Five Amazon Prime Series You Might Not Have Considered
No matter how many television and streaming services have launched in recent years, it always feels like there’s nothing on. You might settle down on the sofa in the evening with every intention of soaking up some great television, but half an hour spent scrolling through the live television listings doesn’t result in you finding anything you’re interested in watching. You open Netflix or Amazon Prime instead, but there are so many TV shows and movies to watch that you don’t even know where to start. Frustrated, you either give up, or you find something else to do with your time, probably taking a moment to wonder why you bother paying for so many subscription packages.
We don’t blame you if you find the range of options available on streaming services to be a little overwhelming. The way they present their attractions is modeled on online slots websites, where hundreds (in some cases, thousands) of online slots with free spins no deposit from every imaginable genre are gathered together under one roof. There, the idea is to provide at least a few online slots to appeal to every type of player, but without a guide to tell you what’s good and what isn’t, you can find yourself unable to see the woods for the trees. There is one more important similarity to note between streaming services and online slots, though. Just when you think your luck is out and there’s nothing there for you, something good comes along out of nowhere.
We promise that there’s good content to be found on all of the big streaming services – it’s just a case of knowing where to look for it. Today, we’ll be focusing on Amazon Prime. If you’re a subscriber and you feel like you’ve seen all the best shows it has to offer already, here are a few that might have passed you by.
Fleabag
This British sitcom, written and performed by Phoebe Waller-Bridge, is the very definition of a hidden gem. The British press went crazy for it when it was being aired and is still mourning the fact that Waller-Bridge decided to end it after just two seasons. The searingly funny and honest comedy, written from a female perspective, tells the tale of ‘Fleabag’ – a down-on-her-luck 30-something singleton living in London who drinks and parties too much and makes regrettable (and often disastrous) decisions in her personal life that often have enormous impacts on the people around her. Oscar-winning actor Olivia Coleman is especially delightful as the central character’s mother-in-law, and big laughs are guaranteed in every episode.
A Very English Scandal
Have you ever wondered what happened to Hugh Grant after he appeared in “Four Weddings and a Funeral” and “Notting Hill?” He didn’t disappear, his career just moved from the big screen to the small one, and he got his best reviews in years playing Jeremy Thorpe in “A Very English Scandal” in 2018. This true-life drama, based on a sex scandal that rocked the British establishment to its core during the 1970s, is compelling viewing from start to finish. When a power-crazed politician decides that he needs to silence a much less powerful man who knows too much about his private life by any means necessary, sparks fly. It’s a serious subject, and yet writer Russell T. Davies has managed to find more than a small dose of humor in it.
The Man In The High Castle
What would have happened if the Allies had lost the Second World War and Hitler had won? What would the world have looked like in the years that followed? That’s a question that many fiction writers have tried to answer in the past seventy years, but perhaps nobody ever painted as convincing a picture of it as Philip K. Dick did when he wrote “The Man In The High Castle” in 1962. Ridley Scott, best known for his Hollywood science-fiction movies, thought so much of the original text and the screenplay that he decided it was worth his time to produce the show for television – and the results don’t disappoint. The United States of America is run by Germany and Japan, but a secret videotape is found that appears to show a world where the Allies won. Where did it come from, and what could it mean?
The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel
Female comedians have a hard time coming up through the club circuit now, so we can only imagine how difficult it must have been for them during the 1950s. We don’t have to imagine, though, because Amy Sherman-Palladino of “Gilmore Girls” fame has done all the imagining for us. Mrs. Maisel is a stereotypical 1950s housewife who gets drunk one night, ends up on a stage with a microphone in her hand, and discovers she has a talent for making people laugh. As New York changes and modernizes around her, she finds herself the unlikely – and very funny – voice of social progress in the city. It’s just a shame that nobody other than her manager agrees with her new career choice.
The Terror
Big ships and icebergs are a match made in Hell. We know that because we’ve all heard of the Titanic, and we’ve seen its tale told in the movie that launched the careers of Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio into the stratosphere. “The Terror” takes the same premise but tells us a much darker and far scarier tale. This is a story that belongs firmly to the horror genre, and one that you’re probably not going to watch late at night when you’re on your own. Jared Harris stars as the captain of a ship that’s stuck fast in the ice, can’t break free and is days away from any potential rescue. As the crew tries to wait things out in Arctic conditions, strange things begin to happen aboard his vessel. There’s a mist that never lifts, and not everyone who walks into it is seen again. This is guaranteed to make the hairs stand up on the back of your neck.
Between the five recommendations we’ve just made, we hope we’ve given you at least one or two weeks of binge-watching to get through. That ought to keep you occupied for a while! When you’re done, come back and visit us again. We might just have some more recommendations for you by then.
