Netflix is expanding its cultural horizons in 2018. The company recently announced that along with a new U.S. series, it will also be releasing a greater number of shows from different countries, ranging from sci-fi and thrillers to documentaries.
A new series called Maniac, an American remake of a Norwegian show, features actors Emma Stone and Jonah Hill as they become entangled in a pharmaceutical trial gone-wrong. In the show, characters engage in a psychiatric treatment that allows them to live in their own dreams. Though not much information has been leaked about the series, Netflix released photos showing the two wearing grey jumpsuits in a lab facility. Other cast members include Sally Field, Justin Theroux, Julia Garner and Jemima Kirke. Directed by Cary Fukunaga (who also directed True Detective, a stellar crime series), this series is sure to be a hit.
Courtesy: Hollywood Reporter
Stranger Things 3 is also set to come out this year, bringing in two new, highly acclaimed actors, Jake Busey and Cory Elwes. Busey plays a journalist for The Hawkins Post, while Elwes plays Mayor Kline, Hawkins’ very own sleazy politician. According to Seventeen.com, season three takes place during the summer rather than the school year and it jumps forward to 1986 when the kids are in ninth grade. Though the season will be slightly shorter than season two, executive producer Shawn Levy notes that the show picks up with the same couples it left off with–meaning, Lucas and Max, as well as Mike and Eleven, are still together. Plus, your favorites like Steve Harrington and Lucas’s adorable little sister, Erica, are getting more air time!
However, Netflix is looking to broaden its boundaries by including shows and documentaries from a variety of countries. With the success of international shows like the U.K.’s Black Mirror, a science-fiction dystopian series that depicts the novelties and horrors of a new, technologically advanced world, the online streaming service is seeking to generate a greater range of shows for subscribers.
- A Dutch series (not yet titled) features students in Amsterdam who discover a portal to a past, demonic world.
- Mortel, a French series, includes teens facing supernatural forces.
- Luna Nera, an Italian series set in the seventeenth century, focuses on a woman accused of witchcraft.
- The English Game is a U.K. series about the invention of soccer and how it became an international sport, written by Downton Abbey creator Julian Fellowes.
- Turn Up Charlie is an eight-part U.K. comedy.
The company’s amount of U.S. subscribers has begun to overtake subscribers of cable television, according to a study conducted by Leichtman Research Group in the first quarter of 2017. Also in 2017, the company reached 100 million subscribers worldwide, driving the desire and interest in adding more international shows to the site.
“Our belief is that great storytelling transcends borders,” Netflix’s chief content officer, Ted Sarandos, says. “When stories from different countries, languages and cultures find a worldwide platform where the only limitation is the creator’s imagination, then unique, yet universal stories emerge that are embraced by a global audience.”