A new week means fresh shows worth adding to the watchlist. From buzzworthy premieres to low-key releases that might surprise you, this week’s lineup offers plenty to stream, binge, or sample between busy days. Whether you’re in the mood for drama, comedy, or something easy to unwind with, there’s something new waiting to be discovered.
High Potential
Why you should watch it: The week-to-week draw of High Potential, for me at least, is Kaitlin Olson’s performance. The show airs among a bunch of other police procedurals and could have easily gotten lost in the mix, but High Potential is actually increasing its viewership in its second season. Olson also grounds the show with a performance that is a touch comedic, compelling and extremely entertaining to watch. According to Variety, it is smashing viewership records held since ER was on the air.
Olson plays Morgan, a single mom of three kids who starts to pick apart murder cases based on evidence she notices around the LAPD office during her night job as a janitor. Her unique Sherlock-esque ability to spot clues and weave together a plausible narrative as a “high potential individual” lends itself well to challenging whodunnits.
She leverages her quirks for a consultant position at the station with a promise that Lieutenant Selena Soto (Judy Reyes) of Major Crimes will help her find out what happened to the father of her oldest daughter, who disappeared 15 years ago — a long-haul plot that finally started moving its gears in the second season.
The show is light on its feet and utilizes a lot of flashy editing to illustrate Morgan’s fast-moving, high-IQ mind to solve the case of the week. It’s a pleasant surprise when High Potential adds some class consciousness in the mix — Morgan has spent years being thrifty to feed her family, allowing her to recall exactly how much she paid for dish soap recently and the niche knowledge she’s collected from working odd jobs to support her family.
There’s also, of course, a very slow-burning romance between Morgan and her detective partner, Adam Karadec (Daniel Sunjata), who has come to rely on her acumen for solving murders. At this rate, their romance will crescendo in the seventh season. I’ll still be watching, of course.
How to watch: High Potential airs Tuesdays at 9 p.m. ET on ABC and streams the next day on Hulu. New episodes begin airing Jan. 6.
Fallout
Why you should watch it: After The Last of Us debuted a more tepid second season that didn’t quite reach the heights of its first, I was worried about Fallout’s sophomore return to Prime Video.
Luckily, the new episodes capture exactly what made the first season so enjoyable to watch: hijinks, retro-futuristic vibes and lots and lots of gore (multiple heads explode in the first episode alone). It helps that the series, helmed by showrunners Geneva Robertson-Dworet and Graham Wagner, is loaded with humor, balancing out the violence (whereas The Last of Us embraces the violence as part of its horror tone).We follow Lucy MacLean (Ella Purnell), the happy-go-lucky Vault 33 Dweller who has surfaced in the apocalyptic wasteland for the first time in her life. She forms an unsteady alliance with the Ghoul (Walton Goggins), a radiation-mutated bounty hunter, as they both search for her father, Hank (Kyle MacLachlan). This time around, Hank’s not kidnapped like the first season but unveiled as being involved in the nuclear apocalypse — and must be brought to justice.
The side plots are just as good too: We catch up with Maximus (Aaron Moten), a soldier who wears mech suits with the Brotherhood of Steel, Lucy’s community back in the Vault, and flashbacks that continue to build out the lore that got us here (with Justin Theroux joining the cast).
Compelling story and performances aside, Fallout is also a feast for the eyes. The production value is through the roof and everything is unique, from the set pieces to the gadgets and costume design. Truly a pleasure to watch.
How to watch: New episodes of Fallout stream on Wednesdays at 3 a.m. ET on Prime Video.
The Copenhagen Test
There have been many exciting new spy shows in the past few years: Black Doves, The Agency and The Day of the Jackal all carved out their own space in the genre. The Americans, back in the 2010s, broke the mold wide open for what could really be achieved for espionage and character arcs over six seasons. The Copenhagen Test, created by Legacies writer Thomas Brandon, isn’t reinventing the wheel, but it’s captivating enough that I binged my way through the season.
The series stars Simu Liu as Alexander Hale, a soldier who’s left field duty for a desk job at the Orphanage, a small resourceful organization that works incognito and oversees the U.S. intelligence community, including the CIA.
