Each month, loads of new films and TV shows are added to Netflix Australia‘s library. Critic Craig Mathieson presents his picks for titles worth watching. For the full list of everything arriving on the platform, scroll down. Also, check out Craig’s top 50 movies on Netflix list.
Top Picks: TV
Devil in Ohio: Season 1
With echoes of Orphan (be careful who you welcome into your home) and Yellowjackets (cults have a deadly gravity), this suspense thriller stars Emily Deschanel (Bones) as a hospital psychiatrist who brings home Madeleine Arthur’s traumatised teenager, who has no past but appears to have escaped from an unknown group that wants her back.
The limited series is an adaptation of Daria Polatin’s best-seller, building tension as the family unit is subverted and scared by the increasingly obsessed newcomer. Jump scares in the bathroom mirror? Absolutely.
Untold: The Race of the Century
Australia winning the America’s Cup yacht race in 1983—ending a 132-year American winning streak—is a celebrated moment whose backstory is little known. This documentary series aims to fill in the numerous gaps about how a boat with a radical design and boxing kangaroo sail came to deliver an iconic sporting moment.
Interviews include many of those involved, including Australia II’s captain John Bertrand and numerous collaborators, as well as featuring the last interview with the late Bob Hawke, who was Australia’s Prime Minister at the time and delivered a legendary congratulatory speech.
Heartbreak High: Season 1
If you entered your teenage years between 1994 and 1999 chances are you watched the original Heartbreak High, a hectic high school drama that had a frank outlook and a feel for juicy adolescent melodrama. Over seven seasons the show had multiple eras and their stars—whether it was Alex Dimitriades’ Nick or Callan Mulvey’s Drazic—and Netflix will be hoping this update can capture the classroom chaos that flowed through all of them.
Creator Hannah Carroll Chapman (The Heights) delivers a diverse contemporary cast and a striking instigating idea: the painting of a mural that reveals every sexual relationship amongst the student body at Hartley High.
Thai Cave Rescue
Amazon won the race to get their scripted drama about the 2018 Tham Luang cave rescue—Ron Howard’s recent film Thirteen Lives—out first, but the events in Northern Thailand created so many headlines worldwide and generated so many different stories that there is likely room for multiple iterations.
Netflix’s limited series has the rights to the story of the 12 boys from the Wild Boars soccer team who were trapped in the limestone caves with their coach, and while there are familiar Australian names in the cast—including Damon Herriman (Justified, The Tourist) and Rodger Corser (Doctor Doctor)—it appears to pay greater attention to the Thai side of events. What should be unchanged? The extreme tension of the underwater rescue.
Top Picks: Movies + Specials
Dune
Arrival director Denis Villeneuve spoke about Frank Herbert’s touchstone 1965 science-fiction novel with spiritual awe: turning the story of a futuristic battle between warring factions on the most valuable but unforgiving planet in the galaxy into a cohesive film was an act of devotion.
With Timothee Chalamet as his fated hero, surrounded by a stacked supporting cast that included Oscar Isaac, Rebecca Ferguson, Josh Brolin, Jason Momoa, and—briefly—Zendaya, the Canadian filmmaker created an epic defined by vast physicality, otherworldly wonder, and bloody conflict. It was a solemn, immersive blockbuster, worth watching again as Villeneuve and company shoot the second instalment.
Do Revenge
Netflix is getting into the Maya Hawke business. The second-generation star (her parents are Uma Thurman and Ethan Hawke) has been a welcome addition to the recent seasons of the streaming service’s signature hit, Stranger Things, embodying the gangly, garrulous Robin Buckley. In this black comedy she plays an outsider new to a high school who forges a bond with a popular girl played by Camila Mendes (Riverdale), who has been betrayed and fallen from grace. Their scheme? Take down each other’s adversaries. It sounds like Hitchcock’s Strangers on a Train crossed with Cruel Intentions.
