Has Apple TV+ quietly become the best streaming service?

Move aside, Netflix and Neon, a new contender is coming for the throne. Plus, a bit of biffo gets going in France, and everything else you need to plan out your weekend.

If there’s one thing I’ve tried to convey through this column every week, it’s this: don’t let the algorithm feed you. Find your own stuff. Dig a little deeper. There’s more out there to see than whatever’s on Netflix’s landing page. These days, with 20 streaming services vying for your attention, you have to go searching for the good stuff. Trust me, it’s worth it. For every Succession or The White Lotus that everybody seems to be watching, there’s a show like How to With John Wilson or Reservation Dogs waiting to be discovered. Honestly, the hunt can be part of the fun. Sadly, you’ll have to carry on your TV exploration endeavours without me. This is my last time editing this column. Good luck out there.
-Chris Schulz, Rec Room editor

If you haven’t tried Apple TV+ yet, now might be a good time to do so

He’s a muscled-up man of mystery, yet he prefers words over action. A tall glass of chilled cucumber water, but he’ll fire up if he has to. In Hijack, the surprise action hit of the year, Idris Elba plays Sam Nelson, a business negotiator who uses his mouth – not his fists – to get his points across. Across the show’s seven episodes, Sam has to try and get inside the heads of the hijackers of his flight to London. He has to figure out who they are, what they want and how he can overpower them.

Isn’t that exactly what Apple TV+ is doing too? When the tech juggernaut’s TV streaming service launched all the way back in 2019, it felt unsure of what it was, and didn’t seem to know what it wanted to be. That’s changed. Since then, Apple TV+ has come a long way, scoring some major hits, like Ted Lasso, Severance, Bad Sisters and Silo. It was enough to earn it third place when we ranked all 20 of Aotearoa’s streaming services in April. (Neon nabbed the number one spot, TVNZ+ was second, and Netflix and Sky Sport Now rounded out the top five.)

Five months is a long time in the world of streaming. Since putting our list together, Hollywood’s writers went on strike, then actors followed suit. Their protests still have no end date, and the results are starting to show. Some of our biggest streaming services are struggling for content. New shows are being delayed because stars can’t promote them, and more reality TV and international content is populating those services. American soaps and late night shows remain off air. The hosts are so bored they started a podcast. As we mentioned a couple of weeks back, a drought looms.

One streamer doesn’t seem to suffering those same struggles. One streamer seems to have prepared for this situation with a content pipeline ready to last the the rest of the year. One streamer seems ready to rule them all. That streamer is Apple TV+.

Unconvinced? Not ready to give up on Netflix just yet? Let me persuade you. One of the big complaints about Apple’s streaming service is that it doesn’t have a large back catalogue for bingeing. That’s true if you’re looking for Friends or The Office. But after nearly four years of content, Apple has plenty of series bolstering out its library. If you haven’t yet seen Bad Sisters, WeCrashed or Slow Horses, I implore you to do so immediately. Same goes with the films Coda, Causeway and Swan Song.

But the past isn’t the reason we’re here. So far, it’s been a very good year for Apple TV+, with crowdpleasers Ted Lasso, Hijack, Platonic and Shrinking all dropping effortlessly enjoyable seasons, as well as critic’s favourites Drops of God, High Desert and Silo offering more complicated, peak TV fare. (It hasn’t all been good: Extrapolations wastes its ridiculously strong cast on a preachy climate change saga you’re best to avoid.)

But it’s what’s coming up that’s really why we’re here. It’s like Apple planned for everyone to go on strike. The Changeling, starring LaKeith Stanfield, debuts this week. It looks great. The Morning Show isn’t my kind of thing, but the third season is coming soon. People love that show. Still Up looks like a very good comedy, in the style of Platonic. Then there are the films. Ridley Scott’s got Joaquin Phoenix playing Napoleon, and Martin Scorsese is delivering the hyped Killers of the Flower Moon. In the wake of Oppenheimer’s success, that one’s going to iMax too.

