One of the best exhibits and flicks to stream on Netflix in 2025
Netflix has had an attention-grabbing yr. Its advert tier, launched final yr, has grown considerably, and its reside TV initiative has expanded to incorporate not solely bizarre one-offs like hot-dog-eating grudge matches but additionally WWE programming. Taking KPop Demon Hunters off Sony’s arms for the enterprise equal of $200 in a potato chip bag additionally turned out to be a reasonably good transfer for Netflix. The animated function about, properly, demon-hunting Ok-pop stars, grew to become essentially the most watched film within the platform’s historical past and a worldwide cultural phenomenon in its personal proper. The sing-along theatrical launch offered out, songs from the film sat comfortably on the high of music charts for weeks, and we bought Huntr/x in Fortnite and the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade mere months after the film’s launch.
However KPop Demon Hunters wasn’t the streamer’s solely high quality providing this yr. Right here’s an inventory of Netflix’s better of 2025.
There are two life classes to remove from this documentary: Don’t be a horrific abuser and by no means piss off a self-described petty man with money to burn. This four-part docuseries, directed by Alex Stapleton and produced by Lifetime Achievement Fellow within the Hater Corridor of Fame Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson, chronicles the rise of Sean “P Diddy” Combs from music video character actor, to hip-hop enterprise mogul, to convicted prison.
The documentary options new interviews from former associates, staff, and mates who allege the whole lot from dishonest enterprise companions out of their share to having information of if not outright arranging the hit that took Tupac Shakur’s life. This isn’t a “enjoyable” watch, so heed the content material warnings, however in order for you a succinct accounting of the place Combs got here from and the way the enterprise of hip-hop can flip males into monsters, that is an informative overview.
There may be vanishingly little I can say about KPop Demon Hunters’ brilliance that hasn’t already been mentioned. So I’ll let what has been mentioned communicate for it:
Rian Johnson’s Knives Out collection has as soon as once more delivered a sharply humorous, intensely shifting whodunit. Daniel Craig as Benoit Blanc drips southern allure, aided by an ensemble solid that includes Josh Brolin as a fiery Catholic priest and Glenn Shut as his secretary. Josh O’Connor delivers some stunning moments as a junior priest struggling to search out which means in his religion, creating attention-grabbing rigidity in opposition to Blanc’s chilly, grim logic. With them working collectively, Wake Up Lifeless Man turns into a enjoyable story that examines the aim religion can have in our lives.
One factor director Guillermo del Toro is gonna do is make an opulent, sumptuous-ass film with over-the-top units and costuming. However Frankenstein isn’t just a visible delight. Oscar Isaac as Victor Frankenstein and Jacob Elordi as his monster give unbelievable performances which are each grounded within the film’s late Victorian aesthetic whereas resonating with the tales of right now. A quote unquote discovered man irresponsibly utilizing know-how to create one thing he doesn’t perceive and in his vanity tries to regulate that winds up destroying his life and others? It’s not that Frankenstein is anybody allegory for right now, it has a number of functions.
And whereas we now have quite a few Frankenstein diversifications, there’s nothing fairly like watching GDT do it. You simply know that man is gonna seize all of the manufacturing designers, make-up artists, and costumers, give them some money, and say primarily “Cook dinner,” and rattling in the event that they didn’t do precisely that.
The Nice British Baking Present
I reside for The Nice British Baking Present (generally known as The Nice British Bake Off outdoors the US). When the solar begins setting at 4:30PM and seasonal have an effect on begins disordering my life, I’m okay as a result of I do know which means it’s Baking Present season. This yr, the present has completed some attention-grabbing issues with the format, making an attempt new variations on the present’s technical problem the place bakers are tasked with making one thing with stripped-down instructions. I want the challenges weren’t so overly targeted on sweets, nevertheless it’s all the time enjoyable studying the completely bonkers names the Brits have for his or her pastries. There is no such thing as a means in a logical world that an oatmeal bar like this needs to be known as a flapjack — it doesn’t even flap! Truthfully, yelling about how British English is Unsuitable is simply as a lot enjoyable as watching the beginner bakers themselves.
The first half of the ultimate season of Stranger Issues is out, and whereas we are able to quibble about whether or not or not it’s high quality tv, it’s good for one particular purpose: it’s lastly ending. The present began off actually sturdy, telling a enjoyable story about children saving the world from the adults which are making an attempt to wreck it. However that sort of storytelling bought misplaced within the close to decade between the primary season and now — despite the fact that the Duffer Brothers need us to imagine that it’s solely been 4 years since Will first went to the Upside Down. It’s okay that tales finish, and I’m glad we’ve bought the chance to finish this present on a excessive notice by returning focus to what made it so nice within the first place — them meddling children.
Squid Sport is one other certainly one of Netflix’s tentpole hits that has come to an finish this yr. Gi-hun / Participant 456 (Lee Jung-jae) has returned to Mr. Beast’s Homicide Island to show the organizers of the lethal video games as soon as and for all. He’s befriended one other crop of determined individuals prepared to do no matter for life-changing quantities of money and similar to within the first two seasons it’s brutal to observe the video games destroy them one after the other.
Clocking in at just below 200 days, James Garfield has the second shortest time period of a US president, and I used to be genuinely enthralled watching Loss of life By Lightning chart his rise to the workplace and tragic fall through an murderer’s bullet. As with Frankenstein, Netflix is as soon as once more on time with a metaphor applicable for present occasions. Loss of life By Lightning takes a have a look at how incendiary political discourse, like the type fomented in opposition to Garfield by his personal social gathering, can result in violence.
However greater than the prescient political commentary, the performances make this present. Michael Shannon imbues Garfield with a salt-of-the-earth high quality that makes you root laborious for him. Shea Whigham has entered his character actor villain period taking part in New York Senator Roscoe Conkling, and Matthew “Mr. Darcy / Tom Wambsgans” Macfadyen provides a heartbreaking efficiency taking part in Garfield’s murderer Charles Guiteau.
The present’s finest moments come from Nick Offerman as Garfield’s reluctant vp, Chester A. Arthur. Offerman as Arthur is regency-era Ron Swanson. All through many of the present’s 4 episodes, Offerman is both drunk, combating, raving about sausages, or a mixture of all three. That man is having a blast chewing the surroundings in a high hat and mutton chops, and I might genuinely watch an entire White Home sitcom with him because the star.