The hook here is that Hale’s mind has been hacked by an unknown enemy, giving them access to everything he can see and hear. He’s made aware of the hack by his boss in a transmission-proof meeting room and must essentially put on an Oscar-winning performance to pretend he’s not aware that someone can see what he sees in his day-to-day life. The show doesn’t take these implications quite far enough, in my opinion — I wouldn’t want a hacker watching my every trip to the bathroom! Among other things.
It’s a catchy enough premise with some great supporting players, like Melissa Barrera as his partner and romantic interest Michelle, and Sinclair Daniel as Parker, a newcomer to the Orphanage who takes point on this operation.
At times, the show could use more forward momentum — it takes a while for the pieces to fall into place, and some elements get a bit convoluted. James Wan is listed as an executive producer, and it could have used a bit more of the horror-centric creative voice he typically wields for films like M3GAN and The Conjuring.
But if you’re a fan of Liu’s work in Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, he brings this character to life well, including a few fun fight scenes along the way. There’s also something about an espionage thriller that feels like a cozy winter show for me.
How to watch: All eight episodes of The Copenhagen Test are streaming on Peacock.
The Staircase
One of the best miniseries of 2022, created by The Beast in Me director Antonio Campos, has made its way to Netflix, and it’s well worth the watch. If for some reason you never encountered the original 2004 true crime docuseries, let me give you the rundown.
Back in 2001, North Carolina novelist Michael Peterson (here played by Colin Firth) called emergency services to report that his wife, Kathleen (Toni Collette), had fallen down the stairs and died. There were suspicious conditions around her death with significant injuries to her head, while Michael contended she had been drinking.
The real-life story reaches stranger-than-fiction heights when it’s revealed that his previous wife also died after falling down a staircase when they were living together in Germany. There are so many lenses to this story that are thoughtfully captured in the series: Michael’s uncovered sexual encounters with men, the kooky trial lawyers (Parker Posey has some one-liners that rival her performance in The White Lotus) and Michael’s eventual romance with the editor of the original documentary series (Juliette Binoche).
It’s somewhat ironic for it to end up on Netflix after all; the original 2004 true crime docuseries it’s inspired by, also called The Staircase, landed on Netflix in 2018 with additional sequel episodes. The performances are out of this world: Every death theory is re-created, meaning we watch Collette put herself through multiple gruesome deaths down that staircase, including getting mauled by an owl.
The Staircase has haunted me since I watched it — and it’s definitely a treat for anyone who’s not already aware of the case.
How to watch: All eight episodes of The Staircase are streaming on Netflix.
The Bold Type
The Bold Type is so quintessentially 2010s that a rewatch now feels nostalgic. The bright, zany series has been added to HBO Max nearly a decade since it first aired on Freeform.
The Bold Type is essentially a workplace comedy. We follow three millennials who become best friends while working at Scarlet, a fictional magazine inspired by Cosmopolitan and under the stewardship of editor-in-chief Jacqueline Carlyle — played by The Office’s Melora Hardin, who in one scene drinks from a Dunder Mifflin mug as a fun little Easter egg.
The best friends in question: fashion assistant Sutton Brady (Meghann Fahy), social media director Kat Edison (Aisha Dee) and writer Jane Sloan (Katie Stevens).
Evidently, it’s not the most accurate depiction of 2010s entertainment journalism. (Jane will spend an entire episode, sometimes days of her time, writing a single article.) But it’s fluffy fun reminiscent of Ugly Betty, and the draw here is spending time with close friends as they form their adulthood identities while balancing their careers, relationships and attending various parties in New York City. I miss their emergency chats — usually about dating — in the magazine’s fashion closet.
At times, The Bold Type will catch you off guard with a storyline that punches above its weight, whether that’s about abortion, a nuanced take on gun ownership or a character navigating her decision to have a preventive mastectomy after a positive test result for the BRCA mutation.
Since The Bold Type, Fahy has garnered two Emmy nominations (one for The White Lotus), Dee has appeared in a few excellent Australian television productions, and Stevens gave birth to a daughter in 2023. It was at the center of comfort TV about millennials entering the workforce that felt endlessly optimistic about an industry that is more akin to a sinking ship these days. I’m ready for a reboot!
How to watch: All five seasons of The Bold Type are streaming on HBO Max and Hulu, and for free with ads on Tubi.
That’s the end of this week’s episode, but there’ll always be more TV to watch. I’ll be back with new recommendations.
