Summer is officially here. School’s out, the sun’s out, & it’s time to binge-watch.

Introduction by Alyssa Mattei
Reviews by Terra Aislin

Summer is officially here. School’s out, the sun’s out, and after the ridiculously long winter we have had its time to celebrate. What better way to do that then spending it in bed binge-watching your next favorite show? Of course, the biggest hassle of all this is picking what to watch. Who wants to waste all that time? Lucky we’ve done all the hard work for you and compiled this list of the best hidden gems on Hulu, Netflix, & Amazon Prime. Do yourself a favor and check them out; they might just surprise you.

HULU

Siren (Freeform)
Just Finished: Season 1
Premiered: March 29th, 2018
Created By: Eric Wald
Starring: Alex Roe, Eline Powell, Ian Verdun, Rena Owen, Fola Evans-Akingbola, Sibongile Mlambo

A young marine worker named Ben Pownall (Alex Roe) who is trying to help the marine life discovers a young girl named Ryn (Eline Powell) who he realizes is a mermaid. The government is paying his family to overfish, which is against the law, but they’re doing this to drain the water of all food. The lack of fish forces the mermaids to surface themselves to search for food so that the government can easily steal the mermaids to perform tests on them.

They’ve stolen one already named Donna (Sibongile Mlambo), the black one, of course. They took stem cells and fluid from her spine, basically just torturing her. But the white mermaid got to go find friends and find help.

Other than that, the show is really fab. They also low-key tried to make the white one look really pretty, and tried to make the black one look a mess, but she ended up looking cute anyway. They couldn’t help that.

STORYLINE - It’s fantasy but it also has an element of realism. It’s interesting, and it’s a mermaid story that has never been told before. 4/5

ENTERTAINMENT - The mermaids all look different and unique, not too romanticized. There are also a lot of layers to the show. 4/5

OVERALL - It’s cute, but if they had me in there it could be better. 4/5

Famous in Love (Freeform)
Just Finished: Season 2
Premiered: April 18th, 2017
Created By: I. Marlene King and Rebecca Serle
Starring: Bella Thorne, Charlie DePew, Georgie Flores, Carter Jenkins, Niki Koss, Keith Powers, Pepi Sonuga, Perrey Reeves

Famous in Love is about a young girl named Paige Townsen (Bella Thorne), she’s gorgeous. She moves to L.A. with her friends to study economics. Her parents only let her move there because she promised to focus on her education and take it seriously. She promised to not try to become an actress or anything, but her friend Cassandra (Georgie Flores) wants to be an actress and her other friend Jake (Charlie DePew) wants to be a film director. He also happens to be madly in love with her.

Cassandra talks Paige into going to an open call for a big movie, she gets the part, and she ends up falling in love with her co-star Rainer (Carter Jenkins). They have this whirlwind romance, and a love triangle ensues (I’m not going to tell you who the love triangle is with because I don’t want to spoil anything).

STORYLINE - They could do a lot more with the cast, really take it there, but the show is made for tweens with short attention spans. 3.5/5

ENTERTAINMENT - The people are pretty. It’s about Hollywood. The show has a lot of nice visuals. 4/5

OVERALL - It’s a cute show. I see it. 4/5

Ingrid Goes West (2017)
dark comedy. dir. Matt Spicer

A socially awkward girl (Aubrey Plaza) gets into it with her best friend who she met through Instagram, because the best friend didn’t invite her to her wedding (which she found out about through Instagram). She pops up, they have a little tiff. Then she decides, you know what? I don’t need this shit. She moves to the west when she makes a new best friend (Elizabeth Olsen) but they get into it too, eventually. You have to watch it to find out why.

STORYLINE - Relatable. Moved quickly. Realistic, but also brought the drama. 5/5

ENTERTAINMENT - Every second something happened. 5/5

OVERALL - Because the other two were 5s... 5/5

Crazy About Tiffany’s (2016)
documentary. dir. Matthew Miele

The founder of Tiffany & Co., Charles Lewis Tiffany, had a work ethic that trickled down into the greater part of his company. This documentary shows all of the intricate details that go into creating and maintaining the company, and how much it costs to be great. It shows that you have to stick to your vision, by any means necessary.

STORYLINE - Interesting, Informative, & Dynamic. 5/5

ENTERTAINMENT - It was entertaining, but not really visually. I could’ve listened to this as an audio in the car, ya know? 3/5

OVERALL - It was still really great. It inspired me, and it can inspired you too if you give it a chance. 4/5

Nerve (2016)
techno-thriller. dir. Henry Joost, Ariel Schulman

Nerve is about a young girl who’s scary (Emma Roberts), who’s best friends with a girl who’s not scary (Emily Meade). The not scary friend is using this app where you accept anonymous truth or dares online and you win money doing the dares. Scary girl does one or two just to get out of her shell. Next thing you know, she’s doing more dares, they’re getting harder, she meets this boy (Dave Franco), and things just keep getting more and more intense.

STORYLINE - It’s almost perfect. (What’s wrong with it? I wasn’t in it.) 4/5

ENTERTAINMENT - A lot of cool colors. The scenes and the cinematography were great. 5/5

OVERALL - I’ve watched it a few times and I could still watch it again. 5/5

A FEW CLASSICS TO REVIST ON HULU

Shows
I Love Lucy (1951-1957)
Living Single (1993-1998)
Golden Girls (1985-1992)
Dawson’s Creek (1998-2003)
Will & Grace (1998-2006)
Desperate Housewives (2004-2012)

Movies
Carrie (1976)
Girls Just Want to Have Fun (1985)
Death Becomes Her (1992)

AMAZON PRIME

The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel (Amazon)
Latest Release: Season 1
Premiered: March 17th, 2017
Created By: Amy Sherman-Palladino
Starring: Rachel Brosnahan, Michael Zegen, Alex Borstein, Tony Shalhoub, Marin Hinkle

Set in New York City in the 50s, Midge, Mrs. Maisel (Rachel Brosnahan) and her husband Joel (Michael Zegen) have just gotten married and Joel has a hobby of doing stand-up comedy. They go to this comedy club after Midge does her magic to get him a slot. After watching him perform, she starts giving Joel all of these pointers, like this needs to be stronger, or come out with this joke, this and that. She actually ends up helping him a lot.

