Netflix held its presentation this weekend at the Television Critics Association winter press tour. The streaming giant tackled the “peak TV” debate by announcing $6 billion worth of new programming options to hit your screen this year. According to their chief content officer, Netflix will provide over “600 hours of original programming in 2016” to its 70 million subscribers worldwide.
That’s a lot.
There’s no such thing as too much TV for Netflix, and they make a good argument for it. However, for the average viewer, like me, who likes to watch a variety of shows, there is such a thing as too many choices. With the onslaught of new shows and seasons premiering this year, I decided put together a guide to keep track of what new on Netflix in 2016.
Click through the slideshow to see a glimpse of what $6 billion and 600 hours of programming looks like.
FEBRUARY
Love: Season 1 – February 19
Official Description: Love follows nice guy Gus (Paul Rust) and brazen wild-child Mickey (Gillian Jacobs) as they navigate the exhilarations and humiliations of intimacy, commitment, love and other things they were hoping to avoid. Love is an unflinching, hilarious and excruciatingly honest take on modern relationships. Love is created, written and executive produced by Judd Apatow, Paul Rust and Lesley Arfin.
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Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon: Sword of Destiny – February 26
The sequel to the acclaimed film, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon: Sword of Dynasty is about “the fight to keep a great warrior’s sword from an evil warlord will change them in ways they never imagined.”
Fuller House: Season 1 – February 26
Official Description: In the spinoff series, Fuller House, the adventures that began in 1987 on Full House continue, with veterinarian D.J. Tanner-Fuller (Candace Cameron-Bure) recently widowed and living in San Francisco. D.J.’s younger sister/aspiring musician Stephanie Tanner (Jodie Sweetin) and D.J.’s lifelong best friend/fellow single mother Kimmy Gibbler (Andrea Barber), along with Kimmy’s feisty teenage daughter Ramona, all move in to help take care of D.J.’s three boys — the rebellious 12-year-old Jackson, neurotic 7-year-old Max and her newborn baby, Tommy Jr.
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MARCH
House of Cards: Season 4 – March 4
Official Description: An uncompromising exploration of power, ambition and the American way, the series orbits Francis Underwood, the House Majority Whip. Underwood is the politician’s politician — masterful, beguiling, charismatic and ruthless. He and his equally ambition wife Claire stop at nothing to ensure their ascendency.
Flaked: Season 1 – March 11
Official Description: Flaked is the serio-comic story of Chip, a celebrated long-time resident of the insular world of Venice, California who falls for the object of his best friend’s fascination. Soon the tangled web of half-truths and semi-bullshit that underpins his all-important image and sobriety begins to unravel. Will Arnett plays Chip, a man doing his honest best to stay one step ahead of his own lies.
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Marvel’s Daredevil: Season 2 – March 18
Official Description: Blinded as a young boy but imbued with extraordinary senses, Matt Murdock (Charlie Cox) fights against injustice by day as a lawyer, and by night as the Super Hero “Daredevil” in modern day Hell’s Kitchen, New York City.
APRIL
The Ranch: Season 1 – April 1
Official Description: Set in present day on a Colorado ranch, this multi-camera comedy series stars Ashton Kutcher, Danny Masterson, Sam Elliott and Debra Winger. The show follows Colt’s (Kutcher) return home after a brief and failed semi-pro football career to run the family ranching business with his older brother Jameson “Rooster” (Masterson) and father Beau (Elliott), whom he hasn’t seen in 15 years. Winger stars as Colt’s and Jimmy’s mother, Maggie, who runs the local town bar. The Ranch is executive produced by Don Reo (Two and Half Men, My Wife and Kids) and Jim Patterson (Two and a Half Men, Mike and Molly). Kutcher and Masterson also serve as executive producers.
Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt: Season 2 – April 15
Official Description: After living in a cult for fifteen years, Kimmy (Ellie Kemper – The Office) decides to reclaim her life and start over in New York City. Armed with just a backpack, light-up sneakers and a couple of way-past-due library books, she’s ready to take on a world she didn’t even think existed anymore. Wide-eyed but resilient, nothing is going to stand in her way. She quickly finds a new job (working for 30 Rock’s Jane Krakowski), a new roommate (Tituss Burgess – 30 Rock) and a new beginning. The cast also includes Lauren Adams, Sara Chase, Sol Miranda and Emmy winner Carol Kane (Taxi, The Princess Bride). The first season of this acclaimed comedy was nominated for an Emmy® award.
