Time to grab your nail bats and steel yourself for the Upside Down: Stranger Things season 5 is here! Over three years since season 4 and nine years since it became a cultural phenomenon, the Netflix original series began its final season on Wednesday, November 26, 2025. However, as fans who impatiently logged on to Netflix that morning discovered, the release dates and times for season 5 are a bit complicated.

To celebrate the end of one of its biggest shows, Netflix seems to want Stranger Things season 5 to dominate our holiday viewing schedules. So, fans who planned to, you know, spend time with family and friends on the most festive days of the year, will have to decide between watching the ball drop or watching the people of Hawkins (hopefully) defeat Vecna once and for all.

Read on for everything you need to know about Stranger Things season 5, from what time the episodes drop to how late fans should expect to stay up watching.

When does each episode of 'Stranger Things' season 5 arrive on Netflix?

Netflix will release Stranger Things season 5 in three parts, with each installment pegged to a major U.S. holiday. The first four episodes arrived on November 26, 2025, the day before Thanksgiving, and the next three will hit the streamer on Christmas Day, December 25, 2025.

The super-sized series finale is set to arrive on New Year's Eve, December 31, 2025.

What time does 'Stranger Things' season 5 arrive on Netflix?

Each installment of Stranger Things season 5 will arrive on Netflix at 8 p.m. ET / 5 p.m. PT on its respective release day. With this primetime scheduling, the final season eschews Netflix's typical practice of dropping new shows at midnight PT on the day of release. (Tudum has a handy countdown clock for anyone who struggles with time zones.)

Here are the full details of Stranger Things season 5's release schedule:

• Volume 1 (Episodes 1-4): November 26, 2025, at 8 p.m. ET/5 p.m. PT
• Volume 2 (Episodes 5-7): December 25, 2025, at 8 p.m. ET/5 p.m. PT
• The Finale (Episode 8): December 31, 2025, at 8 p.m. ET/5 p.m. PT

How long are the 'Stranger Things' season 5 episodes?

Leading up to season 5, the Duffer Brothers have been clear that the final season of Stranger Things will include longer episodes, similar to season 4. In October, Ross Duffer revealed the runtimes for the first four episodes, dispelling rumors that each episode would be at least 90 minutes long.

Here are the confirmed Stranger Things season 5 episode runtimes and titles:

• Chapter One: The Crawl – 1 hour, 8 minutes
• Chapter Two: The Vanishing of Holly Wheeler – 54 minutes
• Chapter Three: The Turnbow Trap – 1 hour, 6 minutes
• Chapter Four: Sorcerer – 1 hour, 23 minutes
• Chapter Five: Shock Jock – TBC
• Chapter Six: Escape from Camazotz – TBC
• Chapter Seven: The Bridge – TBC
• Chapter Eight: The Rightside Up – 2 hours, 5 minutes

Is the 'Stranger Things' finale going to be in theaters?

Yes! Netflix and the Duffer Brothers are bringing the Stranger Things series finale to select theaters in the U.S. and Canada. The fan screenings will show the final episode in more than 500 theaters on December 31 at 8 p.m. ET/5 p.m. PT, timed to the finale’s global premiere on Netflix at the same time. If you already have NYE plans, additional screenings will also take place throughout the day on January 1.

The full list of theater locations is now available at ST5finale.com.

"We’re beyond excited that fans will have the chance to experience the final episode of Stranger Things in theaters," series creators Matt and Ross Duffer said. "Getting to see it on the big screen, with incredible sound, picture, and a room full of fans, feels like the perfect…way to celebrate the end of this adventure."

The second season of Squid Game: The Challenge has come to an end—and made a new player a millionaire. This year, after nine intense episodes, Perla Figuereo, a.k.a. Player 72, made it to the final round and won Red Light, Green Light, claiming the $4.56 million prize.

Perla quickly became a standout player once she arrived on Netflix's Squid Game reality-show spinoff, joining the season alongside her twin brother, Jeffrey Figuereo and 454 other players. While season 1 winner Mai Whelan relied on a cutthroat strategy to win, Perla's gameplay came down to being her "most authentic self" and tapping into her emotions (yes, including all the crying).

"Little Perlita from the BX Boogie Down Bronx and Santiago de los Caballeros, Dominican Republic, is a multimillionaire," she said through tears, in her final confessional. "I can breathe now. Like, money is not gonna be a worry. And that is just something I've never been used to. I am just feeling like the luckiest girl in the world right now."

Below, read on to learn more about Squid Game: The Challenge season 2 winner Perla Figuereo, including how she plans to use all that money.

Perla Figuereo is a model and film enthusiast who grew up in the Dominican Republic and the Bronx.

Perla Figuereo, 26, is a model currently based in L.A., who counts Santiago de los Caballeros, Dominican Republic and The Bronx, New York as her hometowns. In her Squid Game: The Challenge bio, the Leo shares that she "was born into the Mormon Church in the Dominican Republic" before moving to the U.S. She and her brother are no longer members of the faith.

In a Tudum clip, Perla and her brother Jeffrey opened up about their childhood move to the Bronx, explaining that they didn't know any English when they entered public school. They also explained that their mom would send them pirated movies so they could learn the language. Later, the entertainment lovers would both major in film, with Perla graduating from Bates College.

"We were really blessed that we always had a roof, food, and toys," Perla added. "Obviously, we were not the wealthiest, but we were wealthy in love. Something that in the Dominican Republic we say is 'rico de cuna,' which is 'rich from nursery.' So we definitely were that."

Perla Figuereo has worked with brands including Rare Beauty, Yitty, and Ceremonia.

According to her LinkedIn, Perla began her career in video production and social media, working for Fabletics and Galore Media after she moved to L.A. She became an ambassador for Yitty, Lizzo's athleisure and intimates brand, and eventually transitioned to modeling full-time, signing with Storm Management L.A. in 2024. In addition to working with fashion and beauty brands, she has also created her own projects, such as the photo series "Cuberte."

Earlier this year, Perla and Jeffrey appeared in a joint Rare Beauty campaign celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month. In an interview at the time, Perla spoke about the importance of representation in beauty.

"We deserve to see our beauty reflected. Growing up, I rarely saw Afro-Latinas in beauty spaces. Representation reminds us we belong—not just as faces in the crowd, but as storytellers shaping the culture. To see our faces, to hear our accents, and see our curls is freedom from believing that our beauty is not the standard," she said.

Perla Figuereo (Player 72) joined 'Squid Game: The Challenge' with her brother, who sacrificed himself during Marbles.

Though Perla and Jeffrey naturally stood out as siblings competing together, the pair was initially able to stay mostly under the radar, since they initially kept their connection secret, unlike other relative pairs like twins Raul and Jacob Gibson (Players 431 and 432) and father-daughter duo Zoë Naggar (Player 369) and Curt Stinson (Player 370). Perla and Jeffrey stuck by each other's side all the way until they were forced to go up against each other for Marbles.

In an emotional sequence, Jeffrey sacrificed himself so Perla could continue to the next round. Speaking to Tudum, Perla recalled continuing the game solo.

"My brother is the calm that I need sometimes, so when he left, I was really scared that I wasn’t going to hold it together," she said. "For him to trust me so much, it gave me ammo. I was like, 'If Jeffrey trusts me, then I should trust myself, and I shouldn’t doubt myself [or] change for anyone else.'"

Perla Figuereo (Player 72) plans to use her 'Squid Game: The Challenge' prize on family support and beauty treatments.

On the night of the Squid Game: The Challenge season 2 finale, Perla attended Netflix's finale celebration in Hollywood, where she opened up about her big plans for her winnings.

"No. 1 is splitting it with Jeffrey," she explained, per Gold Derby. "I don't need that much money, and my brother is the reason I passed Marbles. No. 2, we're getting our mom and dad a house. We are an immigrant family. We all moved to this country, and our dream was to always own property and not worry about rent. My mom raised us from very low income and still gave us food and a home and a life and an education and happiness. But now it's time to chill and get a house."

She then added, "And then, lastly, I'm gonna get a boob job!"

During her Tudum clip, which included a tour of her L.A. apartment and was filmed after she won, Perla revealed that she had been manifesting wealth for a while. She showed a vision board she'd made with friends before the show came about, which included a check with her name and an infinity sign.

"I wanted to attract security, stability, and the rich lifestyle. [Later], when I won the game, the little credit card was infinite."

Last year, Netflix's rom-com series Nobody Wants This became the surprise hit of the fall, as millions of TV fans fell for the romance between sex podcaster Joanne (Kristen Bell) and hot rabbi Noah (Adam Brody). In addition to the central duo, the L.A.-set Netflix original features a cast of actors from some of TV's most acclaimed shows. In season 2, which premiered on October 23, Justine Lupe's Morgan stands out as one of the most unhinged members (and most-stylish dressers) of the hilarious ensemble.

In her biggest acting role to date, Lupe shines as Joanne's deadpan younger sister and podcast co-host who struggles to adjust to Joanne and Noah's serious relationship. Like her character, the actress is rapidly gaining fans for her no-filter openness about topics like new motherhood. Read on to learn more about the rising star, including where to spot her husband's cameo in season 2.

Justine Lupe is a Julliard-trained actress best known for playing Willa in 'Succession.'

Justine Lupe, 36, grew up in Denver, Colorado making camcorder movies with her brother, Colin, who now works as a cinematographer. She later attended the Denver School of the Performing Arts; her grandmother, community activist Katherine W. Schomp, was a "founding mother" of the school, per Rolling Stone. She went on to graduate from The Juilliard School in N.Y.C. in 2011, and quickly began her screen-acting career. In addition to her early film role in Noah Baumbach's Frances Ha, she also appeared in TV shows including Harry's Law, Cristela, Younger, Snowfall, Madam Secretary, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, and Mrs. Mercedes.

In 2018, Lupe rose to fame with her breakout role as Willa, Connor Roy's younger girlfriend in HBO's hit drama Succession. Willa, a former escort and aspiring playwright, started as a fan-favorite recurring role before Lupe was upped to a series regular in seasons 3 and 4. Speaking to Rolling Stone, creator Jesse Armstrong said of the actress, "She’s so brilliant that you just want to write more and more for her."

Justine Lupe's husband, Tyson Mason, makes a cameo in 'Nobody Wants This.'

Over the past few years, Lupe has had a whirlwind romance and started a family. In August 2023, she went Instagram-official with visual artist Tyson Mason. It's unknown when they began dating, but according to the L.A. Times, they were a couple in 2021. By August 2024, they welcomed their daughter, Ellis. During an appearance on The Drew Barrymore Show in November of that year, Lupe revealed the meaning behind the name.

"My partner picked the name; he loved it," she said. "It means kind and benevolent, which we really wanted to, like, put that energy around the baby. We want you to be kind above all else."

In February 2025, Lupe and Mason were married in a courthouse ceremony in Beverly Hills, California. According to PEOPLE, they were joined by both their daughter and their dog, Lily. Both Lupe and Mason posted about the day on their respective Instagrams, introducing their "ding darn husband" and "ding darn wife."

Several of the Nobody Wants This cast's real-life partners make quick appearances in the rom-com's second season, including Adam Brody's wife Leighton Meester and Jackie Tohn's boyfriend Joe Gilette. Mason also makes a brief cameo in an episode, but according to Lupe, it took some convincing.

"He had a cameo this season. He’s the guy who’s drawing my portrait in the Valentine’s Day episode," she told Tudum. "He drew the portrait of me that goes into the finale. Tyson has zero interest in acting, and I had to beg him to do the part. even though he is not even on camera."

Lupe got advice from Sarah Snook and Kristen Bell on dealing with the "fourth trimester" of postpartum.

As a new mother, Lupe has spoken out about her experiences balancing her Hollywood career with the unspoken effects of pregnancy and postpartum. After filming season 1 during her second trimester, Lupe was several months postpartum when production began on season 2. In her cover story for Who What Wear's Parents Issue, the actress recalled going through a drastic hormonal shift while weaning from breastfeeding, and felt the symptoms for over two months.

"I had crazy anxiety. It was a little bit scary," she said. "I felt a different thing than I'd ever felt—sad, anxious. My body was totally out of control, and my brain didn't understand what was going on. I didn't have any postpartum depression. But this was real, and I didn't know anything about it."

To deal with the experience, Lupe leaned on her Succession co-star Sarah Snook, who had filmed the drama's final season while pregnant. "She gave me some really great podcasts to listen to for the fourth trimester, which is postpartum, and when postpartum came, she checked in on me," Lupe explained. "She was really helpful in terms of being like, 'You have nine months of pregnancy, and you're gonna get so much information about being a pregnant woman, and people forget about what happens after you give birth.'

Lupe was also able to confide in and lean on her on-screen sister Kristen Bell, who has two children with husband Dax Shepard.

"No one’s going to be able to do their best work, or even any work, if they feel completely out to sea while they’re on set," Bell told Rolling Stone. "As a mom, I know that feeling very well—those surging and dropping hormones. You don’t just have a baby and then instantly become who you were previously. There’s a whole process your body has to go through. I’m just glad [Justine's] honest enough to share intimate things. She allows you to feel so close to her, because she’s a very authentic person."

Lupe says she would be "happy with anything" that happens between Morgan and Sasha in 'Nobody Wants This' season 3.

Since season 1, Nobody Wants This has highlighted the unlikely friendship between Morgan and Noah's brother Sasha (played by Veep's Timothy Simons) as one of its main subplots. Fans who have already begun their Nobody Wants This season 2 binge know that Morgan is dealing with a lot on the romantic front, specifically her whirlwind romance with her therapist-turned-boyfriend, Dr. Andy (Arian Moayed). However, Lupe has pointed out that the show doesn't entirely write off Morgan and Sasha's will-they-won't-they vibe heading into season 3.

"I really just want to see their dynamic play out in any way ever," Lupe says of Morgan and Sasha in an interview with PEOPLE. "Tim is my favorite person to act with. He's so fun. He's a dear friend of mine—he's become one of my best friends—and I just love being in scenes with him."

"I am very hands-off about what the writers do and what they choose for these two characters, and I'm just excited to see any iteration," she added. "I think it also could just be really fun to watch them be weird, oddball buddies roaming around town trying to be each other's wingman or whatever. There's so much potential. I would be happy with anything."

Despite its controversies over the past five years, Love Is Blind remains Netflix's biggest reality franchise. Every season since late 2023, the reality show's critics (and increasingly more fans) have questioned whether the "social experiment" has fully broken—and yet, each installment sits firmly in the streaming giant's Top 10.

Love Is Blind season 9 ran throughout October 2025, and it was arguably a depressing first for the franchise, capping off a season of entanglements, rejection, and drama with no marriages. The disappointing finale left fans wondering whether the reality show had reached its natural end. However, season 10 has already been guaranteed for months, and it's set to arrive right on schedule. Read on for everything we know about Love Is Blind season 10 and the future of the reality hit so far.

Has 'Love Is Blind' been renewed for season 10?

Yes. In January 2025, ahead of the season 8 premiere, Netflix marked the franchise's fifth anniversary by announcing a two-season renewal, per Variety. As we approach season 10, it remains the only confirmed, upcoming season (although the show can, of course, get renewed again).

When will 'Love Is Blind' season 10 come out?

Netflix has confirmed that Love Is Blind season 10 will premiere on Wednesday, February 11, 2026. The series is returning right on schedule, following Love Is Blind's tendency to debut new seasons during the week of Valentine's Day each year. After the premiere, season 10 will air weekly on Wednesdays, leading up to the March 4 finale.

Here's the full release schedule for Love Is Blind season 10.

• Episodes 1-6: February 11, 2026
• Episodes 7-9: February 18, 2026
• Episodes 10-11: February 25, 2026
• Episode 12 (finale): March 4, 2026

Where will 'Love Is Blind' season 10 be set?

In late January, just weeks before the season 10 premiere, Netflix confirmed that Love is Blind season 10 will take place in Ohio. The Buckeye State was among fan guesses for the next location, since the show had put out a casting notice for Columbus, Ohio in 2024. (The Columbus Dispatch has some thoughts about the show's decision to brand season 10 as the whole state.)

For anyone keeping track, Boston was also a popular fan theory for season 10, considering several casting notices and a Redditor who claimed that they'd spotted the show filming at the New England Aquarium. (Reddit spottings have spoiled past seasons, including Charlotte, D.C., and Denver.)

Several other locations have received casting notices in the past that have yet to come to fruition, including Atlanta, Georgia (supposedly getting a round two after being featured in season 1), Detroit, Michigan, Miami and Tampa, Florida, Nashville, Tennessee, and Phoenix, Arizona. And just last July, the production company broadened its scope to include Philadelphia, Austin, Texas, St. Louis, Missouri, New Orleans, Louisiana, and Charleston, South Carolina.

Is there a trailer for 'Love is Blind' season 10?

The Love is Blind season 10 trailer dropped two weeks before the show's premiere, giving a hint of the drama to come. As always, we get glimpses of some intriguing new cast members, including one woman who's the mother of a 7-year-old daughter and another who says, "Jesus died single; I don't need to die single."

Then, once the engaged couples get past the honeymoon, the doubts come in. One man is unsure if he can get there physically, and some couples are struggling over decisions about future kids. Also, in an example of what to never say on this show, a man tells his fiancée that he's been wondering what it would be like with his No. 2 person from the pods. Despite all this, we are guaranteed to get at least one wedding this season (or more, if there are multiple blonde brides).

Will season 10 be 'Love Is Blind's final season?

Spoilers for the Love Is Blind season 9 finale ahead. Love Is Blind season 9 ended its run this October with a franchise first: Zero out of six couples left the show married. (This installment came on the heels of season 2 of Love Is Blind: UK, which featured two of the couples who tied the knot but split by the reunion.) Though season 9 ended just a few days after season 1 fan-favorites Lauren and Cameron welcomed their first child, the distance between the original couple's sweet romance and the emotional trainwrecks of the current series feels insurmountable.

Still, based on the unhinged montage that stood in for a post-"I do" celebration in the finale's final moments, Netflix and the show's team believe Love Is Blind is still worth the watch without a "happily ever after." Speaking to Tudum about the matrimony-less season, creator Chris Coelen said that each of season 9's couples made the best decision for themselves, and that "the [show's] experiment is working better than ever."

"I think we’ll see many happy couples continue to come out of the Love Is Blind experiment in the future, who have fallen in love with who they are," he told the outlet. "We’ll also see couples decide that their love is not enough. Whatever the outcome, the journeys along the way, which reflect our society and some of the amazing people who inhabit it, will continue to be at turns joyful, frustrating, and awe-inspiring—in a word, human."

Based on Coelen's comments, Love Is Blind may continue as long as it finds willing participants. Before tuning into future seasons, viewers will have to decide whether to keep watching a show that leans towards the frustrating more than the joyful.

The Victoria's Secret Fashion Show 2.0 is back for another installment of blinged-out lingerie, showstopping angel wings, world-famous models, and girl-power anthems.

Last year, the annual runway event—which initially ran from 1995 to 2018 before its cancellation in 2019—reopened the Pink Carpet with a re-tooled production, emphasizing inclusive casting and an all-female musical lineup. In July 2025, Victoria's Secret announced another can't-miss event for fashion fanatics.

For this year's show, the brand has tapped a line-up of legendary angels (Adriana Lima, Joan Smalls, and Lily Aldridge), viral supermodels (Gigi Hadid, Anok Yai, Iris Law, and Alex Consani), and even athletes like Angel Reese and Sunisa "Suni" Lee. They'll be joined by musical guests Madison Beer, Karol G, TWICE, and Missy Elliott.

As you count down the hours to this year's runway, read on for everything you need to know about how to watch the 2025 Victoria's Secret Fashion Show below.

When is the 2025 Victoria's Secret Fashion Show?

The 2025 Victoria's Secret Fashion Show will be held on Wednesday, October 15, 2025, in N.Y.C. The second installment of the brand's revamped show takes place exactly one year after 2024's return.

How to watch the 2025 Victoria's Secret Fashion Show:

The official broadcast of the 2025 Victoria's Secret Fashion Show will begin on Wednesday, October 15, at 7 p.m. ET and stream on Amazon Live. Amazon Live can be accessed on Prime Video's Home and Live TV tabs. It will also stream across Victoria's Secret's social media accounts, including Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok.

For the second year, the show's Amazon Live stream will begin with the Pink Carpet at 4:30 p.m. ET. The live stream will include a live shopping feature to purchase pieces as they make their way down the runway. (Anyone who needs a bit longer to decide will later be able to shop the show via Victoria's Secret's Amazon storefront.)

Prime Video is included if you have a standalone Amazon Prime membership, or stand-alone Prime Video subscriptions are also available with a 30-day free trial.

Apple TV's girl-squad period drama The Buccaneers returned for its second season in 2025, reuniting die-hard viewers with the American rebels taking over England's old-fashioned social scene. After eight episodes full of coming-of-age drama, heartbreaking scenes, and epic love triangles, the installment ended on August 6, with several huge secrets coming to light at Nan's (Kristine Frøseth) masquerade ball.

Now, fans are clamoring for news on whether the cult-loved series will return for more historical drama. Below, read on for everything we know about The Buccaneers season 3 so far.

Has 'The Buccaneers' been renewed for season 3?

Let's go, girls! Just two months after The Buccaneers season 2 finale, Apple TV announced via a press release that the show has been renewed for a third season. Along with the news, the streamer shared an adorable photo of the cast, all looking glam in their best Gilded Age fits, smiling and holding up number threes.

On social media, Apple TV also shared a teaser to get fans hyped. The steamy clip features Theo (Guy Remmer) and Lizzy (Aubri Ibrag) looking romantically into each other's eyes before smooching and running away together, holding hands. "Tintagel is abuzz. The Buccs will be back," the caption reads.

Series creator Katherine Jakeaways celebrated the return of the show based on Edith Warton's final novel with a statement. "We couldn't be more delighted to be lacing up our corsets, slipping on our ball gowns, and running breathless across the cliffs of Tintagel for the third time to see what passionate adventures our beloved Buccaneers get up to next,” Jakeaways said, according to a press release. "Huge thanks to Apple TV and also to the devoted viewers for loving the show as much as we do."

When will 'The Buccaneers' season 3 come out?

It's unclear when The Buccaneers season 3 will premiere. However, based on casting news announced in late February (more on that below!), the show seems to have entered production in February 2026.

The show tends to debut new episodes on our screens with a pretty consistent schedule. For example, after season 1 concluded in December 2023, season 2 was filmed in the second half of 2024 and premiered in June 2025. It seems possible that, if filming is underway, season 3 premieres either at the very end of the year or in early 2027.

Who in the cast will return for 'The Buccaneers' season 3?

Pending any huge changes, most of the ensemble cast is expected to return for season 3, including Kristine Frøseth (Nan St. George), Alisha Boe (Conchita Closson), Josie Totah (Mabel Elmsworth), Aubri Ibrag (Lizzy Elmsworth), Imogen Waterhouse (Jinny St. George), Christina Hendricks (Mrs. St. George), Guy Remmers (Theo, Duke of Tintagel), Matthew Broome (Guy Thwarte), and Barney Fishwick (Lord James Seadown).

One star whose future with the show is in question is Mia Threapleton, as Honoria Marable is off to pursue a teaching career abroad. We'll also have to wait and see if season 2 newbie Leighton Meester returns for more. And then it seems all but likely that Josh Dylan will not return after the tragic death of Lord Richard Marable.

Who are the new cast members in 'The Buccaneers' season 3?

Is The Buccaneers following starting a trend of casting former stars of teen soaps? It might just be! Of course, last season Leighton Meester came into the fold—and this time around, Vampire Diaries alum Paul Wesley joins the ensemble.

Deadline reported the news in late February 2027, teasing his character details. According to the outlet, the Star Trek: Strange New Worlds actor will play "Frank, who is a mysterious but charming stranger who arrives into Nan and Mrs. St. George’s world, turning it upside down."

Apple TV also teased the news by sharing a video of Wesley in costume and on set on Instagram. In the clip, the star—dressed in a period-accurate coat and with a suave beard—walks through town, and cheekily picks up and tosses fruit from a fruit stand, before pointing to a poster about his casting. "Formally inviting him in. Welcome Paul Wesley to The Buccaneers Season 3," the streamer wrote in the caption.

He's certainly an exciting new addition, and in the coming weeks, we'll have to see if there are any other newcomers this season.

What will 'The Buccaneers' season 3 be about?

Apple TV has unveiled an official logline for season 3: "Our Buccaneers are fighting back. And they’re doing it together. When they arrived in England they were all navigating their first loves. Now, they’re looking for the loves of their lives, and with a new and enigmatic Duke at the helm, Tintagel is also facing an uncertain future. If polite English society thought our American girls rocked the boat, this new bad-boy Duke is about to sink the ship."

It remains to be seen who that bad-boy Duke is. Could it be Wesley's new character? Or, perhaps more likely, Theo's half-brother Kit, who's now to be the Duke of Tintagel?

As fans may recall, the events of The Duchess's Masquerade set up a very dramatic fight for Tintagel to come in season 3. After Theo decides to abdicate and divorce Nan, Blanche (Amelia Bullmore) reveals that his father had a secret son, Kit. He's said to be horrible, so it's likely that he'll become a major player in the next installment.

As for the Nan-Theo-Lizzy love triangle, Nan's pregnancy—of which Theo is still clueless—will continue to provide plenty of drama for the series, as he must choose between his all-consuming love for Lizzy and protecting his child.

In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Kristine Frøseth admitted that she has no idea where her character is running off to in the finale's last scene. "I am just as curious as you are," she told the outlet. "I'm hoping she just keeps running. She meets a group of women, and they all raise the baby together somewhere, and she leaves all the drama behind."

With season 3 on the way, we'll hopefully get to find out more about Nan's next adventure soon!

In 2007, Netflix was a mail-order alternative to Blockbuster, entering the then-new world of online streaming. Now, in 2025, it's one of the world's largest entertainment companies, with more than 300 million subscribers who face an infinite scroll through thousands of options.

If you know where to look, Netflix has everything you'd ever want to watch, from edge-of-your-seat thrillers and swoon-worthy rom-coms to epic period pieces and emotional K-dramas. Let me be your guide—who has spent way too much time on the platform over the past 18 years—to the absolute must-watch series to add to your watchlist. Below, read on for our list of the best Netflix original shows of all time.

'Bojack Horseman' (2014–2020)

Netflix has built an excellent slate of animated shows over the years, from Big Mouth to Arcane to Blue-Eyed Samurai, but Bojack is one of my favorite shows that Netflix has ever made, period. The severely underrated, satirical dark comedy stars the titular horse (voiced by Will Arnett), the former star of a '90s sitcom who's now washed up and miserable. Bojack's failed attempt at redemption is enough for an excellent series by itself, but this is truly an ensemble show with several beloved characters, including the workaholic Princess Carolyn, the ever-peppy Mr. Peanut Butter, and Todd Chavez, one of the best instances of asexual representation in TV history. Plus, though some of the episodes will definitely make you cry, the running animal gags will put a smile back on your face.

WATCH NOW

'Bridgerton' (2020– )

While the wait between seasons can be quite annoying, there's a reason why so many of us viewers are eager to return to the Ton every two years. Shondaland's adaptation of Julia Quinn's romance series transformed the novels from traditional, low-key problematic Regency stories to diverse, needle-drop-filled (still occasionally problematic) sagas that balance steamy sexual tension and modern commentary on the marriage plot. Plus, we'd be remiss not to include the show that catapulted Regé-Jean Page, Simone Ashley, Jonathan Bailey, and Nicola Coughlan to mainstream fame. (Bonus watch: Queen Charlotte is a bit more of a downer, but an excellent addition to the Bridgerton elders's lore.)

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'The Crown' (2016–2023)

We at Marie Claire are well-versed in the royals, so it's no surprise that Netflix's monumental fictionalized telling of the late Queen Elizabeth II's reign made the list. Over seven years, six seasons, and three casts, creator Peter Morgan covered 60 years of the Queen's life, surprising novices and impressing experts with its take on the British Royal Family and major historical events of the 20th century. A special shout-out to Emma Corrin and Elizabeth Debicki for their heartbreaking portrayals of the People's Princess.

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'The Haunting of Hill House' (2018)

Mike Flanagan was the king of televised horror during his five-year tenure at Netflix, and many of the streamer's best shows are part of the "Flanaverse." Fans may have their favorites, but in my opinion, none of the later shows surpass the first terrifying miniseries, set in a haunted house with so many ghosts that spotting them became a top-tier Easter egg hunt. Flanagan's reimagining of the Shirley Jackson novel is both a bone-chilling tale and a heart-wrenching family drama that's become an annual rewatch for me every Halloween. (If you're obsessed with Victoria Pedretti from You, make sure to watch her breakout role in Hill House.)

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'Lupin' (2021– )

The hardest dilemma of this list: Which of Netflix's international thieves would nab the spot on this list? Though Money Heist came in close, I had to choose Lupin, a.k.a. the James Bond the world truly needs. For anyone who hasn't checked out the French-language series yet, Assane Diop (Omar Sy) is a master of disguise who conducts jaw-dropping heists inspired by the literary character Arsène Lupin by Maurice Leblanc. As with many great stories, Assane's true motivation is a mission of revenge, which often comes into conflict with his obligations as a (not-that-great) father.

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'Mindhunter' (2017–2019)

Filmmaker David Fincher (Se7en, Zodiac) mastered the serial killer drama long before he made his way over to Netflix with Mindhunter—but the project might just be his magnum opus. Based on the true-crime book of the same name, about an FBI agent's experience interviewing infamous murderers and launching the Bureau's criminal profiling, it follows fictionalized agents Holden Ford (Jonathan Groff) and Bill Tench (Holt McCallany ), as well as psychologist Wendy Carr (Anna Torv), as they sit down with Charles Manson, David Berkowitz, and more. It's every bit unnerving, but the genius, icy writing and compelling performances will have you on the edge of your seat. We're still holding out for the show to continue in some form.

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'Orange is the New Black' (2013–2019)

Orange is the New Black is one of Netflix's earliest original programs, and it is a defining proof of its vision for the future of television. Though the series ostensibly centers on fish-out-of-water inmate Piper Chapman (Taylor Schilling), the show's vast yet self-contained scope allowed it to delve into each of the excellent supporting characters's backstories and arcs throughout seven seasons. Jenji Kohan's series was legendary for its multi-ethnic and LGBTQ+ representation that dispelled harmful stereotypes, as well as its nuanced treatment of the many societal inequities surrounding mass incarceration. It's a complicated legacy, but you can't deny the show as an acclaimed step in TV's evolution.

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'The Queen's Gambit' (2020)

Netflix's first-ever Emmy win for Outstanding Limited or Anthology Series went to this stunning 1950s and '60s-set drama about the fictional chess prodigy Beth Harmon (played by Anya Taylor-Joy). This show is a marvel both stylistically and narratively, sucking viewers into tense chess matches and making us vicariously feel Harmon's obsession, determination, and brilliance. Though Beth's prone to self-destruction, the miniseries about her is nothing other than confident and masterfully controlled the entire way through.

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'Sex Education' (2019–2023)

The young-adult series is a contentious subgenre for Netflix; while some are iconic—honorable mention to Heartstopper, Never Have I Ever, and American Vandal—many are regrettably cut short. (Again, American Vandal.) But Sex Education stands out for balancing bawdy humor and literal sex education with uplifting coming-of-age plots for its many characters. There's a reason many of its cast members have blown up since the series—see Simone Ashley in Bridgerton, Emma Mackey, Connor Swindells, and Ncuti Gatwa in Barbie and beyond.

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'Stranger Things' (2016–2025)

It's hard to imagine a Netflix subscriber who didn't get sucked into Stranger Things mania at some point in the series's run over nine years. Whether you were a day one devotee falling straight into '80s nostalgia (and screaming "Justice for Barb!") or a later convert obsessing over Vecna theories, Stranger Things is a thrilling coming-of-age adventure that balances suburban drama with genuinely creepy monster moments. It was also the first series to show off the power of Netflix's franchising arm, which means it's more than partly to thank for the streamer's Disneyfication with immersive experiences (for better or for worse).

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'When Life Gives You Tangerines' (2025)

Yes, Squid Game is the biggest Netflix series of all time, but it's not the best K-drama the streaming giant has ever made. (Don't worry, it's still in the Top 5.) That honor goes to When Life Gives You Tangerines, the multi-generational epic that premiered earlier this year and became an instant classic. Tangerines follows one family over 60 years, and each episode warms, soothes, and breaks your heart in equal measure. Trust me, even if you pride yourself on staying dry-faced through the saddest movies, you will be sobbing at some point in the 16-episode run.

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'When They See Us' (2019)

Ava DuVernay's landmark miniseries When They See Us shows the power of television to raise awareness of historic and societal injustices. The unflinching portrayal of the Central Park Five's wrongful conviction for the 1989 assault of Trisha Meili doesn't just focus on the legal proceedings, but also shows how the arrests had a long-lasting impact on the wrongfully accused boys's lives and those of their families and loved ones. Every fictionalized true-crime series should take notes from this show, especially in its scenes showing the former teens struggling to adjust to life after release.

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Calling all reality dating fans: A new Love Island season is almost here. The sixth season of Love Island USA took over pop culture in the summer of 2024, thanks to the addition of host Ariana Madix, the standout cast's fiery personalities, and word-of-mouth social media frenzy as viewers tuned into Peacock every night. By the time the season 6 reunion ended on August 19, fans went through withdrawals and began to count down the days until the show's return.

With summer just around the corner, it's finally time to grab our personalized water bottles, plan our watch parties, and tell our loved ones that we'll be glued to our couches for the foreseeable future. Below, we're keeping track of everything to know about Love Island USA season 7 so far.

When does 'Love Island USA' season 7 come out?

Let's all say it together: We got a text!!!! Peacock has announced that Love Island USA's seventh season will begin on Tuesday, June 3 at 9 p.m. ET / 6 p.m. PT.

This year, new episodes will be released daily, except on Wednesdays. The streamer has yet to confirm the full length of the new season, but it's expected to last at least five weeks, as season 6 ran for 32 days.

Who will host 'Love Island USA' season 7?

After her record-breaking debut season, Ariana Madix will return to host this year's Fiji getaway. The former Vanderpump Rules star will also be joined by comedian Iain Stirling, who will provide his signature narration.

