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Pop CultureMarch 10, 2025

New to streaming: What to watch on Netflix NZ, Neon and more this week

Guest writer

We round up everything coming to streaming services this week, including Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Disney+, Apple TV+, ThreeNow, Neon and TVNZ+

If you enjoy taut local dramas: End of the Valley (Whakaata Māori, March 6)

The past and present collide in End of the Valley, a “tense, emotionally charged drama” almost entirely in te reo Māori that centres on two competing land claims for the fictitious Taukiuki Forest. Young acquisitions lawyer Kaea Williams (Matia Mitai) is tasked with travelling to the remote Tāniko Valley to see if he can foster an out-of-court agreement between the feuding iwi. Upon Williams’ arrival, events take a deadly turn as he’s drawn into a world full of murky secrets and age-old quarrels. The cast is full of local acting legends including Miriama Smith, Roimata Fox and Temuera Morrison, and last week we called it must-watch example of “authentic and high quality by Māori, for Māori storytelling.”

If you love big-budget blockbusters: The Electric State (Netflix, March 14)

Set in the aftermath of a robot uprising in an retro-futuristic past, Netflix’s The Electric State follows an orphaned teenager who traverses across the American West in search of a missing sibling. On this perilous adventure they’re joined by a mysterious robot, an eccentric smuggler, and his wisecracking sidekick. With a mind-boggling budget of $500 million, the cast features Hollywood heavyweights Millie Bobby Brown, Chris Pratt, Stanley Tucci and Woody Harrelson. Add in the directors of Avengers: Endgame, and The Electric State might just be the next big blockbuster franchise.

If you like high-fantasy epics: The Wheel of Time (Prime Video, March 13)

Season three of The Wheel of Time picks up the pace and raises the stakes as Rand al’Thor, embracing his destiny as the Dragon Reborn, is confronted with the growing power of the mysterious Dark One and its evil forces. With the world on the brink of chaos and the Last Battle approaching, Moiraine Damodred and Egwene al’Vere must work together to prevent the Dragon from turning to the Dark. The latest instalment of Amazon’s fantasy epic is sure to be a visually stunning ride, with critics praising the “narrative twists and character turns that even the most jaded fantasy reader might not see coming.”

If you enjoy unflinching dramas: Adolescence (Netflix, March 13)

Described as possibly “the most terrifying TV show of our times,” Adolescence follows a family whose lives are turned upside-down when their 13-year-old son is arrested for the murder of a schoolmate. At the heart of this shocking act of violence is the manosphere, a toxic technoculture where sexism and misogyny is encouraged and celebrated by figures like Andrew Tate. Stephen Graham stars as the boy’s father, and reunites with director Philip Barantini to present each of Adolescence’s harrowing four episodes as a single seamless hour-long shot. Early reviews of this horrifying drama have said that it “is set to be a cultural touchpoint for young masculinity for years to come.”

If you love white-knuckle crime thrillers: Dope Thief (Apple TV+, March 14)

Based on Dennis Tafoya’s best-selling book of the same name, Dope Thief follows Brian Tyree Henry and Wagner Moura as two small-time ruffians who pose as DEA agents to try and rip off Philly drug dealers. But when the lifelong friends “bust” the wrong house, unwittingly stumbling upon and unraveling the largest hidden narcotics corridor on the East Coast, it’s now a game of life or death. Hailing from Oscar-nominee Peter Craig, who co-wrote the screenplays for The Town, The Batman and Top Gun: Maverick, Dope Thief is sure to be one bloody wild ride.

Pick of the Flicks: Sasquatch Sunset (Shudder, March 10)

You know a film is going to be weird if it screens in the Nocturnal strand of the Whānau Mārama: New Zealand International Film Festival. Sasquatch Sunset traces the lives of four gruff sasquatches over the course of a year, in a blend between a Attenborough-like documentary and a silent era comedy. Stars Riley Keough and Jesse Eisenberg are given no dialogue – sasquatches can only communicate via grunts and gestures, of course. Described as an “emotional masterpiece of experimental cinema and fart jokes”, Sasquatch Sunset has to be seen to be believed.

The rest

Netflix

American Manhunt: Osama bin Laden (March 10)

Welcome to the Family (March 12)

Adolescence (March 13)

Love is Blind: Sweden: S2 (March 13)

Skincare (March 13)

My Penguin Friend (March 13)

The Electric State (March 14)

Below Deck: S8 (March 15)

TVNZ+

Man Of The House (March 10)

I Cut Off His Penis: The Truth Behind The Headlines (March 10)

The Punisher (March 11)

Secrets Of Your Big Shop With Michael Mosley (March 11)

The Boss Baby: Family Business (March 14)

Jamie’s Air Fryer Meals (March 15)

SkyMed (March 15)

Getting Filthy Rich (March 15)

Joy Ride (March 15)

Widows (March 15)

Tigerland (March 15)

Black Knight (March 15)

Juniper (March 15)

Pilgrimage (March 15)

Deepwater Horizon (March 15)

ThreeNow

Survive the Raft (March 12)

