The Best Original Shows and Movies on Apple TV+

BEST APPLE TV+ ORIGINAL SHOWS

The popular streaming service has quietly built a solid list of titles, from star-studded movies to underrated series.

So Apple wants to compete with Netflix, Disney.Also, HBO Max, and a plethora of other streaming services. We wouldn’t count Apple out of the streaming wars with $1 billion invested in original content, a reasonable subscription price, and a captive audience on its devices.

With big Silicon Valley money now pouring into Hollywood, the streaming service has been able to attract exciting talent for its original content, resulting in a few gems. While it does not have as large a library as its competitors, it does have a few shows and movies worth watching.

Our picks for the best series, movies, and documentaries available on Apple TV+ are listed below.

The Morning Show (2019– )

The Morning Show is about, well, a morning show… and all of the behind the scenes drama and dynamics that viewers don’t see when they’re enjoying those network programs with their morning coffee. It’s also become one of Apple TV+’s most shiny, award-winning pieces. Much of its acclaim and half of the fun watching the dramedy is due to its star-studded cast, led by Jennifer Aniston as a Katie Couric-like anchor and Reese Witherspoon as the spitfire from down South who haphazardly finds her way co-hosting alongside Aniston’s character when a Matt Lauer-esque scandal erupts regarding her former co-host played by Steve Carell. Although the show might not have anything entirely new to say about gender dynamics in the workplace, it’s an addicting watch that will keep you pressing play, like viewers have been tuning into The Today Show for years.

Mosquito Coast (2021– )

Apple gave an update to this Paul Theroux’s seminal 1981 novel about American idealism gone to rot (after an 1986 movie adaptation starring Harrison Ford). In this version, the author’s own nephew Justin Theroux plays Allie Fox, an inventor who uproots his family. Unlike in the source material, where the trouble starts for Allie when he arrives in Central America, showrunner Neil Cross, of Luther fame, reimagines the saga as a chase. Here, Allie is being pursued by authorities for reasons that are initially unknown to the audience and enlists the help of coyotes, smugglers, to get his brood into Mexico, where more trouble awaits.

Schmigadoon! (2021– )

Schmigadoon! was made for musical theater nerds. In the musical-comedy, Cecily Strong and Keegan-Michael Key play Melissa and Josh, two doctors in a relationship, who get trapped in the strange town of Schmigadoon on a camping excursion. They quickly learn that they are in a Golden Age musical and the only way out is to cross a bridge with their true love. Unfortunately, Melissa and Josh are on the fritz, and they have to brave a series of romantic misadventures before they realize they are perfect for one another. It’s ripe with fun songs, appearances by stage veterans like Kristin Chenowith, and references galore from The Music Man, The Sound of Music, Sunday in the Park with George, and many other shows. Even if you aren’t able to catch the very dorky Easter eggs, it’s a show that’s simply a joy (as long as you can stomach the cast constantly breaking into song).

Servant (2019– )

This psychological thriller, created and written by Tony Basgallop and executive-produced by M. Night Shyamalan, stars Lauren Ambrose, Toby Kebbell, Nell Tiger Free, and Ron Weasley (AKA Rupert Grint) and tracks a troubled couple after a nanny arrives to take care of their infant son. Given Shyamalan’s involvement, you can probably guess that things are not exactly what they seem.

Severance (2022– )

Mark (Adam Scott) is employed at Lumon Industries, a company so mysterious its own workers are obligated to undergo “severance,” a one-time procedure that totally wipes their memories of anything they do while at the office. What they’re not told is that, in order to wall off one section of their memories from another, severance basically manifests an entirely new personality that lives, trapped, inside their heads, existing only within their workplace. The workers, naturally, become obsessed with finding out who they really are. The result is a hideous and hilarious parody of office life and its bizarre intricacies. The show, created by Dan Erickson, builds an entire world inside an office, constructing a mappa mundi of white-tiled halls, carpeted cubicles, and a delightfully analog tech aesthetic that positions it somewhere between Office Space and Being John Malkovich.

Ted Lasso (2020– )

If you’re looking for a show that’ll do nothing short of warm your heart (and inspire you to look up how to get specific tea and biscuits imported into the US), Ted Lasso is it. The series has become a full-blown phenomenon for Apple because of how damn wholesome it is. The plot may sound similar to anyone who has seen Major League, as it follows the mission of the new owner (Hannah Waddignham) of the AFC Richmond football club as she tries to take down the team her ex-husband loves by hiring Wichita State football coach Ted Lasso (Jason Sudeikis). While the plan is sly because Lasso isn’t a total joke but doesn’t know anything about soccer, what he lacks in skill he makes up for in kindness and heartfelt desire to help the team. Its lack of cynicism makes it the utmost comforting watch. So find some biscuits, make a cup of tea, and curl up with Ted Lasso.

Mythic Quest (2020– )

Mythic Quest is a comedy series from the brains of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia veterans Rob McElhenney, Charlie Day, and Megan Ganz, and it’s co-produced by Ubisoft (yes, the video game development company). The series follows a group of devs working on the eponymous Mythic Quest, a wildly successful MMORPG on the cusp of releasing its first major expansion. McElhenney stars as Ian Grimm, a gifted creative director with “an ego the size of a bus,” alongside a great ensemble cast that always finds a way to push the limits of comedy TV.

Pachinko (2022– )

If you were stunned by the first season of Pachinko, Apple TV+’s historical drama series based on Min Jin Lee’s bestselling novel of a family living through the imperial Japanese occupation of Korea and its repercussions, we promise you, the good stuff is only just beginning. The show, which follows Sunja (played in three different eras of her life by Yu-na, Kim Min-ha, and Youn Yuh-jung), a Korean woman who starts a family in Japan, and her descendants who live through the second half of the twentieth century and its ever-changing sociopolitical landscape, is a masterwork that combines riveting plot with historically relevant detail, touching on the moments that defined Korea, Japan, and America during this time period.