Who is in the 'Love Island USA' season 7 cast?

Peacock revealed the first Islanders of season 7 on May 29, just five days before the reality series' premiere. The streamer also dropped a clip that gives fans a sneak peek at the new cast's intros. Some standouts so far: Ace, a self-described "short king" who already has 1 million followers on TikTok; Chelley, a Haitian Floridian who will try not to judge you based off your zodiac sign; and Belle-A (pronunciation TBD), who loves working at her family's coffee shop in Honolulu, Hawaii.

What do we know about the spinoff 'Love Island: Beyond the Villa'?

If you still can't forget the season 6 cast a year later, you're in luck because they're set to return to our screens very soon. Peacock announced last month that the forthcoming spinoff Love Island: Beyond the Villa will also air in summer 2025, following the cast as they "navigate new careers, evolving friendships, newfound fame, and complex relationships outside of the Love Island villa."

The Beyond the Villa release date is still unknown, but we know who's set to return: Serena Page, Leah Kateb, Miguel Harichi, JaNa Craig, Kenny Rodriguez, Kendall Washington, Kaylor Martin, Aaron Evans, Connor Newsum, and Olivia Walker. Other season 6 alums will also pop by, with Kordell Beckham already set to appear.

Calling all Love Island USA fans: Season 6's all-star cast is returning to our screens!

Last year, the U.S. iteration of Love Island, hosted by Ariana Madix, became a pop culture phenomenon in its own right, breaking Peacock streaming records and catapulting the cast into superstardom. After the season 6 reunion, fans were left hoping that the trio dubbed PPG and the rest of the fan-favorite cast could return to TV again...not knowing that we would eventually get some very good news.

Peacock has announced that a new Love Island spin-off, Love Island: Beyond the Villa, is set to premiere soon. As reported by The Hollywood Reporter, the first-of-its-kind series will "follow everyone’s favorite season 6 Islanders around L.A. as they navigate new careers, evolving friendships, newfound fame, and complex relationships outside of the Love Island villa."

So, how long do we have to wait for the best reality TV cast of the past few years to return? (And will we have to fit the series in between our current obsession with Love Island USA season 7?) Read on for everything we know about Love Island: Beyond the Villa so far.

When will the Love Island USA spinoff, Love Island: Beyond the Villa, come out?

We got a text! Peacock has announced that Love Island: Beyond the Villa will premiere on Sunday, July 13, 2025. After the Sunday premiere, new episodes will be released every Thursday at 6 p.m. PT/9 p.m. ET, starting from July 17th.

Who will be in the 'Love Island: Beyond the Villa' cast?

Peacock has announced that the season 6 cast members set to return for the new spinoff include: Serena Page, Leah Kateb, Miguel Harichi, JaNa Craig, Kenny Rodriguez, Kendall Washington, Kaylor Martin, Aaron Evans, Connor Newsum, and Olivia Walker. The series will also include "appearances from other former Islanders."

While most of season 6's standout cast will appear, some surprising names are missing, including one half of the season's winning couple. Though Kordell Beckham is not included in the announcement, he has confirmed to PEOPLE that he will appear on the show, just not as part of the main cast.

According to the outlet, Kordell has been cast in a scripted series(!) that will conflict with the filming of Beyond the Villa. Still, the actor will pop in and out to support the cast and Serena, as the pair is still going strong (and absolutely adorable).

As for the rest of the season 6 cast, the official Beyond the Villa trailer (more on that below) teased cameos from alums like Beckham and Nicole Jacky.

Is there a trailer for 'Love Island: Beyond the Villa?'

The first look at Love Island: Beyond the Villa is here, and so far, the spinoff is looking like the season 6 follow-up we've been waiting for. Though we have a new location in L.A. and a new level of fame for the former Islanders, some things never change, including Aaron possibly making Taylor cry.

The trailer also teases conflicts between the established couples—from JaNa and Kenny disagreeing on moving in to Serena and Kordell facing time apart—and a public reunion between Kendall and Nicole. The exes appear to discuss their post-finale breakup and the public fallout; Kendall starts by saying, "There was a lot of collateral damage," before Nicole argues, "You can say you talked shit about me. Say it with your chest."

On June 25, Peacock released a special sneak peek: the first five minutes of Beyond the Villa are now available to watch. The scene shows the season 6 cast reuniting for a party in L.A., with Kaylor dealing with plenty of drama, between an argument with Liv and her first time seeing Aaron since their breakup.

After some awkward small talk, Kaylor tells Aaron, "My heart is heavy when it comes to you, so I don’t want to do it in this setting, so maybe somewhere else," before inviting him to "her crib." We'll have to wait til mid-July to see whether he takes her up on her offer.

Netflix's new comedy North of North is a lighthearted, feel-good series that gives viewers a sweet peek into Inuit culture in the Arctic Circle. The streaming giant's first Canadian original series, co-produced by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) in partnership with the Aboriginal Peoples Television Network (APTN), the eight-episode show takes place in the fictional town of Ice Cove, Nunavut, Canada. When Siaja (Anna Lambe), a 26-year-old Inuk woman and mother, sets out to change her life, she turns her extremely close-knit town upside down.

To cast the series, creators Stacey Aglok-MacDonald and Alethea Arnaquq-Baril recruited a cast of Indigenous actors from around the globe, including several hailing from the same northern town that inspired Ice Cove. Read on to learn more about the talented cast of North of North.

Anna Lambe as Siaja

Siaja is a 26-year-old modern Inuk woman who shares her 7-year-old daughter, Bun (Keira Belle Cooper), with her high-school sweetheart Ting (Kelly William). Though she had a complicated childhood, Siaja wants to be more than just Ting's housewife, and she's determined to improve life for herself, her daughter, and her community.

Anna Lambe, 24, is a Canadian Inuit actress who grew up in Iqaluit, where North of North was filmed. She made her film debut in 2018's The Grizzlies, which earned her a Best Supporting Actress nomination at the Canadian Screen Awards (Canada's equivalent to the Oscars). Her TV credits have included Trickster, Three Pines, and True Detective: Night Country.

Maika Harper as Neevee

Siaja's mother, Neevee, is a chaotic, unconventional woman who struggled with addiction while raising Siaja as a single mom. Now sober for 10 years, Neevee is a proud outsider in the community who doesn't let many people in, and she fiercely loves her daughter and granddaughter.

Maika Harper, 38, grew up in Iqaluit until she moved to Belleville, Ontario, at 14. She made her TV debut in the 2014 APTN dramedy Mohawk Girls when she was still in college, and went on to appear in the shows Kim's Convenience, Burden of Truth, and Law & Order Toronto: Criminal Intent. The mother-of-two is also the author of three children's books, written in both Inuktitut and English.

Braeden Clarke as Kuuk

Kuuk is an Inuk and Cree man with strong family ties to Ice Cove, who takes a short-term job in the Northern town after some major life drama. He quickly hits things off with Siaja, who appreciates his excitement to learn more about the community.

Braeden Clarke, 37, is an actor from Mikisew Cree First Nation in Alberta, who earned a Canadian Screen Award nomination for his role in the 2023 miniseries Little Bird. He has also previously appeared in shows like Impulse, Outlander, and SkyMed.

Jay Ryan as Alistair

Alistair, a charismatic environmental consultant who first came to the North as a young man and has a history with Neevee, is played by Jay Ryan, 43. The New Zealand-born actor rose to fame with a role on the long-running Australian soap Neighbors, and later appeared in the series Sea Patrol, Offspring, Terra Nova, Beauty & the Beast, and Mary Kills People. Recently, he played adult Ben Hanscom in the horror movie It Chapter Two and made his Netflix debut in the Western series Territory.

Kelly William as Ting

"King Ting" (above, right) is a pilot, a hunter, and a beloved community member who's also a pretty good dad. However, he's also a narcissist with a bit of a cruel side when it comes to his soon-to-be ex-wife.

Kelly William grew up in Xat'sull First Nation, British Columbia, and made his acting debut in a 2009 short film made by his cousin, Helen Haig-Brown. He has also appeared in an uncredited role in the 2022 action movie Jurassic World: Dominion and the series Motherland: Fort Salem.

Mary Lynn Rajskub as Helen

Helen, the senior administrator at the community center, came to the Arctic 23 years ago and cares deeply about the town of Ice Cove...though she still has a lot to learn about Inuk life. She doesn't think much of Siaja when the series starts, but the pair learn to work together under a common goal.

Mary Lynn Rajskub, 53, is a veteran TV actress best known for playing analyst Chloe O'Brian in the action franchise 24. Her other credits include The Larry Sanders Show, Dude, Where's My Car?, Sweet Home Alabama, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, Julie & Julia, 2 Broke Girls, The Girlfriend Experience, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, and The Dropout.

Bailey Poching as Colin

Colin, a queer Māori man originally from New Zealand, serves as the communications coordinator and radio DJ at the community center. He's a sweet and supportive friend to everyone (and has tea about everyone in town).

Bailey Poching, 26, is a Samoan and Māori actor and comedian, also from New Zealand. He has mostly appeared in TV shows and short films in his native country, including the comedies Kid Sister and My Favorite Dead Person. He was also a writer on the comedy game show 7 Days.

Zorga Qaunaq as Millie

Zorga Qaunaq plays Millie, Siaja and Colin's free-spirited colleague at the community center. The actress and multi-disciplinary artist, who grew up in Nunavut and now lives in Ottawa, makes her major acting debut in North of North.

Nutaaq Doreen Simmonds as Elisapee

Elisapee, a community center receptionist, is a residential school survivor who follows both traditional Inuit culture and Christianity. The rude and judgmental Elder doesn't have many people on her good side...and the list starts and ends with Colin.

Nutaaq Doreen Simmonds is an American Iñupiaq actress and activist who grew up in Utqiagvik, Alaska. Before North of North, she appeared alongside Jodie Foster in True Detective: Night Country. She was also indirectly featured in the Oscar-winning film The Revenant; the movie used audio of the actress reciting a poem in the Inupiaq language without crediting her.

Season 3 of Yellowjackets ended on April 11, 2025, wrapping up an installment of death, gore, and mind-blowing revelations. The third season of Showtime's mystery-thriller series about a feral soccer team stranded in the wilderness had the highest body count so far, as the survivors turned against each other in the present day and reconnected to the outside world for the first time in the past.

The season 3 finale wrapped up some series-long mysteries (and introduced an endgame for one of the show's timelines). But several cliffhangers and questions remain, so it's time to gather clues about what may be in store for the soccer team across both timelines. Read on for everything we know about a possible Yellowjackets season 4 so far.

Is 'Yellowjackets' renewed for season 4?

Yes! Paramount+ with Showtime announced the good news on May 20, 2025, about a month after the season 3 finale. With the renewal announcement came the official stats on the prior season; per the streamer, season 3 was Yellowjackets's most-watched season yet, and the finale is now the most-streamed episode in the show's history.

"Yellowjackets has become a cultural juggernaut; with season 3 shattering all previous records, we are thrilled to announce its renewal for a season four on Paramount+," said Chris McCarthy, co-CEO of Paramount Global and President of Showtime/MTV Entertainment Studios. "Ashley and Bart have masterfully crafted an utterly singular, genre-defying phenomenon: a perfect alchemy of psychological horror, survival thriller, and coming-of-age drama that continues to captivate audiences worldwide, brought to life by our extraordinarily talented and beloved cast."

Even before renewal, showrunners Ashley Lyle, Bart Nickerson, and Jonathan Lisco expressed that they needed at least one more season to complete the series's story. While speaking to the Los Angeles Times after season 3, Nickerson told the outlet, "We are kind of banking on another season. So, sorry, if we do get cancelled; if we pulled a total My So-Called Life where we’re just ending. But there are worse things than to go down in history as another My So-Called Life."

Thankfully, we now know that the show hasn't been cancelled.

Is season 4 the last season of 'Yellowjackets?'

In October 2025, Showtime confirmed that season 4 will be the final season of Yellowjackets. Deadline reported the news, stating the upcoming installment was being written at the time, meaning the show will receive a proper ending.

The showrunners shared a joint statement on Instagram at the time. "After three incredible seasons, and great consideration, we’re excited to announce that we will be bringing the story of Yellowjackets to its twisted conclusion in this fourth and final season," they said. "We’ve always known there would come a point when the story would tell us it wants to end, and it’s our belief that our job—our responsibility—is to listen. Telling this emotional, wild, and deeply human story has been a profoundly meaningful experience and a true honor for us, and we’re so very grateful to the brilliant cast, crew, and writers who have bravely gone on the journey with us to bring it to life. Most of all, we want to thank the fans who have stuck with us through every moment, mystery, and meal—the Hive is nothing without you! We can’t wait to share the final chapter with you and hope you find it…delicious."

The decision comes after the series creators previously teased that they needed a five-season arc to tell the full story. Those plans can change, however, and they're clearly now committed to giving the hit drama a solid finale (before it potentially continues longer than necessary).

When will 'Yellowjackets' season 4 come out?

When it was reported that season 4 would be the last one of Yellowjackets, Deadline announced that Showtime was eyeing production to start sometime in 2026 and episodes to air late in the year. It seems the series should be on track to meet that schedule; if it films throughout the spring, we'd guess the show could return by November/December.

That's not unlike the previous production timelines on the series. For example, season 1 debuted in November 2021, and season 2 premiered in March 2023. Season 3 was delayed by the 2023 WGA and SAG strikes, which is why it didn't premiere until February 2025. So, a year and a half seems feasible for episodes to begin rolling out in the late fall.

Who in the 'Yellowjackets' cast will return for season 4?

After season 3's body count, the main cast members to return in season 4 include Melanie Lynskey (Shauna), Sophie Nélisse (teen Shauna), Sophie Thatcher (teen Natalie), Tawny Cypress (Taissa), Jasmin Savoy Brown (teen Taissa), Christina Ricci (Misty), Samantha Hanratty (teen Misty), Courtney Eaton (teen Lottie), Liv Hewson (teen Van), Jenna Burgess (teen Melissa), Kevin Alves (Travis), and Nia Sondaya (teen Akilah). Warren Cole (Jeff) and Sarah Desjardins (Callie) should also return to the present timeline.

Among the teenage survivors, we'll actually be seeing a bit more of one of them. In February 2026, Deadline reported that Nina Sondaya, who plays Akilah, has been upped to a series regular in season 4. As fans may recall, even in season 3, she came more into the fold. She had poisoned all of the livestock (which she cared deeply for), so Lottie could encourage another hunt. She also confronted Lottie in the cave, insisting that she no longer stood for her visions being weaponized. Akilah then disappeared—and while some fans theorized that Lottie must've killed her, she'll be back in a big way.

Aside from the long-running, core cast, one of season 3's new additions, Ashley Sutton (Hannah), is also expected to return after her cliffhanger fate in the season 3 finale. Though other new major cast member Hilary Swank (adult Melissa) is more up in the air, the Oscar winner has said she would be open to returning.

Who are the new cast members in 'Yellowjackets' season 4?

Did you really think Yellowjackets wasn't going to cast more icons for its final season? In late February 2026, Deadline reported two exciting new additions for season 4: comedy legend Jane Squib and former Brat Pack star Molly Ringwald. Ringwald's casting very much aligns with the show's flair for booking former '80s and '90s icons.

While the Eleanor the Great star's role is being kept underwraps, we do know who the Breakfast Club actress is playing. According to Deadline, she'll recur as "Van's mom, Vicky, a recently recovered alcoholic trying her best to course correct her past." However, we don't know if Vicky will appear in the '90s timeline—perhaps when the girls get rescued—or in the present. As fans may remember, Van (played as an adult by Lauren Ambrose and as a teen by Liv Hewson) tragically died in season 3, so Vicky may come into the fold that way. (For what it's worth, Ringwald is 58, and Ambrose is 48, so the past feels more likely, but the makeup department could very possibly age her up, too!)

With those two joining the ensemble, it feels all the more likely that more names will be announced in the coming weeks and months.

What will 'Yellowjackets' season 4 be about?

Season 3 already brought some major status quo shifts to the series, but Yellowjackets season 4 is poised to bring the younger cast out of the wilderness. The finale ends with Natalie making contact with civilization, thanks to the satellite phone from the frog researchers's campsite and the plane transponder Misty broke in the series premiere. In a Deadline interview published after season 3 aired, Nickerson confirmed that the girls are set to be rescued—but not in the season 4 premiere.

"Just to clarify, not to say that we’re gonna get there very soon," the co-creator said. "But we’ve always said that we do think that there is a portion of the story that wants to be told upon their return, we just don’t know when we’re gonna get there."

Speaking to the Los Angeles Times, Lyle added that the writers's plan was always to follow the girls through their difficult readjustment to the real world. "It’s something that we’ve talked about in the writers’s room and, from the very beginning, Bart and I knew that was a piece of the story we wanted to eventually explore," she told the outlet. "These girls have changed remarkably, for better or for worse, in their time out there, especially because of their age. They’re so malleable to begin with and they’ve become very different people. And to see those people readjust to a world that is almost—I wouldn’t say insignificant to them; it’s obviously very significant—foreign to them now in a way that we think would be really ripe for storytelling and to dig deeper into their characters."

On April 4, 2025, Netflix released Pulse and became the latest streamer to join the battle of the medical dramas. Created by Hawaii Five-O alum Zoe Robyn, the Miami-set series takes place in the emergency room of Maguire Medical Center, where third-year resident Danny Simms (Willa Fitzgerald) is dealing with a lot. Not only is a hurricane heading toward the city, but she has just been appointed emergency medicine's new chief resident after she reported the old chief, Xander Phillips (Colin Woodell), for sexual harassment.

By the end of the 10-episode season, the short-term fates of Danny, Xander, and the residents' careers have been sealed. The same cannot be said for their tangled romantic lives heading into a possible second season. (I need to know what happens next with Sophie and Camila!) Below, read on for everything we know so far about the future of Pulse.

Has 'Pulse' been renewed for a second season?

As of Pulse's release, Netflix has not revealed what will happen with the show's future. This is business as usual, as it's very rare for the streaming giant to renew a show before its debut. Fans will have to wait for a few weeks of viewership numbers before Netflix makes a decision to renew.

When would 'Pulse' season 2 come out?

If Pulse gets a second season, viewers will likely only have a short wait between seasons. Medical dramas are traditionally quick to return, so new episodes of Pulse could be back as early as spring 2026.

What would 'Pulse' season 2 be about?

Spoilers for the Pulse finale ahead. By the end of season 1, most of Danny's immediate problems are resolved. Firstly, she still has her job, though Xander's parents pressured the hospital administration to kick her out of Maguire. The resident even earns Natalie's ( Justina Machado) respect enough to be her pick for the chief resident slot. Unfortunately, due to restructuring, Natalie will no longer be in charge of the surgery and emergency medicine departments. The new chair of the ER is attending doctor Patrick Sanchez (J.R. Ramirez), who names Sam (Jessie T. Usher) chief resident instead.

With the administrative switch-up, Natalie and Xander—who's set to become ER's newest attending and doesn't get along with his new boss Patrick—will have their hands full in the new season. They may even become allies as Natalie deals with changes in the trauma center she helped build. There's also the chance that besties Sam and Danny may end up at odds again in a new season since they had both been going after the chief resident spot all season.

As for Danny and Xander, the will-they-won't-they couple end the season with their healthiest dynamic yet, even if they aren't currently together. Xander comes clean to both Danny and the hospital board about what happened at Kennedy, and he finally apologizes to Danny for ignoring their power differential when they were dating. They also both admit that they still love each other, but seeing as he's even more of her boss as attending, continuing their romance doesn't seem to be an option by the end of the season 1 finale.

Speaking to Tudum, Pulse co-showrunner Carlton Cuse highlighted the questions facing Xander and Danny by the end of the season. "We see how much they care about each other, but what’s the path forward? Danny is still going to be a resident. Xander is now her boss again in a different iteration as an attending," he said. "Our hope is that the audience really cares about these two people and about their relationship with each other."

Meanwhile, actor Colin Woodell pointed out that Danny and Xander's love is "real." He added, "They’re both two characters who want to be good partners to each other. But they also have a lot of work to do on themselves. Unfortunately, both of them need to figure some stuff out on their own first before they’re really available for the other."

If you're a Netflix subscriber who has yet to dip your toe into the world of South Korean entertainment, you are in a small minority. According to the streaming giant, "over 80% of Netflix members around the world watch K-content" with Korean-language TV shows and movies joining Spanish and Japanese content as the most popular among U.S. audiences. Netflix's 2024 Korean slate gave us dozens of K-dramas and Korean reality shows, with shows like Queen of Tears, Parasyte: the Grey, Physical: 100 season 2, and Culinary Class Wars dominating the streamer.

Somehow, Netflix Korea went even bigger in 2025, with epic new stories starring Hallyu's biggest stars, and the return of several hit reality competitions. From When Life Gives You Tangerines to Physical: Asia to the final season of Squid Game, global fans had plenty to fill their watchlists. Below, we've rounded up the best K-dramas and reality shows that landed on Netflix in 2025.

The Best Historical Netflix K-Dramas of 2025

'When Life Gives You Tangerines'

Release date: March 7

Warning: You will need a lot of tissues when you watch this gorgeous drama from My Mister director Kim Won-seok. This weekly drama takes place on Jeju Island and "chronicles the adventures of Ae-sun (IU and Moon So-ri), 'the remarkable rebel,' and Gwan-sik, (Park Bo-gum and Park Hae-joon), the 'unyielding iron,' including Gwan-sik’s long-standing crush on Ae-sun since they were young."

WATCH IT

'Dear Hongrang'

Release date: May 16

This historical K-drama, adapted from Jang Da-hye's novel Hong Rang: Swallowing Gold, chronicles the bond between step-siblings Hong-rang (Alchemy of Souls' Lee Jae-wook) and Jae-yi (Destined With You's Jo Bo-ah). Over a decade after Hong-rang disappeared at the age of eight, he returns home with no memory, and Jae-yi becomes "torn between doubt and love for her enigmatic step-brother," per Netflix.

WATCH IT

'Aema'

Release date: August 22

In 1982, the movie Madame Aema made history as one of the box-office hits of that year, and as the most erotic Korean film of its time. This dramedy set in Chungmuro, the heart of the Korean film industry in 1980s Seoul, depicts the fictionalized process of creating the film. Among the characters involved are Jeong Hui-ran (Lee Ha-nee), the acclaimed diva who's removed from the lead role due to studio disputes; Shin Joo-ae (Bong Hyo-rin), a nightclub dancer who's suddenly cast as the film's new star; and Kwak In-woo (Cho Hyun-chul), the timid rookie director about to make his directorial debut.

WATCH IT

'Bon Appetit, Your Majesty'

Release date: August 23

This smash-hit K-drama starring Lim Yoo-na and Lee Chae-min had fans drawing comparisons to Mr. Queen (the highest of compliments). Inspired by the real-life tyrant Yeonsangun, this historical-fantasy series follows Ji-young (Lim), an acclaimed chef who's suddenly transported back to 16th-century Joseon. She's quickly captured by the temperamental King Yi Heon (Lee Chae-min), who will keep her alive as long as she keeps making him excellent meals. (Because this is a K-drama, they eventually fall in love.)

WATCH IT

'Typhoon Family'

Release date: October 11

Like the beloved romance Twenty Five Twenty One, Typhoon Family is a historical drama set amid the 1997 Financial Crisis. Kang Tae-poong (King the Land's Lee Jun-ho) is a wealthy playboy, but when his father dies amid the crisis, he steps up to save the family business, Typhoon Trading. His determination inspires Oh Mi-seon (Pachinko's Kim Min-ha), who works as a bookkeeper at Typhoon. As the pair navigate several crises, they slowly fall in love.

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The Best Netflix Korean Reality Shows of 2025

'Single's Inferno' season 4

Release date: January 14

The fourth season of Single's Inferno marked a big moment for Netflix Korea's unscripted shows, as the first one to be renewed for four seasons. Season 4 featured a new cast, including standout members like Lee Si-an and Jang Theo, who roughed it out on an abandoned island dubbed Inferno, flirting and competing in challenges in hopes of winning a Paradise date in a luxury hotel.

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'Kian’s Bizarre B&B'

Release date: April 8

Webtoon (or manhwa) writer and TV personality Kian84 leads this variety show, where he "sets up and runs an extraordinary guesthouse on the island of Ulleungdo called KIAN Bizarre B&B, which offers a unique experience for young visitors." According to the description, "the guesthouse operates in a realm between healing and hilarity," as Kian welcomes a diverse selection of guests, with the help of his part-timers, BTS member Jin and actress Ji Ye-eun.

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'The Devil's Plan: Death Room'

Release date: May 6

For viewers more interested in games of mental wit than physical strength, The Devil's Plan returned for a second season. The exciting first installment brought together contestants from various fields to solve sophisticated mental games for the chance at a 250 million won (approximately $173,000) prize. Season 2's cast included Single's Inferno host Kyuhyun, EXchange/Transit Love alum Jung Hyun-gyu, legendary Go player Lee Se Dol, K-pop soloist Chuu, and Beef and The Umbrella Academy star Justin H. Min.

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'Better Late than Single'

Release date: July 8

Following the success of Single's Inferno, this reality dating show helps "eternal singles" find their chance at love. The makeover show follows a group of adults who've never been in a relationship, as they "undergo an intensive inside-out transformation, [from] personal style and grooming to mindset and communication" while living together and going on dates.

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'The Echoes of Survivors: Inside Korea's Tragedies'

Release date: August 15

In March 2023, the true-crime docuseries In the Name of God: A Holy Betrayal examined the disturbing stories of four Korean cult leaders. In December, one of the doc's subjects, Christian Gospel Mission (also known as JMS) leader Jeong Myeong-seok, was sentenced to 23 years in prison for sexual violence. This upcoming follow-up docuseries is the "second story" of In the Name of God, and "will feature the final story of JMS and the vivid voices of survivors from painful, tragic events in Korea.”

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'Crime Scene Zero'

Release date: September 23

Following original series like Busted! and Agents of Mystery, Netflix picked up the fifth season of the popular variety show Crime Scene. Follow a cast of celebrities playing different roles in a murder scene as they investigate one another to determine the criminal among them. This new season's cast includes fan-favorites from previous seasons: director Jang Jin, announcer Park Ji-yoon, comedian Jang Dong-min, Flower of Evil's Kim Ji-hoon, and IVE's An Yu-jin. Joining them are guest stars like Culinary Class Wars winner Ha Seok-jin.

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'Physical: Asia'

Release date: October 28

This spinoff of the intense strength competition Physical: 100 expands its scope beyond Korea, recruiting athletes throughout Asia in the franchise's latest "search for the perfect physique." The elite athletes in this Olympics-esque tournament include Physical: 100 alums, the winner of Final Draft, and champion boxer and former Philippines senator Manny Pacquiao.

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'Culinary Class Wars'

Release date: December 16

After its smash-hit debut, Culinary Class Wars will return for a second season, featuring beloved judges Paik Jong-won and Ahn Sung-jae. The cutthroat cooking competition pits 100 chefs against each other through intense and creative challenges, with the acclaimed "White Spoon" chefs going up against the underdog "Black Spoons." Per Netflix, season 2 features "even bigger showdowns, bolder tastes, and unrelenting tension."

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'Physical: Welcome to Mongolia'

Release date: December 24

To celebrate the global success of Physical: Asia, PD Jang Ho-gi brings viewers a travelogue spinoff reuniting members of Team Korea and Team Mongolia. The four-part series will follow Amotti and Kim Dong-hyun as Mongolian fan-favorites Orkhonbayar Bayarsaikhan and Lkhagva-Ochir Erdene-Ochir lead them on a locals' tour of the country's capital, Ulaanbaatar.

The Best Netflix Romance K-Dramas of 2025

'When the Stars Gossip'

Release date: January 4

This rom-com K-drama has a straightforward plot description: "An astronaut and a tourist meet and fall in love at a space station." Hallyu superstar Lee Min-ho plays the space tourist Gong Ryong, an OB/GYN dating the heir to Korea's richest corporation.When the Camellia Blooms's Gong Hyo-jin plays Eve Kim, the perfectionist commander who has to keep Gong alive.

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'Melo Movie'

Release date: February 14

We spent Valentine's Day 2025 with this romance K-drama's all-star cast. Five years ago, movie buffs Ko Gyeom (Choi Woo-shik) and Kim Mu-bee (Park Bo-young) fell for each other before Gyeom disappeared. Five years later, the pair reunite as movie critic Gyeon interviews director Mu-bee about her new film...and becomes her next-door neighbor. Lee Jun-young and Jeon So-nee costar as exes who also reunite to work on a new movie.

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'The Potato Lab'

Release date: March 1

Korean rom-coms love a theme: This lighthearted drama follows a spud-crazy romance. The synopsis: "In The Potato Lab, Mi-kyung’s (Lee Sun-bin) potato-centric life is upended by Baek-ho (Extraordinary Attorney Woo's Kang Tae-oh), a cold pragmatist. A whirlwind healing romantic comedy unfolds, as twisty as a tornado potato."

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'Heavenly Ever After'

Release date: April 19

This rom-com puts a new spin on one of Korea's most popular fantasy concepts: the afterlife. Octogenarian Lee Hae-sook (Kim Hye-ja) is a kind-hearted loan shark whose husband Ko Nak-jun died a year ago. When it's Hae-sook's time to go, she discovers she can choose to live with a specific person and be her desired age for all eternity. Deciding to remain her current age after a dying Nak-jun said she's never been more beautiful, Hae-sook arrives in Heaven to find her devoted husband...who's now in his 30s (played by Son Suk-ku). Come for the extreme age-gap romance, and stay for the scenes of deceased pets reuniting with their loved ones as humans.

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'Tastefully Yours'

Release date: May 12

‬Squid Game's Kang Ha-neul and Sweet Home's Go Min-si lead this rom-com that follows an unlikely romance set among the culinary world. Per the description, "In an attempt to inherit a food corporation, Han Beom-woo (Kang), a chaebol heir turned 'recipe hunter,' meets Mo Yeon-joo (Go),‬ a stubborn chef who runs a one-table restaurant in the small city of Jeonju, South Korea. Their fierce kitchen‬ encounters unfold into a shimmering romance.‬"

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'Genie, Make a Wish'

Release date: October 3

Eight years after they first played love interests in Uncontrollably Fond, Bae Suzy and Kim Woo-bin reunite in this highly anticipated fantasy rom-com from The Glory screenwriter Kim Eun-sook. The fantasy drama (previously known as Everything Will Come True) chronicles the adventures of Jinn (Kim), a genie who's awakened from his centuries-long sleep, and Ga-young (Bae), who's granted three wishes.

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'Dynamite Kiss'

Release date: November 12

2025 may have been a rough year for classic rom-coms, but this hilarious series from SBS TV has K-drama fans swooning. During a trip to Jeju Island, striving "Cinderella" Go Da-rim (Ahn Eun-jin) finds her chaebol "Prince Charming" in Gong Ji-hyeok (Jang Ki-yong), but she ghosts him when she's called away for a family emergency. Weeks later, desperate for a job, Da-rim lies that she's married with a child to get a temp job at a baby products company. But guess who happens to be her new boss? Such begins the twisting, delightfully trope-y romance.

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The Best Netflix Slice-of-Life K-Dramas of 2025

'Our Unwritten Seoul'

Release date: May 24

Korean superstar Park Bo-young does double-duty in this slice-of-life K-drama, starring as two identical twins: perfectionist office-worker Mi-rae, and carefree former athlete Mi-ji. "After a complicated twist of fate, they swap identities, each sister navigating unfamiliar challenges to discover love and their true selves," per the description. GOT 7's Park Jin-young also stars as Ho-su, a childhood friend who reunites with the twins.

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'The Winning Try'

Release date: August 15

In this heartwarming sports drama, Yoon Kye-sang stars as Ju Ga-ram, a disgraced rugby player who gets the opportunity to coach his high school team. Though Hanyang High School is the weakest team in the league, the players and Ga-ram himself begin their quest for redemption.

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'You and Everything Else'

Release date: September 12

This K-drama tearjerker (also known as Two Women or Eun Jung and Sang Yeon) will follow "the journey of two friends who have an enduring, complicated love-hate relationship," per Netflix. Former childhood besties Ryu Eun-jung (Goblin's Kim Go-eun) and Cheon Sang-yeon (Reborn Rich's Park Ji-hyun) reunite at 42-years-old as they face a profound challenge: Sang-yeon's battle with cancer. The Glory's Kim Gun-woo also stars.

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'The Dream Life of Mr. Kim'

Release date: October 11

In the same month that Park Chan-wook's No Other Choice hit theaters, this slice-of-life K-drama offered a different perspective on the midlife crisis. Kim Nak-su (played by Moving and Chicken Nugget's Ryu Seung-ryong) is a corporate manager who is unexpectedly demoted after 25 years of working. As he takes a series of odd jobs to keep himself, his wife (Myung Se-bin), and his college-aged son (Cha Kang-yoon) afloat, Mr. Kim must learn to find happiness outside of monetary success.

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The Best Thriller Netflix K-Dramas of 2025

'Trauma Code: Heroes on Call'

Release date: January 24

Netflix's first original medical K-drama is an adaptation of the webcomic Severe Trauma Center: Golden Hour, produced by WEBTOON Entertainment’s Studio N. The comedy-thriller centers on an ensemble cast led by Kingdom's Ju Ji-hoon and rising star Choo Young-woo. The show's description reads, "Genius surgeon Baek Kang-hyuk transforms a university hospital's budget-draining trauma team into a trauma center that saves lives."

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'Karma'

Release date: April 4

Squid Game season 1 star Park Hae-soo and Hometown Cha-Cha-Cha's Shin Min-a lead this crime thriller K-drama based on the Kakao webtoon of the same name. Per the description, the show follows "six people caught in an unbreakable karmic loop, each bound by reckless choices that spiral out of control." The main cast is rounded out by A Killer Paradox's Lee Hee-joon, D.P.'s Kim Sung-kyun, Running Man alum Lee Kwang-soo, and The First Responders' Gong Seung-yeon.