Wheel of Fortune Australia (March 14)

Neon

Signs of a Psychopath S4 (March 10)

The Righteous Gemstones S4 (March 10)

Barney’s World (March 10)

Evil Lives Here S9 (March 11)

American Monsters S10 (March 11)

Forbidden Love (March 12)

Chicago Justice (March 12)

Late Night (March 12)

Outdaughtered S7 (March 14)

Yogi Bear (March 15)

Rob Peace (March 16)

Prime Video

Stuart Little (March 11)

Stuart Little 2 (March 13)

The Wheel of Time S3 (March 13)

F*** Marry Kill (March 14)

Disney+

Last Take: Rust and the Story of Halyna (March 11)

Meet the Pickles – The Making of Win or Lose (March 12)

Bill Burr: Drop Dead Years (March 14)

The Hardy Boys: S3 (March 14)

Memes and Nightmares (March 15)

Apple TV+

Dope Thief (March 14)

Hayu

The Real Housewives of Atlanta S16 (March 10)

Top Chef S22 (March 14)

Acorn/AMC+/Shudder

Vera S1 (Acorn TV, AMC+, March 10)

The Seeding (Shudder, March 10)

Sasquatch Sunset (Shudder, March 10)

Love After Lockup (AMC+, March 13)

Keep going!

In a scene from TV drama Secret at Red Rocks, A man wearing a green jacket hugs his son tightly as they stand on a beach and look into the distance

Dominic Ora-Ariki and Korban Knock star in Secrets at Red Rocks (Photo: Sky/Rebecca McMillan)

Pop CultureMarch 10, 2025

Secrets at Red Rocks is a delightful dive into nostalgic waters

Tara Ward

Staff writer

Dominic Ora-Ariki and Korban Knock star in Secrets at Red Rocks (Photo: Sky/Rebecca McMillan)

Neon’s new series feels like a kids’ adventure show from the 80s – and that’s a very good thing.

This is an excerpt from our weekly pop culture newsletter Rec Room. Sign up here.

As a child of the 1980s, I grew up feasting on a nutritious diet of local kidult TV dramas: Hotshotz, Strangers, Under the Mountain. Screening on the telly every Sunday, these shows featured smart, independent kids who explored their town on their BMXes, solving crimes and saving lives with cunning and nous far beyond their years. The adults were always the incompetent bad guys, and it was a thrill to watch kids your own age taking charge of their own destiny.

Four decades later, new drama series Secrets of Red Rocks may well herald a new generation of kidult television. Based on the award-winning 2012 novel by Rachael King, the eight-part drama tells the story of Jake (Korban Knock), a young boy who discovers a mysterious sealskin that unlocks a secret spell. It’s a tale of adventure, told through the eyes of a curious, loveable 12-year-old, with a touch of the supernatural thrown in for good measure.

From the opening scenes of the rugged Wellington coastline, Secrets at Red Rocks sets a mystical tone as Jake arrives at Ōwhiro Bay to stay with his father Robert (Dominic Ona-Ariki), a science writer who’s renting a house by the beach. Jake’s mum has a new partner and a new baby, and Jake is feeling lost and ignored. Sadly, like all boring adults, Robert has to stay home and work, and suggests that Jake occupy himself by riding his bike to the unique Red Rocks along the coast. Robert gives his son one piece of important advice: “steer clear of the seals”.

A young girl with red hair and a blue coat and a boy wearing a puffer jacket come face to face with a seal on some rocks at a Wellington beach — Jake did not steer clear of the seals (Photo: Sky/Rebecca McMillan)

It’s not long before Jake is clambering over the red rocks and into a cave, where he finds the seal skin. He also meets some of the locals, including the light-fingered Jessie (Zeta Sutherland) and her scary grandfather Ted (Jim Moriarty), who lives in a run-down shack and is a self-appointed kaitiaki of the coast. Plus, Jake keeps seeing the same mysterious red-haired woman wherever he goes. These characters are all somehow tangled up in Jake’s secret discovery of the sealskin – but what’s the significance of it, and what will happen now that Jake has it hidden under his bed?

There are stories within stories in Secrets of Red Rocks, as Māori myth and Celtic legends, sprites and silkies are woven through Jake’s coming-of-age adventure. The series mixes the mystical with the modern, as Jake tries to understand where he belongs in a changing world. There’s shades of The Secret of Roan Inish here, but the story is set amid a distinctly New Zealand landscape. Wellington’s wild, unpredictable coastline is the star of the show, providing the series with a rich and evocative background that’s full of both beauty and foreboding.

It’s hard to find a television show that all the family can enjoy together – especially one created in our own backyard – but Secrets at Red Rocks does the trick. It’s a delightful series filled with warmth and energy, one set in a familiar time and place but that also has a bewitching sense of otherworldliness to it. And as for that 80s nostalgia of the original kidult dramas? There’s not a device in sight here – just a whole lot of fresh air and freedom.

Secrets at Red Rocks is available to stream on Neon now, and screens on Sky Open on Sundays at 7.30pm.