Long story short, she’s such a great wife that Joel becomes intimidated, like, oh my god, you’re to good for me I can’t do this (weak). He moves out, Midge gets drunk, goes to the comedy club and ends up doing her own stand-up performance which ends up being perfect. She literally blows the club out. So then it follows her journey trying to be a comedian on her own. Her husband being jealous, hatin’ ass bitch. You know, stuff like that.

STORYLINE - It’s funny and entertaining. Makes me do a shimmy. 5/5

ENTERTAINMENT - It’s very stylish. I love the old 50s aesthetic, everyone is super super stylish. 5/5

OVERALL - No shade, you could do without it. 1/5

Daybreakers
Science Fiction, Horror. dir. The Spierig Brothers

The world has been taken over by vampires and they’re having a blood shortage, so they’re gagging. There are different classes of people, so of course the rich can obviously afford to have blood while the poor can’t. So they’re over there starving.

Also, when you don’t have blood you start deteriorating and become deformed, losing your mind. Those people are on the streets acting crazy with no blood, so that’s a problem. It’s like an inner city with poverty problems that’s all centered around blood. And then there’s a major campaign to find humans to steal their blood. They have these huge corporations where they have humans stuck to machines where it just constantly takes their blood.

STORYLINE - It’s a new and interesting take on the vampire epidemic. 5/5

ENTERTAINMENT - Everybody’s a vampire, there are guns and weapons everywhere, it’s mystery, it’s thriller. It’s fun. 4/5

OVERALL - No shade. It’s a 3. 3/5

A FEW CLASSICS TO REVIST ON AMAZON PRIME

Shows
Sex and the City (1998-2004)
Six Feet Under (2001-2005)
Big Love (2006-2011)

Movies
Shirley Temple The Little Princess in Color (1943)
He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not (2003)

NETFLIX

Girlhood / Bande de Filles (2014)
french drama. dir. Céline Sciamma

A young black girl (Karidja Touré) living in the hood in Paris ends up getting bad grades in school. They were like, you’re kind of dumb you gotta get up out of here. On her way out she saw this gang of girls who wanted her to hang out with them, but she tried to get cute saying I’m better than this. Once she saw this boy that she liked hanging out with them she had to go back to them BEGGING. They took her in, changed her life. Got some hair on her head, because she was wearing braids and then she put on a wig, started looking cute. She was feeling it, started learning the ropes, fighting, being up in the streets. The movie is just about her life. There’s a lot going on in the streets of Paris.

STORYLINE - There’s a lot going on, which is cute, but they could’ve polished it a little better. 3/5

ENTERTAINMENT - It really wasn’t that entertaining unless you’re particularly interested in Paris, or the streets, or Black people. 3.5/5

OVERALL - The movie was kind of lit. 4/5

Killing Ground (2016)
australian horror. dir. Damien Power

This couple (Ian Meadows & Harriet Dyer) goes on a camping trip and they’re having a good time but then they realize that something’s fishy. This other family there is just kind of being weird, and then they disappear so they’re wondering what’s going on. And then you’re trying to figure out what’s going on. These two guys (Aaron Glenane & Aaron Pedersen) come by the camp ground to help and they clearly have a secret. I think they’re up to something, and you’re going to think they’re up to something. And then you’re going to realize they actually were up to something. And then you’re going to gag when you find out what they were up to.

STORYLINE - Seamless and beautiful. 4/5

ENTERTAINMENT - It was mixxy. 4/5

OVERALL - Could’ve been a little better, but it was still pretty good. 4/5

Money Heist (Netflix)
Latest Release: Season 2
Premiered (on Netflix): December 25th, 2017
Created By: Álex Pina
Starring: Úrsula Corberó, Itziar Ituño, Álvaro Morte, Paco Tous, Pedro Alonso, Alba Flores, Miguel Herrán, Jaime Lorente, Esther Acebo, Enrique Arce, María Pedraza, Darko Peric, & Kiti Mánver

Originating from Spain and picked up by Netflix, Money Heist is about a man (Álvaro Morte) who goes by El Profesor (The Professor). He collects these criminals and puts them in this abandoned building, teaching them how to rob a bank. They go to rob the Royal Mint, where they make all of the money. He uses the police and the hostages to help him rob it, and they think they’re stopping him but they’re actually helping him. There’s a lot of drama, and love, it’s cute.

STORYLINE - Very annoying, but I guess that was a part of it’s charm. 4/5

ENTERTAINMENT - There was a lot going on. There was always something happening, so it was entertaining. 4/5

OVERALL - It was cute but, it was like ehh. 4/5

A FEW CLASSICS TO REVIST ON NETFLIX

Shows
Charmed (1998-2006)
Gilmore Girls (2000-2007)
Gossip Girl (2007-2012)

Movies
Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1961)
Ghostbusters (1984)
Amélie (2001)
Marie Antoinette (2006)

Terra-views: Hidden Gems for your Summer Streaming

Summer is officially here. School’s out, the sun’s out, & it’s time to binge-watch.

HULU

AMAZON PRIME

NETFLIX

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