We all love sitting back to watch something on Netflix, Hulu, or YouTube while we munch away our responsibilities. However, every once in a while we yearn for series that are more than just background noise, something that, instead of being mind-numbing, makes us react and think. Naming a few, here is:
Bojack Horseman
Rated an 86% on Rotten Tomatoes, Bojack Horseman is an animated series about a humanoid horse. Currently in his forties, Bojack is still stuck in his past life where he starred in a 90s sitcom and was really popular. Many years after the sitcom was canceled, Bojack still lives in a past, and wanting to get back the dignity and respect that used to be his, he manages to scare away his few friends. Accompanied by a golden retriever frenemy, feline ex-girlfriend/agent, and two humans, Bojack tries to make things right in his life.
Although, across the 3-season series, there will be many moments that will hit you hard and make your chin quiver. After all, Bojack is a man… horse… manhorse that truly wants to be happy, but his ego and douchebaggery gets in the way. No wonder the series (on Netflix!) won the Critics’ Choice Television Award for Best Animated Series. Oh, and it’s theme song will get stuck in your mind the entire day.
Rick & Morty
A drunk grandfather who’s extremely intelligent yet sort of mad scientist, a failing marriage, a horse heart surgeon, a crazy teenager, and a kid who’s the companion of the crazy grandfather. Sound like a pretty normal family, right? Nope. Rick is a drunk who once ruined his life but managed to find a way to a parallel universe and lived in that version of his life. On and on the universe jumping happened and then Morty, his grandson, accompanied him everywhere. Chock-full of weird jokes, puns, and literary jokes, Rick and Morty will cause an effect on you. This series is on Hulu, rated 100% on Rotten Tomatoes, and their fan-base is so into it that the creators have had to stream new episodes on YouTube because they tried to “April Fool’s” us and failed.
Reign
An overwhelmingly amazing account of Mary Queen of Scots’ (Adelaide Kane) life and short reign. Yes, this is a historical series and yes, you will cry like a baby as you see how cruel being a royal was, and how both Mary and Queen Elizabeth of England acknowledged how badly they were treated in regards to men. I swear, it will feel like you’re watching a telenovela (come on, you know you like them). A lot of drama, unforeseen plot twists, love, double-sense jokes, handsome men, and gorgeous dresses! Reign is on Netflix, has 78% on Rotten Tomatoes, has had nine nominations on the Teen Choice Awards and Canadian Screen Awards. The ending will kill you, that is all.
Orange is the New Black
Ok, I know you all have seen this series. But it is still amazingly enough to name. It seems to be that I cannot get over that last season, or Poussey, or how annoying Piper is.
The Handmaid’s Tale
A television series adaptation of Margaret Atwood’s book by the same name. For those who haven’t yet read the book this series is amazingly well-done and captures the horrific qualities that explicitly points to women and enslaves them to populate the world. In other words, “your body is no longer your own,” and you couldn’t object either. The actresses were simply amazing. Elisabeth Moss (you may know her from Mad Men), Samira Wiley (Poussey), and Alexis Bledel (portrayed Rory Gilmore on Gilmore Girls), to name a few, are some of the women who appeared in the series. The Handmaid’s Tale will make you want to explode, cry, want to write an insane book even if you are not a writer—it will make you doubt everything and understand why people rebel in justifiable yet crazy manners. It’s on Hulu and rated 99% on Rotten Tomatoes.
Dear White People
Rated 100% on Rotten Tomatoes, this Netflix series is based on the movie by the same name. It follows several black students at Winchester University, an Ivy League college. Amidst the life they confront at the university, which is full of cultural bias, slippery politics, and injustices, they go through life and keep studying while trying to take a stand. The first episode is about a “blackface party” thrown by a student association which, so it happens, is composed by only white people. It brings under the microscope the several variations for people of color: rebelling, embracing your culture, becoming a lapdog to power plays, studying to be a better example for other African-Americans, being queer and black, and being in an interracial relationship. Through irony, brutal honesty, and humor, the series highlights issues that are very much alive in our “post-racial” society.