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'Friendly Rivalry'

Release date: April 6

After its domestic premiere earlier this year, Netflix brought this acclaimed high-school thriller to the platform. Woo Seul-gi (Chung Su-bin) is a studious orphan who moves from her provincial hometown to Seoul to attend the elite Chaehwa High School. She quickly befriends Yoo Je-yi (Reply 1988's Lee Hye-ri), Chaehwa's most popular student, to the surprise of everyone...including Seul-gi herself. The series unfurls the duo's complicated relationship, as well as the journeys of Je-yi's lackeys Ye-ri (Kang Hye-won) and Kyung (Oh Woo-ri).

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'Weak Hero Class 2'

Release date: April 25

Weak Hero Class 1 was one of the best thriller dramas of 2022, following high school student Yeon Si-eun (Park Ji-hoon) as he struggled against brutal school violence. Now, Netflix has taken the reins for the show's second season, in which Si-eun challenges a new set of lethal bullies after he's transferred to a new school. Weak Hero Class 2's cast also includes Twinkling Watermelon's Ryeoun, XO Kitty's Choi Min-young, and Crash Course in Romance's Lee Min-jae.

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'Mercy for None'

Release date: June 6

So Ji-sub stars in this highly anticipated noir crime thriller as a former gangster who re-emerges seeking vengeance. 11 years ago, Gi-jun (So) "severed his own Achilles tendon to leave the world of organized crime." He now lives a peaceful life, while his younger brother Gi-seok (Lee Jun-hyuk) stayed in the game and became a kingpin. Now, Gi-jun returns to "investigate and avenge" Gi-seok's mysterious death. Also starring in the show's ensemble cast are Huh Joon-ho, An Kil-kang,‬‭ Tiger Lee, Gong Myoung, Choo Young-woo,‬ and more.

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'Squid Game' season 3

Release date: June 27

Squid Game's final episodes arrived on the streamer this year, bringing the story of Gi-hun (Lee Jung-jae) and the Front Man (Lee Byung-hun) to a devastating conclusion. Though Netflix's most-watched show of all time concluded its original story, creator Hwang Dong-hyuk's sadistic game will live on, via spinoffs like Squid Game: The Challenge and the rumored Squid Game: USA.

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'Trigger'

Release date: July 25

Korea is known for its strict gun regulation, but this thriller K-drama follows "two men [who] pick up their guns for different reasons" amid a fictional surge in illegal firearms. Lee‬ Do (Kim Nam-gil) is "a military sniper turned police detective, investigating a‬ series of incidents to hunt down the source behind these illegal firearms." Meanwhile, Moon Baek (Kim Young-kwang), "a methodical strategist behind his carefree manner, is the center of the arms‬ broker business.‬"

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'As You Stood By'

Release date: November 7

Parasyte: The Grey's Jeon So-nee and Squid Game's Lee Yoo-mi star in this K-drama adaptation of Hideo Okuda’s novel Naomi to Kanako. Longtime friends Eun-su (Jeon) and Hui-su (Lee) suffered traumatic childhoods and grew up to be unhappy in their adult lives. One day, they decide to finally change their lives...by killing Hui-su's abusive husband (played by Jang Seung-Jo).

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'The Price of Confession'

Release date: December 5

This mystery-thriller K-drama boasts an all-star cast, including Kill Boksoon's Jeon Do-yeon, Goblin's Kim Go-eun, Squid Game's Park Hae-soo, and Extreme Job's Jin Seon-kyu. Jeon plays Ahn Yoon-soo, a woman accused of her husband’s murder, who encounters a mysterious prison inmate (Kim) and "strikes a dangerous deal," according to the show's description.

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'Cashero'

Release date: December 26

Based on the webtoon of the same name, this action K-drama takes place in a world where superpowers are tied to special circumstances. Average man Kang Sang-ung (Typhoon Family's Lee Jun-ho) discovers that he has superpowers connected to the amount of money he possesses. With the help of his math-whiz girlfriend Kim Min-sook (A Shop for Killers' Kim Hye-jun), Sang-ung joins the Korean Coalition of Superheroes. Co-starring are Kim Byung-chul, who plays a lawyer who can only access his powers when he's drunk, and Kim Hyang-gi‬, whose telekinesis is powered by calories.

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The Best Workplace Netflix K-Dramas of 2025

'Resident Playbook'

Release date: April 12

Three years after Hospital Playlist's final episode, the long-awaited spinoff Resident Playbook finally arrived. Per the description, the new medical drama "follows the lives and friendships of OB-GYN residents at Jongno Yulje Medical Center, a branch of the iconic Yulje Hospital." Moving's Go Youn-jung leads the cast, which includes Shin Shi-ah, Han Ye-ji, Kang You-seok, and Jung Jun-won.

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'Beyond the Bar'

Release date: August 2

Netflix's first entry in this year's courtroom dramas boom, Beyond the Bar follows brilliant rookie lawyer Kang Hyo-min (Jung Chae-yeon) as she begins her first job at the prestigious Yulim law firm's litigation department, led by Yoon Seok-hoon (Lee Jin-wook). Though the show eventually falls prey to the problematic age gap, the surprisingly heartwarming cases had fans loving this procedural.

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'Pro Bono'

Release date: December 6

This legal drama stars Crash Course on Romance's Jung Kyung-ho as Kang Da-wit, a famous judge whose dreams of joining the Supreme Court are dashed by scandal. After he's forced to resign, Da-wit's ex Oh Jung-in (Lee Yoo-young) recruits him to work for her modest pro bono practice. The pair makes a deal: If Da-wit wins over 70 percent of his cases in the next year, Jung-in will help him secure a Supreme Court nomination.

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Spoilers for all of Squid Game season 2 ahead. Ever since the original installment became a surprise global phenomenon in fall 2021, viewers have been waiting for Netflix's dystopian K-drama Squid Game to return for more episodes. Three years after season 1's premiere, Squid Game season 2 finally debuted on December 26, 2024, with fans rooting for Gi-hun (Lee Jung-jae) to end the horrifying games. Instead, we were left with a cliffhanger, as season 2 ended with Gi-hun reaching another devastating emotional low as his rebellion against the Front Man (Lee Byung-hun) failed.

Luckily, Netflix has confirmed that Squid Game will complete its epic story. In July 2024, creator Hwang Dong-hyuk revealed that the series would conclude with the third and final season. Now that we know which characters survived season 2, read on for everything we know about Squid Game season 3 so far. (If you're still scratching your head over the cliffhangers at the end of season 2, read our finale breakdown.)

When will 'Squid Game' season 3 be released?

Don't worry: There won't be another three-year wait between Squid Game seasons 2 and 3. Netflix confirmed that Squid Game season 3 will be on June 27, 2025. The streaming giant dropped the release date during their Next on Netflix event on January 29, as well as first-look photos and a poster that makes florals look menacing.

Before the official date announcement, Hwang had confirmed that season 3 was in post-production, with the cast having filmed seasons 2 and 3 back-to-back. The director also teased the possible release window in a post-season 2 interview with Variety. "After season 2 launches, I believe we will be announcing the launch date for season 3 soon. I probably expect that to launch around summer or fall next year," he told the outlet.

Netflix didn't include a full season 3 trailer at the end of season 2, but viewers did get some flashes of a future scene. The Red Light, Green Light doll Young-hee returns, this time under a painted sunset, and she has company. A male doll (her "boyfriend," Cheol-su, per Hwang) faces her while a railroad crossing switches from red to green. Get ready for season 3.

Is there a trailer for 'Squid Game' season 3?

The full trailer for Squid Game season 3 debuted on May 31 during Netflix's live fan event, Tudum, giving fans the biggest glimpse of the upcoming rounds so far. In the new clip—featuring a creepy rendition of the Korean children’s song, "Knock Knock, Who’s There? It’s a Kid"—Young-hee returns for a game that notably isn't Red Light, Green Light, while the remaining players run through a maze in what looks like a separate game.

In the middle of it all is a dejected Gi-hun, who takes a path that leads to the survivor learning the Front Man's true identity.

"The new season will focus on what Gi-hun can and will do after all his efforts fail," series creator Hwang Dong-hyuk told Netflix. "He is in utter despair after losing everything and watching all his efforts go in vain,” Hwang explains. “The story then takes an interesting turn, questioning whether Gi-hun can overcome his shame and rise again to prove that values of humanity—like conscience and kindness—can exist in the arena."

Netflix released the first teaser for Squid Game's final season on May 6, showing Gi-hun rejoining the game after his failed rebellion. Rather than lingering on his state of mind, the clip puts viewers into the action, with glimpses of a new game set to pit mother against son, No-eul crawling through an airshaft, and Jun-ho arriving on an island. (But is it the island?) The two biggest developments? The VIPs have arrived, as well as...a baby?!

See the teaser and some new first-look pictures below:

Who in the 'Squid Game' cast will return for season 3?

The death toll for season 2 was lower than expected, meaning that most of the show's new ensemble cast will be back to finish their arcs. That includes Lee Jung-jae (Gi-hun), Lee Byung-hun (Front Man), Wi Ha-jun (Jun-ho), Jun Suk-ho (Woo-seok), Yim Si-wan (Myung-gi, 333), Jo Yu-ri (Jun-hee, 222), Yang Dong-geun (Yong-sik, 007), Kang Ae-shim (Geum-ja, 149), Park Gyu-young (No-eul), Kang Ha-Neul (Dae-ho, 388), Park Sung-hoon (Hyun-ju, 120), Chae Gook-hee (Seon-nyeo, 044), Lee David (Min-su, 125), and Roh Jae-won (Nam-gyu, 124).

Eagle-eyed fans have also theorized that one fallen player, Gyeong-seok, or 246 (played by Lee Jin-uk), likely didn't die after he was shot in the season 2 finale. The popular theory is that the masked guard who shot him was No-eul and that she will help him escape the facility. (Hopefully, so they could fall in love and raise his daughter together! We can dream!)

With seasons 2 and 3 being connected, it's unlikely that season 3 will add any new cast members. However, we may get another surprise casting like Park Hee-soon as the Front Man's lieutenant.

What will 'Squid Game' season 3 be about?

Netflix has confirmed that Squid Game season 3 will pick up right after season 2's bleak ending. Per the press release, "season 3 explores the choices Gi-hun (Lee Jung-jae) will make amidst overwhelming despair. As the Front Man (Lee Byung-hun) plots his next move, the surviving players find their decisions leading to increasingly dire consequences with each round of the deadly games."

Much of where the show goes next will depend on Gi-hun's mental state, whether he's able to rally and fight again or if he loses all hope. Either way, he'll likely be forced to continue the games with the rest of the remaining players, for the Front Man and VIPs' perverse amusement. (Also, since the Xs are pretty much wiped out, the games could last all six rounds.)

Outside of specifics, which are anyone's guess, there are two big emotional showdowns that season 3 is headed toward: one between Gi-hun and Front Man (hopefully without his mask), and one between Front Man and his brother Jun-ho. Since Captain Park has been working for Front Man, he may lead Jun-ho and crew to the correct island so the two brothers can reunite face to face.

In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Hwang teased that Front Man's complicated feelings towards Gi-hun will factor into the upcoming season. As many fans have theorized, Hwang said there may be some hope for redemption within the Front Man, as the antagonist has a layered response to seeing how Gi-hun retained hope in humanity after winning the games, instead of giving up on people altogether.

"What he feels toward Gi-hun is hatred," Hwang told the outlet. "He looks down on him and wants to win above him. However, deep inside, watching Gi-hun having gone through the same experience he first had in Squid Game, and seeing how Gi-hun is genuinely believing in humanity, is persisting to protect humanity…I believe the Front Man harbors a very strange inferiority complex, or a sense of defeat, when he sees Gi-hun."

"Even deeper down, I suspect he harbors a bit of respect for Gi-hun, as well," he continued. "He really sees what he let go of and what he lost when he sees Gi-hun. Secretly, he might even want Gi-hun to fight on."

Will there be a 'Squid Game' spinoff?

While fans still have another season to look forward to, Hwang has shared that he would possibly be up to return to the world of Squid Game someday. (Likely after a long deal of rest.)

He told THR that he sees the upcoming episodes as the end of the series, but shared where he could see the world of Squid Game going next. "Personally, I see the third season as being the finale to this story. That’s because I believe I’ve had closure to the story I wanted to tell about society through the character of Seong Gi-hun," he explained. "If I ever wanted to go back to the world of Squid Game, it would be about different characters with a different story arc. Some kind of spinoff, maybe. For example, the masked guards. How did they end up here? What do they do in their downtime? Something like that, maybe."

Spoilers for all of Squid Game season 2 ahead. No, your TV isn't broken. Your Netflix account didn't skip an episode. Squid Game season 2 really does end with that abrupt, devastating, infuriating cliffhanger, a moment where all hope seems truly lost. In a way, isn't it fitting? The notoriously bleak Netflix K-drama finally returned at a notoriously bleak time to kick us as we're down, and featured scenes of people voting against their self-interest over and over.

But let's rewind: Squid Game season 2 finally hit Netflix on December 26, 2024, over three years after the first installment became a surprise hit K-drama turned cultural phenomenon turned one of Netflix's most-watched shows ever. Though news of the renewal initially prompted criticism as seeming unnecessary, creator Hwang Dong-hyuk's second season is just as expertly written, thrilling, and timely as the first, as the dystopian death game turns into a pressing commentary on greed and sectarianism taken to their harshest conclusions.

For everyone who's just finished bingeing through the episodes, and needs to process everything we just watched, here's a breakdown of the ending of Squid Game season 2.

What happens in the 'Squid Game' season 2 finale?

Episode 7, "Friend or Foe," starts with the brutal end of the X vs O bathroom fight, which shows how effective a kimbap fork can be as a weapon. (R.I.P. Thanos...and four others, damn.) This fight parallels Deok-su's (Heo Sung-tae) lunch-line murder in season 1, as it signals that players can kill each other outside of a round and benefit from it. Couple that with the ongoing tension of each side needing to recruit more people before the next morning's vote, and that evening is set to be another strobe-light bloodbath.

However, Gi-hun (Lee Jung-jae) realizes it's the perfect time to steal the guards' guns and bring the games down. He convinces his X allies to fight the people who created the games instead of each other. The 12 or 14 of them hide during the carnage and play dead once it's over, so they can ambush the guards and take their guns. The message doesn't get to all the X players, since the guards manning the cameras need to think everything's going to plan. (However, I'm salty because my girl Se-mi, 380, played by Won Ji-an, didn't have to go down like that, at the hands of Roh Jae-won's Nam-gyu, 124. R.I.P., queen.)

Gi-hun and his crew successfully subdue the red-suited guards who come in to end the fight. The plan to fight to the control room is a tough sell, but Jung-bae (390) (Lee Seo-hwan) gets more volunteers by appealing to the rest of the X's as the last chance to get out of there before the O's take over the vote. Hyun-ju (120) (Park Sung-hoon) then comes in particularly clutch, organizing the men and giving a mini-ballistics lesson with her special-forces knowledge. (The players likely know how to use machine guns because many have presumably completed their mandatory military service.)

The rebels get stuck in a firefight against the guards, as the pastel-colored staircases become darkened with bullet holes. Gi-hun and Jung-bae are the ones to go on and try to find the control room, and they get as far as the purple-painted management area. They get stuck fighting their way up a giant staircase, with all the square-masked guards from the control room coming out to swarm them. Their situation quickly becomes hopeless as all the rebels run out of bullets. Front Man (Lee Byung-hun) recruits three players to be backups for Gi-hun and Jung-bae, and former Marine Dae-ho (388) (Kang Ha-neul) is panicking before he volunteers to go back to the dorm for more ammo. Once he gets to the dorm, his poor mental health (perhaps an episode caused by PTSD?) leaves him frozen as soon as he steps back out into the Escher-scape. There may be 15 minutes left in the show, but by the time Dae-ho drops his walkie-talkie, it's clear that the rebels are going down.

What is the Captain Park's secret in 'Squid Game' season 2?

Several subplots outside the games also come to shocking conclusions in the season 2 finale, including Captain Park's identity. (Is it just me, or was it clear from the jump that the fishing captain was working for the Front Man?) Before the reveal, viewers learned that Captain Park had "randomly" found and rescued a drowning Jun-ho (Wi Ha-joon) after the season 1 finale, and that Park had been helping the detective-turned-traffic-cop search for the island facility. Even after a year and a half, they hadn't found it—which tracks because there are over 3,300 islands in South Korea—but could Park really not remember the general area where he rescued someone? Park seemed suspicious from the moment when, during their search in the season 2 premiere, he told Jun-ho, "Come and catch squid with me, okay?"

When a seasick mercenary catches Park messing with the drone, the jig is up and the soldier gets a knife to the gut for his trouble. Unfortunately, he tricks Woo-seok (Jun Suk-ho) into believing the thuds are falling boxes. Park will likely continue steering Jun-ho and the search crew in the wrong direction in season 3...or maybe he'll change course. After all, Squid Game can't end without another confrontation between Jun-ho and Front Man, the two tragic brothers who were kept apart this entire season. I'm placing my bet now: Jun-ho will make it to the right island.

What happens to the Front Man (a.k.a. "Young-il") at the end of 'Squid Game' season 2?

Many questions remain surrounding Front Man/"Young-il." In the "Meet the Cast" featurette ahead of season 2, actor Lee Byung-hyun said Front Man's main goal is to "shatter" Gi-hun's conviction that people are inherently kind, even in the most desperate situations. With that context, it can be argued that every new rule in this season is specifically designed to break Gi-hun's faith in humanity. When did Front Man think of this plan to lure Gi-hun back into the games to mess with him? When did Front Man decide to enter the games himself? Is the Player 001 slot always left open for some meta-fuckery, or have these been two particularly weird (or perhaps extra-entertaining) years for the VIPs to watch?

The dramatic irony of only having the audience know that "Young-il" is Front Man is a good and fascinating twist. Attentive viewers can see on the first watch that Front Man makes some choices just to fuck with Gi-hun, like being horrible at the spinning top. It also adds an extra layer to his argument early in the finale, that the Xs should attack the Os first. Sure, it matches the brutality that only Jung-bae saw in the merry-go-round, but it's also a push to see if Gi-hun will attack players he sees as innocent. I might be reading a bit of smugness into Front Man's expression when the others briefly start agreeing with him, and a bit of satisfaction when Gi-hun agrees that a few players must be sacrificed so the plan can work. "See? Man is evil."

Once the rebels step into the pastel hallways, Front Man barely tries to hide his villainous face. The shot of him glaring at the unmasked guard right before said guard is shot is priceless, as is the beat when it's clear that he's been lying about having no bullets. The way he looks straight into the camera is a bit melodramatic, but it ultimately pays off as he asks Gi-hun, "Are you sure?" as Gi-hun offers him what's believed to be the last spare magazine.

Front Man strings along Gi-hun's hope to the end. The backup team of three takes the purple hallways to a position where they can catch the guards by surprise, but instead, Front Man shoots his fellow rebels himself. Then, over a walkie-talkie, he narrates his own "death" to Gi-hun, passing off his gunshots as a guard. A quick change, and "Young-il" is behind the mask again, ready to torment Gi-hun to his face instead of at his side.

As Gi-hun's on his knees, staring down the barrel of Front Man's gun, the evil mastermind says, "Look closely at the consequences of your little hero game." He shoots Jung-bae. The guards hold Gi-hun down on the ground next to his last remaining friend, to watch him die. And that's the end of Squid Game season 2.

What will happen in 'Squid Game' season 3?

By the end of Squid Game season 2, the people left alive include the Front Man, of course, and his second-in-command (a surprise role played by Park Hee-soon, one of South Korea's most established actors), as well as Jun-ho, Woo-seok, and Captain Park, who are on the boat. A surprising amount of players we've come to know and (some of them) love are also alive: Myung-gi (333) (Yim Si-wan) and Jun-hee (222) (Jo Yu-ri); Yong-sik (Yang Dong-geun) (007) and Geum-ja (149) (Kang Ae-shim); Dae-ho and Hyun-ju (Park Sung-hoon), both of whom will likely blend back in with the remaining players; Seon-nyeo (044) (Chae Gook-hee) and Nam-gyu (Roh Jae-won); and Min-su (125) (Lee David), somehow. As for No-eul (Park Gyu-young), she's definitely alive among the guards, as they spent too much time weaving her into the organ-harvesting plot for that to go nowhere.

A quick toast to the fallen: R.I.P. Recruiter (Gong Yoo), Thanos (Choi Seung-hyun), Se-mi (Won Ji-an), Jung-bae, and Gyeong-seok (Lee Jin-uk).

And then there's Gi-hun, a man who keeps hitting devastating rock bottoms despite being worth at least 400 billion won. (Money really doesn't buy happiness.) His time in the games likely isn't over, as both the Front Man and the VIPs will get a kick out of watching him play completely broken. This season promised six games, and there are three remaining that we still have to see (likely in season 3).

The question remaining at the end of season 2 is just how broken he is. Will he somehow rally emotionally and eventually succeed in his impossible goal? Will he be so numb that he immediately dies in round 4, and one of our other faves takes the hero role? Or will this be the final push for him, as many have theorized, to become the next Front Man once and for all? Only Netflix knows how many months we'll have to wait and theorize for Squid Game season 3.

On October 15, the 2024 Victoria's Secret Fashion Show returned for the first time since 2018, bringing the U.S.'s biggest televised fashion show back to our screens. This year's catwalk promised the brand's most diverse cast yet with names like Josephine Skriver, Jasmine Tookes, and Ashley Graham gracing the runway for the event's big comeback. (Longtime vets—and IRL besties— Skriver and Tookes were returning cast, while Graham made her VS debut.)

Ahead of the show, the trio found a quiet corner amid the runway's bustling backstage to play a game of Marie Claire's "How Well Do You Know Your Costar?" The models showed off their trivia skills, attempting to guess each other's backstage must-haves and signature poses. In between reminiscing on their childhoods and the early days of their careers, Tookes and Graham also broke out into a quick sing-along after realizing they shared a go-to karaoke fav. (While the duo channel Shania confidence, Skriver prefers to scream out heavy metal.)

Watch the challenge above, then rewatch the 2024 Victoria's Secret Fashion Show on YouTube or Prime Video.

Even if you've never used a kitchen a day in your life—aside from microwaving freezer meals or storing sweaters in your oven like Sex and the City's Carrie Bradshaw—odds are you've watched a cooking show. Food-based shows are a staple of feel-good comfort TV—and not just for people who want recipes elevated beyond the odd YouTube tutorial. Bingeworthy reality cooking and baking shows can offer thrilling competitions, gorgeous travelogues, astute historical and social analysis, and the ultimate cozy vibes, all as viewers fall in love with the personalities that show us why food can be a passion and a calling.

Luckily for fans who want to dive deeper into culinary content, most of the world's best cooking shows are available on streaming services including Netflix, Max, Hulu, and Peacock. Below, we've rounded up a wide-ranging selection of the best cooking shows to watch... though maybe not on an empty stomach. (If you're looking for more cooking shows on Netflix, we've got you covered.)

'Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown' (2013–2018)

The late chef Anthony Bourdain starred in several series over his career, but Parts Unknown is his landmark show that inspired many other global food shows. In each episode, Bourdain travels to a new location, from Sicily to Vietnam to Iran, and explores much more than the country's food. His best episodes give a snapshot of the city or country, exploring the region's history and giving viewers a closer look at the locals' daily lives. (If you're in the mood for lighter conversations, there's also his series No Reservations for a more comedic feel.)

WATCH ON MAX

'Barbecue Showdown' (2020– )

What if The Great British Baking Show was in the U.S. and focused on grilling the perfect steak rather than baking the perfect pastry? This fun Netflix series brings eight grill masters together in a series of challenges, to show their talent in cooking meat and sides. If you've ever been intimidated out of getting behind the grill, let this show prove that anyone can do it.

WATCH ON NETFLIX

'Barefoot Contessa: Back to Basics' (2008–2021)

With Barefoot Contessa, Ina Garten brings home cooking back to its roots: accessibility, entertainment, and comfort. Each episode follows the cookbook author and "queen of Thanksgiving" as she gives clear, jargon-free demonstrations of delicious recipes perfect for entertaining. Whether you're following along while cooking for a dinner party or just sinking into the culinary equivalent of ASMR, this show demonstrates why cooking can be a source of joy.

WATCH ON MAX

'Blue Ribbon Baking Championship' (2024– )

This new baking competition gives major Great British Bake Off vibes but stands out for its inventiveness. As the title hints, the theme of this series is the state/county fair, in which home bakers have competed for baking bragging rights for over a century. Hosted by Jason Biggs—who put a moratorium on American Pie jokes—and Sandra Lee, BRBC gathers 10 bakers from across the country to put their skills to the test in themed challenges, judged by Lee, Bryan Ford, and Bill Yosses. The bakes in each episode take the fair-food theme to the next level, from illusion cakes shaped like knitwear and snow cones to a handheld bar of potato candy.

WATCH ON NETFLIX

'Chef's Table' (2015–2024)

This Emmy-nominated docuseries leans into the cinematography of food, turning dishes into works of art. Each season follows a group of award-winning chefs who are redefining the global culinary landscape in their own ways, by establishing themselves as visionaries or honoring and amplifying their cultural heritage. Meanwhile, Chef's Table's many spinoffs (including Pastry, Pizza, BBQ, and the upcoming Noodles) focus on chefs who specialize in a certain dish discipline, showing how one subset of the food industry is reinvented and celebrated across the globe.

WATCH ON NETFLIX

'The Chef Show' (2019–2020)

Remember the 2014 movie Chef, in which actor/filmmaker Jon Favreau played a chef who quit his restaurant job to run a food truck with Sofía Vergara? This Netflix series puts the Iron Man director back in the kitchen alongside his real-life friend Roy Choi, as they make meals for fellow chefs and famous friends. If the easygoing approach to cooking isn't fun enough, this is also the show where Gwyneth Paltrow famously revealed that she had no memory of one of her MCU appearances. (Tom Holland and Robert Downey Jr. also appear in the docuseries.)

WATCH ON NETFLIX

'Chopped' (2009– )

This longrunning competition show has four professional chefs face off in a multi-course format, where one contestant is "chopped" after each course until just one winner remains. The chefs must incorporate mystery ingredients into their 30-minute meals, ranging from durian to candy corn to reindeer pâté. After over 60 seasons(!), Chopped viewers have seen a bit of everything.

WATCH ON HULU

'Cooking With Paris' (2021)

This one-season show hosted by pop culture's most famous heiress may be the most underrated celebrity cooking show. For six wild episodes, Paris Hilton invites a selection of famous friends to her home to make one of her imaginative recipes that embody both Hilton's signature flair and the show's ethos that "anyone can cook." (Sorry Paris, "sliving" didn't stick.) The episodes combine a "stars are just like us" charm with the immense relatability of a cooking challenge that's a bit outside of your skill set (plus a good dose of horror at the thought of ingesting one of the stones on Hilton's bling-encrusted cooking utensils).

WATCH ON NETFLIX

'Crime Scene Kitchen' (2021– )

Despite the title, this competition is not a Gordon-Ramsay-true-crime mashup (though imagine what that would be!). Instead, the Fox hit hosted by Joel McHale has a very cool concept: Baker teams have to investigate the aftermath of a baking session and recreate whatever was made, based only on whatever crumbs, streaks, half-empty containers, and used cooking instruments are left. This series is an absolute must-watch for anyone whose cooking show binges involve playing armchair chef and yelling their knowledge at the screen.

WATCH ON HULU

'Culinary Class Wars' (2024– )

This South Korean competition—best described as Physical: 100 but cooking—gathers 100 chefs to battle it out for culinary dominance, with an added "class" aspect as already widely famous chefs duke it out against up-and-coming talents. Like Netflix's other Korean reality shows, what makes this show stand out is the thoughtful gameplay—from five-hour cooking marathons centered on one ingredient to surprise twists in hidden rooms—and the lovable personalities among the stacked cast. Plus, judges Paik Jong-won and Ahn Sung-jae's discussions on whether variables from varietal skill to nostalgia affect their deliberations are super fascinating.

WATCH ON NETFLIX

'The Great British Baking Show' (2017– )

The Great British Baking Show—or Bake Off if you're an Anglophile—is among the most popular baking shows right now, and for good reason. Since 2010 (Netflix only has episodes from 2017 forward), dozens of the U.K.'s most talented amateur bakers have competed in themed weekly challenges to show their skill and share their love of baking. GBBO has gone through its rough patches—we do not speak of Mexican Week—but the best part of watching is following each year's bakers as they support each other through the often high-stress competition.

WATCH ON NETFLIX

'High on the Hog: How African American Cuisine Transformed America' (2021–2023)

In this important docuseries, food writer Stephen Satterfield explores the ancestry of Black food and culinary traditions, as he travels from West Africa to rural Southern communities speaking with renowned chefs and food historians. Much of Black history is passed down through oral traditions and kept within insular communities; with High on the Hog, Satterfield documents this legacy of culinary invention, while honoring the ancestors who contributed to some of the country's most popular foods. If you love soul food, this is an essential watch to understand its history.

WATCH ON NETFLIX

'Iron Chef America' (2005–2018)

In the '90s, the Japanese series Iron Chef became a cult hit when episodes began airing on Cooking Channel in the States. The U.S. version might not have the at times hilarious dubbing, but it retains the original's rules: A new challenger faces off against one of the show's star Iron Chefs in the Kitchen Stadium, to see who can cook the better meal using a theme ingredient. (Netflix subscribers can also check out their 2022 revival, Iron Chef: Quest for an Iron Legend.)

WATCH ON MAX

'Julia Child: The French Chef' (1963–1973)

Thanks to the streaming era and a bit of archival magic, we can watch Julia Child's original cooking show. Before Martha Stewart, Rachael Ray, or Ina Gerten, Child revolutionized TV by making French cuisine accessible and inspiring generations of women to cook. (The entire series is also available on YouTube.)

WATCH ON TUBI

'MasterChef Junior' (2013– )

There have been many iterations of MasterChef over the past 34 years, but MasterChef Junior remains iconic for giving child virtuoso chefs the spotlight. It's objectively amazing to watch children between the ages of 8 and 13 pull off culinary feats that even adults watching at home would have trouble with, and the friendships that form among the cast can be even more adorable than the most memorable GBBO season. Sure, legendary-yet-controversial host Gordon Ramsey is still there, but he manages to reign in the cursing around the kids, making this the show for people who like their cooking competitions with marginally less yelling.

WATCH ON HULU

'Nailed It!' (2018– )

Another show that turns culinary challenges beyond a baker's skill set into the ultimate experience in relatability, Nailed It! seeks out truly amateur home bakers and tasks them with recreating complicated bakes. (In other words: This is the only baking show I could compete in at my current skill level!) It's refreshing to watch a cooking show where failure is not only expected but the point and host Nicole Byer makes sure that the jokes about the contestants' failures are never mean to the contestants themselves. We love a show where everyone involved isn't afraid to laugh at themselves.

WATCH ON NETFLIX

'Salt Fat Acid Heat' (2018)

Based on host Samin Nosrat's 2017 cookbook of the same name, this excellent travel show follows the chef on a global exploration of her four cornerstones of cooking: salt, fat, acid, heat. Each of the first three episodes takes Nosrat to a different country, where she works with practitioners specializing in one of the titular elements—i.e. exploring the origins of fatty cheese, olive oil, and pork in Italy. For the final episode, the host returns to her home in Northern California to play with heat and bring her cookbook to life, showing how all four elements come together to make a delicious home-cooked meal.

WATCH ON NETFLIX

'Stanley Tucci: Searching for Italy' (2021–2022)

What sounds better than traveling through Italy and dining on mouth-watering dishes with the eternally suave Stanley Tucci? In this short-lived travel series, the Julie & Julia actor and cookbook author channels his love of Italian food and culture into a dreamy exploration of the less tourist-filled corners of the country. In addition to being a charming host, Tucci offers some history on each region, meaning your couch-bound tour of Italy can be gorgeous and educational.

WATCH ON MAX

'Top Chef' (2006– )

Top Chef is the model of a modern cooking show: Each season, a group of chefs from a different U.S. city compete in weekly challenges to avoid elimination and become the last chef standing, $250,000 richer. The Bravo series is also an institution, with a dedicated fan base and a history of former contestants who become award-winning stars in their own right post-show. Whether you go back to the beginning or tune in on the latest season, led by new host (and former winner) Kristen Kish, Top Chef is guaranteed to thrill viewers with heart-racing displays of cooking excellence.

WATCH ON PEACOCK

Ugly Delicious (2018–2020)

In this irreverent docuseries, Momofuku founder (and former Bourdain collaborator) David Chang puts his spin on the culinary travel show. Chang's take includes multiple celebrity guest stars, inserts of food-related pop culture clips, and smart debates on topics surrounding cultural fusion, racism in elitist food culture, and tradition versus innovation. After binging shows like Chef's Table that elevate the food industry to elite art forms, it's nice to watch a show purely focused on passionate foodies discussing their comfort foods.

WATCH ON NETFLIX

After five years, the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show is making a grand return. From 1995 to 2018, the annual event was a must-watch for fans of bling-adorned lingerie, sparking angel wings, and the world-famous models who found breakout fame on the runway, from Heidi Klum to Gisele Bündchen to Tyra Banks. The show's cancellation came in 2019, after years of controversy and criticism of its lack of body diversity. Now, the lingerie brand's runway is back and, according to a press release, "will reflect who we are today, plus everything you know and love—the glamour, runway, wings, musical entertainment, and more!"

The event is set to feature a handful of famous names who have previously wanted the VS runway—including Gigi Hadid, Candice Swanepoel, Imaan Hammam, and Tyra Banks—and a stacked performance slate. The legendary pop icon Cher will take the stage, as well as rising star and Grammy-winner Tyla and K-pop phenom Lisa. Meaning, the fashion show is one to watch.

If you're wondering how to tune into this year's bombshell event, find everything you need to know about how to watch the 2024 Victoria's Secret Fashion Show below.

When is the 2024 Victoria's Secret Fashion Show?

The 2024 Victoria's Secret Fashion Show will be held on Tuesday, October 15, 2024, in N.Y.C. The brand first teased the news in early May, with an Instagram Reel claiming that the company has "read the comments and heard you," teasing a more inclusive version of the ultra-glamorous event.