Special Correspondents – April 29
Official Description: A radio journalist and his technician get in over their heads when they hatch a scheme to fake their own kidnapping during a rebel uprising in South America and hide out in New York instead.
MAY – AUGUST
Marseille: Season 1 – May 5
Official Description: As the municipal elections approach in Marseille, Robert Taro, the city’s Mayor for the last twenty years, prepares his last coup: push through the vote for the construction of a casino in the historic center of the Marina. Nothing has been left to chance, and his successor, Lucas Barrès, is already designated. But the latter’s all-consuming ambition and the secret interests of the city’s leaders, whether they come from its opulent villas or from the cities of the northern suburbs, impede the Mayor’s plans. The race for Mayor becomes a power struggle where no holds are barred. Only one question arises: how far will they go? The cast includes Gérard Depardieu (Robert Taro), Benoît Magimel (Lucas Barrès), Géraldine Pailhas (Rachel Taro), Nadia Farès (Vanessa d’Abrantès), Stéphane Caillard (Julia), Jean-René Privat (Cosini), Guillaume Arnault (Eric), Hedi Bouchenafa (Farid), Carolina Jurczak (Barbara) and Nassim Si Ahmed (Selim). Marseille is written by Dan Franck who serves as Executive Producer. Florent Siri (‘Cloclo’), director of episodes 1-4, also serves as Executive Producer. Thomas Gilou is the director of episodes 5-8. Marseille is produced by Paris-based Federation Entertainment, led by Pascal Breton, producer of the hit French series Dolmen and Sous le Soleil.
Grace and Frankie: Season 2 – May 6
Official Description: Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin star as Grace and Frankie, two women whose lives are suddenly turned upside down when their husbands, played by Martin Sheen (“Robert”) and Sam Waterston (“Sol”), reveal they are gay and leave them for each other. Both sparring partners and partners-in-crime, they form an unlikely bond to face an uncertain future together and discover a new definition of “family,” with laughter, tears and plenty of mood enhancers along the way. From executive producers Marta Kauffman (Friends) and Howard J. Morris (Home Improvement), the hilarious and heartbreaking comedy takes on aging with gusto – from joint pain to joint rolling and blind dates to night blindness – and offers a poignant look at how life’s turning points show us who we really are. The series also stars Brooklyn Decker, Ethan Embry, Baron Vaughn and June Diane Raphael. In addition to Kauffman and Morris, the series is also executive-produced by David Ellison, Dana Goldberg and Marcy Ross from Skydance Productions, along with Paula Weinstein and Fonda and Tomlin.
Orange is the New Black: Season 4 – June 17
Official Description: Ready to do a little more time with the ladies of Litchfield? The outrageous, award-winning and critically-acclaimed series from EmmyⓇ Award winner Jenji Kohan stars Taylor Schilling, Uzo Aduba, Laura Prepon, Kate Mulgrew, Natasha Lyonne, Laverne Cox, Dascha Polanco, Michael Harney, Danielle Brooks, Taryn Manning, Selenis Leyva, Yael Stone, Nick Sandow, Samira Wiley, Lea DeLaria, Jackie Cruz, Elizabeth Rodriguez and Adrienne Moore. Lionsgate Television produces the series.
Stranger Things: Season 1 – July 15
Official Description: The new drama series written and directed by Matt Duffer and Ross Duffer (Wayward Pines, Hidden) consists of eight, one-hour long episodes. In the series, a young boy vanishes into thin air. As friends, family and local police search for answers, they are drawn into an extraordinary mystery involving top secret experiments, terrifying supernatural forces, and one very strange little girl. The series, set in Indiana, is a love letter to the ‘80s classics that captivated a generation. Stranger Things stars Winona Ryder (Show Me a Hero), David Harbour (Suicide Squad), Finn Wolfhard (The 100, Aftermath, The Resurrection), Millie Brown (BBC’s Intruders, Once Upon A Time, NCIS), Gaten Matarazzo (The Blacklist), Caleb McLaughlin (The Lion King on Broadway), Noah Schnapp (Bridge of Spies, The Peanuts Movie), Natalia Dyer (After Darkness, Hannah Montana: The Movie), Charlie Heaton (Shut In, Urban and the Shed Crew) and Matthew Modine (Weeds, Proof). The Duffer Brothers are writing, directing and showrunning the series, and will serve as executive producers along with Shawn Levy and Dan Cohen via their 21 Laps entertainment banner (The Spectacular Now, Night At The Museum, Real Steel, Date Night). Stranger Things is a Netflix production.
