Pick of the week
Better Call Saul
There’s an inbuilt problem with prequels: viewers know which characters survive. Better Call Saul has suffered from this – we know, for example, that Mike (Jonathan Banks) appears in Breaking Bad while Rhea Seehorn’s Kim does not. This element of foreshadowing needn’t be a massive problem, though – absence doesn’t necessarily mean death, and Kim has been offered various routes out of the narrative murk – but this final run has felt muted at times. Quibbles aside, the concluding part of the series remains a treat for the eyes and a masterpiece of staging. Seeing how the writers clean up the calamitous mess left on Jimmy’s carpet is sure to be intriguing. Netflix, from Tuesday 12 July
***
The Girl From Plainville
When Michelle Carter was convicted in 2017 of the involuntary manslaughter of Conrad Roy III, her name became synonymous with generational dysfunction. Carter and Roy only met a handful of times – but over the course of an online relationship, Carter convinced a depressed Roy to take his own life. This dramatisation struggles, understandably, to fully reckon with the dark enigma at the heart of the story: her motivation. But the performances, particularly Elle Fanning as Carter and Chloë Sevigny as Roy’s anguished, baffled mother Lynn, are excellent.
StarzPlay, from Sunday 10 July
***
How to Change Your Mind
“What if mental health problems, like OCD, PTSD, alcoholism and depression could all be helped by psychedelic therapy?” This question is at the heart of Michael Pollan’s fascinating four-part series based on his book of the same name. Exploring LSD, psilocybin, MDMA and mescaline, the series examines the increasingly unignorable evidence that the world’s needlessly draconian and indiscriminate drug laws are leading us to neglect medical remedies that are staring us in the face. We hear from suicidal depressives whose lives have been changed by LSD.
Netflix, from Tuesday 12 July
***
DB Cooper: Where Are You?
“Walking into an airport back then was like walking into a supermarket,” recalls one witness. “Put down $20 and you got a flight.” In 1971, this is exactly what hijacker DB Cooper did. Once on board, he threatened the crew with explosives, demanded a large sum of money and a parachute and simply vanished into the night. But what then? No one really knows, and nature hates a vacuum. This fascinating documentary is as much about the decades of professional and amateur sleuthing that the case has attracted as it is about the enigma at its heart.
Netflix, from Wednesday 13 July
***
Resident Evil
A woman is walking through a silent, post-apocalyptic city in what feels like a homage to the cold open of Danny Boyle’s 28 Days Later. What follows plays out very much like the video game that spawned this series – zombies, jump-scares, chases and near-death experiences. The plot zigzags between the present and the future: Ella Balinska is Jade Wesker – the focus of a manhunt and the daughter of Albert (Lance Reddick), an agent for the sinister Umbrella Corporation and later in charge of the response to the spread of a deadly virus. Good, goofy fun.
Netflix, from Thursday 14 July
***
Farzar
Roger Black and Waco O’Guin, the creators of Netflix’s adult, animated sitcom Paradise PD, bring a comparable sensibility to this sci-fi comedy in the vein of Futurama or Rick and Morty. However, it’s neither as wryly witty as the former nor as delightfully loopy as the latter; instead, the self-conscious crudity and air of detachment distracts from the narrative without ever being funny enough to pick up the slack. The plot itself is basic: a planet ruled by warrior Renzo, is under attack. Can his idiot son Prince Fichael and his crew repel the invaders?
Netflix, from Friday 15 July
***
Victoria’s Secret: Angels and Demons
Victoria’s Secret was once the leading lingerie retailer in the US; the angels were the supermodels chosen to parade the brand’s wares. Matt Tyrnauer’s documentary series, however, is more concerned with the demons and scandals of recent years. Les Wexner, the former CEO, proved controversial, justifying the company’s refusal to use transgender and plus-size models. There have also been criticisms of the company’s employment practices. Can a new slate of more progressive ambassadors such as footballer Megan Rapinoe save the brand?
Paramount+, from Friday 15 July