How to watch the 2024 Victoria's Secret Fashion Show:

The official broadcast for the 2024 Victoria's Secret Fashion Show will begin on Tuesday, October 15, at 7 p.m. ET, and stream via Amazon Live, which can be accessed on Prime Video's Home and Live TV tabs. It will also stream across Victoria's Secret's social media accounts, including Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok.

Ahead of the show, the show's Amazon Live stream will begin with the Pink Carpet at 6:30 p.m. ET. The live stream—free for Amazon customers in the U.S.—will also include a live shopping feature to purchase pieces as they make their way down the runway.

If you have an Amazon Prime membership, Prime Video is included, and stand-alone Prime Video subscriptions are also available. For those who don't already have an account, 30-day free trials are available.

Five years after executives decided to end the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show, it's returning to a runway format in fall 2024. The brand first released a short teaser on Wednesday, May 15, showing model Candice Swanepoel texting a "VS Squad" group chat to spread the news. The back of her T-shirt declares on behalf of the brand, "We are back."

All eyes will be on the lingerie brand when its runway—complete with its infamous angel wings—arrives tonight, Oct. 15. Victoria's Secret shut down its official show in 2019 following a slew of controversies and external criticism: executives behaved improperly, viewership and sales declined, and audiences were increasingly frustrated with how a single body type was shown as the ideal of an "angel" on its runway.

This time around, the brand says it has "read the comments and heard you"—implying the program will correct its past mistakes and set a fresh (but still glittery) precedent. "Let’s hope they got it right," one commenter wrote on the original announcement post. So far, top models including Gigi Hadid, Tyra Banks, and Adriana Lima are reportedly returning to the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show runway; the brand also shared that three women performers will take the stage alongside the models for the very first time.

Ahead, we break down everything we know about the runway's return—including how to watch the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show and who's walking in it—and revisit why it was called off to begin with.

When is the 2024 Victoria's Secret Fashion Show? Who's walking the runway?

Victoria's Secret announced in late August that the Victoria's Secret Fashion show would return on Tuesday, October 15, 2024. Two teasers pointed to a revival of the high-glam, bombshell energy of the late '90s and early 2000s through a more inclusive lens.

Victoria's Secret first shared an Instagram Reel and a press release announcing their fashion show will return sometime in fall 2024. The brand's press materials said the show "will reflect who we are today, plus everything you know and love—the glamour, runway, wings, musical entertainment, and more!"

Past members of the so-called VS Squad have ranged from Gisele Bündchen and Naomi Campbell to sisters Bella and Gigi Hadid. In recent years, Victoria's Secret has also signed Paloma Elsesser, Hailey Bieber, and Precious Lee to in-house ad campaigns and a reworked "tour" format last fall.

The brand confirmed that at least two of the biggest names to walk its runway are coming back for the 2024 installment. A video shared in late August showed Gigi Hadid strutting through the Plaza Hotel in New York City to pick up a golden VS invite from Tyra Banks.

More members of the cast have teased their return on social media—or were photographed attending a rehearsal in Brooklyn the day before the event. Models including Adriana Lima and Barbara Palvin are confirmed to make their return; meanwhile, reports surfacing on X (formerly Twitter) suggested Ashley Graham and Paloma Elsesser would walk the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show runway for the first time.

About the timing: Victoria's Secret's comeback efforts have gained some traction in recent months. Gen Z stars including Sabrina Carpenter, Olivia Rodrigo, and Renée Rapp have worn custom and archival VS pieces for major performances. Business-wise, the brand is also reporting better-than-expected sales for the start of 2024.

Where Can I Watch the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show?

Spoiler: There's no shortage of places to stream the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show on October 15. The main broadcast will premiere at 7p.m. on Amazon Live and Prime Video—and include a live shopping feature to purchase pieces as they float down the runway. Additionally, Victoria's Secret will stream the show on its Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok accounts.

A press release from Victoria's Secret also hinted that models who are walking in the show will also share behind-the-scenes content from their personal social media accounts.

Who's Performing at the 2024 Victoria's Secret Fashion Show?

Past iterations of the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show always included a Billboard Hot 100 pop star or band performing alongside the runway. Lineups have ranged from a Taylor Swift and Fall Out Boy duet, to solo appearances by Ariana Grande and Selena Gomez. Even Destiny's Child serenaded the models as they strutted down the runway in 2002.

The 2024 Victoria's Secret Fashion Show is bringing the concert-like atmosphere back with a special twist. On Tuesday, Sept. 17, the brand announced that its first all-women musical lineup would accompany the October runway. Although, judging by their star power, "accompany" might not be the right word.

Music legend Cher was the first musical guest to be announced with two portraits in her Victoria's Secret best. The following day, Victoria's Secret shared that Grammy-winner Tyla would also take the stage; the day after that, it completed the trifecta by announcing K-pop queen Lisa would perform as well. The label promised its lineup would "only get more iconic from here."

When was the last Victoria's Secret Fashion Show?

Victoria's Secret held its fashion show every year from 1995 until 2018. Each show featured models walking in the brand's lingerie—some sets adorned with over-the-top embellishments like Swarovski crystals—and heavy, sculpture-like wings to match each set. At its height, it was watched by several million viewers on a prime time TV slot.

The final show was broadcasted in December 2018. Gigi Hadid, Jasmine Tookes, and Elsa Hosk were among the runway cast.

Why was the Victoria's Secret Fashion Show canceled?

Several circumstances combined leading to Victoria's Secret canceling its annual fashion show in 2019. Viewership for the program had substantially declined in the mid-2000s, along with sales of its bras and underwear. Victoria's Secret had exclusively cast thin, tall models for its shows, and as conversations about size and body inclusivity also gained traction, industry insiders and viewers alike wondered why Victoria's Secret wouldn't cast models who reflected their customer base. Critics said the show objectified women rather than empowering them.

Uproar ensued when the brand's former chief of marketing, Ed Razek, made comments about trans models that offended readers in a 2018 interview with Vogue. The former executive had also previously spoken disparagingly of plus-size models. In 2019, he stepped down from his role. Former chief executive Les Wexner also left the brand in 2021.

All this happened against the backdrop of the #MeToo movement and rising competitors who took a more inclusive approach to marketing lingerie (like ThirdLove, Aerie, and Parade). In the following years, Victoria's Secret started a rebranding effort that included expanding its roster of catalogue and in-store models, along with the launch of the VS Collective, a group of spokespeople intended to signal the brand's refreshed image. Soccer player Megan Rapinoe, tennis star Naomi Osaka, and actress Priyanka Chopra were among the Collective's first class.

Victoria's Secret attempted to address critics last fall with its "World Tour," a documentary-meets-runway film released on Amazon Prime at the start of New York Fashion Week in 2023. The brand partnered with independent designers, creatives, and filmmakers to create artistic capsules based on their home cities, which were then modeled on camera by the likes of Hailey Bieber, Paloma Elsesser, and Lila Moss. Some viewers compared it to Rihanna's Savage x Fenty fashion shows, which are also produced as videos for streaming.

Editors' note: Marie Claire editors will update this post as more information regarding the 2024 Victoria's Secret Fashion Show is released.

There has never been more reason to say, "That's hot." For the first time in nearly two decades, Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie are set to star in a reality show. The two 2000s fashion icons and legendary socialites will return to the screen, 17 years after their hit The Simple Life went off the air in 2007 following its five-season run.

Fans began speculating that Hilton and Richie were up to something in early May when they posted throwback photos of themselves on Instagram with their longtime nicknames in the caption, writing, "From Day 1: Sill and Bill." Weeks later, they officially confirmed a new project was in the works when they posted a teaser featuring a static screen on an old TV set. "New Era. Same Besties," they wrote in the caption, teasing that their new show is "coming soon to Peacock."

Fans of Hilton, Richie, and The Simple Life should surely be excited—but it's since been reported that their new Peacock show isn't a reboot of their classic '00s reality series. Rather, it's a three-part special, Paris & Nicole: The Encore. With the duo's return to the screen due out soon, we're breaking down everything there is to know about their new project.

When is Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie's new show 'Paris & Nicole: The Encore' coming out?

Paris & Nicole: The Encore will be released on Peacock on Thursday, December 12. The pair and streamer announced the release date by sharing a hilarious teaser on October 30.

In the clip, the besties sit in the audience of a theater, watching an opera singer belt some serious vocal chops, as if it's an audition. After she finishes performing, they ask if she could try again but instead sing "Sanasa" in opera style—a reference to an inside joke of theirs that was frequently mentioned on The Simple Life.

What will Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie's new show 'Paris & Nicole: The Encore' be about?

Paris & Nicole: The Encore has been teased as a "New Era" for the BFFs, and it sounds like it'll be somewhat of a continuation of their classic '00s show, while also entirely different.

Peacock shared an official synopsis for the three-parter ahead of its release, giving fans more insight into what's set to unfold. It reads: "More than 20 years since OG reality icons Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie first took the world by storm, the life-long friends reunite in a new special. Follow the dynamic duo as they try to produce a once-in-a-lifetime operatic performance based on their self-coined phrase, 'Sanasa.'"

Based on that description, fans can expect the show to follow a similar form to The Simple Life, as the duo will be put in an unfamiliar, funny situation. As reality show devotees and '00s pop culture fans will remember, their original show, which debuted on FOX in 2003 before changing networks to E!, saw them participating in manual labor outside their comfort zones.

Both socialites/entrepreneurs have since starred in their own reality shows post-The Simple Life. Richie appeared in the short-lived Candidly Nicole, from 2014 to 2015, which admittedly had more of a comedic, scripted bent. Hilton, meanwhile, has hosted everything from a competition series (Paris Hilton's My New BFF) to a cooking shows (Cooking with Paris) to more candid shows about her life (Paris in Love).

Given their TV history, it's only right that The Encore finds them in an entirely different scenario, trying something new together.

Beyond that, it sounds like the show will really lean into the aughties icons' lore since it's centered around their "Sanasa" joke. The phrase dates back to the besties' childhood and was frequently referenced on The Simple Life, including moments of them singing their made-up song, so the sequel series is clearly for them and their longtime fans.

Is there a trailer for 'Paris & Nicole: The Encore?'

Yes! After months of anticipation, Peacock dropped a trailer on December 4, just a week before the show's premiere. It warms our nostalgic hearts as it begins with Paris saying, "I missed you, Bill," while Nicole responds, "Missed you, Sill," referring to their nicknames.

The clip also gives a more thorough look into what's to come from The Encore. Featuring a voiceover from theater icon/The Traitors host Alan Cumming, he notes how "they're still the same girls willing to try anything" and describes their efforts to turn "Sanasa" into a full-blown opera. Based on the trailer, the pair will attempt to get music written, audition a cast of opera stars, and produce an actual stage show inspired by the song/phrase/bit.

Still, as Cumming describes, "In order to rewrite their magnum opus, they must revisit their past." Meaning, they'll also take a trip down memory lane and go back to places featured on The Simple Life, like small-town Arkansas, as the trailer teases. We can't wait to see what they get up to.

How can you watch Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie's new show?

Hilton and Richie's new reality show will stream on NBC's streaming platform, Peacock, so you'll need a subscription to tune in. The streamer has a handful of special offers, but its most common Premium plan is available for $5.99/month and their ad-free Premium Plus option is available for $11.99/month.

Is 'The Simple Life' streaming?

The Simple Life isn't currently available to stream, but individual episodes or full seasons are available to rent and purchase on Prime Video and Apple TV+. Fingers crossed Peacock acquires the rights to our favorite socialites' OG series so we can tune into it once we've binged the new one.

Sadie Dupuis was riding in a packed van through rural Montana, jostling around with her bandmates and their drum kit and merch boxes. She’d just learned that she had pneumonia after stopping at an urgent care clinic. 

Speedy Ortiz, the rock band for which Dupuis is the songwriter and guitarist, was headed to play a show in Canada. After three months on the road for back-to-back tours, the group was exhausted. Dupuis had been trying to figure out why her nagging cough hadn’t cleared up, and had squeezed in visits to a handful of different clinics over several weeks to try to get an answer. She finally had one, but it didn’t change anything about her plans.

“I hadn't lost my voice; it didn't even occur to me to cancel shows. A lot of musicians my age and older came up in that ‘the show must go on’ tradition,” says Dupuis, who’s 35. The headliner on that tour had also come down with pneumonia, and hadn’t backed out of any stops. “We’d perform through anything unless we were physically unable,” she says. “It was the reality of how people worked.”

That was back in 2014. Dupuis doesn’t stand by that mentality anymore—and she hasn’t since the start of the pandemic, which shifted her perspective. When tours across the country were canceled to prevent the spread of Covid-19, she started meeting with other musicians to strategize how to help those who were suddenly out of work. Without a lot of options, many ended up back on stage, even at the risk of their own health. They needed the money. Conditions for musicians were—and had been—dire: low pay from concert halls and festivals hadn’t increased in decades, public arts funding was limited, venues took hefty cuts from merchandise profits, and streaming services provided meager profits.

Dupuis wanted to change that; to really shift how the finances of the music industry worked. But she found there was really nowhere to go with her concerns.

Unlike many sectors of the labor market, the vast majority of musicians have historically not had union representation. Artists are considered independent contractors running their own businesses, meaning they aren’t able to unionize in the same way as, say, factory workers at an auto plant or journalists at newspapers.

Dupuis believed that without a larger collective voice, artists would continue to struggle. And so, she—along with 14 other musicians—formed the United Musicians and Allied Workers (UMAW) group, an advocacy organization aimed at bringing music workers together to fight for a more just industry.

The group was announced publicly in May 2020. Since then, they’ve mobilized over 100,000 music workers, which includes not only musicians, but songwriters, venue staff, indie label employees, and booking agents. Members make a self-determined monthly dues payment of $3 to $15. They’ve opened local chapters in New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Philadelphia. A steering committee helps direct the group as a whole, and smaller groups focus on specific campaigns.

Most members are gig workers who only have the opportunity to make money from touring and streaming—neither of which pay fairly. “Opening bands fees haven't really changed in several decades. A lot of opening artists make $250 a night, and that might be split between a five-person band with a couple people on crew—the money disappears very quickly,” Dupuis says.

As ticket sales have stagnated and the costs of touring have continued to rise, even headlining musicians are struggling. “It’s insane how much they have to spend,” says Ari Fouriezos, an artist manager at Friendly Announcer, who works with bands like Big Thief and Caroline Rose. “They spend on a corporate level, but they don’t get the benefits of a corporation—no discounts, no leveraging, no unifying force showcasing that these bands are stimulating the economy.”

A group that Fouriezos works with headlines venues in the U.S. that hold as many as 1,800 people. On a recent 60-day tour, the five-piece band brought in about $320,000 (excluding merch sales), but their expenses were so high that they only walked away with $15,000 of profit. “These artists have a ton of touring history and did this for 10 years before starting to make these numbers,” Fouriezos says. “Every single cost goes back to the artist. There’s so little room for profit on top.”

Exorbitant ticket distributor fees are becoming cost-prohibitive for fans, shrinking concert attendance and making it less likely for those who do show to be able to buy merchandise, Fouriezos says.

There’s little control over how their music can be shared with audiences, too. When Universal Music Group decided to pull all of its artists' songs from TikTok during a licensing war earlier this year, it hurt small, indie artists the most, greatly limiting their chances of exposure to new fans and the virality that wins better record deals and touring opportunities these days.

Then there’s the threats from AI. Many artists are concerned with how large companies will use it to avoid hiring real people. This led UMAW to call on Congress to block big corporations from holding copyrights on music that’s created with significant AI-enabled elements, protecting jobs for actual humans. “You aren't going to go to your local club and see an AI band,” says Zack Nestel-Patt, an organizer with UMAW and bassist of the indie rock band No Swoon. “Where the issue lies is in the true workhorse of music industry finances, which is TV and movie scores. It will for sure replace my friends who make their money as composers writing for ads. Instead of a musician making money, now there's just more corporate profit.”

Despite the challenges, there have been wins. UMAW has been focused on raising artists’ wages, including calling for fair pay at SXSW, which hadn’t increased its rates in a decade. After a UMAW petition, the festival raised rates from $250 for bands and $100 for solo artists to $350 and $150, respectively. Still paltry, UMAW believes, but it’s progress.

Then there’s arguably the biggest issue plaguing the music industry right now: payouts from streaming. Currently, Spotify, Apple, Amazon, and Google pay an average of $0.00173 per stream—and a large percentage of that goes to the rights holders—typically labels—before an artist sees any money (if you can really see a fraction of a fraction of a cent).

“So many artists have been forced to not envision music as a career because of the finances,” Nestel-Patt says. “And that’s not to say you should make art to make money. I don't think anybody’s getting into music to do that. But you do have to pay rent, and it would be nice if more people could do that by making art and making beautiful things. You don't have to necessarily work other jobs on top of that if you envision a different way of finances flowing in the music industry.”

In the summer of 2021, UMAW turned their efforts toward public pressure, lobbying, and legislation. “We cold emailed a lot of Congress members to start conversations,” Nestel-Patt says. One member had worked with U.S. Representative Rashida Tlaib of Michigan and made a connection. Soon, they had a Zoom round table with the Congresswoman and Detroit-area musicians regarding streaming and the #JusticeAtSpotify campaign.

Tlaib was supportive of UMAW’s work and partnered with them to draft a piece of legislation related to their concerns. In March 2024, UMAW announced the introduction of the Living Wage for Musicians Act—led and co-sponsored by Tlaib and U.S. Representative Jamaal Bowman of New York. The legislation would create a new streaming royalty, funded through an additional subscription fee and a 10 percent levy on non-subscription revenue. That money would allow for the vast majority of musicians who build wealth for platforms like Spotify and Apple Music to make a sustainable income in the digital age.

It could be years before the legislation is voted on and enacted, but it’s the first step in making streaming payouts more equitable—and proof that traditionally siloed musicians can come together to effect major change. “The [Living Wage for Musicians Act] is the first action-oriented thing I’ve seen that gives me a little hope,” Fouriezos says. “It would be a life-changing amount of money to so many people.”

Change will require consumers to play a role, too. Which may mean paying more to listen to music they love. But Dupuis and Nestel-Patt believe that listeners would be willing to shell out more for music if they knew that money was going to the creators. “People want to support their artists,” Dupuis says. “They want to see their favorite artists be able to tour for many years to come. And they're not aware of how low these payouts are and how they're becoming even lower and even less equitable.”

Raising awareness of those issues won’t happen unless there’s a cultural pivot away from the idea that making music should be somewhat miserable, Nestel-Patt says. Artists of all kinds have had to learn to romanticize the concept of suffering for their art—it’s a coping mechanism that every person in a creative industry has to let go of before they can demand more for themselves. But change will require artists to get brutally honest about the realities of trying to make a living off streaming and touring in order to build more public support for UMAW’s efforts, he adds.

Not that it’s easy. When artists do open up about how rough it can be, people jump on them—fellow musicians included—for not eagerly embracing a life of constant ramen. “Last year, the band Wednesday posted the economics of a tour to SXSW, and people were criticizing them for getting an Airbnb instead of sleeping in their van,” Nestel-Patt says. “This idea that you have to struggle for your art is ridiculous. If you're a salesman at a Xerox company, and you go on a business trip, no one's gonna be like, ‘sleep in your car.’ There's no expectation to hustle and struggle and live through hell for your work.”

Bringing artists together to have these types of conversations is important to UMAW. "Since musicians don’t have a central workplace, they see themselves as individuals, and usually only consider their own path and struggles and don’t see how all of these things play into larger patterns,” Dupuis says. The same reason someone might perform while they’re sick and not realize how that could put others at risk is the same reason they might accept unfair pay or gatekeep information about how much they’re making, she argues. Artists don’t always see how their personal problems connect to larger public, systemic issues. But for UMAW to keep moving forward, musicians need to recognize that they aren't operating alone.

The shifting of mindsets—of consumers and artists and big businesses—is not easy work. True transformation will require time. But who better to imagine a new way forward than a bunch of creators?

Everyone in show business has to start somewhere, and while many of those starts are of the lower-profile, slower-moving variety, a rare few burst on the scene to immediate acclaim. That includes directors, some of whom kick off their feature film careers helming small movies that fly under the radar before finally putting out a widespread smash—like Nora Ephron, whose 1992 directorial debut, the relatively little-known This Is My Life, was soon eclipsed by the iconic rom-com Sleepless in Seattle—while others open with an undeniable, must-watch hit.

Here, we’ve rounded up 15 directors whose debuts fall in the latter category, from now-well-established names like Spike Lee and Sofia Coppola to up-and-comers like Celine Song and A.V. Rockwell.

'Past Lives' (2023) – Celine Song

It may be hard to believe, but Past Lives, which earned nominations at the 2024 Oscars for Best Picture and Best Original Screenplay (and deserved even more), was the first film Celine Song had ever directed. Before putting out the heart-wrenching movie about revisiting a childhood romance—which Song also wrote—she'd written two plays and worked on the writing staff of the Amazon Prime series The Wheel of Time. She’s already got her second feature lined up: The Materialists, another A24 project reportedly about a matchmaker’s complex love life starring Dakota Johnson, Chris Evans, and Pedro Pascal.

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'Lady Bird' (2017) – Greta Gerwig

Technically, Greta Gerwig co-directed the 2008 indie film Nights and Weekends with Joe Swanberg, but her solo directorial debut didn’t come until 2017's Lady Bird. The coming-of-age story sees Saoirse Ronan in the titular role and earned five Oscar noms, including a Best Director nod for Gerwig. That marked a major turning point in her career: Until then, while she’d written several features, Gerwig also typically acted in them, too. Since Lady Bird, however, she’s largely stayed behind the camera, as director of Little Women, Barbie, and a pair of upcoming Chronicles of Narnia films, and as writer of next year’s live-action adaptation of Snow White.

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'Molly’s Game' (2017) – Aaron Sorkin

Aaron Sorkin’s Hollywood career spanned two decades before he finally tried on a director’s hat. During that time, in addition to serving as writer and creator of several popular shows like The West Wing and The Newsroom, he wrote seven feature films, including A Few Good Men, The Social Network, and Moneyball. His first directing credit arrived in 2017 with Molly’s Game, a biopic of so-called “poker princess” Molly Bloom starring Jessica Chastain—which Sorkin also wrote, earning him a Best Adapted Screenplay Oscar nom—and was quickly followed by a few more, for The Trial of the Chicago 7 and Being the Ricardos.

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'She’s Gotta Have It' (1986) – Spike Lee

The first full-length “Spike Lee Joint” was this 1986 dramedy about a young woman (played by Tracy Camilla Johns) juggling three suitors, one of whom was played by Lee himself. The movie earned Lee the first-ever Best First Feature trophy at the Independent Spirit Awards and was adapted into a Netflix series more than 30 years later. It also kickstarted his career, which now includes two dozen film directing credits, stretching from Do the Right Thing to Inside Man to BlacKkKlansman, which finally earned him his long-overdue first Oscar, for Best Adapted Screenplay.

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'Fruitvale Station' (2013) – Ryan Coogler

Ryan Coogler started writing and directing short films in college and made his feature-length debut before he was 30, with 2013’s Fruitvale Station. The intense film recounts the final hours of Oscar Grant (played by Michael B. Jordan), a young Black man who was killed by a police officer in the titular San Francisco BART station in 2009. The movie won Coogler the award for Best First Film at the Cannes Film Festival and Best First Feature at the Independent Spirit Awards, among many other accolades, and it also kicked off a long-running collaboration with Jordan, who Coogler would go on to direct in Creed, both of Marvel’s Black Panther films, and his next project, an untitled supernatural horror film.

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'Booksmart' (2019) – Olivia Wilde

Wilde is another Hollywood mainstay who took her time before dabbling in directing—and scored major acclaim for that first feature. Her teen comedy Booksmart arrived in 2019 after she’d racked up more than 15 years’ worth of film and TV acting credits, plus back-to-back music video directing credits in 2016. Like several of her peers on this list, Wilde earned the Independent Spirit Awards’ Best First Feature for Booksmart. She followed it up with 2022’s Don’t Worry Darling, which premiered amid a cloud of offscreen drama and received much more mixed reviews.

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'Aftersun' (2022) – Charlotte Wells

Before making her full-length directorial debut with 2022’s Aftersun, Charlotte Wells produced a handful of short films and wrote and directed a trio of shorts while earning her master’s at New York University. Her first feature stars Paul Mescal and Frankie Corio as a father and daughter on their last vacation together; the emotional film not only sparked many conversations about Wells’ relationship with her own father, who died when she was 16, but also earned her a handful of high-profile awards related to her directing—yes, including the Indie Spirits’ Best First Feature—alongside an Oscar nomination for Mescal.

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'A Thousand and One' (2023) – A.V. Rockwell

Among the biggest snubs of the 2024 Oscars was A Thousand and One, which deserved recognition in so many categories but was unfortunately shut out of all. Stretching over the course of a decade, it stars Teyana Taylor as a single mother in New York City who kidnaps her son out of the foster care system to raise him herself. It marked the directorial debut of A.V. Rockwell, who also wrote the film and had previously worked as a writer and director on short films, including Alicia Keys’ The Gospel. Despite the Oscars snubs, Rockwell earned plenty of other awards and nominations for A Thousand and One, including first-time feature trophies from the Indie Spirit and Gotham awards, and the Sundance Grand Jury Prize for drama.

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'The Lost Daughter' (2021) – Maggie Gyllenhaal

Maggie Gyllenhaal’s parents are both writers and directors, so it was perhaps only a matter of time before the award-winning actress stepped behind the camera. She finally did so almost 30 years into her career, with 2021’s The Lost Daughter, which she both directed and wrote, based on Elena Ferrante’s 2006 novel of the same name. The psychological drama stars Olivia Colman as a woman whose encounter with a young mother (Dakota Johnson) while on vacation sparks memories of her own experiences as a mother decades before, with Jessie Buckley playing her in flashbacks. In addition to acting nods for Colman and Buckley, it earned Gyllenhaal a Best Adapted Screenplay Oscar nom. Now, she's filming her next writing and directing project, an adaptation of Bride of Frankenstein dubbed The Bride! and starring Buckley in the titular role.

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'Get Out' (2017) – Jordan Peele

Jordan Peele made a major career pivot in 2017. Until then, he’d made a name for himself in ridiculously goofy sketch comedy but with the release of his directorial debut Get Out that year, Peele set off on a new path as a highly regarded auteur filmmaker. The psychological thriller follows Daniel Kaluuya’s Chris on an increasingly terrifying trip to meet his girlfriend’s parents, and it earned four Oscar nominations, including Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor, and Best Original Screenplay for Peele, who went on to become the first Black winner of the last of those. He’s since followed it up with directing credits on two more hit horror films, 2019’s Us and 2022’s Nope.

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'Eighth Grade' (2018) – Bo Burnham

Like Peele before him, Bo Burnham had built up a successful career as a comedian before shifting gears and moving behind the camera. He did so with 2018’s Eighth Grade, an incredibly relatable film starring Elsie Fisher as an awkward middle-schooler, which Burnham also wrote and earned him several award nominations and wins for both directing and writing. Since then, apart from a supporting role in 2020’s Promising Young Woman and his pandemic-era comedy special Inside, Burnham has largely stuck to directing and producing, focusing specifically on the standup specials of other comedians, including Jerrod Carmichael, Kate Berlant, and Lil Rel Howery.

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'A Star Is Born' (2018) – Bradley Cooper

Longtime actor Bradley Cooper took a big swing with his directorial debut—with the hefty task of remaking A Star Is Born for the fourth time—and he certainly didn’t miss. The 2018 film, in which he starred opposite Lady Gaga, was a box office smash and earned eight nominations at the Academy Awards, albeit no Best Director nod for Cooper himself, which he later said “embarrassed” him. He tried again with 2023’s Maestro, which he also co-wrote and starred in as legendary composer Leonard Bernstein—but alas, once again, the film’s seven Oscar noms failed to include a directing nod for Cooper. Better luck next time, Brad!

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'One Night in Miami…' (2020) – Regina King

In yet another instance of a widely acclaimed actor trying directing on for size, Regina King made her feature-length directorial debut in 2020, more than 30 years into her Hollywood career, after she’d served as director for more than a dozen episodes of TV shows including Scandal, This Is Us, and Insecure. Her film debut arrived with One Night in Miami…, based on a stage play of the same name, which imagines a 1964 meeting between Malcolm X, Muhammad Ali, Jim Brown, and Sam Cooke. It was short-listed for a trio of Oscars and King received several nominations for her directing, including from the Directors Guild of America, the Golden Globes, and the NAACP Image Awards, among others.

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'Promising Young Woman' (2020) – Emerald Fennell

Emerald Fennell got her start as an actor in the mid-aughts and built a strong career with largely supporting roles in movies like Anna Karenina and The Danish Girl, and shows including Call the Midwife and The Crown. She went on to serve as showrunner of the second season of the hit series Killing Eve in 2019, and a year later made her directorial debut with the (very intense) black comedy Promising Young Woman, which stars Carey Mulligan as a young woman out for revenge for her best friend’s sexual assault and subsequent death by suicide. Fennell won the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay for her work writing the film and was nominated for Best Director and Best Picture that year, as well. Her next project was 2023’s Saltburn, which she wrote, directed, and produced. While Salutburn was overlooked at this year’s Oscars, it earned dozens more nominations elsewhere.

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'The Virgin Suicides' (1999) – Sofia Coppola

As an heir to the Coppola family legacy, it’s no surprise that Sofia Coppola has spent much of her life carving out her own piece of Hollywood success. After appearing in several of her father Francis Ford Coppola’s films throughout her childhood, Coppola stepped behind the camera and made her directorial debut in 1999 with The Virgin Suicides. The drama, which Coppola adapted from Jeffrey Eugenides’ 1993 novel of the same name, has since become a cult classic, and it also kicked off her long-running collaboration with Kirsten Dunst, who has appeared in three of the eight films written and directed by Coppola.

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Travis Kelce has been diversifying his professional portfolio as of late—the Kansas City Chiefs tight end is now hosting a reboot of the popular game show Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader? for Amazon Prime Video (his version will be called Are You Smarter Than a Celebrity?), is producing documentaries (like one about Jean-Michel Basquiat called King Pleasure), co-hosting a podcast, “New Heights,” with his brother Jason, and, now, has taken on his first major acting role—in a Ryan Murphy-produced horror series, to boot.

The Hollywood Reporter confirms Kelce’s casting in Grotesquerie, a forthcoming show co-starring Niecy Nash-Betts and Courtney B. Vance on FX. Nash-Betts confirmed Kelce’s involvement in the show in an Instagram video posted yesterday, although details remain scant and no details have been revealed about what role Kelce specifically will be playing. We do, however, have this teaser Murphy dropped back in February, featuring Nash-Betts’ voice “sounding very disturbed about a crime scene,” The Hollywood Reporter writes.

In Nash-Betts’ clip on social media, Kelce appears in a white shirt, wearing a big smile and revealing he’s “jumping into new territory.” Thankfully, he’s in good hands—Murphy is no stranger to the horror genre, having created the American Horror Story franchise. A former reality star (hello Catching Kelce!), Kelce continues to dip his toe into scripted projects, like hosting Saturday Night Live or producing the indie film My Dead Friend Zoe, which premiered at SXSW in March. But this does, indeed, mark new territory for one-half of the most famous couple in the world (Kelce dates some singer-songwriter you may have heard of named Taylor Swift). 

Kelce showed his excitement by reposting Nash-Betts’ video via his Instagram Story and adding the caption “Steppin into a new world with one of the legends!” tagging Nash-Betts in the process.

According to Deadline, Grotesquerie is slated for a fall premiere—just in time for Kelce to return to the field as (yet again) a defending Super Bowl champion with the Chiefs. 

“I like to have exciting things going on,” Kelce told People. “And sure enough, I’m out here in the entertainment world trying to dabble into that before I get back locked in on football and knowing that that’s going to be my focus until I’m done playing.” He added, “But to dabble around in the entertainment space is something that I’m really interested in.”

For the first time since her mother, Sarah Ferguson, was diagnosed with breast cancer and skin cancer just seven months apart, her eldest daughter Princess Beatrice is speaking publicly about her health, an update given during an appearance on the U.K. talk show This Morning.

Per People, Beatrice was actually in New York City for the interview, taping the segment on the top of the Empire State Building. The chat highlighted Beatrice’s support for The Outward Bound Trust, an educational charity that works to empower young people through challenging learning expeditions; the organization was once supported by Beatrice’s grandfather, the late Prince Philip. Beatrice was on top of the Empire State Building for a reason, as the charity had organized the first-ever rappel off of the building as a fundraiser.

During the conversation, Beatrice said that her mother—known formally as the Duchess of York and more informally as Fergie—was “all clear” following her cancer one-two punch of the past year. “She’s such a phenomenal icon,” Beatrice said to the ITV show’s co-hosts Josie Gibson and Craig Doyle. “As a mum, she’s been amazing. She’s been through so much, and her sense of purpose and resilience really keeps me going.”

Beatrice continued “She’s doing really well. She’s had a bumpy health scare last year, but all clear now. At 64, she’s thriving. She’s been through so much, but I think really now she’s coming into her own. We’re just reminded when any parent or individual has a health scenario, just really get the checks that you need to get as early as you possibly can.”

Beatrice is the elder of Prince Andrew and Fergie’s two daughters, and is extremely close to her younger sister, Princess Eugenie. “Both my sister and I are so proud of her for taking those steps to get those checks, and it really modeled our health considerations on that,” Beatrice said, adding “There’s nothing more important than family.” (In addition to her birth family of four, Beatrice married Edoardo Mapelli Mozzi in 2020, and in doing so became a stepmother to his son, Wolfie; together they share daughter Sienna, who was born in 2021.)

Fergie was diagnosed with malignant melanoma in January, just six months after treatment for breast cancer and undergoing breast reconstruction surgery, Hello reports. In January, a spokesperson for the Duchess of York said that “Her dermatologist asked that several moles were removed and analyzed at the same time as the Duchess was undergoing reconstructive surgery following her mastectomy, and one of these has been identified as cancerous,” they said. “She is undergoing further investigations to ensure that this has been caught in the early stages. Clearly, another diagnosis so soon after treatment for breast cancer has been distressing, but the Duchess remains in good spirits.”

Fergie told Hello of her daughters “They support me through thick and thin, not least my recent illness,” she said. “We call each other ‘The Tripod’ because we prop each other up, come what may.” 

