📺 The returns of Squid Game, The Bear, and one underrated gem
Reviews of Squid Game S3, The Bear S4, Such Brave Girls, and Revival, plus our weekly watchlist
Happy Thursday! Fans of binge TV had a field day last week with the drops of both Season 4 of The Bear and Season 3 of Squid Game. For us TV reviewers, it was a busy time. Add in the return of Such Brave Girls (one of our favorites), and the debut of Revival, and you’ve got a lineup that spans prestige, thrills, and network nostalgia.
In today’s edition:
Weekly Watchlist
Such Brave Girls - S2 (Hulu / Disney+)
Squid Game - S3 (Netflix)
The Bear - S4 (Hulu / Disney+)
Revival - S1 (Syfy / Peacock)
— Jess Spoll and Jenni Cullen
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Below is a selection of new shows and movies premiering this week on streaming. Our unabridged list of July releases is available for premium subscribers.
On Becoming a Guinea Fowl* (Movie) — In Rungano Nyoni's Cannes-selected (and later A24-distributed) drama, a death in a middle-class Zambian family unearths a history of sexual violence.
Watch on Max: July 4 (*streaming premiere)Sinners* (Movie) — Set in the 1930s South, this supernatural horror film follows twin brothers (Michael B. Jordan) who return home to escape their pasts—only to confront something far darker. Written and directed by Ryan Coogler.
Watch on Max: July 4 (*streaming premiere)Such Brave Girls (Season 2) — Created by and starring sisters Kat Sadler and Lizzie Davidson, this British sitcom about a dysfunctional single-parent family—and notably, one of our favorite new original shows of the last few years—returns with new dark, hilarious, emotionally raw episodes.
Watch on Hulu: July 7 (all 6 episodes)Renaissance: The Blood and the Beauty (Limited Series) — this BBC docu-drama stars Charles Dance as Michelangelo Buonarroti and examines the atmosphere of politics and rivalry during a period of great artistic genius.
Watch on PBS: July 8 (1 of 3 episodes, then weekly)Ballard (Season 1) — This Bosch spin-off follows LAPD detective Renée Ballard as she catches bad guys, both on the street and in her own department.
Watch on Prime Video: July 9 (all 10 episodes)It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia (Season 17) — The gang is back for another season of morally bankrupt schemes and ridiculous antics in Philly. After nearly two decades, the longest-running live-action American sitcom still finds ways to push boundaries and double down on the chaos.
Watch on Hulu/FXX: July 9 (1 of 16 episodes, then weekly)Too Much (Season 1) — This new rom-adjacent comedy from Girls creator Lena Dunham stars Megan Stalter (Hacks) as a workaholic New Yorker who takes a new job in London and forms an unusual connection with a local guy (Will Sharpe) there.
Watch on Netflix: July 10 (all 10 episodes)Leviathan (Season 1) — Scott Westerfeld's 2009 steampunk novel gets the anime treatment in this new series. Set in an alternate timeline during World War I, Leviathan follows a pair of teens looking to change history while mechanized war machines and genetically engineered creatures go head to head in battle.
Watch on Netflix: July 10 (all 12 episodes)
These popular shows came back with new episodes. Here’s what we thought and where you can watch them.
Such Brave Girls - Season 2
Keywords: cringe humor, British, dark comedy
Watch if you like: Fleabag, Derry Girls, Catastrophe
Such Brave Girls might take the cake for biggest sleeper hit of 2023. This small-budget original comedy premiered quietly, but delivered a sharp and surprisingly delightful first season. Next week, the series will officially be back with new episodes.
If you missed our first write-up, here’s the setup: British comedian Kat Sadler and her real-life sister Lizzie Davidson co-star in this off-beat comedy about a traumatized, dysfunctional family made up of a narcissistic single mother (Louise Brealey) and her two daughters. One is clinically depressed and passive (Sadler), the other is brash and overconfident in her terrible life choices (Davidson).
To a lot of people that might sound like a nightmare premise, but bear with me. If you can handle second-hand embarrassment, Such Brave Girls is brutally funny, thriving on exceptional chemistry, whip sharp comedic timing, and writing that holds no punches. Stay tuned for a review of the new eps in next week’s newsletter.
