WHAT WE CAN’T WAIT TO WATCH
Roxanne Roxanne
March is a big month on Netflix for hip-hop fans. In addition to Rapture, a docuseries profiling eight rappers, and the RZA-directed Azealia Banks vehicle Love Beats Rhymes, we’re getting a biopic about one of the genre’s seminal figures, Roxanne Shanté. Michael Larnell’s film, which premiered at Sundance in 2017, stars Chanté Adams as the Queensbridge MC whose epic clap back to U.T.F.O., Roxanne’s Revenge, became an underground hit and sparked the Roxanne Wars of the 1980s. Mahershala Ali, Nia Long and Beastie Boy Adam Horovitz co-star. March 23
Read Toronto rapper Michie Mee’s thoughts on Roxanne Roxanne here.
Jessica Jones (season 2)
Of the half-dozen Marvel TV shows bouncing around the ether, Jessica Jones is the only one that feels like appointment viewing, driven by Krysten Ritter’s terrific performance as the eponymous self-hating, super-powered private investigator. (She can jump really high and punch people through walls, but she’d really rather just sit by herself and brood, ideally with a bottle at hand.) The second season promises to delve into Jessica’s past, but the biggest question is whether showrunner Melissa Rosenberg can come up with a big bad as threatening – and as interesting – as David Tennant’s mind-controlling Kilgrave was in season one. March 8
Collateral
There’s the whodunit and then there’s the systemic whodunit. English playwright and The Hours screenwriter David Hare takes the temperature of Brexit-anxious Britain in this miniseries, which originally aired in the UK in February. When a Syrian refugee is shot dead while delivering pizza in London, a detective (Carey Mulligan) takes on the case, but this isn’t a straightforward murder mystery. The investigation springboards into an exploration of religion, politics, immigration and the trustworthiness of vaunted institutions. The excellent support cast includes Billie Piper, Saskia Reeves and Nicola Walker. March 9
The Standups (season 2)
Having a successful Netflix special is a feather in the cap for most stand-up comics. But for those working their way up the ladder, it can be hard to land. Enter The Standups, the terrific series featuring comics on the rise. Last year’s first season featured talents like Nate Bargatze, Nikki Glaser, Beth Stelling and Fortune Feimster. The new season features soon-to-be-household-names like Kyle Kinane, Rachel Feinstein, Gina Yashere and Aparna Nancherla. Keep your eye on Nancherla, who’s played JFL42 here several times, often getting better post-show-feedback than headliners. You’ll recognize her deadpan voice from season four of BoJack Horseman (where she played BoJack’s alleged daughter), and she was the ramen blogger in the now-classic dating episode of Master Of None. March 20
The Joel McHale Show With Joel McHale
If you missed the simple pleasure of watching a very tall man make fun of silly people on reality television, McHale is back doing what he did for years and years on The Soup – but now with unbleeped swear words and appearances from celebrity BFFs like Kevin Hart and Jason Priestley, who dropped by to kick off the first episode of McHale’s new weekly show, produced by none other than Paul Feig (Bridesmaids). It is what it is – which is to say, an utterly ephemeral pop-culture smackdown that evaporates as you watch it – but it’s also the thing McHale was born to do. And for those of us still mourning the end of Community, the first episode gave us a little reunion with Alison Brie and Jim Rash, who just happen to have their own Netflix gigs these days. March 4
Love (season 3)
Speaking of Community cast members, Gillian Jacobs has been doing exceptional work as a self-destructive Los Angeles scenester on this barbed comedy opposite Paul Rust (who co-created the show with his wife Lesley Arfin) as Gus, a dweeby wannabe writer. After a brilliant first season and a decent second, the third and final season will explore what happens when Gus and Mickey finally commit to one another. $10.99 per month says it’s likely to be just as messy as the first two. March 9
Santa Clarita Diet (season 2)
Having given the world the cult delights of Andy Richter Controls The Universe and Better Off Ted, Victor Fresco went even further with the blank cheque of a Netflix series: a bloody fantastic zombie comedy in which Drew Barrymore and Timothy Olyphant play Sheila and Joel Hammond, a pair of undistinguished suburban California realtors whose career and marriage are reinvigorated rather messily when she develops a taste for human flesh. The new season promises even more berserk farce, thanks to an expanded mythology and a new challenge – a rival couple played by Maggie Lawson and some beanpole named Joel McHale. Synergy! March 23
Nailed It
Baking shows make great TV – especially when the contestants mess things up. There’s no hot mess like a gooey, chocolatey mess that aspiring chef creators try to pass off as professional. As Nailed It’s host, comic Nicole Byer, puts it in the show’s addictive trailer, “It looks like it’s alive!” about one such horrendous dessert. The premise is simple: three home bakers try to recreate a complicated pastry for a $10,000 prize. Byer and chocolatier Jacques Torres are joined by a rotating cast of celebrities and pastry chefs to judge the results – or, as Byer puts it in the show’s catchphrase, to see “who nailed it and who failed it.” March 9
Layla M.