Royal commentator Phil Dampier told The Daily Mail that “Beatrice and her sister Eugenie are always very happy to talk about their mother, to whom they are very close,” he said, adding that “they are inseparable and always support each other through thick and thin.”

Beatrice is one of only two members of the British royal family—the other being her late aunt, Princess Diana—who has ever attended a Met Gala. Though in New York City yesterday on the day of the Met, Bea wasn’t in attendance like she was six years ago, when she made her Met debut in purple Alberta Ferretti. At that time in 2018, she was living in the Big Apple, and opened up during her This Morning interview about her love for the city. “New York for me, when I was figuring out my life and what I wanted to do, New York gave me a place to have a job and just get on with it,” she said. “So New York has always sort of had a special place for me and for mum, as well. She came out here, started her charity back in the day. So New York for us has always been a great city to spend some time in.”

She added that her “little ones” are “phenomenally about coming to travel” but said she “hasn’t yet braved the international flight” with her daughter, who will turn three in September.

The May 2nd release of The Idea of You marks the debut of 2024's hottest new boy band, August Moon. The Prime Video rom-com, based on Robinne Lee's book of the same name, follows the unconventional love story between a 40-year-old single mother, played by Anne Hathaway, and a 20-something musician named Hayes Campbell, brought to life by Nicholas Galitzine. If the age difference wasn't enough, Hayes is also one of the five singers who make up the super-famous British pop group August Moon, which has drawn comparisons to One Direction since the source novel's 2017 release.

August Moon mania has risen in tandem with anticipation for the film's release, as both former Directioners and current boy band enthusiasts tap into the band's charm. Their Spotify already has over 265,000 monthly listeners, and they've maintained an active Instagram full of behind-the-scenes clips and even TikTok challenges. And not to worry, the songs are genuine bops that will make their way onto countless Spotify Wrapped playlists by the end of the year. So, what do you need to know about August Moon? Read on for a primer about the fictional band and what fans have speculated are connections to 1D.

Is August Moon based on One Direction?

Long story short, partly. Lee has been open about drawing inspiration from multiple men while crafting the character of Hayes Campbell and, yes, that included Harry Styles. Other Brits like Prince Harry, some of her ex-boyfriends, and her husband also informed the character.

As fans have discovered the book, many have noticed the similarities between August Moon and One Direction, since they both count five young artists from across the pond as members. There's also the fact that Hayes and Styles are known for their history of dating older women, most notably Styles' former relationship with Olivia Wilde.

Still, Lee has made it clear that she does not think her book should be overshadowed by its loose inspiration. “This was never supposed to be a book about Harry Styles,” she told Vogue in 2020. “It was supposed to be a story about a woman approaching 40 and reclaiming her sexuality and rediscovering herself, just at the point that society traditionally writes women off as desirable and viable and whole.”

As for the film adaptation, Galitzine said in an interview with PEOPLE that he "likes to distance" his performance of Hayes from easy comparisons to Styles. He explained, "I think Hayes is his own character and has his own struggles and wants and tastes, even in who he is as a musician."

"We took tons of different references," Galitzine added. "I think the boy band as a whole was an amalgam of a lot of different artists and groups. I'd love people to come to watch the movie with an open mind and embrace Hayes and August Moon, and maybe become fans of August Moon individually as well. I mean, there's some really, really catchy songs in the movie."

Who plays the members of August Moon?

August Moon is comprised of Hayes Campbell (Galitzine), Oliver (Raymond Cham Jr.), Adrian (Jaiden Anthony), Simon (Viktor White), and Rory (Dakota Adan).

Galitzine is best known for starring in the 2023 rom-com Red, White & Royal Blue, the hit 2023 comedy Bottoms, the recent Starz series Mary & George, and the 2021 musical Cinderella, where he first showed off the skills he utilizes as the main vocalist on all of August Moon's songs. Cham is an LA-born actor and dancer who started as a child actor; he recently appeared in the Max dramedy series Sort Of and the short-lived Fox series The Big Leap. Anthony is a professional dancer who makes his acting debut in The Idea of You; he has previously danced for Beyoncé, Khalid, and NewJeans. White (a.k.a. Slavik Pustovoytov) is a Ukrainian dancer with millions of followers on TikTok and Instagram. Adan is a dancer, model, published poet, and content creator.

What bands influenced August Moon?

The men behind August Moon have opened up about how they underwent "boy band boot camp," a.k.a. a month they spent practicing for performance scenes and building chemistry as bandmates, per J-14, which is not unlike what many pop groups do in real life.

Specifically, Galitizine has cited groups like '90s legends Backstreet Boys and *NSYNC, as well as K-pop superstars like BTS, as sources of inspiration.

“Watching how BTS commands a space as a group helped me in establishing a simpatico between myself and the four lads, how we interact with each other on stage,” Galiztine told Variety, mentioning the “nonchalance” of the "Dynamite" singers' choreography in particular.

"But they're incredible artists," he added. "To be fair, I had three weeks before starting, so there was no way I was going to get to BTS level.”

While speaking with Marie Claire, Lee also mentioned a fun Easter egg that she incorporated while writing the book: All of August Moon song titles, as well as the band's name, are references to her favorite band as a kid.

"I used to be a big Duran Duran fan when I was young, and August Moon is from a lyric in one of their songs, [‘The Wild Boys’]," she shared. "In the book, all their songs, tours, and albums are named after different, more esoteric Duran Duran lyrics."

Who wrote the songs for August Moon?

To craft the original songs of August Moon, the team behind The Idea of You recruited a roster of real-life hitmakers who have worked with countless superstars (including One Direction). Frankie Pine served as music supervisor for the Michael Showalter-directed film, fresh off her work on last year's Daisy Jones & The Six, and famed vocal coach Eric Vetro worked with Galitzine.

Meanwhile, songwriter and record producer Savan Kotecha served as executive producer on the fictional group's songs. He tapped into the same pop songwriting skills he's used when working with artists like Ariana Grande, Britney Spears, The Weeknd, and others. Kotecha has also worked on music for movies like Netflix's Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga, and has experience as a vocal coach on The X-Factor, the competition reality series in which 1D.

Kotecha's 1D connection definitely comes through in August Moon's music. The fictional band's lead single "Dance Before We Walk" has drawn countless comparisons to the real band's breakout 2011 hit single, "What Makes You Beautiful." Both songs were written by Kotecha and Carl Falk.

Speaking with The Daily Beast, Kotecha revealed that he didn't hear the similarities between the two songs until the August Moon track was released.

“It’s so funny—I’ve been asked this so much, and until 'Dance Before We Walk’ was out, it never entered [my mind],” Kotecha said of the parallels between One Direction and August Moon. “Maybe it’s stupid of me because I was so in it, and when you’re in it you kinda don’t understand what you’re doing sometimes. That was never the goal. Me and Carl never even spoke about it. I think it’s just that when we write male pop songs together, that’s what it sounds like. … People are drawing the comparisons, but I think when people see the movie, they’ll understand it’s not the same band.”

Pine also explained to the outlet that their main consideration was for August Moon to be "musically as strong as One Direction."

"But we also wanted them to be quite not as flashy as One Direction," she added. "We wanted them to feel a little bit more grounded, like with the clothing, and making them a little bit more approachable and down-to-earth.”

Could August Moon become a real-life band?

Unfortunately, August Moon will likely join Daisy Jones & The Six and Turning Red's 4*Town on the list of beloved fake bands that only exist on screen. (Although, at least 4*Town had one IRL performance.) In an interview with Elite Daily, the actors who play the boy band, save for Galitzine, assured that August Moon is only meant to exist within the sphere of the film and its soundtrack.

"I hope people can walk away from this movie and appreciate what's in the film," Cham told the outlet. "It would be an honor for fans to desire more from us, but I think what's in the film is incredible and we really did everything that we could to make it special."

The past decade has not been the best for the romantic comedy genre. We can't deny that must-watch rom-coms have been few and far between in recent years, as studios focus on blockbuster tentpoles over mid-budget darlings. With less frothy comedies hitting theaters, streamers have come in to pick up the slack, but it can be hard to tell which releases are worth a true rom-com fan's time. May we, the rom-com connoisseurs at Marie Claire, point you toward one streamer with a supreme collection: Prime Video.

The original films coming out of Amazon MGM Studios have been having a moment. Several of their new releases have become word-of-mouth hits over the past two years, from original comedies like this year's Upgraded to novel adaptations like 2023's Red, White & Royal Blue. And that was before they released the most-anticipated rom-com of 2024, the Anne Hathaway-led film The Idea of You. It seems like Amazon has tapped into the secret sauce that makes for fun, fulfilling love stories.

“It is always our mission to create content that connects with our customers, and the rom-com genre has been wildly successful in accomplishing this goal,” Courtenay Valenti, head of film, streaming, and theatrical at Amazon MGM Studios tells Marie Claire in a statement. “Anchored by the universal theme of the enduring power of love, we hope to create stories that are imbued with humor and joy; equally important, these stories allow audiences to find connection and inspiration.”

Below, we dove into the depths of Prime Video's offerings to bring you a selection of films that rom-com fans should add to their watchlists, from heartwarming holiday romances to hilarious and flirtatious hijinks to pure escapist decadence.

'About Fate' (2022)

Starring Emma Roberts and Thomas Mann, this 2022 film pulls off one of the cardinal requirements of a good rom-com: The chemistry between the leads has to be charming enough for viewers to buy into the wild meet-cute. (Call it the Sleepless in Seattle rule.) In the first scenes of this remake of a 1978 Soviet film, both Margot (Roberts) and Griffin (Mann) are counting down the hours until they get engaged on a December 30th dinner date. Both of their hopes are eventually dashed, and Margot is also left dateless for her sister's New Years Eve wedding. Through unfortunate circumstances, the strangers meet and Griffin agrees to play Margot's faux-boyfriend for the wedding. Wild? Absolutely, but as they bumble to the wedding in a blizzard(!), it's clear that Margot and Griffin just might be meant to be.

WATCH

'Anything's Possible' (2022)

In this heartwarming teen romance, Kelsa (Eva Reign) and Khal (Abubakr Ali) are high school seniors who become each other's first loves. Kelsa is a confident trans woman who keeps her YouTube channel secret from her mother (Renée Elise Goldsberry), while Khal is a cis man who spends his free time giving romantic advice on Reddit. As their relationship blossoms, the pair deal with high-school politics, friendship drama, and social stigmas in this contemporary, groundbreaking rom-com.

WATCH

'The Big Sick' (2017)

I'm calling it: The Big Sick is the rom-com that started it all. Or at least, the forerunner that ensured Prime Video was a streamer to watch for original love stories. Based on the real-life romance between writers Kumail Nanjiani and Emily V. Gordon, this film follows a fictional version of the stand-up comic Kumail as he falls in love with a grad student (played by Zoe Kazan) who heckles him at a show one night. Their effortless relationship faces huge challenges, namely Kumail keeping Emily secret from his traditional parents and Emily's sudden illness from a mysterious infection (the titular Big Sick). Fair warning: This one gets a lot heavier than the typical rom-com, but Nanjiani and Gordon's deft handling of sensitive topics gives The Big Sick an elevated authenticity that helped it earn an Oscar nomination for Best Original Screenplay.

WATCH

'The Idea of You' (2024)

This adaptation of Robinne Lee's 2017 novel is pure escapist fantasy with a boy band twist. While accompanying her teen daughter to Coachella, Soléne Marchand (Anne Hathaway), a recently divorced art gallery owner on the cusp of 40, has a meet-cute with Hayes Campbell (Nicholas Galitzine), the 24-year-old heartthrob in pop quintet August Moon. Despite their age gap, the pair have a whirlwind, globe-trotting romance until the pressures of fame bring their whirlwind affair back down to earth. Come for the loose Harry Styles/1D inspiration, and stay for Hathaway and Galitzine's electric chemistry.

WATCH

'I Want You Back' (2022)

In this joke-a-minute flick, Peter and Emma (played Charlie Day and Jenny Slate) have arguably the best reactions to their parallel, unexpected break-ups. The strangers meet by chance while crying in the same stairwell, quickly bond over their sorrow, and then team up to sabotage their respective exes' new relationships. Okay, the last part goes a bit overboard, but the pair's screwball schemes deliver the laughs, and Day and Slate are a casting match made in Heaven.

WATCH

'Música' (2024)

This inventive musical comedy mixes a coming-of-age story with romance—leading to a real-life coupling of its leads. Vine-turned-YouTube star Rudy Mancuso wrote, composed, and stars in this film as a version of himself: a student and part-time puppeteer living with synesthesia, a neurological condition that makes his brain hear musical rhythms from everyday sounds. After a fight with his long-time girlfriend Haley (Francesca Reale), he meets Isabella (Camila Mendes), a fellow Brazilian-American who immediately connects with Rudy's unique way of seeing the world. Chaos ensues as Rudy attempts to juggle his relationships with both women.

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'Red, White & Royal Blue' (2023)

Based on Casey McQuiston's 2019 novel of the same name, this adorable flick follows the unlikely animosity-turned-romance between the First Son of the United States and the handsome Prince of England. After Alex Claremont-Diaz (Taylor Zakhar Perez) and Prince Henry (Nicolas Galitzine) cause an international incident at a royal wedding, the hostile acquaintances are forced to pretend to be besties in a series of public appearances. Forced proximity leads to genuine friendship and even love, but will the world accept a romance between two scions of world leaders?

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'Something from Tiffany's' (2022)

This is the stuff of classic rom-com magic: During the holiday season in New York City, an epic mix-up brings two kindred spirits together. Single dad Ethan (Kendrick Sampson) buys an engagement ring for his girlfriend Vanessa (Shay Mitchell) at Tiffany's, on the same night Gary (Ray Nicholson) buys chef Rachel (Zoey Deutch) a pair of earrings. When Gary is hit by a car immediately after and Ethan comes to his aid, their gifts get mixed up and the wrong woman gets a Christmas Day proposal. In the aftermath, Ethan and Rachel begin to see their relationships, and the budding friendship between them, in a new light.

WATCH

'Upgraded' (2024)

In this art-world spin on Cinderella, ambitious intern Ana's (Camila Mendes) career gets a boost when she's tapped for a work trip to London. The demanding gig takes a turn as she's upgraded to a first-class flight and meets William (Archie Renaux), the handsome son of a British celebrity. Unfortunately, William mistakes her for her demanding art director boss (Marisa Tomei). As Ana and William grow closer, her little white lie threatens to blow up their modern fairytale romance.

WATCH

When The Idea of You author Robinne Lee first heard a real song performed by August Moon, the fictional boy band at the center of her 2017 novel, the moment felt “surreal.” Lee first thought up the pop group nearly a decade ago, while crafting the story of a whirlwind romance between one of the band’s singers, Hayes Campbell, and a successful art dealer and single mom approaching 40, Solène. Now her novel has been adapted into one of the year’s most-anticipated movies, complete with a soundtrack that could be played through her home speaker. “I’d kind of dreamt this up, and now I could walk into my kitchen and ask Alexa to play the song,” she tells Marie Claire over Zoom, a week before the movie’s May 2 release on Prime Video.

Lee is no stranger to Hollywood; she’s a working actress who has appeared in beloved films like Hitch, 13 Going on 30, Deliver Us From Eva (in which she starred alongside her friend and The Idea of You co-producer Gabrielle Union), and the Fifty Shades trilogy. She has now earned her first producer credit on the Amazon Studios film, which stars Anne Hathaway and Nicholas Galitzine as the dreamy lead couple. Still, The Idea of You has introduced Lee to a new facet of fame, as her book about a middle-aged woman reveling in her sexuality has spawned both a passionate fanbase and notable controversy. “I feel like it's life imitating art. I wake up to messages and feel like, Oh my God, I'm Solène now,” Lee says.

Below, Lee chats with Marie Claire about the big differences between her book and the film directed by Michael Showalter, how Hollywood representation is slowly changing for women over 40, and why it’s hard to be a celebrity in 2024.

Marie Claire: Now that The Idea of You has become a movie, what was your reaction to listening to actual August Moon songs for the first time?

Robinne Lee: The other morning I walked into my kitchen, and as a trial, I was like, 'Alexa, play August Moon.' And she started playing 'Dance Before We Walk.' It was so crazy to me that I'd dreamt up this band. I used to be a big Duran Duran fan when I was young, and August Moon is from a lyric in one of their songs, [‘The Wild Boys’]. In the book, all their songs, tours, and albums are named after different, more esoteric Duran Duran lyrics. The fact that I'd kind of dreamt this up, and now I could walk into my kitchen and ask Alexa to play the song, that was a very surreal feeling.

MC: Were there any parts of the book that you wished had made it to the big screen and didn’t?

RL: I love the scene at the restaurant in France and the first time Hayes really impresses Solène. You see that he's been working on how to speak the art world language and how to fit into her world. It's lovely seeing him as not the celebrity at the table; no one knows who he is. That would've been lovely to have seen. There's a scene with two of them in Miami when they're fighting because she's getting nervous, and it's starting to feel very real. He says [something] like, ‘Someone always gets hurt, but I don't want to walk away because I was afraid of getting hurt.’ I would've loved to see that exchange.

MC: The biggest change from the book to the movie is the ages. Solène’s daughter Isabel (played by Ella Rubin) is aged up from 12 to 16, so she’s no longer the big August Moon fan she once was. What was your reaction to that aspect of the film?

RL: I knew they were doing that beforehand. They felt removing Isabel's fandom as a reason for the relationship to not work out would benefit the story for a viewer of the film. Literature is different because you have time to see everything that's going on in the character’s mind. So even though Solène is conflicted and does things that are not necessarily positive in the book, you also know that her heart's in the right place because you're able to read all that.

I love Ella Rubin, [who plays Isabelle]. I like her dynamic with Anne on screen and I buy her having outgrown August Moon. I buy her concern with her mom, but still, it's not as fragile. I wanted the fragility in the book because you have to swing for the fences. I wanted Hayes to be really young and I wanted Isabelle to be really young, because I wanted there to be higher stakes. When I saw the film, I was so wrapped up in the chemistry between Nicholas and Anne that I didn't have so much anxiety about Isabelle as I did writing her as a character.

MC: The book has a heavy focus on fashion. Why was it important to get to know Solène through her style?

RL: I have a Pinterest page of Solène's clothing that I started keeping when I was writing the book, so you can go and see everything. There's nothing she wears in the book that was not out at that time. They're all current designers or things I'd found that were vintage. It's all real.

In college, I interned for ELLE Magazine; I did every summer break and Christmas break and then for a full year in Paris. I'm a huge fashion person. I see it as an art, and she's in the art world. If you spend any time in the art world, you know that [with] all these people—art dealers, art consultants, and representatives—nothing is haphazardly put together. Everything is a very conscientious choice. This is how I'm presenting myself; I'm in this world and this is how I want the world to see me. So that was a really fun experience, dressing her and imagining her wardrobe.

MC: You've spoken before about how the idea for this book came from exploring the theme of a woman in her 40s, a mom, reclaiming her sexuality. Now that the film's coming out seven years after the book, do you feel anything has changed in visibility for women over 40?

RL: I know when the book was first coming out, I was noticing things. It came out at the same time as the first season of Big Little Lies. That, to me, was groundbreaking because we were seeing women of a certain age being sexy individuals. That hadn't didn't exist when I was writing the book in 2014 and 2015, but by 2017, it was out there in the world. I thought, Oh my gosh, this is incredible that we're seeing this now.

Another movie that came out around then is called Elle; it's a French film starring Isabelle Huppert, and it's very dark. She was nominated for an Oscar. It was so nice to see this French film get recognition, even by the American award season, of a woman being a sexual individual at 60, owning it, and being confident on screen.

I think that we don't get very many opportunities like that; it's slowly changing. But you also don't want to force actresses who don't feel comfortable being sexy to be sexy. Not everyone feels comfortable. So now you're looking for someone willing to do that at 40 and still feels good in her skin. Regardless of how we view her, she feels I can do this. I love Julianne Moore and she will do sexy. You need people like that who are not afraid. We need to see that. We need to see women who are comfortable in their skin and don't have to be 22.

MC: The book explores fandom—from why people love it to the toxic parts of it and why art that's enjoyed by women and girls is often reduced. Since it's been published, your book itself has gotten a bit of a fandom. How has that changed your mind about the concept since 2017?

RL: I feel like it's life imitating art. I wake up to messages and feel like, Oh my God, I'm Solène now. I'm seeing all these things being written about me because I wrote this book. It's [often from] this blind space of judgment and hate, and I was like, Thank you for proving my point. I feel very comfortable in writing what I wrote because that definitely exists, and it's still out there.

I think it’s harder to be famous in the time of social media where people can reach out and tell you how they feel about you. I don't think people realize there's someone on the other end receiving that. I think about Gen Z and even younger millennials, growing up with all that access to celebrities, and what that does to people. You see so many celebrities leave social media and I totally get it, because it can be very toxic.

MC: The tradition of rom-coms based on books is long, but there's been a resurgence lately with movies like Red, White & Royal Blue and The Idea of You. Why do you think these movies are such a draw for people?

RL: People like things that make them feel good. Romantic comedies are the kind of thing that you can lose yourself in for 90 minutes, and go on a journey that you probably won't ever take in your life—or you did one time and it was a long time ago, or you hope it'll happen in the future. But it's like a fantasy. After 90 minutes, it's done, and you've gone on this rollercoaster of emotions.

I see movies because I want to feel something. I think as humans, we're just looking to make that connection. So many people find that in rom-coms because, if it's done well, you feel every moment of falling in love again. Falling in love is a magical thing, and it doesn't happen very often to people in real life over and over again. This is the way to let it happen over and over again. You can watch it, go for that ride, and then are like, 'Okay, done. Gimme the next one.'

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Prime Video's new sci-fi series Fallout is a truly wild ride, with several storylines of brutal post-apocalyptic adventures and an entire video game franchise of lore behind it. Executive produced by Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy of Westworld fame, the new series takes place over 200 years after a nuclear holocaust has destroyed the world, and follows a group of survivors from different factions as they try to navigate a chaotic, violent world.

The Fallout season 1 finale, which hit streaming when the show premiered on April 10, is filled with twists that turn the worlds of the characters and the franchise as a whole on their heads. Read on for our breakdown of the many questions that the Fallout ending answers, as well as where Lucy (Ella Purnell), Maximus (Aaron Moten), and The Ghoul (Walton Goggins) are headed in the already-confirmed Fallout season 2.

When does 'Fallout' take place?

Like any good series that's adapted from a source material with an extensive history, Fallout's timeline could use a brief explanation. In the world of the franchise, the nuclear bombs dropped and civilization as we know it ended on October 23, 2077. While the show's '50s-inspired style may lead you to think otherwise—Fallout's world diverges from our own and essentially never progressed beyond 1950s society, hence its retro-futuristic aesthetic. 

The present timeline of the Prime Video adaptation takes place in 2296, 219 years after the events in 2077—or the furthest out that the franchise has ever gone. If you're a fan of the video game, the show joins the events of all of the past games, making the Fallout series a part of the overall canon. 

How did 'Fallout' set up the season 1 finale? 

When the eighth and final episode of Fallout season 1 begins, both Lucy and The Ghoul are headed to Lee Moldaver's (Sarita Choudhury) compound (the dilapidated Griffith Observatory). Lucy is determined to save her father, Hank (Kyle MacLachlan),  and has Siggi Wilzig's (Michael Emerson) head with her, while The Ghoul is keen to speak with Moldaver, following the reveal in episode 7 that she was also alive before the bombs dropped.

Maximus, meanwhile, is on his way to the Brotherhood with a decoy head, and a plan to lead the knights to Moldaver's compound so he can reunite with Lucy and go live with her in Vault 33. (After a season-long will-they-won't-they, he and Lucy also finally kissed.) 

At Vault 33, Lucy's brother Norm (Moisés Arias) is also close to uncovering whatever is behind the door to Vault 31. 

What is the secret of the Vaults and Hank McLean?

In the pre-war storyline, Cooper Howard (Walton Goggins) begins having suspicions about Vault-Tec when dropping his wife Barb (Frances Turner) off for work at the company, and eventually investigates by bugging her Pip-Boy. 

While "waiting for Barb" at her office, he listens in on a meeting with representatives from several corporations. Barb's colleague Bud (Michael Esper) pitches a collaboration with the Vault-Tec vaults, but another company quickly points out that if people survive a nuclear holocaust on the surface, they'd probably wipe out the Vault Dwellers the minute the Vaulties reveal themselves. Bud argues that the key to winning the "great game of capitalism" in Fallout world is out-living all of their enemies—or anyone who isn't them.

Barb jumps in after another exec brings up the obvious question: How will they ensure that the Vault Dwellers don't kill each other off in a few generations? She says that she and Bud already have an idea for three inter-connected vaults, but Vault-Tec also wants to gather any and all plans for how to cultivate a perfect society. As it turns out, those plans are instituted throughout a network of vaults, with each one serving as its own sick, twisted social experiment. (The Vaults in the video game are all the more disturbing.) 

In the show's modern day timeline, this wild reveal is intercut with Norm discovering the secret of Vault 31. Having been deserted, the first being who Norm runs into is a brain floating in a machine, credited as Brain-on-a-Roomba (perfect, no notes). The brain immediately tries to inject Norm with something, but it's laughably easy to outmaneuver a Roomba.

Norm eventually finds a terrifying sight behind Vault 31: dozens of bodies in cryogenic chambers. The brain calls them Bud's Buds, or "a well-trained staff of highly-supervised junior executives." There are empty chambers with screens categorizing both Betty (the legendary Leslie Uggams) and Hank as "reactivated," confirming that both of the eventual Vault 33 Overseers are actually revived employees of Vault-Tec who lived before the blasts. 

Given that Michael Esper, who plays Bud, is the voice of Brain-on-a-Roomba, it's confirmed that the brain is actually Bud, now over 200 years old. 

Another blink-and-you'll-miss-it reveal is that, in the early timeline, Coop's eavesdropping is interrupted by a fresh-eyed Vault-Tec junior executive named Henry, a.k.a. a young Hank MacLean. But before Henry arrives, Coop hears one more mind-melting revelation.

Who dropped the bombs in 'Fallout?'

As it turns out, Vault-Tec is a mega-evil corporation that planned to eventually take over the Wasteland via the Vault Dwellers. We hear as much when Roomba-Bud explains the purpose of Vaults 32 and 33 to Norm. 

Basically, the plan is to slowly release the Vault-Tec managers in Vault 31 to its two adjacent shelters, where they'll secretly steer each vault's citizens in the right direction. As Roomba-Bud says, the citizens of Vaults 32 and 33 are "genetically selected to breed" with the revived Vault-Tec execs to "create a class of super managers." He explains that they've selected "people with positivity" who "will inherit the Earth after we've wiped the surface clean." 

In the past, as Vault-Tec debates whether nuclear war will ever actually happen and what would be the most profitable investment, Barb offers a simple solution. She suggests Vault-Tec should drop the bombs themselves.

The stakes of this reveal go far beyond the contained world of the Fallout TV show. The ongoing video games have never given a definite answer as to who dropped the bombs, and fans have spent decades theorizing who threw the first punch in the fictional, apocalyptic war between the U.S. and China. The revelation that a corporation in a search for profit was the one to destroy the world is a shock (and ironic that that's the big twist in a show helmed by Amazon). It also alters the Fallout franchise forever, especially since Bethesda, the studio behind the games, has confirmed that the events of the show will be considered canon.

However, there is a chance that "Vault-Tec dropped the bombs" isn't the final answer. As you may recall in the excellent opening scene of the series, both Coop and his daughter were outside in the danger zone when the first bombs fell on L.A. If Barb was part of the team dropping the bombs, why would she let her family be caught in the crosshairs? 

Fans are already debating whether Vault-Tec's plan went awry and someone else dropped the bombs first, as IGN reports. Considering Fallout season 2 is already a go, it's likely that even more twists and turns are ahead in the show's pre-war storyline.

What happened to Shady Sands and Lucy's mom, Rose MacLean?

The fate of Shady Sands is also uncovered in the finale when Lucy makes her way to Moldaver. She finds the scientist dining with a feral ghoul while Hank is caged up nearby. As she begins to spill the mystery of Hank's past, Moldaver mentions Lucy's mother Rose once again, and says that the elder and younger MacLean women share the same curiosity that made Lucy want to know what was out there beyond the vault doors. 

According to Moldaver, before she died, Rose discovered that something was siphoning Vault 33's water supply and questioned whether civilization had returned to the surface. Hank had shut down the idea, but she'd recognized he was hiding something. Rose ran, with Lucy and Norm in tow, and found "this wonderful city" known as Shady Sands. When Hank came after them and Rose refused to go back to Vault 33, he took the kids back and "burned that city to the ground."

It turns out that Vault-Tec's "wipe the surface clean" directive wasn't limited to the initial war. Apparently, any functioning civilization, needed to be eliminated, so when the Vault Dwellers eventually reclaimed the surface, they could easily take over.

This is another major reveal in terms of franchise-wide lore, as Shady Sands was the capital of the New California Republic, a Wasteland faction that appeared in previous games. Per Polygon, the NCR was "a centrist, pluralistic democracy" that became a "stabilizing force in the Wasteland" and "resurrected the best systems of the old world." While no government is perfect, game fans had seen Shady Sands expand from a small settlement to "a fortified city and, eventually, the capital of a great nation." With Hank's attack, it means that great city has been reduced to rubble.

If Shady Sands' destruction isn't enough to telegraph that Hank MacLean will be the big bad of Fallout going forward, Lucy begins to have memories of her time with her mother in Shady Sands, where the pair also knew Moldaver. She realizes what may be Hank's most wicked secret: He let Rose bear the brunt of the blast in Shady Sands. Moldaver's feral ghoul friend isn't so random after all—she's Lucy's mother.

What is the Relic?

The Relic proves to be the weakest element of the finale, as it becomes clear that the head everyone had been obsessed with was just a token to get all of the show's main characters in the same place at the same time. This season-long mystery is dropped in the middle of all the huge reveals: the bead Wilzig implanted in his head is the key to cold fusion, a limitless power source that Moldaver can use to essentially restart the NCR in her vision. 

In episode 7, pre-war Moldaver (who was then known as "Miss Williams") told Coop that she had solved cold fusion. Vault-Tec bought her research, though, and stashed it away, because such a net good for humanity didn't fit with their "wipe the surface clean" business model. (Although, it seems likely that they did use her technology to help power their vaults indefinitely.) 

Because of proprietary business, Moldaver needs a Vault-Tec employee to activate cold fusion. Hank refuses to tell her the code, and that's when Moldaver uses the bombshell regarding Lucy's mother to turn her against her father, resulting in one of the season's most heartbreaking, compelling moments from Ella Purnell's performance. Lucy then demands Hank put in the code, which he does. (As fans on Reddit have pointed out, the code, 10-10-97, is the date that the first-ever Fallout game was released.)

The cold fusion machine initiates, and there's a brief swell of glorious music when an array of computers warm up as the NCR flag blows behind them—but there's still 25 minutes left in the episode, and the Brotherhood has descended upon the Griffith Observatory.

Where does Maximus stand with the Brotherhood?

The Maximus storyline may start out the episode, but it ends up fading to the background while Lucy and The Ghoul deal with the big reveals. After parting ways with Lucy, Maximus heads back to the Brotherhood outpost with the fake head, and they immediately clock him for wearing a squire get-up without a knight in tow. However, despite Maximus's many transgressions, Elder Cleric Quintus (Michael Cristofer) recognizes that Maximus has learned that "power is taken, not given." He plans for himself and Maximus to use the power of the Relic to revamp the Brotherhood and take over the Wasteland.

After some scenes of preparation (including a sweet one where Maximus reunites with his old friend Dane, who really did shred their own leg), the full strength of the Brotherhood attacks Moldaver's forces, narrated by Hank telling Lucy about how the people of the Wasteland are violent, desperate, and "forced to do horrible things to survive." Hank tries to validate his choice of Vault-Tec's peaceful world over the surface's violent one, but where does that leave the Surface Dwellers who have been thrust into that violence because of his actions?

Throughout the series, Maximus has been the stand-in for an essentially good Surface Dweller who is "forced to do horrible things to survive," like Hank says. The theme comes to the surface when he finally fights his way through to the main chamber, where he reunites with a still-devastated Lucy. She tells Maximus that Hank was the one who destroyed Shady Sands, his former home. In that moment, viewers are finally given the full story behind his flashback that's re-appeared throughout the series: Maximus survived Hank's blast and was rescued by a member of the Brotherhood. Meaning, it's because of Hank that he's connected to the organization in the first place. 

Maximus nearly bursts out in rage, but he had already thrown Hank the key to get out of his cage. By then, Hank has already suited up in some power armor, and once Maximus snaps out of a state of shock, it takes just one punch for him to be knocked out. 

When Maximus wakes up, Lucy and Hank are gone and a wounded Moldaver is limping back into the room to light up the remains of L.A. As they gaze out over the city, Moldaver asks Max what he thinks the Brotherhood would do with infinite power. Despite saying that he feels as though nothing positive could come from their reign, Moldaver tells him that all he can do is try to stop them, and with that, she dies. 

Dane and the surviving members of the Brotherhood immediately file into the room, assume Maximus killed Moldaver, and knight him before he can correct them. While he appears disillusioned, it could be possible that this will eventually inspire Max to take down the organization from within. 

How does 'Fallout' set up season 2?

After Hank knocks out Max, Lucy threatens to shoot him out of a vengeful rage. Instead, The Ghoul shoots Hank in the face and emerges from the shadows to ask the Vault-Tec minion one question: "Where's my fucking family?" In that dramatic moment, Hank runs away.

Left with Lucy and an unconscious Max, The Ghoul offers the former Vault Dweller a lifeline. She can either stay there, where the Brotherhood would very likely kill her, or come with him to track down Hank, who's headed off to find whoever's "behind the wheel" of the current iteration of Vault-Tec. Lucy, ever curious and now full of rage, goes with him, after quickly mercy-killing the ghoul that was her mom. With a last, "Okey dokey," she walks into the future.

One of the last shots of the finale shows Lucy, The Ghoul, and his pup companion heading out into the night, with the now-lit Hollywood sign behind them. 