— Jenni
Length: 30-min runtime, 2 seasons / 12 episodes (all 6 episodes of S2 will air July 7)
Watch on: Hulu
Squid Game - Season 3
Keywords: horror, survival thriller, Korean
Watch if you like: The Hunger Games, Alice in Borderland, Battle Royale
Jess’s Rating: 4/5 ⭐
The third and final season of Squid Game is a return to form—brutal, gripping, and emotionally rich, in a way that Season 2 struggled to be. With a renewed focus, this batch of episodes recaptures what made the series a global phenomenon in the first place and offers a satisfying resolution to the story.
Picking up where Season 2 left off, this chapter leans into the emotional fallout of Gi-hun’s choices, while also delivering a new slate of sadistic, creatively engineered games. Lee Jung-jae gives a career-defining performance, playing a version of our protagonist who is hollowed out by loss and rage. The show continues to walk a fine line between high-concept dystopia and grounded character drama—and when they strike that perfect balance, few shows do it better.
The season is not without its missteps: the cartoonish VIPs remain tonally jarring, and one CGI moment (you’ll know it when you see it) is distractingly bad. But these are forgivable distractions in a conclusion that otherwise sticks the landing. Creator Hwang Dong-hyuk has said this is the end of the main story, and it feels like it, with an earned denouement that embraces the show’s moral ambiguity. The final scene, though, seems to confirm the long-rumored American spinoff, teased by a surprise (and to this reviewer, unwelcome) celebrity cameo. Whether that will be a worthy continuation remains to be seen, but as an end to Gi-hun’s story, Squid Game bows out with poise.
— Jess
Length: 60-min runtime, 3 seasons / 22 episodes (6 in Season 3)
Watch on: Netflix
The Bear - Season 4
Keywords: drama-comedy, heartwarming, chefs
Watch if you like: Shameless, Sweetbitter, Shrinking
Jenni’s Rating: 3/5 ⭐
The Bear has always thrived on intensity—its compelling characters, immersive cinematography, and snappy yet naturalistic dialogue made Seasons 1 and 2 some of the most electric TV in recent memory. While the latest seasons retain elements of that original magic, they also suffer from structural issues that dull the impact.
My biggest problem with this recent installment lies in the pacing and story structure. Without strong individual episode arcs, both seasons start to feel like one long, montage-heavy blur—more emotionally exhausting than exhilarating. There is forward momentum in S4, and a few standout episodes (particularly 4, 7, and 10) break through the noise, but the journey between them feels more like a slog than I want in a beloved show. Carmen’s growth is a powerful thematic through-line—but one delivered in fragments, surrounded by repetition and a constant sense of rallying with nowhere to go.
The series still shines in moments. The writing and sense of place remain incredibly special, with every episode offering scenes that remind me why I fell in love with it in the first place. The Bear knows how to do heartwarming. When all the ingredients align, I’m teary eyed and smiling, thinking: damn it, they’ve done it again. But these moments increasingly feel manipulative and out of place—an attempt to generate emotional weight that the current storytelling doesn’t always support.
If you have the time to binge the full 10-episode arc in one sitting (or better yet, the 20 episodes of both S3 and S4), you might walk away with a more cohesive, satisfying experience. But if you’re watching week to week or squeezing in episodes when you can, the languorous structure may undermine any real narrative payoff.
— Jenni
Length: ~40-min runtime, 4 seasons / 38 episodes (10 in S4)
Watch on: Hulu/Disney+
Our thoughts on brand new streaming content, and where you can watch.
Revival
Keywords: zombies, supernatural noir, horror
Watch if you like: From, Wayward Pines, Bates Motel
Jess’s Rating: 2.5/5 ⭐
What if the dead came back to life, non-violent, fully themselves with memories intact? Take that compelling premise and run it through the clunky filter of network TV, and you get Revival. It’s familiar and occasionally hokey, but watchable nonetheless.
Set in a small Wisconsin town a month after “Revival Day”, the show begins with residents still adjusting to the reappearance of everyone who died within a specific two-week window. They’re not zombies in the traditional sense—there’s no brain-eating or unintelligible speech—they’re just humans who were once dead, now back again, and not entirely welcomed by the living.
If you miss the days of Grimm or other mid-budget supernatural dramas that weren’t trying to win Emmys, Revival scratches that itch. The execution is broad, the dialogue is stiff, and the tone veers wildly from horror to romance to procedural mystery. But for all its flaws, there’s something comforting in its mess. It reminds me of stumbling onto something on cable in the 2000s and sticking around not because it’s great, but because it’s just intriguing enough.
— Jess
Length: 45-min runtime, 1 season / 8 episodes (3 available now, new on Thursdays)
Watch on: Syfy / Peacock
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