The Lesson Is Murder: Complete Docuseries — Graduate school can actually be fun, if your teacher is a former FBI agent who leads your class on in-depth investigations of horrific killings. As an added incentive, for every 10 dismemberments they study, they get a pizza party. (Hulu)

The Night Agent — The bestseller by Matthew Quirk becomes a suspense series about an FBI grunt (Gabriel Basso) who gets caught up in a conspiracy that reaches from Big Tech to the federal government. Wow, that far? Can’t wait for that pulse-pounding chase scene of him walking briskly down the hall. (Netflix)

Only You: An Animated Shorts Collection

— Eight shorts running five to seven minutes in length showcase the work of a dozen animators from groups that are underrepresented in the industry. You know, like people who can’t afford to do cartoons as a hobby. (HBO Max)

The Real Housewives Ultimate Girls Trip Season 3 — After a one-season experiment of gathering at someone’s home (that surprisingly resulted in zero casualties), the girls are back on the road, making a trip to Thailand to take in the sights and air their endless grievances. A surfeit of good restaurants means plenty of opportunities to yell across the table at a cat. (Peacock)

PREMIERES FRIDAY:

I Am Georgina — In Season 2 of her reality series, celebrity football girlfriend Georgina Rodríguez reveals what it was like to experience the best moment of her life and the worst moment of her life, all in the very same year. Unless she’s just being melodramatic, but you wouldn’t expect that of someone who lists Gucci as a charitable dependent. (Netflix)

Love Is Blind — The first five episodes of Season 4 let us get to know the 30 new singles who are going to be trying to take a relationship from “verbal only” to full-on matrimony. Sample inspirational dialogue: “You know, Romeo and Juliet didn’t work for a reason.” Well, sure. But what do Baz Luhrmann’s directorial decisions have to do with this? (Netflix)

My Kind of Country — Music stars Jimmie Allen, Mickey Guyton and Orville Peck go on a worldwide search to find competitors who can light up the Nashville scene, with an emphasis on diversity and inclusivity. Apparently, the show’s title is short for My Kind of Country Is the Kind That Gets Your Ass Beat at the County Fair. (Apple TV+)

Reggie — Baseball great Reggie Jackson looks back on his lifetime of accomplishments and the front-row seat he’s enjoyed at his country’s concurrent stumbles toward racial harmony. But if really wants to make news, he’ll finally explain that time Enrico Pallazzo had to stop him from killing Queen Elizabeth.

(Prime Video)

Up Here — If you had to revisit the tail end of the 20th century, would you want to see it rendered as a musical romantic comedy? Some of the creatives behind Dear Evan Hansen, Frozen and Hamilton are betting that you would. Apparently, they’re also betting that you don’t remember Spice World, because talk about defining an era in a way that makes everything else superfluous. (Hulu)

Who Were We Running From — This Turkish crime series follows a single mom and her daughter as they move from one hotel to another, ever on the lam from the shadows of their past. Great, we’re so cynical now that we can’t even remake Slums of Beverly Hills and keep it a comedy. I don’t wanna imagine what’s going to happen when these chicks get to Bel-Air. (Netflix)

PREMIERES SUNDAY:

Great Expectations — Olivia Colman is Miss Havisham and Fionn Whitehead is Pip in a series adapted from the Dickens classic by Steven Knight, who did 2019’s Guy Pearce–led A Christmas Carol. Sounds high-tone, but nobody will hold it against you if you would have preferred to see what the Muppets could have done with this one too. (FX on Hulu)

Rabbit Hole — Returning to the “thriller series” milieu he knows so well from 24, Kiefer Sutherland takes on the role of a corporate spy who gets framed for murder by the perpetrators of a vast conspiracy. He has eight episodes to figure it all out; the good news is that if he isn’t satisfied with his progress, he can just torture the shit out of himself. (Paramount+)

PREMIERES TUESDAY:

Mae Martin: SAP — The nonbinary, bisexual Canadian comic muses on life’s little bittersweet realizations, like the children they never had. Given that Martin’s previous Netflix special led to their acclaimed 2020 series, Feel Good, they probably shouldn’t regret squeezing out shows instead of puppies. (Netflix)