We also get a hint at what Hank's up to. As the sun rises, the new big bad stands on a hill and looks out onto the remains of the Las Vegas skyline. The end credits cements Vegas as the future setting of the series by leading fans through the Strip and past the Tops Casino, until it closes out to ominous gates behind a revamped sign that reads, "Welcome to Fabulous New Vegas."

New Vegas is another infamous setting from the Fallout franchise; there's even an entire game named after it. TV viewers can decide how deep they want to get into game spoilers ahead of the second season; although, the events of Fallout: New Vegas take place 15 years before Fallout season 1, and a lot can change in over a decade. 

What seems all but confirmed is that the setting of the forthcoming season 2 will be full of post-apocalyptic casinos, factions at war, and new, charismatic leaders to meet and  fear. 

Leave it to Mama Kelce to spill the tea! None other than Travic Kelce’s mother, Donna Kelce, revealed that Travis and his girlfriend, some up-and-coming singer named Taylor Swift, had a couple’s vacation to Carmel-by-the-Sea, California with another famous couple we can’t get enough of: Gigi Hadid and Bradley Cooper. (Swift and Hadid are longtime friends.)

Donna knows this because her younger son sent her a photo of the foursome’s getaway, she shared at QVC’s Age of Possibility Summit in Las Vegas—which, interestingly, Cooper was also attending. That’s what prompted Travis to send the photo of the two couples to his mom, and when Cooper arrived in Vegas with his food truck Danny and Coops Philly Cheesesteak, Donna greeted him warmly, saying “Travis told me you were going to be here,” People reports.

Donna added that she wished Travis could have joined them in Vegas for the event, but he was tied up finishing production on Are You Smarter Than a Celebrity?, his new game show spinoff of Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader? that is set to stream on Amazon Prime Video. 

Just as Travis is busy with a new project, so is his girlfriend, who last Friday released her latest album, The Tortured Poets Department, to much fanfare. Both Travis and Donna have reacted to it, with Travis reportedly having listened to tracks from the album early. “He is always in awe of her,” a source told People. (Apparently his favorite tracks were “Down Bad” and “LOML,” and surprisingly not “The Alchemy,” which is heavily laden with football references like touchdowns, trophies, “and even being the greatest in the league,” Page Six reports. Travis plays tight end for the Kansas City Chiefs, and won his third Super Bowl with them earlier this year.) Mama Donna also reacted to The Tortured Poets Department, saying at the QVC event in Vegas that she listened to the entire album, and listened to it the morning it was released (last Friday, April 19). “I was just very impressed,” she said. “She is a very talented woman, and I think it is probably her best work.”

In Carmel-by-the-Sea, Page Six reports that Travis and Taylor were spotted eating at La Bicyclette Restaurant; their visit comes right on the heels of the new album’s release and the complicated feelings that must come with releasing your innermost thoughts into the world. “It’s stressful, you feel vulnerable,” a source speaking to Page Six said. “It’s her most complicated piece of art.”

She is so in love with Travis “she’s getting nervous about things going wrong—or that he’ll wind up thinking the fame is too much,” Page Six reports. The source told the outlet “She wants a happy ending with Travis. She is worried about jinxing things,” adding that she cares so much that “she is nervous something will mess things up.” 

Though Travis seems comfortable with the limelight—certainly more comfortable than some of her exes (cough, Joe Alwyn)—Taylor has a level of fame that “can be daunting for anyone,” Page Six writes. 

“There’s very little oxygen between her life and fame,” the source said. “Travis is a peacock, but he has never dated a celeb before, and she is one of the most famous women in the world. Right now he is enjoying everything and she is hoping that is stays like that.” They added that Taylor is hoping “he doesn’t get freaked out about the fame. That the constant-ness of it doesn’t get exhausting for him.”

Our fingers are crossed, too.

In April 2024, Fallout debuted on Prime Video and introduced viewers to their next favorite video game turned into a series, filled with radiation zombies and tons of body horror. The must-watch show takes place in the distant future, two centuries after a nuclear holocaust ended modern civilization (hence all of the vintage needle-drops). Countless different factions populate the Wasteland that was once L.A., but the show focuses on three main players: Lucy MacLean (Yellowjackets star Ella Purnell), who grew up in a Vault underground and ventures to the surface to save her abducted father (played by Kyle MacLachlan); Maximus (Aaron Moten), a squire in the mech-suit aided cop-cult Brotherhood of Steel; and The Ghoul (Walton Goggins), a seemingly immortal bounty hunter who was also alive before the bombs dropped.

The Emmy-winning series delighted gamers and TV fans alike with its dystopian, lore-filled, intricately plotted story. (Westworld's Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy serve as executive producers, and the vibe of the two shows is not dissimilar.) The series made such a splash that Amazon quickly made big plans for the show's future. It was renewed just a week after the premiere, which makes sense, considering the demand: According to Prime Video, at the time, the show ranked among the streamer's top three most-watched titles ever within just four days of its debut, and it was their most-watched series since the Lord of the Rings reboot Rings of Power. With the fan interest surrounding Fallout season 2, below, we're breaking down everything there is to know.

When will season 2 of 'Fallout' be released?

Okay dokey, Fallout fans: It's time to buckle up because season 2 is almost here. Just days before the original release date of Wednesday, December 17, Prime Video decided Christmas came early by announcing via a press release that Fallout will now premiere one day earlier than planned. Now, the first episode will arrive at 9 p.m. ET/6 p.m. PT on Tuesday, December 16. The streamer teased the news by turning the Sphere in Las Vegas, the season 2 setting, into a snow globe featuring Fallout's fan-favorite characters.

Following the December 16th premiere, the rest of the season will roll out weekly on Wednesdays until the February 4th finale.

Which of the cast will return for 'Fallout' season 2?

Most of the main cast will return for the next season, including Ella Purnell (Lucy MacLean), Aaron Moten (Maximus), Walton Goggins (The Ghoul), Kyle MacLachlan (Hank MacLean), Moisés Arias (Norm MacLean), Frances Turner (Barb Howard), Michael Esper (Bud Askins), Leslie Uggams (Betty Pearson), Dave Register (Chet), Annabel O’Hagan (Stephanie Harper), Zach Cherry (Woody Thomas), Rodrigo Luzzi (Reg McPhee), Johnny Pemberton (Thaddeus), and Xelia Mendes-Jones (Dane).

The biggest question right now is whether Sarita Choudhury could return, as her character Moldaver was shot in the finale. But if Moldaver could survive 200 years post-apocalypse, who says death can stop her?

Are there any new cast members in 'Fallout' season 2?

Fallout is building out its already impressive cast even more. In early November 2024, Deadline reported that '90s icon and former child star Macaulay Culkin is set to appear in season 2. The details regarding who he'll be playing are scarce and yet to be confirmed by Prime Video, but the outlet shared that Culkin is said to portray "a crazy genius-type character." Sounds great!

In a surprise move, the release of the first teaser trailer revealed that Justin Theroux is also a new cast member. His casting appears to have been made quietly and kept under wraps. However, we do know who he's playing: Prime Video stated in a press release that The Leftovers alum will portray game character Robert House. Fans of the series may recall House had a brief appearance in season 1, but now that Theroux is in the role and the show is headed to Vegas, you can expect to see even more of him—considering he's the ruler of Sin City.

What will happen in 'Fallout' season 2?

Season 1 of Fallout ended with two major cliffhangers. Firstly, a heartbroken Lucy learned that her father, Hank (MacLachlan), is secretly a part of the conspiracy behind the Vaults. It's revealed that, before the bombs dropped, Hank was an employee of Vault-Tec, the defense contractor that sold spots for families to their doomsday Vaults. To ensure that their business model paid off, Vault-Tec dropped the nuclear bombs themselves to start the war and monopolize the industry. (This detail is original to the show, which ends decades of debate among video game fans regarding who started the apocalypse.)

If prompting Armageddon wasn't bad enough, Vault-Tec also conspired to use the Vaults as sadistic social experiments, installing systems to test which Vault would become the ultimate society. Lucy's Vault 33 was connected to two others, and her brother Norm (Moisés Arias) discovers that Vault 31 is full of the cryogenically frozen brains of Vault-Tec workers. They've been preserved since before the war, and once awakened, they often end up being elected as an overseer of the other Vaults. Also, their mission extends to ensuring civilization doesn't restart on the surface, taking away their monopoly. Hank has gone to extreme lengths to fulfill his role, including destroying the surface community Shady Sands (and radiating Lucy's mother in the process when she took their children to live there).

In the final battle to capture the McGuffin that everyone's been searching for all season, which turns out to be the key to infinite power via cold fusion, Hank escapes, and Maximus is knocked out. The Ghoul offers Lucy two choices: Stay and likely get killed by the Brotherhood, or join him in tracking down Hank, who knows where the remaining members of Ghoul's family may be hiding out.

She decides to go with him, setting up season 2 with a road trip plot line, as they set out to track him down. The final scene also shows a hint of Hank's destination, at least for a couple of episodes: New Vegas, the town that's the subject of one of the most popular Fallout games. Basically, expect many more interesting characters and even more bloodshed.

Is there a trailer for 'Fallout' season 2?

Okey dokey, here we go! Prime Video unveiled the official season 2 trailer about one month before the premiere date. The clip gives a greater sense of the bonkers world The Ghoul and Lucy are entering as they head to New Vegas in search of her father. "What exactly is it you plan on doing once we find your daddy?" he asks his new partner in crime. Her answer? "Gonna bring him to justice."

According to the clip, the journey to do that won't be so easy; they'll face a whole slew of notorious creatures, familiar to game fans, and battle with adversaries, all the while a war brews in the backdrop.

The trailer gives a first look at several newcomers, including Macaulay Culkin, Kumail Nanjiani, and Justin Theroux's characters. There's also exploding mice, shots of Sin City, and so much more.

If you're eager for even more footage, Prime Video also shared a teaser in mid-August, showing The Ghoul and Lucy trudging through the desert. "Wanna know why the world ended? It started here with one man," The Ghoul says, referring to their destination of Las Vegas.

There, The Ghoul comes face to face with Theroux's seemingly very powerful, very dangerous new character who rules over the city. "Like yourself, I am the very best at what I do, and what I do is I know everything," Theroux's character Robert House says to him. "I know there’s a war coming. The bombs will only be the beginning. My concern is that you would do just about everything to save your family. I think you are actually quite a violent man. You just don’t want to kill me yet." The clip then teases images of explosions and characters putting on machinery to prepare for battle; so it looks like a war is indeed coming—and like this season will be even more epic than the first.

What has the cast and crew said about season 2?

In an interview with GQ, creators Graham Wagner and Geneva Robertson-Dworet teased some of the storylines they're excited to explore in season 2, including Lucy's motivation as she goes after her dad.

"What exactly her precise motive is is something we're very excited to dive into more in season 2, but I wouldn't ever underestimate Lucy's curiosity as something that's motivating her deep down," Robertson-Dworet told the outlet. "As much as she leaves to find her father in the pilot, she also wants to f--kin' know what's out that door. Similarly, over the course of the season, she's learned that everything she thought about the world, in her vault, was wrong, right? ... There's a certain amount of, ‘I want to understand, I want to leave the cave again.’ In a way, it's a mirror image to the pilot."

The co-showrunners have also teased that one of the most beloved monsters from the game will make it to the screen in season 2. While speaking with TheWrap, the pair confirmed that some characters next season will have to face off against the apex predators of the Fallout universe, the Deathclaws.

“We wanted to get Deathclaws [in season 1], but we didn’t want to just throw it away. It’s such a monumental piece,” Wagner explained. “We want to save some something for season 2 to be able to do it properly, not just added on to the massive world-building we had to do already in season 1. So season 2, we’re very excited to finally tackle one of the most iconic elements of the games.”

By the final episodes of Shōgun, it becomes unmistakably clear that Anna Sawai has been the period drama’s most pivotal character all along. The critically-acclaimed FX miniseries, based on James Clavell’s 1975 novel, transports viewers to Japan in the year 1600, where rival lords on the country’s Council of Regents are on the brink of war. Sawai plays Mariko, a noblewoman and practicing Catholic, whose lord, Yoshii Toronaga (Hiroyuki Sanada), tasks her with translating for English sailor John Blackthorne (Cosmo Jarvis). Mariko is the picture of a dutiful samurai woman—proper and preternaturally calm, hiding any inner turmoil behind her eightfold fence—and while portraying Mariko, Sawai is able to show the often-unacknowledged strength with which Japanese women have lived for centuries.

Considering Hollywood’s notorious history of diminishing female characters to one-note caricatures, it is a revelation to watch the 31-year-old slowly peel back layers of Mariko’s unshakeable social mask to reveal her nuanced internal world, as she balances her duty towards Toronaga with her deep-seated grief from losing her entire family in the wake of her late father’s disgrace. “Without Mariko and Fuji, Blackthorne could be dead by episode 3 or 4 maybe,” Sawai says, while chatting with Marie Claire over Zoom from her home country, Tokyo, where she's spending some well earned downtime following a whirlwind press tour.

Sawai, who cut her teeth with roles in F9 and the Apple TV+ series Pachinko and Monarch: Legacy of Monsters, knows the significance of playing an Asian female character who isn’t reduced to a trope. “A lot of times the women are sidelined, and they're often just mentioned as the love interest of the male figures. In [Shōgun], they really have their own story… You see what they're going through and how much power they actually have.”

Below, the actress speaks with Marie Claire about Mariko’s heartbreaking arc in episode 9, the period-accurate details she learned to portray a female samurai, and how one of her dreams actually influenced Mariko’s reunion with her childhood friend, Ochiba.

Marie Claire: What attracted you to the role of Mariko, and to working with [show creators] Rachel [Kondo] and Justin [Marks]?

Anna Sawai: I was really moved by Mariko's story and the fact that she's based on Hosokawa Gracia, who actually lived in Japan in 1600. We really see this quiet strength. To be able to give voice to the Japanese women was a huge thing for me, because oftentimes, it's just like, 'Japanese people are very cute and submissive and maybe nerdy,' but it's so one dimensional. For someone who doesn't know Japanese culture, it might be fine, but a lot of times when I see the depiction of Japanese women, I never really felt like it was reflecting me. Finally with Mariko, it felt like, ‘Okay, this character feels real.’ Justin and Rachel made sure that they were going to do this right, and that it felt right for me as a Japanese woman. They were very respectful to the Japanese supervisors who came on board, the people who were playing the characters. They made sure that it was all properly done.

How deep did you get into the research? What was it like balancing the real-life historical figures the show was based on, but also knowing that Mariko is a fictional interpretation?

AS: I did my research on Hosokawa Gracia-san because I really wanted to know the core of her, but at the same time, I knew we weren't making a documentary on her. The names are different, for a reason—they're fictional characters. So it was a nice kind of guideline. But I think I definitely focused more on Mariko in the script. I talked to Rachel, because Rachel had been working on this project for many more years than me, even way before I got on board. Talking to her about why she wanted to bring Mariko to life; to give more voice to her was very important to me. What I received from [Rachel] was huge, and she is the reason why Mariko is so powerful.

I've watched the behind-the-scenes footage which showed the several experts on set for everything, down to gestures and movements including how to hold chopsticks differently. What was the most minute thing you had to learn how to do for the show?

AS: Going down the stairs, or walking on the stones... usually in modern day, you would just walk one step forward [each time]. Back then, you would have to put your left or right foot forward, and then you would put your other foot next to it. You would have to walk like that, and it was so time consuming. On days that they were trying to shoot a wide shot like we're walking into the house, it took three minutes to get into the house. Even just sitting down, there were different styles to it. If you're wearing a kimono, you're sweeping your hands underneath your knees and then sitting. Whereas if you're wearing a hakama—which is like pant-style; you'll see Mariko wearing it when she's on a horse or on the battlefield—she'll kind of hit her knees with both of her hands and then sit down. Even when I was crying and I wanted to wipe my nose—because I cry from my nose—they were like, ‘You're not supposed to put your hand like that. You have to take out the little sheet that's in your pocket and you have to fold it a certain way.’ I was like, ‘I can't do that. I'm just going to let it dribble.’ Everything's very specific.

After filming, was it weird going back to real life in modern-day Japan, while still having the period dialect and all those specific gestures in your head?

AS: It wasn't weird because, obviously, I would go back home, and I would be in my modern day PJs, and seeing Japanese people... they're not all talking the way that we talk on the show. I think it gave me so much more appreciation and understanding of why we're the way we are. They had to cut the tea scene [between Mariko and her husband Buntaro in episode 8] a lot—it was a 25 minute scene originally—but in the end, after the tea ceremony, we had a shot where she flips the cup and just admires the design and the way it's made. There's no words shared between Buntaro and Mariko, but you see that Japanese people have appreciated moments that way: in silence, giving their time to observe it, rather than saying a lot. So when people don't say too much, I think right now I'm much more appreciative of it.

You've had multiple lives in your career between being a pop star and an actor, and you also moved around a lot as a kid between New Zealand, Japan, and Hong Kong. Mariko also embodies a similar fluidity in terms of being both a Christian and a samurai. As you crafted the character, did you find yourself relating to Mariko, and as she says in the premiere, having “more than one heart”?

AS: It really felt relatable to me. I am Japanese, but I'm not like [most] people. Japanese people will look at me and say that I seem a little bit mixed in some ways, not in how I look, but in how I carry myself. I think Mariko definitely had these different faces which were kind of contradicting at times, because of the way you serve your lord. You will even give your life to serve your lord. Whereas, if she's a Catholic, you can't wish to die. I'm not religious like that, so I did have to do my research, and I did talk to Rachel who had a better idea of it. In the end, it made a lot of sense to me that Mariko wanted to die, and then she found Catholicism and she was saved by it. She was able to find more meaning in her life, but it could have been anything. It didn't have to be Catholicism; she's not into the politics and the money. She's just into it because it gave her meaning. Realizing that there could be something that really changes the way that you look at life, and questioning what that meant for me, made me understand what it was to be a Catholic and a samurai.

Her relationship with John Blackthorne could have been a trope that has played out for far too long in the media—the sexualization of Asian women—but instead it's very authentic and nuanced. What do you think are the elements of Blackthorne that intrigued Mariko the most?

AS: I think that he is the first person who makes her feel just human, not being seen as a woman, and not having to close her mouth in front of him. If anything he's like, 'Tell me, what are you thinking?' He's so accepting of everything. It's definitely not what she thought she was going to find. The relationship that they make is not what she expected. But I think that it's because she approaches him in the beginning as someone she doesn’t really care about. She doesn’t need to impress him, or give respect to him like she gives respect to the Japanese men. That allows her to be herself, and as he sees that, he’s so accepting of it.

What I love about the relationship is that the romance seems like a by-product. It's not the main focus, and that's not the point of her character. It's that they have this very human connection in the hot spring scene, and they're allowed to connect on a very deep level as just human beings. Then they have this beautiful sequence of their imaginary day in London. Mariko knows that she'll never have that, and I think Blackthorne understands that as well, but they’re sharing this ideal day that they would spend together. And then, after being accepted and feeling seen, that’s when the romance starts to ignite. I love that it’s more of a human connection.

In my opinion, it actually isn't Blackthorne who is the major relationship for Mariko. It's Ochiba. I love how the major turning point of the show is just getting these two women, who have been torn apart by male influence over their life, to actually reconnect. What was it like playing that episode 9 scene with Fumi Nikaido where Mariko and Ochiba finally talk?

AS: I just remember feeling like, I miss you. By that point, Mariko was like half of me; half of me was made by Mariko. Before shooting that scene, I had dreamt of my childhood friend who I have no contact with anymore, and I don't even know how to reach her. But in the dream I was like, I wonder what happened to us. What made us grow apart? And then waking up, I was like, That was so random. I haven't even thought about her in years. Then I opened the script and realized that that was what Mariko was going through with Ochiba. I stepped on set remembering my friend, and just looking into Fumi's eyes and realizing that what's coming out of her mouth is very sharp, but that she is trying to stop Mariko because she cares about her friend. That was very bittersweet. Fumi was just such a great scene partner. I received so much from her. I loved shooting that scene.

I know that a lot of the draw of episode 9 is that Mariko gets to actually fight—go full badass—and take a lot of her agency from behind the scenes into the forefront. What fascinated me is how she balanced anger and also peace with death. How is Mariko feeling when she arrives at that emotional place?

AS: The leaving the castle scene is the only scene where she's actually able to fully express what's going on inside. Even the scenes that come afterwards, they may feel like a release, but it's still constrained in a way. I feel like everything that she had been through was coming out in that scene. [My performance] wasn't really anything calculated. It was more just a visceral feeling going into the scene and then holding that naginata [blade], and seeing the lords upstairs just watching. Everything just landed in the way that it should have. I allowed Mariko to freely express it all, which was really nice, because in every other scene it's all very stoic and covered and concealed. I also think that the decision she makes [to die] is not made in that scene. It's made in the scene in episode 8 where she sees Toronaga-sama, for the first time, really [broken] down and grieving his friend. She realizes that that was all part of his plan, and that he was about to give her the next role to play out like Hiromatzu did. That was the pivotal scene, and I think people are only seeing the transformation in the naginata scene.

Do you believe that Mariko felt in her final moments that she was truly able to honor her father?

AS: I would like to think so, yes. When she is tasked with this role from Toronaga-sama, she realizes that she's going to serve her lord and also fulfill what her father wanted, which was for her to finish this battle. I think she doesn't realize that that is the way it's going to happen. She can’t read that they're going to get attacked during the night and that was going to be her final moment. But she realizes that during the course of leaving the castle, something could happen, and if anything is about to happen, then [she] is going to make it a statement. In the final moment, I think she definitely knows that her decision is allowing her to follow her father and his will and also fight against the injustice.

Though episode 9 is the end of Mariko’s story, it would be lovely to spend more time with the character. Would you ever return to the world of Shōgun in some way, like maybe exploring Mariko’s past?

AS: Yeah! I love Mariko so much that if there was more that I could explore, I would do it in a heartbeat. But I think that her story is now complete, and I don't know if anyone should be trying to like touch that. It's kind of perfect the way it ended. If there is a prequel then yeah, it would be when she's younger, and I don't know if I can play her younger.

How has the journey of playing Mariko impacted you? How do you hope that your portrayal of this woman will impact viewers of the show?

AS: It definitely made me think about my life and what I'm doing here; I had this whole life crisis last year. I think it will allow the viewers to think about that. This is really what Japanese women went through, and still there is the shadow of that [history] in modern day Japan. I think [Shōgun] will really inform people that Japanese women are not simple. They're very complex, and even if it's not shown too much, there's so much going on. You don't know someone's story unless you really sit down and talk to them. I hope that there's more respect for Japanese women, because I feel like a lot of times it has felt more surface level. I will carry Mariko with me for the rest of my life, because really she is that powerful. She has that strength. I just hope that people are able to really reflect on their lives and how they value it and how they want to live it.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Is the era of the A-list movie star a relic of the past? Maybe, according to Reese Witherspoon, who spoke at an event for her Apple TV+ series The Morning Show, which she stars in alongside Jennifer Aniston. Witherspoon said, per The Hollywood Reporter, that she wasn’t sure that careers like her’s and Aniston’s were possible anymore thanks to streaming, the outlet reported.

Asked by interviewer Kara Swisher about this particular time in tech and media—roughly six months after the end of the SAG-AFTRA strike—Witherspoon said that the streaming landscape has changed in recent months.

“Streaming was, like, the biggest thing for three to four years, and there was a never-ending constant smash for content, and, like, literally, we could sell anything,” said Witherspoon, who, in addition to acting, also frequently executive produces content. “What I’m seeing right now, I think from the buying and selling landscape side of it, is that probably part of the strike was a reset for these studios that are not profitable—the streaming services—and an opportunity for them to resize, rework, and cut costs. So we’re going to probably see less stuff, which is probably good, right? It was just chaos. It was a flea market. We can slow down a little bit. But there’s going to be more intention around it, and it’s going to be a little bit harder.”

Witherspoon said she wonders and worries what the future will be like for actors in Hollywood, pointing to her co-star Aniston beside her and asking “Are careers like ours possible ever again? Are there opportunities for people to really emerge as a star? How do you know with no data transparency? How do we even know if something did well or didn’t do well?” 

Witherspoon added that Netflix is “pretty transparent about it” and reveals some figures, but “the other people don’t. And it’s tough as an actor—how do you negotiate? How does a producer? How do you market? If you don’t know where you sit in a landscape, how do you value something?” She added “There’s real amounts of data, too, and they’ve got a lock on it. They don’t want you to have the advantage, and it’s tough.”

Aniston shared her own thoughts on working in Hollywood today: “We did start in this industry in a time when it was so glamorous and so fun, and [you would] just go on auditions and auditions and just hope that you get it,” she said. “And if you did get that Movie of the Week and then hope you get that little guest star on Quantum Leap. When it was so simple, and now it is becoming so…it’s too much sometimes.” 

As for when we can expect season four of The Morning Show, at the event it was noted that it wouldn’t be until sometime after the presidential election in November, showrunner Charlotte Stoudt said.

By now, most television fans have dipped their toes into Korean entertainment—from must-watch K-dramas to acclaimed Korean movies—but not as many viewers have been exposed to the vast world of Korean reality TV. Some of the most popular series in South Korea are variety shows that have been staples of international primetime TV for over a decade—and the rise of streaming has finally allowed the unique competition series to find a global audience. (Add in a recent influx of can't-miss dating shows, and Korea has become home to some great new series that sit among the best reality shows of all time.)

Korea's unscripted TV slate truly has something for everyone. There are survival shows if you're a fitness buff or find it thrilling to see people pushed to their physical limits; or if you're the type of person who plays along with Jeopardy or tries to solve mystery movies before the twist is revealed, there are several complex puzzle shows. Here, we've rounded up a selection of the best Korean reality shows to watch—grouped by the most popular genres—to welcome you into K-reality.

The Best Korean Dating Shows

These dating-focused series are more introspective than anything Western media puts out—think more Terrace House than Love Island—but that doesn't mean viewers won't get sucked into rooting for couples or thirsting over fan favorites. These series often have two layers: as the contestants mingle and flirt, a panel of celebrity hosts serves as audience surrogates, watching along and commenting. If you prefer vicarious viewing with less stress (a.k.a. the opposite of Love Is Blind), watch these shows.

'Better Late Than Single' (2025– )

Netflix released its latest dating hit during a packed summer of Western reality TV, offering a wholesome palate cleanser. In this show, a cast of nine "eternal singles" (known as 모태솔로 or motae-solos in Korean) went through six-week makeovers to get themselves ready for a dating retreat in Jeju Island. While the dating portion of the show follows Asian reality's typical slow-burn format, the pre-retreat coaching—in areas from fashion to fitness to speech to therapy—gets viewers even more invested in rooting for the characters to grow and find their first loves. (Good news for fans: season 2 is on the way!)

WATCH ON NETFLIX

'Change Days' (2021)

This short-lived reality series is like a chiller version of The Ultimatum, but the first season predates its U.S. counterpart by a year. Four couples on the brink of breaking up move into a guesthouse on Jeju Island, where their relationships are put to the test over two weeks. After going on dates, the participants decide to stay with their partner, ask out someone new, or leave alone.

WATCH ON NETFLIX

'EXchange' (2021– )

Also known as Transit Love, this popular show is similar to Change Days, though instead of pairs on the verge of breaking up, it gives couples who have long broken up a second chance to reunite with their ex or to find new love. The cast includes pairs of exes, who all move into a shared house on Jeju Island. The former couples also have to treat each other like strangers, while the housemates get to know each other and go on dates, adding another layer to the drama.

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'Heart Signal' (2017–2023)

One of the most popular dating shows in Korea, Heart Signal, centers on eight everyday people—four men and four women—as they live together and date each other for a month, hoping to find their soulmates. However, they aren't allowed to express their feelings verbally. Instead, at the end of each episode, everyone sends a "heart signal" text to whomever they like. Meanwhile, celebrity panelists follow along and predict who will end up together. Korean and international viewers have commented on how relatable the cast members are as they experience the highs and lows of dating.

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'I Am Solo' (2021– )

This show takes the living together and dating concept to a more serious level, as all the singles who come onto the show are focused on marriage. The cast members search for a future spouse by discussing their ideal families, core values, and everything else you'd look for in a long-term partner. (Yes, the show has led to successful marriages.) And, instead of following the same group through a season, matches are made quickly with new casts being added in every couple of episodes.

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'Love Catcher' (2018– )

An eternal question of reality dating shows is whether contestants are there for "the right reasons," or just for the chance of a future career as an influencer. Love Catcher brings this question to the forefront. Of the 10 strangers living together over several weeks, some are "love catchers" and some are "money catchers." If money catchers end the show coupled with a love catcher, they can walk away with a prize of 50 million Korean won (about $36,000). As the contestants chase either love or money, a panel of hosts joins the viewers in trying to suss out everyone's true motives.

WATCH ON TUBI

'Single's Inferno' (2021– )

Single's Inferno has become a proven gateway show for new fans of Korean unscripted TV. (After all, it was the first Korean reality show to enter Netflix's Top 10.) Every season, a group of gorgeous young singles is ferried to an abandoned island, dubbed "Inferno," where they get to know each other while living in tents and cooking their basic meals. If a couple successfully pairs up, they win an overnight date in "Paradise," a.k.a. a nearby luxury hotel. Countless viewers have become engrossed by the show's escapism and breezy, low-stakes drama. (If you catch up too quickly, don't worry: Singles Inferno season 5 is already in the works.)

WATCH ON NETFLIX

The Best Korean Survival and Competition Shows

Survivor stans, look no further. These series follow people as they compete in intense physical and teamwork challenges that push them to their mental limits. The nail-biting challenges tap into the feral sports fan in all of us (whether the contestants are athletes, geniuses, chefs, or influencers), and there's no shortage of entertaining contestants to capture your attention.

'Culinary Class Wars' (2024– )

Fans of cooking shows know that competitions don't have to be physical to get your heart racing (and your mouth watering). This reality series recruits 100 talented chefs to duke it out for bragging rights as the most skilled cook in Korea. 20 contestants are White Spoons, a.k.a. culinary celebrities who have already found fame or acclaim before appearing on the show. (One familiar name for Americans is Top Chef alum Edward Lee.) The other 80 are Black Spoons, underdogs fighting to prove themselves against culinary heavyweights. Plus, the whole thing is judged by three-Michelin-starred chef Ahn Sung-jae and Netflix regular Paik Jong-won.

WATCH ON NETFLIX

'The Devil's Plan' (2023– )

With all the vibes of an intellectual Physical: 100, The Devil's Plan puts its contestants through an intense competition that tests their mental and social strategizing skills. The cast of super-smart celebrities and civilians (ranging from actors and K-pop stars to a college student who passed open casting) live together as they go through the challenges, which alternate between competitive and collaborative. The players and viewers must be quick on their toes, considering how quickly alliances are formed and fall apart, making it the perfect watch for fans of Jeopardy and Big Brother.

WATCH ON NETFLIX

'The Gentlemen's League' (2021– )

Also known as Let's Play Soccer, this sports competition series brings together and trains a successful soccer team of athletes from other, lesser-known sports. It's a long process: Each season contains more than 100 episodes(!) showing dozens of athletes going through challenge-based auditions. Once the final team is picked (and dubbed the "Legendary Avengers"), they're trained by notable retired players and eventually enter a nationwide competition. Several familiar faces from Physical: 100 have appeared on the show, including Kim Dong-hyun, Lee Jang-kun, Andre Jin, and Hong Beom-seok.

WATCH ON NETFLIX

'The Influencer' (2024– )

Social media's influencer industry is already cutthroat, so it was the perfect theme for one of Netflix's Squid Game-esque reality competitions. In this show, 77 content creators across platforms, including Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, and AfreecaTV (South Korea's answer to Twitch), undergo intense challenges to determine who is the most influential (and worth the $220,000 grand prize). The wide range of niches—from beauty to comedy to drag artists—and inventive challenges make this show fascinating for whoever wants to see how influencers keep their subscribers' eyes glued to their screens.

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'Physical: 100' (2023– )

In this smash-hit survival series, 100 contestants—from Olympic gold medalists to pro bodybuilders and fitness YouTubers—experience intense challenges to determine which among them has the "perfect physique." Often compared to Squid Game when it first premiered, Physical: 100 captured global viewers' attention thanks to its inventive quests, ranging from individual endurance matches to one group round where a team had to move a 4,000-pound ship across a field of sand. In a surprising twist, this series is often more heartwarming than brutal, as Physical: 100 may be one of the best depictions of sportsmanship ever shown on streaming.

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'Siren: Survive the Island' (2023)

In this intense, all-women competition, 24 contestants grouped into teams by professions—police, military, firefighters, bodyguards, elite athletes, and professional stuntwomen—battle each other in brutal challenges to see which group will claim victory. (The gameplay has been compared to a complicated Capture the Flag.) Meanwhile, the contestants' personalities and grit get time to shine, as they prove that women in these male-dominated fields are just as strong and fierce.

WATCH ON NETFLIX

The Best Korean Game and Variety Shows

"Korean variety" is more of a general vibe than a strict definition. These game shows are all based on one beloved viewing pastime: watching celebrities and comedians ridiculously work their way through outlandish situations. If your favorite part of late-night TV is either Saturday Night Live (yes, there's a Korean version) or the game segments in talk shows, then be sure to check these out.

'Busted!' (2018–2021)

This Netflix series is like a mix of The Amazing Race, Running Man, and LARPing, where a group of celebrities (Yoo Jae-suk, Ahn Jae-wook, Lee Kwang-soo, Kim Jong-min, Park Min-young, Kim Se-jeong, and EXO's Sehun) role-play as rookie detectives investigating a murder-conspiracy case. As they travel throughout Korea, solving challenges and picking up clues, they're met with slapstick surprises to navigate. Come for the intricate games, stay for the hilarious, self-aware antics that the group must fumble their way through. (Fans of this format can also check out Netflix's Agents of Mystery.)