Director Mijke de Jong’s coming-of-age film about Dutch-Moroccan teen Layla (Nora El Koussour), who’s sick and tired of dealing with Islamophobia and xenophobia in Amsterdam, premiered in the Toronto International Film Festival’s Platform program in 2016 and received a theatrical run in the U.S. last year. The film charts Layla’s journey from university-bound student to radical Islamist who must navigate a new set of societal rules after she moves to Jordan with her jihadist husband. March 23
Sabrina Lantos/Netflix
Alias Grace
SOLID BETS
RuPaul’s Drag Race (season 9)
We were so into the drag queen competition series last year that we did two different covers for our drag-focused Pride issue featuring season 9 queens Shea Couleé and Sasha Velour. It also felt like the right moment: the show had hit a new level of cultural zeitgeist after moving to U.S. cable network VH1, and the season delivered with memorable celebrity guests, meme-able moments, extra shocking eliminations and the now-infamous line: “This is a lip sync for your life. We need to see your lips.” March 1
Alias Grace
Another NOW cover story subject is bowing on Netflix this month: Sarah Polley’s adaptation of Margaret Atwood’s novel about a 19th century teenage housemaid (Sarah Gadon) who spent decades in prison for murdering her employers (Paul Gross and Anna Paquin). When the series premiered at TIFF (ahead of its Canadian broadcast premiere on CBC), NOW critic Radheyan Simonpillai lauded Gadon’s exhilarating performance as a “memorable character whose lingering unknowability is her greatest strength.” March 25
Steve Jobs
When Aaron Sorkin and Danny Boyle’s biopic about the Apple founder came out in 2015, it followed two other films about the vaunted tech exec, who died at age 56 in 2011. Questions swirled: how would Michael Fassbender stack up to Ashton Kutcher’s earlier portrayal in the widely panned Jobs? Or Justin Long’s in the parody iSteve? (Okay, almost no one asked these questions.) NOW critic Norm Wilner lauded Fassbender for capturing Jobs’s charisma and called the film “snappy, perceptive and offering a remarkable number of walk-and-talks for a film set exclusively at product launches.” March 1
The Stanford Prison Experiment
In 1971, Stanford University psych prof Philip Zimbardo created a simulated jail experience using 24 middle-class students as fake guards and prisoners to test a hypothesis about abusive behaviour. It was supposed to last 24 days but ended in under a week after the students playing guards became too sadistic. Whether the study proved ordinary people will act authoritarian if given a chance has been debated, but one thing is for certain: the story makes for an intense movie. March 3
Casino
Martin Scorsese’s crime epic about Las Vegas gangsters in the late 70s/early 80s wasn’t universally loved upon its release in 1995, but its exhilarating zaniness stands the test of time. From the comic coterie of aging mob bosses and Robert De Niro’s colourful suiting to the soundtrack of pop classics, conflicting voice-overs, wild editing and over-the-top violence (including one of the most vicious beatings in movie history), it laid the groundwork for the sensory overload that was The Wolf Of Wall Street. Sharon Stone’s character falls victim to raging alcoholic and gold-digging wife clichés, but as a study of toxic masculinity Casino remains incisive. March 1
Hanna
Joe Wright’s action thriller is all about Cate Blanchett as a deliciously evil spy, but if you’re suddenly a Saoirse Ronan super-fan thanks to her Oscar-nominated turn in Greta Gerwig’s Lady Bird, this movie is essential viewing. Ronan stars as the titular teenage assassin, trained as a child by her CIA agent dad (Eric Bana). Yes, the story has holes but the action sequences are ace and the film is beautiful to look at. There’s more than enough here to justify a night in with a bag of all-dressed chips. March 31
Pride And Prejudice And Zombies
As the title bluntly and ineloquently states, this 2016 film is mash-up of Jane Austen and zombie movies. Fortunately, Burr Steers’s send-up succeeds largely by keeping the juiciest material – Austen’s proto-feminist satire of social mores, obviously – in the foreground. Tons of fun. March 29