Blonde
Arriving with an R-rating in America due to the sex scenes and a declaration by Australian writer/director Andrew Dominik (Chopper, Killing Them Softly) that it will be “one of the 10 best movies ever made”, this anti-biopic is one of the most anticipated movies of the year. Ana de Armas, who’s impressed via supporting roles in the likes of Blade Runner 2049 and No Time to Die, gets a defining role as a fictionalised version of Marilyn Monroe, the most famous of Hollywood stars. Historic misogyny and the misdeeds of famous men help define this psychological drama, shot in black and white, with Dominik already getting the full-throated blessing of author Joyce Carol Oates, whose acclaimed 2000 novel he adapts.
All titles arriving on Netflix Australia in September
September 1
Playing Beatie Bow
Off the Hook: Season 1
Love in the Villa
Fenced In
Samurai Rabbit: The Usagi Chronicles: Season 2
JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure STONE OCEAN: Episodes 13-24
September 2
Dune
Devil in Ohio: Season 1
The Festival of Troubadours
Dated and Related: Season 1
You’re Nothing Special: Season 1
Fakes: Season 1
Buy My House: Season 1
Fabulous Lives of Bollywood Wives: Season 2
Ivy + Bean: The Ghost That Had To Go
Ivy + Bean
Ivy + Bean: Doomed to Dance
September 3
Little Women
September 5
Rick & Morty: Season 6
Once Upon a Small Town
Cocomelon: Season 6
Bee and Puppycat
September 6
Diorama
Sheng Wang: Sweet and Juicy
Rodrigo Marques: King of Uncouth
Untold: The Race of the Century
Get Smart With Money
September 7
Chef’s Table: Pizza
Indian Predator: The Diary of a Serial Killer
September 8
Entrapped: Season 1
The Anthrax Attacks
September 9
Cobra Kai: Season 5
End of the Road
No Limit
September 9
Merli. Sapere Aude: Season 2
Narco-Saints: Season 1
September 12
Ada Twist, Scientist: Season 3
September 13
Jo Koy: Live from the Los Angeles Forum
September 14
The Lørenskog Disappearance: Season 1
Heartbreak High: Season 1
Broad Peak
The Catholic School
Sins of Our Mother
September 15
Liss Pereira: Adulting
Terim
Dogs in Space: Season 2
September 16
Sant: Season 1
Fate: The Winx Saga: Season 2
The Matrix Resurrections
The Brave Ones
Love Is Blind: After the Altar: Season 2
Do Revenge
I Used to Be Famous
Jogi
Mirror, Mirror
Skandal! Bringing Down Wirecard
Gymnastics Academy: A Second Chance
Drifting Home: Season 1
September 19
Go Dog Do: Season 3
September 20
Patton Oswalt: We All Scream
September 21
Iron Chef Mexico: Season 1
Designing Miami: Season 1
The Perfumier
The Real Bling Ring: Hollywood Heist
Fortune Seller: A TV Scam
September 22
Snabba Cash: Season 2
Thai Cave Rescue: Season 1
The Dreamlife of Georgie Stone
Karma’s World: Season 4
September 23
The Girls at the Back: Season 1
Jamtara: Sabka Number Ayega: Season 2
ATHENA
A Jazzman’s Blues
Lou
Pokémon: The Arceus Chronicles
September 24
Dynasty: Season 5
Fullmetal Alchemist: The Final Alchemy
September 26
A Trip to Infinity
My Little Pony: Make Your Mark: Chapter 2
September 27
Nick Kroll: Little Big Boy
September 28
Inside the World’s Toughest Prisons: Season 6
Too Hot To Handle: Brazil: Season 2
Blonde
Eat The Rich: The Gamestop Saga
September 29
The Empress: Season 1
September 30
Floor is Lava: Season 3
Human Playground: Season 1
Entergalatic
Rainbow
Anikulapo
Phantom Pups
The Dry
Date to be announced
Who Likes My Follower?
Plan A Plan B
Cyberpunk: Edgerunners
See also
* Best new movies and TV series Stan
* Best new movies and TV series on Amazon Prime
* Best new movies and TV series on Disney+
* All new streaming movies & series
