This year has been great for series, to say the least: almost every week, a new season of a well-known franchise or a brand-new series is released, guaranteed to blow us away. ExpressVPN’s study reveals how the past year was exciting for the streaming industry and which series was watched the most.
Heartstopper
The Netflix teen series doesn’t try to be too ambitious, just a simple yet charming story. The British series follows a teenager trying to make it as a gay boy in an all-boys school. Soon he finds an ally in the captain of the rugby team and realizes that they may be more alike than he first thought.
Euphoria Season 2
The glorious return of Euphoria is proof that the series is not a so-called ‘one-season wonder.’ Picking up after Rue’s first-season slump, the Sam Levinson-produced series is moving at a breakneck pace, with Sydney Sweeney giving a particularly remarkable performance. It is also important to note that the series’ Hungarian cinematographer, Marcel Rév, has once again done a fantastic job.
Tokyo Vice
In 1999, American journalist Jake Adelstein moved to Tokyo because he had to pass a written exam in Japanese to get a job on the editorial staff of a major Japanese newspaper. After passing the exam, however, he begins to explore the dark and dangerous world of the Japanese yakuza under the wing of a veteran vice squad detective.
Stranger Things Season 4
Released on 27 May 2022, the first seven episodes of Stranger Things season 4 – with the second to follow in July – will see the Elevens embark on a new series of eerie adventures. It has recently been announced that one of Netflix’s most successful series is ending after its fifth season, so fans were understandably eagerly awaiting the new season. Interestingly, two episodes of the fourth season were directed by the Hungarian director of the film Kontroll, Antal Nimród.
Inventing Anna
Bold entrepreneur or talented con artist? A journalist reveals the story of Anna Delvey, who has fooled New York’s elite into believing she is a German heiress.
Kleo
In the aftermath of the fall of the Berlin Wall, a former East German spy trained to assassinate is determined to take revenge on those who betrayed him – after he finds out who did it and why.
Maid
For the past year and a half, American miniseries based on a true story has been treading on each other’s heels, illuminating the hypocrisy of the upper classes and the rotting flesh of the fruit of a self-fulfilling USA through the dramatic story of a character, usually a con artist. The autobiographically inspired A Maid’s Testimony is a refreshing exception. The protagonist is not from the upper crust but from the down-and-out poor, whose only sin is being trapped in an abusive relationship from which she and her daughter are forced to flee.
So, this Netflix miniseries avoids the glamour. Still, it doesn’t become misery porn either: we feel the pain of Alex’s predicament, who is in a tight spot, searching for a solution in the indifferent maze of bureaucracy, and we feel his stomach clench with him, but it relieves the tension with its commercial storytelling devices or its slightly absurdist spice. Margaret Qualley dominates the screen, showing behind her character’s steely willpower the fear and hopelessness she can’t afford to feel for her young daughter and the supporting characters around her.
Midnight Mass
Netflix can be and has been criticized for throwing money at everything, and its content is increasingly diluted, peddling mostly woke jokes and clashing stories. The term ‘Netflix series’ has acquired a pejorative connotation: but among the lightweight and mostly content-less series, there is a natural pearl – especially when a creator takes advantage of the free hand offered by the streaming service rather than abusing it. This is the case with Mike Flanagan, who, alongside his films such as The Dream Doctor and Oculus, owes his career mainly to Netflix – and his career to himself and his consistent, thorough construction. There are few more conscious directors/creators in the horror genre than Flanagan, and after the Hill House and Bly Manor series, he has cranked out another mini-series.
Midnight Mass is his most mature work to date: in this seven-chapter story, the inhabitants of an island face their demons, and Flanagan knows what makes the flies go dead: the slow, sprawling running time pays off not only as the finale approaches but in the individual scenes. This is thanks to the excellent script, which probes into the characters’ psyches and persistently observes and talks to them. The Midnight Mass is like a confession: it brings up all the dirt you can think of on sin, religion, and human relationships and then eradicates it in a cathartic conclusion. A masterpiece of chilling moments and dramatic power.