The last week of August is a traditionally dry one on TV, and this year is no exception. Yet it’s quite likely that you haven’t caught up on all of these streaming highlights from the past week, so please give something from this list a whirl. (If nothing below suits your sensibilities, check out our guide to What You Should Watch On Streaming Right Now.)
Ted Lasso (Apple TV+ series) — Jason Sudeikis is reviving his small-time college football coach character (who hails back to a 2013 advertising campaign) for this show. Lasso is somehow coaching professional English soccer, and good luck to him. What’s even more important, though, is that our own Brian Grubb calls the series “almost unreasonably good,” despite the seeming odds against it.
Lovecraft Country (HBO Max) — The unfurling of monsters continued on Sunday night, and there’s no time like now to catch up if you missed it. This week, Leti’s confronting a poltergeist after transforming a ramshackle Victorian home into a boarding house. Given that this happens on Chicago’s North Side, one can expect racist neighborly responses, which will spark dormant spirits within the structure.
Bill And Ted Face The Music (VOD) — Decades in the making, the long-anticipated threequel of the greatest damn franchise ever is here. Yes, “greatest” is a subjective term (fight me, Vin Diesel), but is anyone going to argue that the reteaming of Alex Winter (as Bill S. Preston, Esq.) and Keanu Reeves (as Ted “Theodore” Logan) is an unwelcome sight in 2020? Nope. The good news (for them) is that they’re getting the hell out of 2020 to steal music from themselves in the future and save the world. And unlike The New Mutants, they’re on VOD in addition to theaters this weekend.
The Binge (Hulu film) — Vince Vaughn plays “the adult” in this movie that’s a boozy play on The Purge but without the murder. Basically, teens are allowed to get totally blitzed (alcohol, drugs, you name it) for one 24-hour stretch per year, and the endearing Skyler Gisondo (Santa Clarita Diet, Booksmart) looks like the rising star of this project.
Cobra Kai: Seasons 1 & 2 (Now on Netflix) — Season 3 of this crowd-pleasing arrival will arrive in 2021, but you can catch up to your heart’s content on the series that started as a YouTube original. Ralph Macchio’s Daniel LaRusso faces off again with William Zabka’s Johnny Lawrence and both of their respective dojo members, and the show’s still got the same energy as the original movies. Macchio promised us that “[t]he best is yet to come” for this series, and we believe him. May the franchise live on as long as possible.
Ravi Patel’s Pursuit of Happiness (HBO Max series) — The star of 2014’s Meet the Patels is back to mull over deep conversations in a four-part season. Maybe some of life’s more fundamental questions shall be solved, but the journey to several different continents will fuel enough escapism that answers might not matter.
Love Fraud (Showtime series debut) — This critically acclaimed Sundance Film Festival limited series feels like the lovechild of Dirty John and Tiger King, as one prolific con-man leaves a decades-long trail of destruction.