The Get Down: Season 1 – August 12
Official Description:The first six episodes of Baz Luhrmann’s all-new music-driven drama, from Sony Pictures Television, will focus on 1970s New York City – broken down and beaten up, violent, cash strapped — dying. Consigned to rubble, a rag-tag crew of South Bronx teenagers are nothings and nobodies with no one to shelter them – except each other, armed only with verbal games, improvised dance steps, some magic markers and spray cans. From Bronx tenements, to the SoHo art scene; from CBGBs to Studio 54 and even the glass towers of the just-built World Trade Center, The Get Down is a mythic saga of how New York at the brink of bankruptcy gave birth to hip-hop, punk and disco — told through the lives and music of the South Bronx kids who changed the city, and the world…forever. Luhrmann, director of Moulin Rouge!, Romeo + Juliet, and The Great Gatsby, will direct the first episode and serve as executive producer, overseeing all creative aspects of the show. Joining him on the creative team are four-time Academy-Award winner Catherine Martin (The Great Gatsby,Moulin Rouge!), along with Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Stephen Adly Guirgis (The Motherf***er With The Hat) and hip-hop historian and writer Nelson George, and a trio of the pioneers of hip-hop: Grandmaster Flash, DJ Kool Herc, and Afrika Bambaataa, each of whom will also be portrayed on the series. The cast includes Shameik Moore, Justice Smith, Herizen Guardiola, Skylan Brooks, Tremaine Brown Jr., Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Jimmy Smits, Giancarlo Esposito and Jaden Smith.
2016 TBA
These releases are slated to premiere sometime in 2016.
The Crown: Season 1
Official Description: This story reveals the political rivalries and romance behind Queen Elizabeth II’s reign and the events that shaped the 2nd half of the 20th century.
Marvel’s Luke Cage: Season 1
Official Description: After a sabotaged experiment leaves him with super strength and unbreakable skin, Luke Cage becomes a fugitive trying to rebuild his life in modern day Harlem, New York City. But he is soon pulled out of the shadows and must fight a battle for the heart of his city – forcing him to confront a past he had tried to bury.
Mascots
According to Variety, “Mascots appears to be in the style of [Christopher] Guest’s mockumentaries… Mascots follows the ‘unusual’ men and women of the 8th World Mascot Association championships competing for the prestigious Gold Fluffy Award.”
One Day at a Time: Season 1
This remake of the classic 1975 sitcom will change things up, centering on a modern Cuban American family. The legendary Rita Moreno will lead the show about “a recently separated former military mom who is navigating a new single life while raising her radical teenaged daughter and socially adept tween son, with the “help” of her old school Cuban-born mom and a friends-without-benefits building manager named Schneider.”
Pee-wee’s Big Holiday
Official Description: In Pee-wee’s Big Holiday, a fateful meeting with a mysterious stranger inspires Pee-wee Herman to take his first-ever holiday in this epic story of friendship and destiny. Judd Apatow (Anchorman, Bridesmaids) and Paul Reubens (Pee-wee’s Big Adventure, Pee-wee’s Playhouse), worked together to bring the project to fruition and produced the film. It was written by Reubens and Paul Rust (Comedy Bang! Bang!, Arrested Development), and is directed by John Lee (Wonder Showzen, The Heart She Holler).
The OA: Season 1
Actress-writer-producer Brit Marling and director-writer-producer Zal Batmanglij team up once again to bring an edgy new series to Netflix.
Lady Dynamite: Season 1
Official Description: Lady Dynamite is based on what Maria Bamford has accepted to be “her life.” The occasionally surreal episodes, refracted across multiple periods inspired by the actor/comedian’s life, tell the story of a woman who loses – and then finds – her s**t.
Jadotville
Fifty Shades of Grey star Jamie Dornan stars in Jadotville, which was acquired by Netflix a year ago. According to Netflix’s chief content officer, “The story of how Pat Quinlan led his troops against an overwhelming force without losing a single man is one of the great stories of the 20th century, and we are proud to be working with such a talented and committed team to bring it to life. This film will be an amazing addition to our global original films initiative.”
Which movies and TV shows are you most looking forward to watching on Netflix this year?
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