Physical (2021– )

For all of its neon colors and being pegged as a show about the ’80s aerobics craze, you might think that Physical is a peppy comedy. But then the show retreats into the lead character Sheila’s head where a voiceover makes it evident that this housewife has turned to the fitness movement because of an all-consuming eating disorder, and it’s clear the show is about a much darker topic. Created by Annie Weisman (Desperate Housewives) and starring the always excellent Rose Byrne, the show is a deeply uncomfortable but necessary viewing experience that, underneath all of the spandex, operates as a dual portrait of a woman in the throes of a disease, and an era crumbling under the allure of capitalism.

Home Before Dark (2020– )

This mystery is inspired by Hilde Lysiak, a young girl who publishes her own newspaper in Pennsylvania and got the scoop on a murder case. She’s helped by her father, a former New York Daily News reporter. You can try to make this stuff up, but it’s not recommended. The Florida Project‘s precocious star Brooklynn Prince portrays Lysiak, and she’s supported by Jim Sturgess, Abby Miller, and Louis Herthum.

Lisey’s Story (2021)

Lisey Landon (Julianne Moore) has been a widow for two years since her husband, the famous novelist Scott Landon, died, and her home is overrun with boxes and crates of his books, writing materials, and unpublished manuscripts, the latter of which is highly desired by Professor Dashmiel (Ron Cephas Jones), who hounds Lisey at every opportunity. Procrastinating on her cleanup, she and her sister Darla (Jennifer Jason Leigh) attempt to care for their nearly nonverbal sister Amanda, who speaks in coded nonsense and seems to reside in a world totally apart from our own. Dashmiel sics obsessive Scott Landon fan Jim Dooley (Dane DeHaan) on Lisey to try to wear her down, but Jim’s attempts to liberate Landon’s stuff become increasingly more violent. When Lisey finds a hidden message from her late husband promising to send her on a “bool” hunt with a hidden prize at the end, all the disparate threads start to converge. The miniseries, with episodes written by Stephen King himself and directed by Pablo Larraín (Jackie, Ema) keeps its true intentions hidden, lingering on sweeping, atmospheric shots and scenes that go on for just long enough to get uncomfortable.

Little America (2020– )

The Big Sick co-writers and real-life couple ​​Kumail Nanjiani and Emily V. Gordon created this anthology series about immigrants in America. Each episode tells a singular story, some funny, some romantic, about unique immigrant experiences, like of a young man from Nigeria who finds a connection to Oklahoma cowboy culture or a woman from Uganda set on making it as a baker.

Defending Jacob (2020)

This limited series stars the retired Captain America himself (Chris Evans) in an adaptation of William Landay’s crime novel of the same name about an ADA’s son suspected of killing a classmate. Michelle Dockery and Jaeden Martell co-star for the miniseries, which proved to be the streaming service’s surprise hit with its eerie tone and many twists and turns upon its spring 2020 release.

Dickinson (2019–2021)

The phrase “Emily Dickinson comedy” might sound like a misnomer, but this show is more so an utterly weird, but true-to-itself poetic response to the poet than a biographic drama about her. Pop star and True Grit actress Hailee Steinfeld plays the literary icon in her younger years as a wild socialite, remixing the 1850s-set show to feel like a contemporary teen series (she speaks like a 20something from this century, Wiz Khalifa plays Death, you get the picture). It may take a lot of creative license, but it’s downright amusing, witty, and has its own sense of genius.

For All Mankind (2019– )

For All Mankind starts off in the summer of 1969, with every nuclear family in America gathered around their TV sets to see the first human being set foot on the moon—except, instead of Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong, it’s a Soviet cosmonaut who hops out of the spacecraft, hoisting a hammer and sickle flag into the lunar soil. What For All Mankind does that is so remarkable, not to mention insanely fun to watch, is imagine what would have happened if such a grand failure had driven us to achieve much more than we did. Creator Ronald D. Moore, who also brought us a little show called Battlestar Galactica, fashions a creatively designed alternate timeline for the space program and American politics, creating a space freak’s playground chock full of historical what ifs.

Foundation (2021– )

Isaac Asimov’s Foundation is not the sort of book you read and wonder, Why hasn’t this been adapted into a laser-blasting, spaceship-exploding blockbuster space opera yet? The best way to describe the first book in Asimov’s centuries-spanning series is “groups of guys sitting in rooms and discussing events that you never actually get to see,” which is not exactly material that lends itself to the neon light show sci-fi entertainment we’ve grown to expect, and not the sort of thing you want to hear about a new science fiction television series. But trust that Apple TV+’s adaptation of Foundation, set in the far future of humanity at the beginning of the end of a galaxy-wide empire, and starring Jared Harris as psychohistorian Hari Seldon, has pulled off the unenviable task of adapting the core ideas of what made the books so revolutionary in the first place, while adding new notes of emotion and excitement to expand the world.

Little Voice (2020)

After singer-songwriter Sara Bareilles took her talents to Broadway where she adapted Waitress as a musical, among many other projects, she headed to Apple TV+ to co-create this coming-of-age series. Little Voice follows a young hopeful singer named Bess (played by Brittany O’Grady of The White Lotus) as she moves to New York and tries to make it in the Big Apple. Cliched as it may be, it’ll find its way to warm your heart and you won’t be able to get its original tunes out of your head.