Slowly but surely, Apple TV+ found its footing. The streaming service, which at launch we called “odd, angsty, and horny as hell,” has evolved into a diverse library of dramas, documentaries, and comedies. Now its library is so packed that we’ve declared it “the new HBO.”
Curious but don’t know where to get started? Below are our picks for the best shows on the service. (Also, here are our picks for the best movies on Apple TV+.) When you’re done, head over to our guides to the best shows on Netflix, best movies on Hulu, and best movies on Amazon Prime, because you can never have too much television.
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Slow Horses
As we wrote last year, Slow Horses is the ideal show for people who want a Pizza Hut-Taco Bell-esque combination of John Le Carré–style espionage thrillers and The Office. Based around the misfits of Slough House, where MI5 agents are sent when they biff it as spies, the show effortlessly jumps from shoot-outs and car chases to quirky conversations and camaraderie. The show's fourth season, which launched last year, was a little more subdued than the ones before, but the fifth, which rolls out this fall, promises to hit the gas. Catch up now.
The Morning Show
Every streaming service needs a flashy mainstream drama with Hollywood heavyweights to pull in viewers. Apple TV+ has The Morning Show. When Alex Levy (Jennifer Aniston) loses her morning news program cohost Mitch Kessler (Steve Carell) following sexual misconduct accusations, she gets paired up with Bradley Jackson (Reese Witherspoon) to revamp the show. What unfolds is a #MeToo-era drama full of TV network intrigue and Sorkin-lite dialog. In its second season, it went deep on Covid-19, and in the third season the series' fictional network, UBA, finds itself dealing with the aftermath of a cyberattack. The new season, in which the office politics of the network get even more tense and intense, launched September 17.
Platonic
Look around and you'll see plenty of stories about how men are lonely and struggle to keep their friendships as they get older. That doesn't happen on Platonic, a show about two longtime friends—Sylvia (Rose Byrne) and Will (Seth Rogen)—who are figuring out how to keep their relationship going even as romantic relationships and careers test the bonds they built when they were younger.
Chief of War
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