January’s Streaming Haul Is Better Than January Deserves

January is January. The light disappears early, leaving the apartment becomes a negotiation with yourself, and the couch develops a gravitational pull that’s hard to argue with on principle. Netflix’s timing is impeccable, or cynical, depending on how you look at it—the new month’s lineup is substantial.

On the series side, the one I’m most interested in is Kingdom—a Korean period drama set during the Joseon dynasty that apparently introduces a zombie outbreak into the political intrigue, which sounds like exactly the kind of deranged premise that either falls apart in episode two or becomes obsessive viewing. Sex Education also arrives, a British show about a teenager whose therapist mother’s work bleeds into his school social life in ways that are apparently sharper than the premise suggests. Pose, Ryan Murphy’s drama about New York’s ballroom culture in the late ’80s, finally shows up—one of the better things on television in recent memory, wherever it first landed. Titans brings the DC grimdark treatment to the streaming format for anyone still hungry for that.

The film side is a broader sweep. FYRE: The Greatest Party That Never Happened documents the Fyre Festival collapse, which generated enough material for two competing documentaries that appeared almost simultaneously—both worth watching if you have any appetite for watching something expensive and ill-conceived detonate in slow motion across a Bahamian beach. Conversations with a Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes is the one for late-night insomnia viewing. T2: Trainspotting holds up better than it had any right to, and Solo is there for completists. Tidying Up with Marie Kondo also arrives, which is precisely the kind of aspirational viewing I’ll put on in January and accomplish absolutely nothing as a result of. The apartment stays chaotic. But at least something on screen looks organized.