WATCH ON NETFLIX

'The Game Caterers' (2021–2022)

In this YouTube series, famed variety show producer Na Yeong-seok (New Journey to the West, Earth Arcade, Jinny's Kitchen) hosts pop-up "business trips" where he brings entertainment to groups of Korean celebrities. The celebs get to show off their personalities as they're put through challenges, including the "famous people" quiz, word relays, and sports games where speaking in English is forbidden (which is always harder than you may think). Some of the global stars who've appeared so far include actors from Hospital Playlist and Squid Game, as well as K-pop groups like BTS, Seventeen, and Girls' Generation.

WATCH ON YOUTUBE

'Kian's Bizarre B&B' (2025– )

A popular recent theme on Korean variety shows is celebrities running bed and breakfasts open to non-famous guests. (See Hyori's Homestay and Youn's Stay.) In this show, manhwa (Korean webtoon) artist and TV personality Kian84 runs a B&B on Ulleungdo Island with his employees, SNL Korea’s Ji Ye-eun and BTS member Jin. While the interactions between the guests and hosts are very endearing, the big draw for this show is how the B&B becomes a constant obstacle course, featuring a climbing wall as the front door and fire poles for stairs. Kian's Bizarre B&B was such a big hit that it's getting both a second season and a spin-off, led by Korean variety legend Yoo Jae-suk.)

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'Knowing Bros.' (2015– )

Also called Men on a Mission, this high school-themed show stars a fixed cast of comedians and celebs—including former wrestler Kang Ho-dong, Super Junior member Kim Hee-chul, and former basketball player Seo Jang-hoon—who are the titular bros at a fake high school. In each episode, they welcome guest stars "newly transferred" from another school (typically the stars of a currently airing K-drama or a popular idol group). It begins as a more traditional talk-show segment, while the second half features the usual popular variety games and skits.

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'Running Man' (2010– )

Running Man, one of the longest-running variety shows in South Korean history, is essential viewing for anyone trying to dip their toes into Korean unscripted TV. In each episode, a regular cast of TV personalities welcomes several guests, as they play challenges that range from basic party games (think upgraded charades and rock-paper-scissors) to massive sports tournaments and multi-location scavenger hunts. Odds are, any Korean celeb you can think of has a hilarious clip from a Running Man appearance (and even some U.S. celebs, including Ryan Reynolds and Tom Cruise).

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'Zombieverse' (2023– )

Everyone has wondered at one point or another if they could survive a zombie apocalypse, so it's no wonder that the masters behind the zombie genre would turn the hypothetical into a reality show. This time, a group of celebs and comedians, who think they're about to serve on a dating show panel, are launched into a fight for survival. This show also straddles the line between scripted and unscripted (after all, contestants know that the "zombies" are a horde of talented background actors), and the fun comes through in the cast's spontaneous moments of fear, selfishness, or bravery.

WATCH ON NETFLIX

The Best Korean Lifestyle and Celebrity Reality Shows

This side of the variety coin is filled with slice-of-life docusoaps that follow celebrities and public figures as they live their daily lives. The plots can range from mundane daily activities to behind-the-scenes looks at their work lives. Some traits all the shows share: Any drama is low-stakes, and often monitored by the ubiquitous celeb commentary panel.

'I Live Alone' (2013– )

Also known as Home Alone, this long-running lifestyle show follows the daily lives of celebrities who forgo the cultural norm by living alone. (Koreans often live with their immediate family until they move out to get married and start their own family.) The guests record their daily activities, give testimonials, and even appear on the panel that watches along and comments on the footage. This hugely popular show is made for "people watchers," who find comfort in the fact that even celebrities struggle with stuff like cramped apartments and brutal hangovers.

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'Jinny's Kitchen' (2023– )

This travel show is part of a series of specials in which actors open and operate a Korean restaurant in a tranquil corner of the world. Oscar winner and Minari star Youn Yuh-jung used to lead the cast, though, in later installments, actor Lee Seo-jin has been in charge of the shop. Returning cast members Jung Yu-mi, Park Seo-joon, and Choi Woo-shik join him in running a Korean street food eatery for two weeks in Bacalar, Mexico and Reykjavík, Iceland. BTS's V (real name Kim Tae-hyung) rounded out the cast as season 1's intern, while season 2 recruited Netflix regular star Go Min-si. (A previous season of Youn's Kitchen, filmed in Tenerife, Spain, is also streaming on Tubi.)

WATCH ON PRIME VIDEO

'Return of Superman' (2013– )

The premise of this family show is simple and often adorable. It follows celebrity dads as they take care of their kids...by themselves, while the moms get time off to relax. In the decade-plus since the show began, not all families have followed the exact scenario (sometimes the moms stick around to help), but two things remain the same: The kids are delightful, and celeb friends of the dads often pop by to help out. Some well-known dads in the show's history include Epik High's Tablo and Physical: 100 alums Choo Sung-hoon and Kim Dong-hyun.

WATCH ON VIKI

The Best Korean Music and Talent Shows

Some of the most popular K-pop groups in history, and the most well-known viral TikTok dances, have originated from these singing and dancing competition shows, and there are likely many more to come.

'Boys Planet' (2023)

Among the numerous Korean singing survival shows, the most buzzy hits tend to be competitions where idol trainees (a.k.a. aspiring singers going through the industry's training system) compete to land a spot in a temporary K-pop group. (Some famed groups who have emerged from these shows include I.O.I., IZ*ONE, Wanna One, and Kepler.) 2023's Boys Planet took over the overall K-pop fandom for its three-month run, as 98 male trainees went through performance elimination rounds with the hope of debuting in the eventual nine-member group ZEROBASEONE.

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'The King of Mask Singer' (2015– )

If you've ever watched the trip that is the U.S. version of The Masked Singer, then the original Korean series deserves a viewing. But fair warning: You won't find elaborate, full-body costumes or flashy performances with dozens of background dancers here. Instead, Korean celebrities with impressive voices (including many K-pop idols) show off their pipes without preconceived judgments based on their backgrounds. (It's another Korean show Ryan Reynolds has appeared on! Who knew?)

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'Pop Star Academy: KATSEYE' (2024– )

While this is an English-language series centered on crafting a global girl group, we're including it here since it shows its K-pop influence loud and clear. The Netflix docuseries follows the training and reality competition that created KATSEYE, a six-member girl group under the U.S. label Geffen Records and HYBE, the Korean juggernaut that's home to groups like BTS, Seventeen, and Le Sserafim. Out of 120,000 aspiring stars, 20 trainees are followed as they study for over a year, hoping for the chance of a debut and eventual global stardom.

WATCH ON NETFLIX

As Kaia Gerber prepared to join the family business—you know, becoming a supermodel and all—one of the most legendary supermodels of all time, Cindy Crawford (who Gerber knows simply as “Mom”) went the tough love route in preparing her daughter for a career in the industry.

Gerber told Jimmy Fallon on The Tonight Show that Crawford used to show her videos of models falling as Gerber prepared to walk in her first runway show. “I didn’t even know you could fall this many different ways,” Gerber told the talk show host. 

Gerber—who said her mom is “full of great advice”—told Fallon “I remember right before I was going to do my first-ever fashion show, she sat me down and had my whole family gather around and played me compilation videos of models falling,” she said. “I think to be like, ‘This is the worst case scenario.’”

Gerber made her runway debut at just 16 years old, walking in Raf Simons’ Calvin Klein show during New York Fashion Week in September 2017. “Knock on wood, I haven’t ever fallen,” Gerber said. “Maybe she scared me enough that I didn’t fall.”

To juxtapose, Crawford was 24 years old when she took the runway for the first time, walking for Donna Karan’s spring 1991 collection.

Gerber—who is currently not just modeling but also acting, and right now is starring in Palm Royale on Apple TV+ opposite Kristen Wiig, Laura Dern, Allison Janney, and Carol Burnett—told WSJ. Magazine that she has “reached a point of acceptance” about the ongoing “nepo baby” conversation. (Gerber’s dad is Casamigos founder Rande Gerber.)

“I personally am very aware of all the wonderful things it has done for me, and I would never, ever say anything negative about it, because that is my truth about it,” Gerber said. “I can actually ask my parents [for] advice on career things, on business things. That’s very rare, to have parents who are in the same industry or career as you, whose advice you can actually trust.”

The Crown may be over, but Netflix just dropped a new dramatization of royal family history. The new film Scoop shows the behind-the-scenes process behind the infamous 2019 BBC Newsnight interview, where journalist Emily Maitlis (played here by Gillian Anderson) sat down with Prince Andrew (Rufus Sewell) to discuss his friendship with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Based on producer Sam McAlister’s book Scoops: Behind the Scenes of the BBC’s Most Shocking Interviews, the movie highlights the women who made the award-winning interview happen, showing how Maitlis formed her strategy for questioning the royal and how the ensuing fallout led Prince Andrew to step down from his royal duties.

While she's less known in the U.S., across the pond, Maitlis is one of the U.K.'s most esteemed journalists and her decades-long career has made her a fixture in the media industry. She wasn't involved with the Netflix film, but that doesn't mean her own take on the 2019 interview won't soon make its way to streaming. Read on to learn more about the media figure, including her thoughts on Scoop compared to her own TV series.

She's a multi award-winning journalist and documentary filmmaker.

Maitlis, 53, was born in Ontario, Canada, and grew up in Sheffield in north-central England. After graduating from Cambridge University, she worked as a documentary reporter and presenter in Hong Kong before moving back to the UK to work as a business correspondent for Sky News. In 2006, she began working as a regular presenter (or anchor) on BBC News Channel programs, including Newsnight; in 2018 she became Newsnight's lead anchor.

She has won several awards over the course of her career, including Broadcast Journalist of the Year at the 2017 London Press Club Awards, and Network Presenter of the Year at the Royal Television Society (RTS) Television Journalism Awards in 2019 and 2020. She's also the author of the 2019 book Airhead: The Imperfect Art of Making News.

In early 2022, Maitlis left the BBC to host the daily news podcast The News Agents alongside alongside fellow journalists Jon Sopel and Lewis Goodall. She's married to an investment manager, Mark Gwynne, and they share two sons. Maitlis is also known as a running enthusiast—she sometimes conducts interviews while running, per the LA Times.

She really does have a necklace shaped like her beloved dog, Moody.

In Scoop, the character of Maitlis shares several scenes with a special companion, a whippet named Moody. The broadcaster's beloved dog even precedes her first appearance in the movie. We see the British doggo navigating the halls at the BBC's London headquarters before Maitlis eventually pops up, wearing a chic gold necklace featuring a pendant shaped like the pup.

In real life, Maitlis is a dedicated dog mom to Moody, but she's come under fire for bringing him into the workplace. He was a regular at the BBC, as one insider told the Daily Mail. "Emily loves that dog so much, and he would often be at her side when she came to work....You'd turn up to work and Emily would have her dog with her. But she was the only one. Some laughed. Others thought it was pretty entitled. Maybe it was a presenter thing, but those earning far less than Emily had to shell out for dog walkers and the like."

Moody even became a national talking point in the U.K. after Maitlis was criticized in 2019 for letting her dog take up his own seat on a train. Let's refrain from wading into the dogs-on-train-seats debate, but at the time, Maitlis argued that her critics were "pet-shaming." You can't deny how much she loves her pup.

Gillian Anderson almost turned down the role due to Maitlis' esteemed reputation.

To play Maitlis, Scoop cast X-Files and The Crown alum Gillian Anderson, but the Emmy- and Golden Globe-winner almost turned down the role. During an April 3 screening in New York City, the actress revealed that she initially thought that playing the public figure seemed like a "really bad idea," especially since they run in the same social circles.

"I felt Emily Maitlis is known very well in the U.K. She’s been on our screens and in our ears and podcasts for a long time, and she’s kind of known as a superwoman about town," she explained during the Q&A. "There’s a comment or an off-the-cuff comment in the film about how she swims and she jogs and she interviews world leaders and all that. And all of that is very true, and she is quite a formidable presence, and I know lots of people who know her.”

Anderson continued, “I played a few people who are no longer living already, and the prospect of not only playing somebody who was living but living in my neighborhood seemed like a really bad idea. So I said, ‘No, thank you.’”

Maitlis hasn't watched 'Scoop' yet... because she's working on her own show for Prime Video.

While Maitlis wasn't involved with the making of Scoop, she is executive producing another project that delves into the famed 2019 interview. In November 2023, Variety reported that Amazon is producing a three-part miniseries called A Very Royal Scandal, with Michael Sheen portraying Prince Andrew and Ruth Wilson playing Maitlis. While Scoop focuses on Sam McAlister as the protagonist, A Very Royal Scandal will "follow Emily Maitlis’ professional and personal journey as a Newsnight journalist, leading up to her acclaimed interview with Prince Andrew," per the official description.

In an April 5 interview with Deadline, Maitlis commented on Scoop, alluding to the fact that she and McAlister have "differing recollections about how the Prince Andrew interview was secured."

Maitlis said of the Netflix film, “I’ve left them very much to do their own thing because I think the last thing they want is me peeking around the edges offering my [views]. It says it’s based on a fictional account, so I think it goes into different places and it does different things [than the Amazon series will].” A representative for the former anchor later clarified that she was describing Scoop as a “dramatization.”

Of the dueling film and miniseries, Maitlis added, "This [the Amazon series] will be a very different beast. I’m sure there’s room for both. It’s unreal that there is all this interest and all this excitement.”

It has been a full 21 years since Legally Blonde 2: Red, White & Blonde—the followup to the 2001 original—came to the screen in 2003. Fans of the Reese Witherspoon-helmed franchise have been clamoring for a Legally Blonde 3 since, and while we’re not getting a film (yet, anyway), good news on this front: we’re getting a television series, multiple outlets report.

Variety reports that Witherspoon is executive producing the series under her Hello Sunshine banner, along with the duo behind Gossip Girl and The OC, Josh Schwartz and Stephanie Savage (who are also writing the series). Plot details surrounding the series aren’t confirmed yet, but the show will be streamed on Amazon Prime Video.

The original film was a massive box office success, grossing over $140 million worldwide. A stage musical based on the 2001 movie debuted on Broadway in 2007, and received multiple Tony nominations.

It’s unclear if Witherspoon will star in the series in addition to executive producing, but she previously told The Hollywood Reporter that she was interested in revisiting Elle in her forties: “I want to discover what age means to that character,” she said in 2019. “Aging, contemporary ideas, how things have evolved—or not evolved.”

And, in addition to the series, we shouldn’t give up hope of a future film happening—Deadline reports that Legally Blonde 3, co-written by Mindy Kaling and Dan Goor, has been in the works for several years. Kaling acknowledged that writing the sequel was “going a little more slowly than we like” back in April 2022, four years after Witherspoon announced the project in June 2018. The reason? “Just because we really want it to be good,” Kaling said. “I think of it like Reese’s Avengers. Elle Woods is like her Captain America, and so you don’t want to be the person that messes up that story.” 

A few months later, though, Witherspoon gave an encouraging update, saying that Top Gun: Maverick had given her inspiration to do Legally Blonde 3 correctly. “I feel like these characters are my friends, so I safeguard them,” she told USA Today. “I would never make the subpar, mediocre version of their story.”

Relatively speaking, the MTV Video Music Awards is a young ceremony. Making its debut in the '80s, and hitting its stride in the '90s and '00s, the VMAs quickly became the place for performers to lean in on their personas. It's earned a reputation of being bold, unpredictable, and controversial: in at least two cases, the cops have been called. Unlike buttoned-up affairs like the Oscars and the Met Gala, the VMAs is an arena where celebrities have traditionally felt empowered to go there.

So, if you enjoy drama, get ready: These are the wildest and most jaw-dropping moments from the VMAs.

Macy Grey's Dress

This one's fairly self-explanatory: Macy Grey used her dress to promote her upcoming album, quite literally: "MY NEW ALBUM DROPS SEPT. 18 2001,” the front reads (and the back reads, "BUY IT.") Sadly, the ploy didn't work, and album sales were underwhelming.

A Double Denim Reference

If you remember the Britney Spears-Justin Timberlake double denim outfit at another awards ceremony (the AMAs), so did Katy Perry and Riff Raff. Thirteen years after the original event, the pair gave us a slightly more modernized update to the "classic" look.

Britney and G-Eazy

This incredibly awkward encounter included Britney Spears putting her hand on G-Eazy's crotch and the duo grinding up against each other, but the most cringe-y part might have been G-Eazy going in for a kiss...and Spears dodging away from it and shaking her head no.

Fifth Harmony Dumps a Member

Wow, that felt...pointed! When Fifth Harmony took the stage in 2017, they started with five members, before the middle one jumped back and off the stage. It was a very not-subtle comment upon Camila Cabello, who had left the group at the end of 2016. Wow.

Beyoncé's Pregnancy Announcement

Instead of a card, or a gender reveal party, or a themed cake, Queen Bey chose a more dramatic way to reveal she was pregnant with her first child: At the end of her Grammys performance, she literally dropped the mic, unbuttoned her jacket, and cradled her bump. Epic.

Rihanna Dodges a Kiss

Oh goodness, this was awkward. While he was presenting Rihanna with the 2016 Video Vanguard Award, Drake admitted that he'd been in love with her since he was 22 (the two had dated years ago, and it was rumored they were dating again). Then he went in for a kiss...and Rihanna swerved.

T-Pain's Elephant

I bet it's hard to stand out on a red carpet with so many stars. But T-Pain, accompanied by circus performers and a literal elephant...certainly stood out! This was all to promote Three Ringz, his studio album. The elephant was covered in gold jewelry and cloth, and T-Pain called her "my beautiful woman." Okay.

"Miley, What's Good?"

Nicki Minaj is no stranger to beef or controversy (this isn't the only time she makes it on this list). But certainly one of her most memorable was during her acceptance speech, in which she called out Miley Cyrus as " this b**ch that had a lot to say about me the other day in the press. Miley, what's good??"

"Fartman"

The very popular Howard Stern was hoping to reinvent a National Lampoon character and start a movie franchise with a gross "Fartman" skit on stage (with bare butt cheeks in the back!). Needless to say, the skit flopped, there was no movie, and the whole thing became a punchline.

Andrew Dice Clay Is Banned

Banned for life, no less! On stage to introduce Cher, Andrew Dice Clay said some particularly colorful swear words and provided us with, among others, this nursery rhyme: “Rockabye baby on the treetop/Your mother’s a whore, I ain’t your pop.” So, you know, that did it!

Pee Wee Herman's Joke

Following an arrest for indecent exposure at an adult movie theater, Pee-wee Herman (whose show was aimed at kids) immediately faced an onslaught of backlash. Yet, in the face of cancellation, he got onstage and quipped, "Heard any good jokes lately?” The crowd roared in appreciation.

Van Halen's Tough Reunion

In a world of awkward moments, this one is right at the top: The strain between members of Van Halen (specifically Diamond Dave and David Lee Roth) literally played out right on stage as the group, ostensibly there to promote some greatest hits, tried and failed to make nice.

Courtney Love Interrupts Madonna

After throwing her compact at Madonna, who was mid-interview, Courtney Love was invited to the conversation. It was...so uncomfortable to watch, but included some impressively snarky Madonna commentary including, "Courtney Love is in dire need of attention right now."

Krist Novoselic Hits Himself With His Guitar

While performing onstage in 1992, the bassist for Nirvana later remembered, "We started playing this song and my amp just didn’t work. So I thought, ‘I’m gonna do this bass toss and walk off.' Well, the bass got caught in the TV lights, and then boom! It fell on my head." He noted in another interview, "The only time I’ve ever dropped it was then in front of 300 million people.”

Cobain Slips In Lyrics

In the same performance, Kurt Cobain was there to play "Lithium" but said he'd much rather prefer to play the more controversial, "Rape Me." He and the band was forbidden from doing so, but Cobain played the first few bars anyways before playing "Lithium."

Lil Mama Rushes the Stage

While Alicia Keys and Jay-Z took to the stage to play “Empire State of Mind," (which is, to be fair, a banger), native New Yorker Lil Mama was so inspired that she took the stage. Was she supposed to? No. Both performers looked befuddled and just tried to keep going.

Eddie Murphy Takes Us to the Bathroom

Eddie Murphy hosted the 1985 VMAs and decided to take viewers on a tour of Radio City in the middle of the show. What follows is spontaneous and funny, but in a bit that could have gone horribly wrong, he ends up in the women's bathroom, scaring the crap out of a very confused lady coming out of the facilities.

Taylor's Words for Harry Styles

As One Direction took the stage to announce Best Pop Video, the camera panned to Taylor Swift (who had previously dated Harry Styles). There was no audio, but it sure looked like Swift was whispering to pal Selena Gomez, "Shut the **** up." Then 1D announced Gomez as the winner, lol.

Fiona Apple's Speech

Pop icon Fiona Apple has never been one to shy away from speaking her mind. So, when she won Best New Artist, she had some thoughts for her fans. “This world is bull****...You shouldn’t model your life on what we think is cool, and what we’re wearing and what we’re saying and everything. Go with yourself.”

Lady Gaga "Dies"

After being nominated for nine awards that year, Lady Gaga took the stage to perform "Paparazzi”—and then gave a wild performance, in which she ultimately got drenched in blood and ended the performance hanging limply from a noose. Fame killed her, get it?

Miley Twerks on Robin

There was a lot at play in this performance, but the factors leading up to the "twerk heard round the world" involved some concerns about 1) Miley Cyrus' and Robin Thicke's age difference, 2) their not great live performance, 3) Cyrus' appropriation of twerking, 4) some lewd gestures made with a foam finger, and, ultimately, 5) Cyrus grinding up against Thicke.

Diana Ross and Lil' Kim

Diana Ross thought Lil' Kim's costume on stage (bodysuit plus strategically placed pastie) was so funny that she reached over and, uh, jiggled Lil' Kim's breast. Both of them laughed it off, but Mary J. Blige over on our left there looks like she's absolutely not having it.

Prince's Butt

In what I can only imagine must have been a funny sight gag for the audience, Prince took the stage in 1991 to deliver “Gett Off” in a yellow jumpsuit...that when he turned, revealed itself to be sheer. Specifically in the butt area. Yes, Prince showed everyone his butt on stage.

Madonna's Wedding Dress

Madonna's always been an iconoclast, but one of her most infamous moments was when she sang "Like a Virgin" in a wedding dress (yes, her belt says "Boy Toy"!). Apparently, lol, she was originally planning to sing the song to a Bengal tiger on stage, although clearer heads thankfully prevailed.

Lady Gaga's Meat Dress

If you're familiar with one wild VMAs outfit, it's probably this one. Lady Gaga appeared at the ceremony in a meat dress—and yes, it's actual meat—saying later that "If we don't stand up for what we believe in and if we don't fight for our rights, pretty soon we're going to have as much rights as the meat on our own bones."

Britney and the Python

To sing “I’m a Slave 4 U” on stage in 2001, a real, living python was placed around Britney Spears' neck—and she then proceeded to (carefully) dance around with it. In her memoir, Spears later said that she was terrified and the snake was hissing at her the whole time.

Eminem Threatens to Hit Moby

After an altercation with, of all things, Triumph the Insult Comic Dog, Eminem got onstage to call singer Moby "that Moby girl" and added, "I will hit a man with glasses." (Moby had previously called "a misogynist, a homophobe, a racist, and an anti-Semite." Eminem had responded by calling him a slur in one of his songs.)

Adam "MCA" Yauch Storms the Stage

In one of the weirdest moments from the show ever, Beastie Boys’ Adam “MCA” Yauch stormed the stage as his alter ego Nathanial Hornblower to protest Spike Jonze's winning for Best Director for R.E.M.’s “Everybody Hurts." In a largely incoherent speech, he said it was an "outrage" and a “farce."

Kid Rock Fights Tommy Lee

The 2007 VMAs were, even by normal standards, chaotic (and including more than one fight), but the crowning "achievement" may have been when Kid Rock attacked Tommy Lee. The two share an ex in Pamela Anderson, and Kid Rock later noted their beef had been "going on for five years."

Tim Commerford Climbs a Set

Rage Against the Machine band member Y.tim.K (Tim Commerford) was so mad that Limp Bizkit won for Best Rock Video that he climbed the stage scaffolding...and was arrested. He spent the night in jail and the incident was cited as a contributing factor for why the band broke up.

Madonna, Britney, and Christina

Yup! With a callback to her iconic wedding dress performance, Madonna took the stage with Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera clad in white to perform and, ultimately, kiss them both on the lips. A lot of (frankly homophobic) backlash followed, and Spears in particular was vilified.

Taylor and Kanye

It was the beginning of a very complicated feud, but there's no denying that Kanye taking the microphone from a very stunned Taylor Swift to loudly proclaim that "Beyoncé had the best video of all time” was one of the most awkward awards show moments. Ever.

Long before he became Taylor Swift’s boyfriend, Travis Kelce was a Super Bowl champion and one of the best tight ends in the National Football League. (Kelce plays for the Kansas City Chiefs, who won the Super Bowl last month.) Now, it seems, he may be looking to expand his career repertoire and add game show host to his resume, as he’s reportedly in talks to host a reboot of Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader? for Amazon Prime Video.

Kelce and his brother, Jason, have already found success on Prime with their hit documentary, Kelce, released in 2023. And this would actually not be Kelce’s first foray into television, lest we forget his 2016 E! reality dating show, Catching Kelce, filmed many moons before he met and fell in love with the most famous woman in the world. He’s even been a host before, taking on hosting duties for Saturday Night Live one year ago, in March 2023.

Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader? was originally hosted by Jeff Foxworthy and premiered in 2007 on Fox. The show ran until 2011 until its cancellation; Foxworthy returned in 2015 to host one more season. In 2019, Nickelodeon revived the show with host John Cena, but it only lasted for a single season. Now, according to Variety, sources close to the project say that the reboot would use celebrities in place of where the original series had children contestants (which is actually a genius idea). 

Last year, Kelce disclosed that he’s interested in pursuing a career in Hollywood once he retires from the NFL, whenever that may be. He has produced two films—his first project, My Dead Friend Zoe, premiered at SXSW earlier this month, and King Pleasure, an upcoming documentary about Jean-Michel Basquiat, begins production this summer.

Of his experience hosting Saturday Night Live, Kelce said “It was an experience that was like nothing else that I’ve ever gone through.” He added “I just can’t thank them enough for giving me that opportunity, because I didn’t know I was going to enjoy scripted comedy, or that entire entertainment world as much as I did, until I was on a set and going through the week of preparation and stuff like that.” 

Of his future in the entertainment industry, Kelce said he’s “definitely interested [in pursuing more acting projects],” and added “but that’s a whole new craft that I feel like I really got to lock in and focus on [before I do].”

Hopefully the deal can work out, as Page Six reports that “despite Kelce’s interest in the program, producers are hesitant to extend an offer over questions of his availability due to his contract with the Chiefs running until 2025.” Kelce is already a familiar face on television, and not just for NFL fans or Swifties. He starred in over 375 nationwide commercials in the 2023 NFL season which, according to The Wall Street Journal, is more than any other athlete or celebrity. In addition to even that, the brothers Kelce host a No. 1 podcast, “New Heights,” where Kelce sometimes drops tidbits about his personal life with Swift. 

Girls5eva is back! (Unless you didn't catch them in the first round, in which case, introducing Girls5eva!) Executive produced by Tina Fey and created by Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt alum Meredith Scardino, the musical comedy follows the grassroots comeback of Girls5eva, a Y2K-era girl group who get new buzz after their only hit is sampled in a rapper's latest hit. The now middle-aged Dawn (Sara Bareilles), Wickie (Renée Elise Goldsberry), Summer (Busy Philipps), and Gloria (Paula Pell) are determined to revive their pop-star career and keep doing what they love, no matter what obstacles—from the music industry's ageism to their ordinary personal lives—get in their way.

The hilarious successor to joke-a-minute series like 30 Rock and Kimmy Schmidt, Girls5eva was on Peacock for its first two seasons, before the streamer decided not to move forward with the underrated gem. Netflix picked up the series in October 2022, and Girls5eva just made its debut on the streaming giant, along with six new episodes. So, will the comedy continue on at its new home? Here's what we know about a possible Girls5eva season 4.

Has 'Girls5eva' been renewed for season 4?

Not yet, but season 3 did just hit Netflix in mid-March, and the streamer has been known to take a couple months before making a decision on more seasons. In an interview with Decider, Scardino shared that the Girls5eva crew is definitely up for more episodes. “I would like to do one. I would like to see the story continue, assuming people watch it and love it,” she told the outlet.

The showrunner didn't drop any hints for the future of the show, but she did reveal that she has “a notes app [full] of a bunch of ideas and things” for the comedy going forward.

When would 'Girls5eva' season 4 come out?

If season 4 does get the go ahead, it's likely that Girls5eva could return to the yearly release schedule it had a Peacock, with seasons 1 and 2 premiering in May 2021 and 2022. There's a precedent for Netflix comedies releasing at a quick pace: Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt aired on the platform for four seasons, which each installment coming out within a year of each other.

What would 'Girls5eva' season 4 season 4 be about?

The Girls5eva season 3 finale sees the group riding on an unexpected wave of success. After Summer tricks Ticketmaster's resale bots into selling out their Thanksgiving Day concert at Radio City Music Hall, the group finds out that Wickie's old solo single "Yesternights" had been featured in The Crown's finale (wrapping up an earlier joke about Kate Bush's feature on Stranger Things season 4). Wickie immediately gets a call from Nance Trace (Vanessa Williams in just a voice cameo, unfortunately), and this time she has enough juice to bring Girls5eva along for the ride. Though the show ends on a cliffhanger, cutting out before Wickie says whether or not the group will take the gig, it's pretty clear that the group is headed for new levels of stardom. What comes after a reunion at Jingle Ball, a comeback alum, and a (sort of) hit tour? With this show, we're sure whatever happens, the laughs will come.

Things started off so well for Brittany Mills and Kenneth Gorham, who quickly bonded in the Love Is Blind pods over their backgrounds, values, and religion. But it all started to go downhill after they left the pods for a tropical getaway, and their issues ultimately snowballed into an avalanche once they returned to “real life” in North Carolina.

While their onscreen relationship took an abrupt mid-season turn, a TikTok that Brittany posted ahead of the season 6 reunion stirred up speculation that things weren’t quite finished between her and Kenneth. Hopefully, they’ll clear it all up at the reunion—so read on for the latest updates, plus a reminder of how it all began for the duo. 

Warning: Spoilers ahead for the sixth season of Love Is Blind.

What happened between Brittany and Kenneth on ‘Love Is Blind’ season 6?

Brittany and Kenneth were among the first couples to get engaged this season. They seemed like a natural pair and a great fit: They connected in the pods over both feeling like they’d had to grow up quickly and were mature beyond their years after losing a parent at a young age. They also shared a deep commitment to their religion and were both planning to wait to have sex until they were married. Plus, their career paths had some overlap: Kenneth is a middle school principal, and Brittany was formerly a teacher (though she’s now a senior client partner at a recruitment firm).

But being so perfectly aligned on so many things didn’t mean it was all smooth sailing for the pair. When they first arrived in the Dominican Republic for the post-pods vacation, Brittany and Kenneth were still in the honeymoon phase of their new relationship—full of ear-to-ear smiles and heartfelt promises to always check in about each other’s days before bed. Unfortunately, they soon began to drift apart, as evidenced by a painfully awkward scene in which they sat in silence on a boat ride, seemingly at a loss for things to say to one another.

They hit another hurdle on the trip following a conversation between Kenneth and fellow contestant AD, who questioned how ready the couple was to face the challenges of interracial dating and whether Brittany, a white woman, was prepared for the responsibilities of raising half-Black children with Kenneth. Though Kenneth went on to bring up the topic in a candid conversation with Brittany, with both of them agreeing that they were, indeed, committed to putting the necessary work into their relationship, Kenneth expressed some apprehension about how Brittany fit into his normal life.

The pair also had trouble aligning on the physical side of their relationship. At one point on the vacation, Brittany questioned whether Kenneth was even attracted to her, since he never seemed to want to be touchy-feely, while he worried that he was “smothering” her with affection and that she wasn’t into it.

Once they got back to North Carolina, that misalignment continued, with an additional barrier between the couple: Kenneth’s phone, which he rarely seemed to look up from, even when Brittany was trying to talk to him or ask questions.

Did Brittany and Kenneth make it to the altar?

Nope. They were the first of the engaged couples to call it off: Their breakup came in the season’s eighth episode, not long after they’d returned to Charlotte and moved in together. By that point, things had become rapidly more strained between them, as Kenneth seemed more focused on his phone than Brittany, and she felt her attraction to him dwindle as a result.

The breakup came one night during a conversation in which Brittany once again expressed her desire for physical touch from Kenneth, adding that she was worried she’d lost the “crave” she’d felt for him in the pods. Kenneth gave in pretty much immediately, suggesting that if the “crave” was gone for her—though he maintained that it was still there for him—there was no point in their staying together. All in all, it was a pretty anticlimactic split, with Kenneth calmly talking them through the end of their relationship while tears ran down the face of a seemingly stunned Brittany.

The conversation ended with a hug and with Kenneth immediately picking up his phone to call a friend and make his escape, while Brittany continued to silently cry in the kitchen.

In a joint interview with Entertainment Tonight after the episode aired, Kenneth said he hadn’t seen the split coming and had still been ready up to that point to marry Brittany. They also revealed that after taking some time apart, they'd been able to rekindle a friendship.

“We actually decided the night that we ended our intimate relationship that we would actually remain friends,” Brittany said. “Although we did drift apart, we learned so much. And I think I can speak for both of us, we’re so thankful for the process and how it went and how it was handled.”

Kenneth agreed, adding, “We’re still super close because we just have a larger understanding of who we are.”

What happened at the reunion?

A few days before the reunion episode aired, Brittany posted a video on TikTok featuring a surprise appearance by Kenneth, immediately sparking speculation that they’d gotten back together.

They cleared it all up at the reunion—where they sat onstage together in coordinating black outfits. Though they haven’t rekindled their romantic relationship, Brittany and Kenneth said they’ve formed a very strong friendship: “We speak nearly every day,” Brittany said, later adding, “The bond that we have is gonna last for an eternity, and I’m happy with that.”

Kenneth also addressed the internet chatter over how unfazed he seemed by their onscreen breakup, saying that he was indeed “in shambles” and called fellow contestant Clay crying after it all went down.

“Everyone processes differently,” he said.

