Every month, streaming services add movies and TV shows to their libraries. Here are our picks for some of August’s most promising new titles. (Note: Streaming services occasionally change schedules without giving notice. For more recommendations on what to stream, sign up for our Watching newsletter here.)
New to Amazon Prime Video
‘Butterfly’ Season 1
Starts streaming: Aug. 13
In this spy thriller, Daniel Dae Kim plays David Jung, a former U.S. intelligence agent who has been hiding out in South Korea, ducking the ex-colleagues who once betrayed him. Then his skilled secret agent daughter Rebecca (Reina Hardesty) shows up in his life, and David must finally reckon with his past mistakes. Based on a comic book series, “Butterfly” has Piper Perabo playing David’s archrival, Juno, the head of the black ops organization that trained Rebecca. As these old acquaintances and their younger counterparts play cat-and-mouse games across the glittering cities and quiet country sides of Korea, they also wrestle with whether it’s possible to leave old lives and grudges behind.
Also arriving:
Aug. 1
“Built in Birmingham: Brady & the Blues”
Aug. 6
“The Pickup”
Aug. 7
“Taurasi”
Aug. 13
“Sausage Party: Foodtopia” Season 2
Aug. 20
“The Map That Leads to You”
Aug. 25
“Upload” Season 4
Aug. 27
“The Terminal List: Dark Wolf” Season 1
New to AMC+
‘Clown in a Cornfield’
Starts streaming: Aug. 8
The teen melodrama genre crosses over with the slasher genre in this blood-spattered horror movie, based on an Adam Cesare novel, which focuses on the daily lives and hopes of the victims more than these kinds of stories usually do. Katie Douglas plays Quinn, who moves with her father to a dying Missouri town, where most of her peers occupy their time making videos they hope will go viral. Many involve the kids wearing the costume of Frendo the Clown, the creepy-looking mascot for the town’s closed, burned-out corn syrup factory. As Quinn adjusts — and grows closer to the mayor’s handsome son Cole (Carson MacCormac) — she also begins to suspect that there is an actual malevolent Frendo out there, stalking local high schoolers.
‘Irish Blood’ Season 1
Starts streaming: Aug. 11
At the start of this mystery series, a cynical Los Angeles divorce attorney named Fiona (Alicia Silverstone) receives an invitation to come to Ireland from her father, Declan (Jason O’Mara), who disappeared from her life when she was 10. When she arrives, Fiona discovers that her dad and her mom (Wendy Crewson) have been lying to her for decades, to protect her from some dangerous people. “Irish Blood” follows Fiona as she works alongside an eccentric policewoman, Roisin (Ruth Codd), to learn more about her family’s dark past. While piecing together the puzzles of her own life, Fiona also reflects on the woman she has become.
Also arriving:
Aug. 1
“Family Tree”
Aug. 4
“All the Gods in the Sky”
“Gags the Clown”
Aug. 1
“I Saw the Face of the Devil”
Aug. 14
“True Crime Story: Smugshot” Season 2
Aug. 18
“D.I. Ray” Season 2
“Nelly Knows Mysteries”
Aug. 21
“Blinded” Season 3
Aug. 22
“Deb’s House” Season 2
“Tornado”
Aug. 25
“HIP” Season 4
“The Sommerdahl Murders” Season 6
Aug. 28
“Kidnapped”
Aug. 29
“The Twin”
New to Apple TV+
‘Chief of War’ Season 1
Starts streaming: Aug. 1
Jason Momoa stars in this historical action-adventure series that he cocreated (with Thomas Paʻa Sibbett. It is set over 200 years ago in the Hawaiian Islands. Momoa plays Kaʻiana, a warrior who jostles with Kamehameha I (Kaina Makua) and others for control of Hawaii’s future. Set at a time when foreign explorers were finding their way to the islands — some with colonizing on their minds — “Chief of War” is rooted in the real stories of the Indigenous communities who had to band together to try and hold on to their traditions and identities. Momoa and his team also fill each episode with lots of stunning scenery and brutal combat.
‘Platonic’ Season 2
Starts streaming: Aug. 6
Seth Rogen just received a slew of Emmy nominations for his Apple TV+ series “The Studio,” yet that show may actually be his second-funniest Apple project. Each episode of “Platonic — the comedy series cocreated by Francesca Delbanco and Nicholas Stoller, co-starring and co-produced by Rogen and Rose Byrne — offers an impressive torrent of snappy dialogue, delivered by lovably messed-up characters. Season 1 introduced Sylvia (Byrne), a bored upper-middle-class Los Angeles housewife who reconnected with her wild side when she started hanging out again with one of her oldest friends, Will (Rogen), a middle-aged man-child. As Season 2 begins, Will is about to get married and Sylvia is mitigating the stay-at-home mom blahs by starting a party-planning business. It does not take long before these two go back to goading each other — hilariously — into goofing off instead of growing up.