All that and I haven’t yet mentioned For All Mankind. The space saga is now three seasons deep into its alternative history in which Russia beat American to the moon. Things get really wild from there. Now Succession has finished, For All Mankind might just be the best show on television. I’m not the only one who thinks this. A fourth season is rumoured – but unconfirmed – to be landing before Christmas.

It’s not like the cupboards are completely bare. Other streamers have decent shows coming too. Loki’s second season is landing on Disney+, The Boys spinoff Gen Z and the John Wick spinoff The Continental are coming to Prime Video, and Sex Education’s fourth season will soon land on Netflix. But they’re getting fewer and farther between.

Between now and Christmas, if you can give up your Netflix addiction, Apple TV+ might just offer the best value for money for all you brave savvy switchers out there. 

Join The Spinoff Members

“Love your work. It’s made engaging with the news a much more rewarding experience.”
-Martin, Spinoff member since 2022.

If you love what we do and want to support us, please consider becoming a member today. Already a member? Thank you, your support means the world to us.

All the new stuff coming soon to a screen near you

According to critics, Telemarketers is the corporate exposé of the year. In the early 2000s, two teens working at the fundraising company Civic Development Group began filming some of the stuff going on at a place that would soon be fined for “the biggest telemarketing scam in American history”. The results, executive-produced by the Safdie brother, deliver a high stakes Michael Moore-style doco in three hectic parts. “Compulsively watchable,” says Vulture. This one’s on Neon from Tuesday.

Elsewhere, Apple TV+ has The Changeling, the horror series based on Victor LaValle’s twisted novel. LaKeith Stanfeld is getting rave reviews for this one: “Maybe one of the most nuanced and gut-wrenching performances you’ll ever see in a horror series,” says a critic for the San Jose Mercury News. Elsewhere, take your pick from a Netflix slate that includes season five of Top Boy, as well as new shows Spy Ops, Scouts Honour and the nature doco Predators narrated by Tom Hardy.

Those of you still hanging out for more zombies will be thrilled by the launch of The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon, a spinoff that’s earning comparisons to The Last of Us. It’s on TVNZ+ from Monday. Disney+ has season two of I Am Groot, Neon has the fourth season of A Black Lady Sketch Show. And don’t forget the biffo: the Rugby World Cup kicks off on Saturday morning at 7.15am with a grudge match between New Zealand and France. If that’s not enough sport for you, the Warriors’ first playoff game in ages kicks off at 6pm. Both games are live on the free-to-air Sky Open (the channel formerly known as Prime).

If you’re heading out for a night at the movies, there’s Theatre Camp (“A deeply charming and hilarious stage kid mockumentary,” says The Guardian), My Big Fat Greek Wedding 3, and Biosphere, a sci-fi comedy starring Mark Duplass living in a dome and attempting to procreate with his male cellmate. Yes, really. It’s had great reviews.

For more try our weekly New to Streaming guide.

Everything you need to know

• Sixteen former staff members working for Jimmy Fallon have detailed a toxic work environment created by the late night host. Rolling Stone has more (this one’s paywalled).

• Remember Spot, Goldstein and Tina from Turners? Tara Ward has the best Aotearoa TV ad characters of all time.

• How does the movie review aggregate site Rotten Tomatoes actually work? Vulture finds out it might be rotten to its core.

• We’re not getting a Taylor Swift concert, and it looks like we’re not getting the Taylor Swift concert movie experience either, Stuff reports.

• Alex Casey has a frame-by-frame analysis of The Project NZ’s outstanding ‘come box’ debacle, potentially the best local TV blooper of all time.

• Yellowstone is too horsey for me but the drama surrounding Taylor Sheridan’s massive cable hit is too good too miss. Kevin Costner is quiet quitting, the show’s been cancelled, and it’s all heading to court. Vulture has more.

• Tāme Iti is coming to kick Celebrity Treasure Island butt. Alex Casey talk to him.

• How much Louis Theroux is too much Louis Theroux? A critic for The Guardian tunes into the documentary maker’s new TV channel and finds that 22 hours is the maximum amount of Louis Theroux anyone can take.

---

That’s it for Rec Room for this week. If you liked what you read, why not share Rec Room with your friends and whānau.