For the record, cheating is not a genetic condition. But Clay Gravesande didn't seem so sure, as he spent much of the sixth season of Love Is Blind constantly reminding his fiancée, Amber Desiree “AD” Smith, about the commitment issues he was feeling after having a front-row seat to his father’s struggles with monogamy. Even so, AD stuck by his side throughout the season, culminating in a walk down the aisle that seemed all but guaranteed to end with “I do.”

Here’s a refresher on what actually ended up happening between Clay and AD.

Warning: Spoilers ahead for the sixth season of Love Is Blind.

What happened between AD and Clay on ‘Love Is Blind’ season 6?

AD’s time in the pods got off to a rocky start. For some reason, she started off by building a relationship with Matthew—who you may recall as the walking red flag of a man who once walked out of the pods as the woman he’d just asked a question was still speaking. Things came to an abrupt end between them, however, once AD realized that Matthew had been saying almost the exact same things to both her and another woman on the show—coincidentally, also named Amber.

From there, she turned her attention instead to Clay...who, let’s be honest, wasn’t without his own fair share of red flags. AD later told Us Weekly that she spotted them immediately, but as she proclaimed on the show, “If I see a red flag, I’m like, ‘Oh, well, I’ll just paint my nails red to match.’”

Despite the show’s entire premise, Clay insisted that he needed to know what AD looked like before he could propose (she refused), and he also talked often about his tendency to lead with his “very huge” ego and lack of experience building stable relationships. But none of that stopped AD from saying yes when Clay eventually proposed. She said he felt like “home,” and he praised how she “saw past my bullshit and … believed in me.” 

In addition to their strong emotional connection and flirty chemistry through the pod walls, AD and Clay soon discovered during the post-pods trip to the Dominican Republic that they had plenty of physical chemistry, too. (Though, once again, he expressed a bit of a controlling fixation on his partner’s physical appearance, as he bluntly noted that if AD ever started to get “out of shape,” even while pregnant, he would try to stop that from happening and get her to join a gym.)

That pattern continued throughout their several weeks of living together in Charlotte before the wedding. Despite their very apparent physical connection, and even after encouraging meetings with each of their mothers, Clay continued to display his misplaced priorities and to express doubt over whether he was ready for a lifelong commitment—even saying outright at one point that he “might not be mature enough for marriage.” Meanwhile AD continued to wave away those fears on the belief that their love for one another and emotional connection would be enough to overcome any obstacles they’d face.

Did AD and Clay get married?

In a bit of a twist ending, they didn’t. In the days leading up to their wedding, Clay finally seemed more confident about the prospect of a marriage, giving no indication at their final date night that he might say anything other than “I do.” He even proclaimed at his bachelor party, “I can see myself married to AD.” 

That excitement and self-assurance lasted through the entire day of the wedding, as Clay got ready with his friends and seemed happy and eager to meet AD at the altar, saying, “She’s my best friend. I could ride with her ‘til the wheels fall off.” Even a pre-wedding conversation with his father didn’t seem to trip Clay up. Instead, he opened up a heart-to-heart and was able to express just how much he felt he’d grown by being vulnerable with AD about witnessing his father’s infidelities firsthand.

But it all came crashing down after AD said “I do,” as Clay replied that while he loved her and was still “rocking with” her, it wouldn’t be “responsible” of him to marry her without continuing to work on himself first and getting to a point where he can give her “100%.” AD left the altar in tears—after stopping for a hug from Clay’s mom. Clay later visited her dressing room on the venue grounds to apologize for the “game-time decision” and to suggest that they could keep dating while he does that work, she didn’t agree, sadly adding that she felt like a “sacrifice” in service of Clay’s own soul-searching journey.

“You don’t want to pick me, somebody else will,” she said through tears as she headed back home. “I’m done. My heart is, like, completely broken.”

As for what they’ve been up to since then, ahead of the reunion episode’s air date, both Clay and AD played coy about their current relationship: AD told Entertainment Tonight, “I would say you would have to wait and see,” while Clay added only, “TBD.”

What happened at the reunion?

As instructed, we waited and saw, and it turns out that AD and Clay are definitely not getting back together.

They reported that it took several weeks after the wedding before AD agreed to speak to Clay again. And though Clay maintained that AD is the love of his life, that he made “the biggest mistake” by saying no at the altar, and that, if given the chance, he would “1,000%” date her again, AD was (understandably) frustrated by those proclamations, saying, “You had your chance. There’s nothing that I wouldn’t have given you.”

She went on to accuse Clay of “playing” her by knowing from the start that he wasn’t planning on actually getting married. He disagreed, saying that even up to the final minutes before the big moment, he was on board with becoming husband and wife. Alas, he said, he got too in his head and started to worry that he wouldn’t be able to be the husband she needed or deserved, and so he couldn’t say “I do.”

He credited AD with the fact that he came out of Love Is Blind as “a different man” and said that he’d now be ready to fully commit to someone, as he’s spent the last year “doing the work” and going to therapy.

But with that option completely off the table for her, AD dropped a bit of a bombshell later on in the reunion, sharing that she’d actually met up with Matthew for “two-ish” dates after the show. The first, she said, largely revolved around him apologizing to her and being “very, very upset” over what happened between them on the show, while the second was a bit more date-y, with him cooking dinner for her (rice and chicken, for the record). After that, however, things fizzled out, since, according to AD, “we live two completely different lifestyles.”

Amy Cortés and Johnny McIntyre were the first couple to get engaged in the Love Is Blind pods this season, and that commitment stayed strong until the very end—regardless of Johnny’s confusion over various forms of contraception. In fact, their relationship was so clearly unshakeable that it actually caused some drama between another couple, when Jimmy took issue with Chelsea’s (objectively true) declaration that Amy and Johnny were the season’s strongest couple.

As for where that seemingly sure-thing “happily ever after” stands now, here’s a recap of Amy and Johnny’s lovey-dovey romance.

Warning: Spoilers ahead for the sixth season of Love Is Blind.

What happened between Amy and Johnny on ‘Love Is Blind’ season 6?

Amy and Johnny are among the most low-key, drama-free couples to come out of Love Is Blind. Their love story, of course, began in the pods, where they realized again and again that they were on the “exact same page” about so many aspects of their lives, including a shared love of adventure and travel.

Soon enough, they were the first duo to get engaged, and from there, they were off to the races. They met each other’s families—to great success—had a romantic dance lesson, and spent practically every second of their camera time gushing about one another and their fairy-tale relationship.

The only obstacle they faced throughout the season was an ongoing discussion about contraception, which was never actually resolved on camera. To Johnny’s apparent shock, Amy wasn’t on birth control. Though they discussed the prospect of Johnny’s getting a vasectomy, he shied away from that idea after doing some “research” into the procedure, leading Amy to share that she was considering getting on birth control, especially after her doctors had suggested that it could help with her anemia. 

For some reason, condoms were never mentioned onscreen, despite being a perfectly valid birth control method, with a 98% efficacy rate when used correctly—though Johnny recently told People that he and Amy “definitely” did discuss condoms as an option, adding, “I don’t know why it wasn’t shown in here. … But regardless, it was just a very funny thing of watching it back and [having people] be like, ‘Wow, did he really pass high school health class?’”

In the meantime, as they continued to explore their options, Amy and Johnny claimed they weren’t having sex until they’d nailed down a definitive method of contraception; they agreed they weren’t quite ready to start having children—though a giggling AD suggested at her and Amy’s bachelorette party that their claims of abstinence may have been exaggerated.

Did Amy and Johnny get married?

Yes! They were actually the only duo to tie the knot this season. Their love was seemingly such a sure thing that Johnny didn’t even give the usual heartfelt speech expected of LiB contestants before saying “I do.” Instead, after Amy poured out her heart, ending with a tearful “I’m excited for what’s next,” he simply replied, “I can’t wait.” And that was that!

Fittingly for the couple, their wedding included a toast to the newly combined McIntyre-Cortés family, with Amy clearly emotional at how “magical” of a moment it was for the newlyweds.

What happened at the reunion?

As was to be expected for the season’s “strongest couple”—and its only success story—Amy and Johnny still appeared to be blissfully in love throughout the season’s reunion episode. In between bouts of unpacking the other couples’ drama, Amy and Johnny offered a palate cleanser in the form of a very sweet montage of photos and videos from their first year of marriage as well as an update on how close their tight-knit families have gotten.

They also shared their favorite things about each other: the fact that Amy doesn’t “jump the gun to assumptions” and that Johnny “is just so gentle and caring and loving.” They also claimed that they still have yet to have their first big blowout fight. “We just talk!” Amy said.

And, of course, they had to address the elephant in the room: Johnny admitted that he didn’t know a ton about birth control before his conversations with Amy and verified that condoms were in fact an option. They also confirmed that they’ve settled on a contraception method that works for them: “We figured it out, and that’s all that matters,” Amy said, playing somewhat coy, despite the fact that just before the reunion episode aired, she shared a paid partnership post on Instagram for Natural Cycles, an app-based birth control option.

Every season of Love Is Blind seems to be legally required to have at least one unbelievably messy love triangle. Season six had two of ‘em, but, with all due respect to Jimmy, Chelsea, and Jess, Jeramey Lutinski’s entanglement with Laura Dadisman and Sarah Ann Bick easily claimed the most-messy crown. Jeramey opted to propose to Laura in the pods, but that didn’t necessarily put a hard stop on his “friendship” with Sarah Ann—a recipe for disaster (and reality TV gold) if there ever was one.

Read on for a recap of what went down between the trio.

Warning: Spoilers ahead for the sixth season of Love Is Blind.

What happened between Jeramey and Laura on ‘Love Is Blind’ season 6?

Jeramey was torn between Laura and Sarah Ann from the beginning. He and Laura bonded over cleanliness—including Jeramey’s veritable fleet of robot vacuums, which help keep his home so spotless that Laura would later describe it as having “serial killer vibes”—and made plans for new holiday traditions. Meanwhile, Jeramey was also attracted to self-described “patriot” Sarah Ann, she of the questionable views on abortion.

Ultimately, he chose to propose to Laura after she declared her love for him and their shared “family values,” and he realized that she checked “all of the boxes” for him.

“Sarah is amazing, but Laura is my forever person,” he said after making his decision. “I genuinely think she and I have a better connection than anybody I’ve ever met.”

Alas, Jeramey may want to check his definition of “forever.” Though he and Laura experienced a few days of newly engaged bliss when they traveled to the Dominican Republic post-pods—minus Laura’s semi-serious disdain for Jeramey’s love of Hawaiian shirts—after returning to North Carolina and reuniting with their phones, Jeramey found that Sarah Ann had DM’d him on Instagram. Things went downhill from there.

The gist of the message, according to Laura’s retelling, was that Sarah Ann was willing to rekindle her romance with Jeramey, should anything ever change between him and Laura. Though Jeramey showed Laura the message, seemingly in a display of trust, he also heart-reacted to the message, rather than completely closing that door. Indeed, a few days later, while out one night, he apparently learned that Sarah Ann was out, too, and decided to have a chat with her, rather than going home to his fiancée.

This is where things turn into a case of he-said, she-said. In a scene that belongs in a reality TV hall of fame, Laura confronts Jeramey over why he was out until 5 a.m. He claims that he was out with friends, heard Sarah Ann was out, too, and ended up chatting with her in his car in a karaoke bar’s parking lot before heading home; he points out that he shared his location with Laura, so she could see that he was in fact at the bar the entire time. Laura argues that she wasn’t up all night tracking his location and has him repeat his story—clearly, just to force him to dig his own grave a little deeper, as she then reveals that she actually did check his location and knows he was far from the karaoke bar at one point, suspiciously close to Sarah Ann’s house.

That effectively ended their engagement. Days later, at a group hangout at a lake house—their first time seeing each other since that final argument—they had an especially frosty back-and-forth that ended with Laura uttering a truly iconic line: “Go kick rocks with open-toed fucking shoes.”

Sarah Ann was also at the party, and after a tense conversation in which AD tried to get to the bottom of why Sarah Ann thought it was appropriate to DM an engaged man (inconclusive), Sarah Ann and Jeramey decided to leave the rest of the group behind and jet ski off into the sunset together, as the camera flashed back and forth between them and Laura crying tears of frustration over Jeramey’s behavior.

Did Jeramey and Laura make it to the altar?

Definitely not. See above.

What happened at the reunion?

They may not have made it to the altar, but Jeramey and Laura did make it to this season’s reunion episode—with Sarah Ann in tow, too.

To start, Jeramey and Sarah Ann revealed that they’ve stayed together in the year since the show finished filming and that they now live together. That’s when Laura appeared—via Zoom, since she was in Spain on a work trip—and things went about the way you’d expect.

They started by rehashing the infamous karaoke bar night, with Jeramey maintaining that he “didn’t intentionally” lie to Laura about where he’d been, though she accused him and Sarah Ann of having “corroborated” their stories to leave out the part where he drove her home that night. (“You’re a clown,” Laura told her ex-fiancé as their stories of how their final fight played out diverged.) Both Jeramey and Sarah Ann were adamant that nothing physical or “inappropriate” happened between them during those hours in the car, and though fellow cast member Chelsea chimed in to note that she’d “never stayed up ’til 5 a.m. just to talk,” Laura herself put a definitive end to that portion of the conversation by saying, “I don’t care what they did until 5 a.m.; I think they’re both disgusting.”

Sarah Ann also got into a spat with several of the other women from the show. They accused her of being a “pick-me girl” for having unfollowed them all on social media while continuing to follow the men from the season—and, of course, for the DM she sent to Jeramey while he was still engaged.

About that DM: The reunion included an unaired scene from the lake party in which Sarah Ann and Laura sat down for a chat. In it, Sarah Ann apologized if the DM had hurt Laura, but said she’d felt the need to get her feelings off her chest so she could move on with her life; Laura said she had indeed found the DM “disrespectful,” but that she appreciated the apology. She went on to warn Sarah Ann that Jeramey had turned out to be completely different than the picture he’d painted for her in the pods, saying that she felt “literally blindsided” at the change and adding, “Just be careful, babe.”

That, of course, didn’t stop Sarah Ann from going full jet ski Bonnie and Clyde with Jeramey later that very afternoon.

The Laura-Jeramey-Sarah Ann portion of the reunion ended with Sarah Ann apologizing to Laura once again for the DM, with Jeramey taking full blame for the messiness of the karaoke bar night, and with Laura announcing that she’s now dating someone new. So, all’s well that ends well?

When the 2024 Academy Awards nominations came out last January, it was no surprise that Oppenheimer racked up the most noms of the year. The epic Christopher Nolan movie—a.k.a. one half of Barbenheimer—has been a frontrunner for the Oscars since it made its debut in theaters on July 21, 2023, with countless film fanatics heading to theaters in droves to see the nearly three-hour biopic of physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer, father of the atomic bomb (played by Cillian Murphy). In that (admittedly vast) runtime, Nolan tells the story of Oppenheimer's life from his early days as a renowned scientist, to his complicated love life (featuring supporting performances from Emily Blunt and Florence Pugh), to his leadership of the Manhattan Project during World War II, to his public downfall in the years after the war, due to a private government hearing on his alleged communist ties spearheaded by Lewis L. Strauss (Robert Downey, Jr.).

As shown by the many awards Oppenheimer has racked up this season, from the Golden Globes to countless critics' organizations, the film stands tall as one of the best drama movies of 2023. Murphy and Downey give career-best work in the film, with the former transforming over the course of the movie from a theoretical thinker on science and faith to a disillusioned man who has been forced to face the consequences of his involvement in the dawn of the nuclear arms race. If that subject doesn't sound like it would birth an entertaining story, then you're underestimating Nolan's ability to imbue even a closed-door legal hearing with impressive dramatic stakes. Also, the Trinity Test detonation sequence is a must-watch for anyone looking for a scene that will literally take their breath away.

Luckily, the film arrived on streaming a good month before the Oscars (which is more than we can say for late-to-streamer films like Poor Things and Anatomy of a Fall).

How to Watch 'Oppenheimer'

Oppenheimer is currently available to stream on Peacock, after arriving on the platform on February 16. Though the NBC-owned streamer does offer a free tier, viewers will have to subscribe to one of the platforms paid tiers to watch the film. Peacock costs $5.99/month with ads or $11.99/month add-free. In addition, Oppenheimer is also available to rent or purchase digitally on platforms including Prime Video, Apple TV, Vudu, and more.

For anyone hoping to catch Cillian Murphy's haunted expression on the big screen, Oppenheimer is still showing in limited theaters as of Oscar weekend; check here for Oppenheimer tickets.

This news is interesting on multiple levels: actress Margaret Qualley—a model and actress who you might have seen on the Chanel runway recently, in movies like Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, Poor Things, and Drive-Away Dolls, or on television shows like The Leftovers, Fosse/Verdon, and Maid—is set to take on the role of Amanda Knox in a forthcoming limited series on Hulu produced by none other than Monica Lewinsky. (Lewinsky has had her own fashion moment as of late.)

The series is as of yet untitled, Variety reports, and Hulu has ordered eight one-hour episodes. The official description states that the show is “based on the true story of how Knox was wrongfully convicted for the murder of her roommate Meredith Kercher and her 16-year odyssey to set herself free.”

The series will be written by KJ Steinberg of This Is Us and Gossip Girl fame; Steinberg and Qualley will also executive produce, as will Lewinsky. The untitled Amanda Knox project now marks the second limited series based on a real person that Qualley has undertaken, following Maid, based on the memoir of the same name by Stephanie Land. Her work on Maid garnered Qualley both a Golden Globe and an Emmy nomination; Qualley was also nominated for an Emmy for her role in Fosse/Verdon.

Variety reports that the Hulu series won’t be the first time Knox’s infamous story has made it to the screen, both big and small: in 2011, Lifetime aired the original film Amanda Knox: Murder on Trial in Italy, and the 2021 film Stillwater starring Matt Damon and Abigail Breslin is believed to have been inspired by Knox’s story. These two projects are in addition to several news special reports and documentaries on the matter. 

Knox was just 20 years old in 2007 when her roommate Kercher was brutally murdered in their shared home while both were studying abroad in Perugia, Italy. She spent almost four years incarcerated in Italy following a wrongful conviction; in 2015, Knox was, at last, acquitted of Kercher’s murder, and Rudy Guede was found guilty of the crime.

Though Qualley is a talent in her own right, she’s also known as the daughter of fellow actress Andie MacDowell. When Qualley married music producer Jack Antonoff last August, one of his artists—a little-known singer-songwriter named Taylor Swift—was in attendance, and she shut down an entire road.

And as to the Lewinsky connection, who can understand being young and thrust into the public eye unexpectedly more than her? In addition to this project, Lewinsky also co-produced the third season of Ryan Murphy’s American Crime Story, called Impeachment, released in 2021 and focused on her relationship in the late 1990s with U.S. President Bill Clinton.

Netflix’s landmark reality franchise Love Is Blind has been a controversial yet unavoidable part of pop culture since it debuted in January 2020. Five years in, the original U.S.-based series has developed a growing list of misconduct accusations and lawsuits from former contestants. The numerous complaints, mostly from cast members in the second and fifth seasons, have raised concerns about the alleged exploitation of participants and whether the series, either in concept or during its production, places its participants in possible places of harm. Below, we summarize the history of allegations brought against the series in various lawsuits and reports, in chronological order of when the events became public knowledge.

Jeremy Hartwell’s lawsuit and the Insider report

In July 2022, Variety and CNN reported that season 2 participant Jeremy Hartwell had filed a lawsuit against Netflix, production company Kinetic Content, and casting company Delirium TV, accusing the three companies of various labor-law violations, including fostering “inhumane working conditions” and paying cast members less than minimum wage. Hartwell claimed that while filming the pods portion of the series in Santa Clarita, Calif., producers "plied the cast with alcohol and deprived them of food and water—while paying rates that were below L.A. County’s minimum wage." Hartwell’s lawyer at the time, Chantal Payton of Payton Employment Law, said in a statement to Variety that the conditions made cast members “hungry for social connections and altered their emotions and decision-making.”

More mistreatment allegations were brought to light in an April 2023 Insider report, in which several cast members, including season 2 stars Danielle Ruhl and Nick Thompson, as well as Hartwell, spoke out about their experiences on the show. The participants interviewed alleged that they were left physically and emotionally exhausted after filming days, with one participant describing filming as “emotional warfare.” Cast members also claimed that they were not provided adequate mental health support during or after filming, including one incident where Ruhl said she told producers she was having "suicidal thoughts" while filming in Mexico and wanted to leave the show. Insider also confirmed that in early LIB seasons’ contracts, cast members faced a $50,000 penalty for leaving the show “without producer approval.” The contracts also reportedly included clauses requiring engaged couples to show up to their weddings even if they did not want to get married, as well as banning married couples from getting divorced before their final episode aired.

Kinetic Connect has denied allegations from both the 2022 lawsuit and the Insider report, with CEO Chris Coelen responding to many of Ruhl’s claims in a September 2023 interview with Variety. As for the show overall, the CEO said that Kinetic provided access to psychological care throughout filming, explaining that two psychologists were present in the control room during filming in the pods, and that post-pods, cast members are given a hotline for a specialist who is available 24/7. Coelen also responded to the report’s claim of the $50,000 penalty, saying that production never enforced the clause, and that the penalty was removed from contracts in recent seasons.

Tran Dang’s lawsuit

In October 2023, PEOPLE reported that season 5 cast member Tran Dang (who filmed for the season but was not included in the final episodes) had sued Kinetic Connect and Delirium TV over claims of sexual assault, false imprisonment, and negligence. According to the full lawsuit obtained by Deadline, Dang, who got engaged to Thomas Smith on camera, said Smith allegedly assaulted her while they were filming in Mexico in May 2022. Per the complaint, Smith, who is also listed as a defendant, “forcefully groped [Dang], exposed himself in the nude, and repeatedly made sexual contact over her express objections.” The suit also alleges that "because of [Kinetic Content and Delirium TV's] 24-hour surveillance of cast members, most, if not all, of these traumatic acts were likely captured on film.” Dang also claims that “producers made attempts to mask [the] sexual assault by characterizing it as a lack of attraction on part of [Dang].” Per the suit, Dang decided to quit the show after multiple alleged attempts to notify producers about repeated alleged assaults, but she claims she was told she had to film a "final scene" with Smith, in which she was "fed lines by producers."

Kinetic and Delirium gave a joint statement to People, where the companies said that they “cannot address undisclosed concerns,” and claimed that Dang “never informed the producers of any alleged wrongdoing of any kind.” Coelen also spoke to the outlet, alleging that Dang "never told [producers] that she felt unsafe or experienced any of the allegations that she made" in the suit. He also called Dang’s false imprisonment claims “preposterous,” claiming that participants are always free to walk away from the show. “We do not tell people what to say, what to do, we consistently tell people that this is their journey, this is their life to lead as they choose. We're there to follow it,” he said.

In a statement to PEOPLE, Smith's attorney Kip Patterson told the outlet that they do not comment on ongoing litigation.

Renee Poche’s lawsuit

In January 2024, Variety and USA Today reported that season 5 cast member Renee Poche had filed a lawsuit against Netflix and production company Delirium TV, seeking to nullify her contract and claiming “intentional infliction of emotional distress along with violations of various California labor and civic codes.” During her season, Poche became engaged to Carter Wall, who, per Variety, “landed a spot on the series despite being allegedly broke, jobless, unhoused, violent and addicted to amphetamines and alcohol.” Poche claims she was placed in a “dangerous situation" by being "forced to spend long stretches of time alone" with Wall as his "erratic and alarming behavior and emotional instability became glaringly obvious to Poche and the production staff." Per the suit, some of the alleged erratic behavior included Wall "regularly berat[ing]" her, soliciting painkillers and amphetamines, and physically threatening a camera operator while they filmed at a resort in Mexico.

She eventually ended the relationship, but despite Poche claiming in an October 2023 interview that the pair made it all the way to the altar, her and Wall’s relationship was not included in the aired episodes. Poche also told Variety that after she decided to go public with her “traumatic” experience on the series, Delirium "initiated private arbitration against her for purportedly violating her non-disclosure agreement." The production company is reportedly “seeking $4 million from a woman who earned a total of $8,000 from her appearances on the reality series.”

Netflix couldn't be reached for comment about the above lawsuits, while Delirium TV did not respond to requests to comment. Wall, who is not listed as a defendant in Poche's suit, has not spoken publicly about his time on Love Is Blind as of the time of publishing.

According to Variety, Poche is the first former cast member to challenge the legality of the binding provisions that are ubiquitous in the reality industry. Poche is represented by power lawyers Bryan Freedman and Mark Geragos, who also represent former Real Housewife Bethenny Frankel in her fight to help protect reality stars from alleged exploitation.

Stephen Richardson's lawsuit

New lawsuits continue to surface in 2025. In September, season 7 contestant Stephan Richardson (who had paired up with Monica Davis until they broke up, when he was said to have cheated on her) brought forth a new suit, with the intentions of creating a class action.

As reported by Deadline, Richardson's filing includes language similar to the other suits, with claims that Netflix did not properly label the terms of their employment and allegedly treated them poorly during production. Richardson and his attorneys write in the suit that the cast members were called "independent contractors" so the producers could have "substantial exercise of control over the manner, means, and timing of their work performed for Defendants' non-scripted content productions," per Deadline.

"Defendants exercised substantial control over every aspect of the Cast’s lives during production, including the Cast’s time, access to food and drinks, sleeping arrangements, and contact with family and friends and other persons outside of production. Defendants did not allow the Cast to move or act of their own free will while the production took place," the suit states.

However, Deadline reports Richardson's filing differs because he is proposing a "sweeping class action suit." If a judge approves the class certification, cast members from other seasons could join.

A dollar amount was not listed, but the reality alum also seeks damages.

Prime Video's highly-anticipated rom-com The Idea of You has released its first trailer, showing a heart-fluttering look at the romance between an approaching-40-year-old mom and a pop star that looks a lot like one of the world's most famous musicians. The romance is one of the buzziest new comedy movies of 2024, thanks to its stars—the always-gorgeous Anne Hathaway and the booked-and-busy Nicholas Galitzine—and its notorious source material. Now that a good look at the film has finally arrived, we're moving it even higher up our must-watch lists.

Based on Robinne Lee's bestselling novel of the same name, The Idea of You follows Solène (Hathaway), a newly-divorced mom who takes her 16-year-old daughter Izzy to see her favorite band, August Moon, play at Coachella. Solène runs into August Moon's frontman, Hayes Campbell, and the unlikely pair have unbelievable chemistry. As the two begin a relationship, Solène has to balance her everyday life with this extraordinary romance, and deal with both the societal baggage around age-gap romances and the intense backlash to dating a man with a massive fanbase.

The trailer is full of both sweet and steamy moments, from the awkward meet-cute as Solène somehow finds herself in Hayes's trailer to his romantic shoutout onstage and even him tracking her down at her gallery (with paparazzi in tow) and convincing her to give the relationship a shot. Their first kiss is hot enough to elicit a deep exhale from Solène, but it's clear that she's more concerned about public opinion than he is. “What about what people will say?” she asks during a tryst, before Hayes responds, “I don’t care what they say.”

The natural chemistry between Hathaway and Galitzine should be enough of a draw, but as some former Directioners know, another lure for the movie is that Hayes is said to be based on none other than Harry Styles. Since The Idea of You novel came out in 2017, there has been speculation that it was based on the author's Harry Styles fanfiction, and it was part of the fanfic-to-traditional-publishing pipeline that began in the 2010s. (See Fifty Shades of Grey, After, etc.) In a 2020 interview, Lee even admitted that she began the book after researching Styles and learning about his history with dating older women—though, when asked if Hayes was inspired by Styles, she answered, "Inspired is a strong word." Instead, she added, "I made him into my dream guy... like Prince Harry meets Harry [Styles]."

Ella Rubin, Annie Mumolo, Reid Scott, Perry Mattfeld, and Jordan Aaron Hall also star in the film, and Jaiden Anthony, Raymond Cham, Vik White and Dakota Adan making up the other four members of August Moon. The movie will also feature original songs; the first, “Dance Before We Walk,” was released Wednesday along with the trailer.

The Idea of You will premiere at SXSW before making its debut on Prime Video on May 2, 2024.

Lindsay Lohan made a rare red carpet appearance at the Paris Theater in New York City last night for the premiere of her newest Netflix romantic comedy, Irish Wish.

The 37-year-old actress shut down the green carpet wearing a vintage John Galliano silver satin gown, sourced from the Albright Fashion Library.

Lohan's gorgeous dress featured a carefully ruched bodice and a lengthy hem that grazed the floor. The Mean Girls actress, styled by Rob Zangardi and Mariel Haenn for the occasion, completed her look with a pair of crystal-embellished Santoni heels, chunky gold and silver bracelets, and shimmering drop earrings.

Later in the evening, Lohan was spotted leaving the premiere all bundled up in a cream-colored coat while carrying a black tasseled clutch.

Irish Wish, Lohan's third film with Netflix, follows Lohan's character Maddie as she heads to Ireland for a friend's wedding and unexpectedly becomes the bride-to-be herself, as a result of a simple wish.

Considering Lohan takes on the role of a bride in the film, it only makes sense for her press tour to include a fair share of bridal-inspired looks. Prior to attending the premiere in a satin gown, Lohan was spotted earlier in the day entering The Drew Barrymore Show in an all-white look.

The Freaky Friday actress wore a cream-colored fur coat with a crystal-embellished white top and crisp white trousers. She finished the outfit with square-frame oversized sunglasses, a gold clutch, and coordinating gold platform heels.

Despite playing a bride-to-be in Irish Wish, Lohan is in fact married in real life. She tied the knot with her husband Bader Shammas back in 2022 and the couple welcomed their first child, Laui Shammas, in 2023.

Irish Wish is set to hit Netflix on March 15, with at least one bridal outfit in store onscreen.

It’s pretty difficult not to love this anecdote about one of the most famous couples in the world: on the heels of her own musical film experience This Is Me…Now (and its accompanying documentary, The Greatest Love Story Never Told, both streaming on Amazon Prime), Jennifer Lopez, alongside husband Ben Affleck, took in a recent screening of Dune 2 in an L.A. theater—and stuck around after the film was over to pick up trash left behind.

The high-profile couple went to the movies just like any other couple might on Monday night, “and after the movie ended, they were spotted cleaning up after themselves,” Page Six reports. 

An X (the platform formerly known as Twitter) user posted a video, commenting alongside it that “Dune 2 was AMAZING,” adding “Post credits scene was realizing JLo & Ben Affleck were sitting right in front of us lol.” In the short clip you can see the casually dressed couple “tidying up their seats,” Page Six writes. “It did appear, however, that Lopez didn’t have much to clean up, as she was holding a very full soda and popcorn bucket.”

One commenter wrote of the couple—who married in 2022—“Respect for taking their things and cleaning the sofa,” alongside a laughing emoji. Another added “So many people just leave their food & drinks behind in public places like this, it’s disgusting. Shoutout them.”

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle inked a reported $100 million deal with Netflix back in 2020 that is in place until 2025—and it’s currently unclear if the partnership between the Sussexes and the streaming giant will be renewed (and if either side is even interested in that).

Since striking the deal, the couple has released their eponymous six-part docuseries, Harry & Meghan, to big numbers in the latter part of 2022; Harry has also released the documentary Heart of Invictus last August, and the couple are currently producing a film adaptation of Carley Fortune’s novel Meet Me at the Lake. Other rumored projects include possible lifestyle content from Meghan and a documentary on Africa from Harry. 

After Harry and Meghan’s $20 million Spotify deal was axed last summer, questions have persisted about whether their Netflix deal will meet the same fate. The Mirror reports that Harry and Meghan “don’t seem confident about the future” of their deal, “with time running out for it to be renewed,” the publication writes. The five-year contract will end next year, “and it’s yet to be confirmed if it will be renewed,” The Mirror reports.

Public relations expert Ryan McCormick said, per The Mirror, that the Sussexes don’t seem “overly confident that it will last” after they failed to mention their Netflix deal on their revamped website for Archewell Productions. (In all fairness, the Sussexes also don’t mention Meghan’s brand-new podcast deal with Lemonada Media, where she is producing a “dynamic” new podcast after severing ties with Spotify; Lemonada will also take “Archetypes,” Meghan’s show with Spotify, and release it more broadly.)

A statement on Archewell Productions’ site reads “At Archewell Productions, we believe that stories have the power to unite and inspire audiences around the globe. Founded in 2020 by Prince Harry and Meghan, The Duke and Duchess of Sussex, our company is dedicated to illuminating thought-provoking and diverse narratives that underscore our common humanity and celebrate community.” It also adds that Harry and Meghan are working on “scripted and non-scripted TV, film, documentaries, and podcasting,” but fails to go into any specifics.

“Why Meghan and Harry haven’t discussed their Netflix deal could be for a number of reasons,” McCormick said. “One of them is that they may not be legally permitted to do so. If that’s not the case, the duo may be cautious about discussing the arrangement because they’re not overly confident that it will last.”

As ever, Harry and Meghan have been criticized for their Netflix partnership (aren’t they criticized for, well, pretty much everything?), specifically their explosive docuseries, directed by respected filmmaker Liz Garbus. “For all the criticism that the Duchess and Duke have received, I think their silence on certain matters is serving them both very well recently,” McCormick said.

All of this said, a tally on the positive side of the coin comes from Netflix’s chief content officer Bela Bajaria, who seemed confident in the content the Sussexes were bringing to the table: “They actually have a bunch in development,” Bajaria said last month at a Netflix event announcing upcoming projects. “They have a couple of unscripted things they’re working on with Brandon [Reigg]. And they actually have, like, a bunch of development, they have a movie in development, a [scripted] series that they’re working on.”

Bajaria emphasized that the projects are “all very early development”; she also seemed excited about the film—presumably Meet Me at the Lake—adding that the “movie’s great.” Though she didn’t offer further details, the “unscripted” projects are thought to be documentaries, The Mirror reports. 

Meghan herself said in November, while attending Variety’s Power of Women event in L.A., that the pipeline was full for her and Harry: she said that they were working on “Things that make people feel—I was going to say ‘good,’ but it’s more than that,” she said. “Things that make people feel something, right? And feel a sense of community. But we have so many exciting things on the slate. I can’t wait until we can announce them, but I’m just really proud of what we’re creating. My husband is loving it, too. It’s really fun.”