What are you going to be watching this week? We round up everything coming to streaming services this week, including Netflix, Amazon Prime, Disney+, Apple TV+, ThreeNow, Neon and TVNZ+.
The biggies
Squid Game: The Challenge (on Netflix from November 22)
A real-life Squid Game feels a little bit on the nose for a dystopia, but hey, that’s where we are in 2023 apparently. In this series, 456 players compete to win $4.56m, the largest single cash prize in reality TV ever (breaking a previous record of $2.6m). As per the hit series, each player is put through a series of games. Not per the series, players will not be killed off in droves. / Sam Brooks
Faraway Downs (on Disney+ from November 26)
Remember Baz Luhrmann’s 2008 film Australia? Probably not, because it was hyped a lot and came out to middling box office returns and even more middling reviews. The general consensus that it was simply too much movie, and a pretty disjointed one at that. So now, 15 years later, it is coming to Disney+ as a six part miniseries, using what has to be swathes of unused footage. I actually have a soft spot for the OG film – it’s very 1930s, in a good way – so I’m looking forward to this. / SB
Fargo (season five on Neon from November 22)
If you told me 10 years ago that a Coen brothers film would have a spinoff series that lasted for five seasons, I would have assumed that spinoff series would come from O Brother Where Are Thou?, not Fargo, but that’s where we are. The fifth season of this anthology series sees Ted Lasso’s Juno Temple as Dot, a seemingly typical Midwestern housewife whose past comes to haunt her, when Sheriff Roy Tillman (Jon Hamm!) comes searching for her. / SB
The notables
Doctor Who: The Star Beast (on Disney+ from November 26)
Devil’s Peak (on ThreeNow from November 21)
This series, adapted from Deon Meyer’s detective novels of the same name, follows disillusioned detective Benny Griesel, who is forced back into action in crime-plagued Cape Town by a new case – a local vigilante killer with a personal vendetta is taking matters into his own hands when it comes to people committing crimes against children. Gritty! / SB
Utopia (all seasons on TVNZ+ from November 23)
In this cult hit, a community of comic book fans believe that a graphic novel predicted several disastrous epidemics, including mad cow disease, and a rumoured unpublished sequel supposedly contains further information on future world events. When one fan finds the manuscript, he and his friends find themselves as the target of a secret organisation who will kill anyone in their way to get their hands on it. I’ve not seen this one but fans speak incredibly highly of it, so if this sounds even remotely like your jam, give it a spin. (This is the original British version of the series, by the way! You can also watch the American adaptation on Prime Video if you so desire.) / SB
The films
The Pope’s Exorcist (on Neon from November 24)
This isn’t your mother’s Exorcist, it’s your Pope’s exorcist! This horror is, somewhat surprisingly, based on not one but two books by Father Gabriel Amorth – An Exorcist Tells His Story and An Exorcist: More Stories (sadly “The Exorcist” was already taken). All you need to know, really, is that Russell Crowe plays a scooter-riding priest in the 1980s. I’ll let you take it from there. / SB
Leo (on Netflix from November 21)
The second animated film from Adam Sandler’s production company stars the man himself as Leo, a jaded and desperate lizard who gets depressed after a visitor to the classroom where he lives suggest he’s old. Sure! When the chance to explore the world presents itself, Leo jumps at the chance to be taken home by his students but surprise surprise, it turns out he can talk. Hijinks, presumably, ensue. / SB
Salt (on Neon from November 24)
Is Salt a good movie? Maybe, maybe not. But what it definitely is, is a film where Angelina Jolie knocks things and people down while wearing a very conspicuous wig. Those movies (Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, Wanted, Mr and Mrs Smith, Maleficent) are always guaranteed good times, and Salt is no exception to the rule. / SB
Netflix
November 20
Stamped from the Beginning
November 21
Leo
November 22
Squid Game: The Challenge
Crime Diaries: The Celebrity Stylist
I Don’t Expect Anyone to Believe Me
High on the Hog: How African American Cuisine Transformed America: Season Two
November 23
My Little Pony: Make Your Mark: Chapter 6
My Daemon
November 24
A Nearly Normal Family
My Demo
Last Call for Istanbul
DOI BOY
Wedding Games
Neon
November 20
Elf
November 21
Trainwreck
November 22
Fargo: Season Five
The Little Rascals
November 23
Navajo Police: Class 57
Spring Awakening: Those You’ve Known
Four Brothers
November 24
Chucky: Season 3
The Pope’s Exorcist
Salt
November 25
An Unexpected Christmas
Merry Liddle Christmas Baby
My Christmas Family Tree
The Santa Stakeout
Time For Them To Come Home For Christmas
Christmas Carole
Wonder Park
TVNZ+
November 20
Screw
Ali
Southpaw
November 21
Dictatorland
November 22
Catching a Serial Killer: Sam Little
August: Osage County
Babs
November 23
Utopia
November 25
Country Music Awards Highlights
ThreeNow
November 21
Devil’s Peak: Season One
November 23
Saving the Manor
November 24
Legends of the Lost with Megan Fox
Disney+
November 23
The Naughty Nine
November 26
Doctor Who: The Star Beast
Faraway Downs
Prime Video
November 22
Comedy Island: Japan
November 24
Elf Me
November 26
Polite Society
Apple TV+
N/A
AMC+/Acorn
November 20
Hollington Drive
Shudder
November 20
Sons of Steel
A Dangerous Summer
Hayu
N/A