Picks by Independent staff and contributors
Drink Masters, Netflix
When I was a kid, the best part of Thanksgiving was always raiding my uncle’s liquor cabinet. (It was the ’70s. Things were different.) A vast unguarded collection of spirits lined its mahogany shelves. While the adults argued, I played bartender to my cousins. Give me a range of colorful spirits and I would concoct visually stunning creations with zero understanding of what was in them. Drinkability was beside the point; what mattered was that their appearance was devastating. So naturally I was drawn to Drink Masters, a 10-episode reality competition for mixologists with a $100,000 prize. These drinks go far beyond your everyday fireball pick-me-ups. Science is involved, lots of it — especially molecular biology — plus pots, pans, beakers, hoses, fire, and dry ice. If you’ve never seen, let alone tasted, the kind of margarita that takes 90 minutes to prepare, you’ll find the recipe here. But be warned — you’ll also start to crave ever more complicated refreshments. Minor spoiler alert: in the very first episode, one contestant faces the chopping block after preparing a cocktail that is potentially fatal to the drinker. Good times! —James Judd
Babylon Berlin, Netflix
If you want an immersive mystery-thriller to take you away this Thanksgiving, look no further than Babylon Berlin. Over four compelling and atmospheric seasons, this German series offers up a gritty Berlin during the interwar period. The city is peopled with traumatized veterans, unexpected spies, agitated revolutionaries, insouciant flappers, criminals (both petty and powerful), convincing cross-dressers, Asian houseboys, making-ends-meet sex workers, and, of course, glowering Nazis. Even the city itself is a kind of character that whirls at a feverish pitch as the fragile Weimar Republic moves inexorably toward collapse. In the run-up to the American midterm elections I found the incipient authoritarian themes compelling and cautionary. Here, Nazis are considered dopes and hired thugs that the monarchists and capitalists can use to exert their will over the progressive elements of society. Their real menace emerges slowly as each new season unfolds. While it’s “only” a mystery series, Babylon Berlin feels like history with flesh on it. And it has lessons to teach us. —Edouard Fontenot
Hacks, HBO Max
Both seasons of Hacks will provide a respite from the tumult of real holiday family dynamics. They may also inspire you to face any other conflicts head-on and with abandon. Career-oriented stand-up comic Deborah Vance (played by Jean Smart) battles a descent from fame with the help of Ava (Hannah Einbinder), a young bisexual comedy writer who enters her life after having been fired from her previous gig for an inconsiderate tweet. The two women, as caustic as they are craving connection, develop an intergenerational bond that gives them both new life. At its core, Hacks is about a duo who become more than the sum of their parts: a testament to how two abrasive, self-absorbed personalities — both with propensities to funnel their pain into humor — can hold each other up. —Sophie Mann-Shafir
Better Call Saul, Netflix/AMC+
As a squeamish fan of Breaking Bad, I bailed when the character development petered out and the violence got ridiculous. But in its prequel, Better Call Saul, creators Vince Gillian and Peter Gould doubled down on character. The premise is how Jimmy McGill evolved from a lawyer with typical aspirations into Saul Goodman, an attorney indiscernible from his colorful clients. They had me with the opening scene in a New Mexico district court bathroom where McGill is rehearsing his defense of three very bad actors who did very bad things to a cadaver. And it kept me through all six seasons. I even joined Reddit to talk about the characters. I cannot stop obsessing about why I like this man so much. He’s vulnerable yet cruel, loyal yet corrupt, a hired gun for a bloodthirsty drug cartel who mocks the bloodless and greedy patriarchy of lawyers. If Thanksgiving and family have you feeling morally flexible, watch this instead of boosting Aunt Gertrude’s Hummel figurine. (Seasons 1 to 5 on Netflix; season 6 on AMC+.) —K.C. Myers
We Are Who We Are, HBO Max
Call Me By Your Name director Luca Guadagnino’s We Are Who We Are isn’t a traditional coming-of-age story. Following the lives of two teenagers on an American military base in Italy as they explore love, identity, and belonging, the series steers clear of arriving at a universal platitude on adolescence. Rather, it’s a meditation on place and how its inhabitants experiment with identity relative to their surroundings. The show’s atmosphere is perhaps its most affecting element: its sweeping establishing shots create a dreamlike aura that stays with you even if you can’t quite piece it all together. In the rigid and austere environment of the military base, the teenagers explore a convoluted nonlinear journey into nonbinary gender and sexual expression that is never solidified into strict categorization. The characters are far from villains, but they aren’t heroes either. They are flawed, solipsistic, and wholly human. It’s a slice-of-life tableau of young people and their families bumping up against their place on an outpost of the American empire, rendered with dexterity and beauty. —Sam Pollak
High Water, Netflix
In a scene from the Polish series High Water, villagers rise up against the police and military who are attempting to blow up the banks of a river. The government is planning to flood rural farming areas to mitigate flooding in Wrocław, one of the country’s major cities. The effort is unsuccessful, and the villagers, with their raised pitchforks, are depicted as defiant, misguided, and heroic. This historical drama details political and personal turmoil surrounding the floods that swept through Central Europe in 1997. It’s not hard to see parallels with more recent populist floods sweeping the world. Distrust of government is on full display. The would-be hero, Jasmina, is a young woman with knowledge and science on her side — which in the end aren’t sufficient to stave off disaster. Juicy subplots include drug addiction, the re-emergence of past lovers, and family betrayals. High Water illuminates a history and culture unfamiliar to the average American and shows us something about our own reality. —Abraham Storer
Cowboy Bebop, Netflix/Hulu/Crunchyroll
In 2071 — 50 years after Earth’s hyperspace gateway was destroyed — the planet is nearly uninhabitable. Yet life finds a way through interstellar colonization. The Inter Solar System Police (ISSP) employ certified bounty hunters, or cowboys, to capture outlaws for cash. Spike Spiegel, a suave chain-smoking ex-hitman for a criminal syndicate, and Jet Black, a bonsai-loving cyborg and retired ISSP officer, captain the Bebop as professional space cowboys. Their crew expands to include Faye Valentine, a femme fatale con artist with amnesia; Edward, an ambiguously gendered teenage ace hacker; and Ein, a genetically modified corgi with data-driven superintelligence. The Bebop crew sail through the cosmos in search of bounty, living paycheck to paycheck as they try to reconcile their pasts with each new adventure. Cowboy Bebop was created in Japan by Shinichirō Watanabe and Sunrise animation studio in 1998. Its fusion of neo-noir, cyberpunk, and science fiction genres has appealed to audiences worldwide for over two decades, solidifying its legendary cult status in anime. —Hannah Trott
The Other Two, HBO Max
There’s no shortage of feel-good family sitcoms to watch with Grandma this weekend while you’re sharing leftovers around the TV. Then there’s The Other Two. The titular duo are the aging millennial siblings of a Bieber-like teen heartthrob named Chase Dreams, whose overnight success (he’s “the next big white kid”) forces his older brother and sister to reckon with their own failed show-business aspirations and the sorry state of their lives in general. (In the opening episode, we see big brother Cary at a TV commercial audition for the role of “man who smells fart at party.”) The gags come fast and furious and skewer everything from the vacuity of social media to celebrity foot fetishes. National treasures Molly Shannon (as the siblings’ endlessly supportive mom) and Wanda Sykes (as Chase’s no-nonsense publicist) are highlights of a uniformly excellent cast. It’s one of the funniest (and, incidentally, gayest) shows streaming right now. And underneath all those raunchy jokes is a story about coping with loss and the value of having family there when you need them. Maybe it’s not such a bad show to watch with Grandma after all. —John D’Addario
