We round up everything coming to streaming services this week, including Netflix, Amazon Prime, Disney+, Apple TV+, ThreeNow, Neon and TVNZ+.
If you like to laugh AND learn: Guy Montgomery’s Guy Mont Spelling Bee (ThreeNow, Thursday 22)
The greatest televised spelling competition returns this week in Guy Montgomery’s Guy Mont Spelling Bee, pitting comedians against each other in a fierce battle of words. Last season provided such dizzying highs as Kura Forrester not knowing who Winston Churchill is, James Mustapic calling everyone “dumb bitches” and Josh Thomson spelling hors d’oeuvres as “phwoar-d’yum’urves”. The format just premiered to rave reviews in Australia, so we can only hope season two is going to be even bigger, better and more unhinged.
If you like buzzy social experiment reality TV: Made in Korea: The K Pop Experience (TVNZ+, August 23)
This new reality series from the BBC takes five English lads with dreams of making it big in music and chucks them into a brutal popstar training course in South Korea. Their band, Dear Alice, has just 100 days to learn from the world’s greatest choreographers, songwriters, and K-pop business experts before they are launched on the global stage. “They will face a schedule of choreography, vocal and performance lessons, life coaching techniques, alongside an immersion into all aspects of Korean life,” the blurb reads. Think Popstars, but much more hectic.
If you are missing the Olympics: Grit and Glory: The Road to the Paralympics (TVNZ+ August 24)
If you are missing the highs and lows, tears and cheers, triumphs and tragedies of the Olympics, never fear. Not only are the Paralympics starting next week, but TVNZ is premiering Grit and Glory: The Road to the Paralympics this Saturday night at 8.05pm on TVNZ1 and TVNZ+. Made by Attitude Pictures, the documentary showcases a range of incredible athletes as they battle to win their place on the team for Paris.
If you are a sucker for a rom-com: Anyone But You (Neon, August 21)
If corny romantic comedies with a rich metatext are your thing, look no further than Anyone But You. Starring Sydney Sweeney and Glenn Powell, the film follows of pair of people who hate each other, but are forced to pretend that they are a couple for convoluted and classic rom-com reasons. What could possibly happen next? You’ll never guess! Comes to Neon on August 21, so in the meantime please enjoy this hilarious review from CommonSenseMedia: “I wanted to watch a romantic comedy to laugh and have it be sweet. This made me feel disturbed and sad for society.”
If you like intergenerational prestige drama: Pachinko S2 (AppleTV+, August 23)
Critics raved about season one of Pachinko, based on the novel by Min Jin Lee. The Guardian called it “a sumptuous South Korean epic like nothing else on TV“, while others fretted if it was too early in the year to crown the best show of 2022 (it was only March). Offering up a multi-generational narrative, Pachinko explores everything from the immigrant experience to the resilience of women, providing plenty of opportunities to give the old waterworks a whirl. “Awash in big emotions, this is not a series shy about trying to make you cry,” wrote the NBR. Unsurprisingly, season two is already getting five star reviews.
The rest
Netflix
Cocomelon Lane (August 19)
Langston Kerman Bad Poetry (August 20)
Terror Tuesday (August 20)
Untold: The Murder of Air McNair (August 20)
Why Him? (August 20)
Back to 15 S3 (August 21)
Mantap Warrior (August 21)
The Accident (August 21)
Wyatt Earp and the Cowboy War (August 21)
Nice Girls (August 21)
Popstar Academy: Katseye (August 21)
Baby Fever S2 (August 22)
GG Precinct (August 22)
Sailor Moon Cosmos (August 22)
Secret Lives of Orangutans (August 22)
That 90s Show (August 22)
Stowaway (August 23)
The Frog (August 23)
Incoming (August 23)
Tokundo (August 23)
We Are! (August 23)
Eileen (August 24)
Kenny’s World (August 24)
Operation Fortune (August 24)
The First Slam Dunk (August 25)
TVNZ+
The Marlow Murder Club (August 19)
Critical Incident (August 20)
Customer Wars (August 21)
Neighbourhood Wars (August 21)
Great Escapes with Morgan Freeman (August 22)
Mr Throwback (August 23)
Heartland Rugby (August 24)
ThreeNow
The Real Housewives of Orange County Season 18 (20/8)
The Real Housewives of New Jersey Season 14 (20/8)
Surgeon’s: At the Edge of Life Season 4 (21/8)
Death by Fame (August 23)
Seeking Sister Wife S1-4 (August 25)
Neon
The Playboy Murders S1-2
Sick Note S1-2
The Unbreakable Tatiana Suarez
The Beekeeper
Flushed Away
My 600-lb Life S2-5
Stevie Van Zandt: Disciple
Disney+
OceanXplorers (Aug 19)
Muslim Matchmaker (Aug 20)
Betrayal: The Perfect Husband: A Father’s Secret: Season 2 (Aug 21)
The Supremes At Earl’s all-you-can-eat (Aug 23)
Acorn/AMC+/Shudder
DI Ray S2 (Acorn TV, AMC+, August 19)
The Walking Dead: The Return (AMC+, August 22)
Hell Hole (AMC+, Shudder, August 23)