The Crazies
Breck Eisner’s underrated remake of the 1973 George A. Romero (RIP) horror classic stars Timothy Olyphant and Radha Mitchell as a small-town Iowa couple fighting off citizens who are turned into enraged zombies by a mysterious virus. File this one under horror remakes that might even be better than the original. March 31
The Hitman’s Bodyguard
Ryan Reynolds and Samuel L. Jackson goof their way through this entertaining, odd-couple action flick about a security expert (Reynolds) who must escort an assassin (Jackson) to the Hague so he can testify against the president of Belarus (Gary Oldman). It’s big on stunts and laughs and the cast – including Salma Hayek and Daredevil’s Elodie Yung in hilarious supporting roles – look like they’re having a good time. March 16
Full list of new titles available in March, by date:
TV SHOWS
March 1
RuPaul’s Drag Race (season 9)
March 2
Girls Incarcerated (season 1)
Voltron: Legendary Defender (season 5)
March 4
The Joel McHale Show With Joel McHale (season 1, weekly episodes every Sunday)
March 5
Broadchurch (season 3)
March 6
Borderliner (season 1)
Black Lighting (season 1, weekly episodes)
March 8
Marvel’s Jessica Jones (season 2)
Riverdale (season 2, weekly episodes)
March 9
Collateral (limited series)
Nailed It (season 1)
Love (season 3)
My Next Guest Needs No Introduction With David Letterman: Malala Yousafzai
Trolls: The Beat Goes On! (season 2)
March 13
Stretch Armstrong: The Breakout
Terrace House: Opening New Doors (part 1)
March 15
Tabula Rasa (season 1)
The Hollywood Masters (season 2)
March 16
Edha (season 1)
On My Block (season 1)
Spirit Riding Free (season 4)
Wild Wild Country (season 1 )
March 20
The Standups (season 2)
March 21
Shadowhunters: The Mortal Instruments (season 3)
March 23
Alexa & Katie (season 1)
Dinotrux Supercharged (season 2)
Requiem (season 1)
Santa Clarita Diet (season 2)
The Mechanism (season 1)
SWORDGAI The Animation (part 1)
March 25
Alias Grace (limited series)
March 27
Baroness Von Sketch Show (seasons one and two)
March 30
A Series of Unfortunate Events (season 2)
Trailer Park Boys (season 12)
Trump: An American Dream (season 1)
Rapture (season 1)
March 31
You Me Her (seasons 1-3)
MOVIES
March 1
2 Fast 2 Furious
Adel Karam: Live from Beirut
Casino
Fast & Furious
Fast Five
Love Beats Rhymes
Sisters
Sleeping With Other People
Steve Jobs
Stomp The Yard
The Fast And The Furious
The Fast And The Furious: Tokyo Drift
The Forest
The Rundown
The Tale Of Despereaux
True To The Game
March 3
The Stanford Prison Experiment
March 4
Expedition China
March 5
Beach Rats
The Brothers Grimm
March 6
The Brothers Grimsby
Benji (1974)
Benji: Off The Leash
Columbus
For The Love Of Benji
Gad Elmaleh: American Dream
March 8
Ladies First
March 9
The Outsiders
Transformers: The Last Knight
Wind River
March 10
Gook
March 12
Kygo: Live At The Hollywood Bowl
Troy: The Odyssey
What To Expect When You’re Expecting
March 13
St. Vincent
Ricky Gervais: Humanity
March 15
Before The Flood
March 16
Benji (2018)
The Hitman’s Bodyguard
Take Your Pills
The Legacy Of A Whitetail Deer Hunter
March 21
Bob The Builder: Mega Machines
March 23
Race
Game Over, Man!
Layla M.
Roxanne Roxanne
March 29
Pride And Prejudice And Zombies
March 30
Eye In The Sky
First Match
Happy Anniversary
The Titan
March 31
A Walk Among The Tombstones
Bewitched
Catfish
Clerks 2
Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind
Hairspray
RV
Talladega Nights: The Ballad Of Ricky Bobby
The Fifth Element
Underworld
Underworld: Awakening
Underworld: Evolution
Underworld: Rise Of The Lycans
Hanna
Let Me In
Lucky Number Slevin
Pandorum
Spy Kids
Spy Kids 2: The Island Of Lost Dreams
Spy Kids: All The Time In The World
Texas Chainsaw Massacre
The Back-Up Plan
The Crazies
The Man
Winter’s Bone
LAST CALL
TV series and movies leaving Netflix this month
March 1
12 Years A Slave
Heartland (season 1-8)
March 4
Prison Break (season 1-4)
Angel (seasons 1-5)
Roswell (seasons 1-3)
March 6
The Finest Hours
March 9
Daddy’s Home
March 16
The Godfather Part I-III
March 20
Zootopia
March 31
Zoolander 2