Also arriving:
Aug. 1
“Stillwater” Season 4
Aug. 22
“Invasion” Season 3
New to Disney+
‘Eyes of Wakanda’
Starts streaming: Aug. 1
The latest addition to the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s television division is this animated anthology series, telling stories about the history and philosophy of the isolated and technologically advanced kingdom of Wakanda. Though the episodes take place in different eras and in different countries, they are connected by the idea that, across generations, Wakanda’s bravest warriors covertly ventured into the outside world, aiming to retrieve their nation’s stolen treasures from countries not so keen to let them go. The series serves as both a companion piece and a prequel to the “Black Panther” movies, balancing elaborate action sequences with some thoughtful consideration of what resource-rich lands like Wakanda owe to the world.
Also arriving:
Aug. 3
“Naming the Dead” Season 1
Aug. 6
“The Proud Family: Louder and Prouder” Season 3
“Raising Asia” Season 1
Aug. 15
“Limitless: Live Better Now”
Aug. 20
“Reminder” Season 1
Aug. 25
“The Last Rhinos: A New Hope”
“LEGO Disney Princess: Villains Unite”
Aug. 27
“Shipwreck Hunters Australia” Season 2
New to Hulu
‘King of the Hill’ Season 14
Starts streaming: Aug. 4
Along with “The Simpsons” and “Bob’s Burgers,” “King of the Hill” is one of a handful of series that proved TV audiences could get just as emotionally invested in cartoons about ordinary American families as they do in live-action sitcoms. After the show’s original run ended in 2010 (after 13 seasons and 259 episodes), fans kept clamoring for a comeback, arguing that this low-key but satirically sharp look at life in the small, working-class town Arlen, Texas, was more relevant than ever. The revival is set 15 years after Season 13, with the characters all older — including Bobby Hill (Pamela Adlon), who was a teenager in the original run — but still living in Arlen, trying their best to be good people in an increasingly complicated world.
‘Alien: Earth’ Season 1
Starts streaming: Aug. 12
Noah Hawley — the writer-producer behind “Legion” and the TV series “Fargo” — ventures into the “Alien” universe for his latest project. Set two years before the events of the 1979 “Alien” film, “Alien: Earth” begins with a spaceship crashing onto our planet and setting lose a bevy of predatory deep-space monsters. But the show is just as much about the state of human society in 2120, at a time when a handful of corporations run the world, each looking to find an edge in both space exploration and robotics. Sydney Chandler plays Wendy, a pioneering mix of human and machine, who leads a team of fellow hybrids on a mission to neutralize the new alien threats — while also salvaging a few for her company’s big boss to study and exploit.
Also arriving:
Aug. 5
“Capturing Their Killer: The Girls on the High Bridge”
Aug. 7
“The Monkey”
“Ted Bundy: Dialogue With the Devil”
Aug. 8
“Necaxa” Seasons 1
“Ralph Barbosa: Planet Bosa”
Aug. 18
“Are You My First?” Season 1
Aug. 19
“Stalking Samantha: 13 Years of Terror:”
Aug. 20
“The Twisted Tale of Amanda Knox”
Aug. 26
“Ruby Red Handed: Stealing America’s Most Famous Pair of Shoes”
New to Max
‘Peacemaker’ Season 2
Starts streaming: Aug. 21
The writer-director-producer James Gunn is flying high right now with the success of his feel-good, family-friendly “Superman,” the first film in his revamped DC Comics movie universe. But Gunn has played with DC’s toys before, with the R-rated movie “The Suicide Squad” and the equally adult-oriented animated TV series “Creature Commandos.” So for longtime Gunn fans, it’s reassuring in a way to see him immediately following up “Superman” with a second season of “Peacemaker,” a darkly comic “Suicide Squad” spinoff starring John Cena as the title character: a musclebound meathead who sows havoc as much as he saves lives. In Season 2, Peacemaker gets a glimpse at an alternate universe where he’s not a big joke, and it makes him rethink — in his own lumbering way — what it means to be a hero.
Also arriving:
Aug. 1
“Final Destination Bloodlines”
“Marc Maron: Panicked”
Aug. 3
“The Yogurt Shop Murders”
Aug. 5
“Hard Knocks: Training Camp With the Buffalo Bills”
Aug. 8
“Freaky Tales”
Aug. 15
“The Legend of Ochi”
Aug. 22
“The Heritage” Season 1
Aug. 29
“Horses & Hangmen”
New to Peacock
‘The Rainmaker’ Season 1
Starts streaming: Aug. 22
Based on a best-selling John Grisham novel, this legal drama follows a young law school graduate named Rudy Baylor (Milo Callaghan), who gets fired from a white shoe firm on his first day at work and then quickly gets hired by the sleaziest ambulance-chasing operation in town. Rudy’s first big case? An impossible-to-win lawsuit against a negligent hospital, represented by the same lawyers who just canned him. John Slattery plays the bullying boss at the powerhouse firm, while Lana Parrilla plays Rudy’s new employer Jocelyn Stone, known as Bruiser, and P.J. Byrne plays Bruiser’s shrewd, shameless paralegal. “The Rainmaker” starts out following the book’s basic narrative but quickly adds more characters and subplots, building out a larger world that could keep this series going once Grisham’s story runs out.
Also arriving:
Aug. 1
“Borderline”
Aug. 22
“Night of the Zoopocalypse”
The post The Best Movies and TV Shows Coming to Disney+, Amazon, Max, AMC+ and More in August appeared first on New York Times.
