If you’re looking for an excuse to beat the heat and stay on the couch for the day, then you’ve got plenty of options. Whether you want a classic comedy, like Step Brothers or Clueless, or a movie that will make you clutch your blanket to your neck, like Alone or the Blair Witch Project, there’s something for everyone in June. And for those who want more bite-sized offerings, much-lauded shows like Dave, Lupin, and Too Hot to Handle are all returning for their second seasons this month. Check out everything that’s new on Netflix, Hulu, Disney+, Amazon Prime, HBO Max, and more below.
What’s New to Streaming in June
A selected list of movies and TV shows coming this month that The Ringer is very excited about.
The Big Lebowski (Netflix, June 1)
Adam Nayman: Of all the Coens’ movies, The Big Lebowski is, at least on the surface, the most ambling and aimless. It starts with a tumbleweed that tumbles through its opening shots to the serene sounds of the country band Sons of the Pioneers, which kicks things off at a mellow tempo. The tumbleweed’s slow encroachment through the frame is like a cue for Jeffrey Lebowski’s own woebegone progress. This is a man who takes it easy to the point that he loses track of the days of the week, and who dresses like every day is Casual Friday. But the film around him has depths to plumb, and then some: There is no bottom.
Jerry Maguire (HBO Max, June 1)
The Blair Witch Project (Hulu, June 1)
Alyssa Bereznak: David Hochman was covering the Sundance Film Festival for Entertainment Weekly when he first saw The Blair Witch Project. “I remember sending notes to my editor that night, saying: ‘This is going to be something. I don’t know what it was, but this is going to be something,’” he recalls.
That “something” was a cultural phenomenon that fundamentally changed the way we interact with entertainment. The Blair Witch Project’s principal photography cost a mere $35,000, but it went on to gross about $248.6 million at the box office—an indie film record at the time.
Jennifer’s Body (Hulu, June 1)
Step Brothers (Amazon Prime, June 1)
Alan Siegel: The surreal mix of filthy silliness and reckless abandon resulted in one of the most rewatchable big-screen comedies of all time. “What I think people respond to is this very dangerous edge in the whole thing,” said Mary Steenburgen, who plays the mother of Will Ferrell’s character. Appearing in it, she pointed out, was like “going wild.”
Clueless (HBO Max, June 5)
Jane Hu: The film was so popular it even spurred a TV spinoff that ran for three seasons, spanning 62 episodes and two different television networks. Clueless is over 25 years old now; if Clueless were a character in its own universe, it would be home from college and ready to hook up with its stepsister. But its monumental influence has only grown, from its helpful driving tips (don’t take the freeway!) to its now-shared vernacular (“As if”).
Loki (Disney+, June 9)
Lupin Part 2 (Netflix, June 11)
Micah Peters: Like Luther, which feels like a spiritual predecessor, Lupin isn’t going to win awards or even turn heads for its ability to develop tertiary or even secondary plots or characters—like Luther, that doesn’t really matter. You’re there to see a difficult hero be difficult and heroic—everyone else is there to be charmed, vexed, or eluded by them. Perhaps “effervescent” more ably describes [Lupin’s protagonist] Assane than “difficult”—where Idris Elba played DCI John Luther with vague annoyance and exquisite exhaustion, Omar Sy’s performance bounds off the screen, and is almost musical.
Gone Girl (Hulu, June 15)
Dave: Season 2 (Hulu, June 17)
Danny Heifetz: David Burd has turned the story of his rap career into a TV show for FXX. Burd cowrote the show with Jeff Schaffer, a Seinfeld vet who cowrites Curb Your Enthusiasm with Larry David and created the FX show The League. Dave chronicles Burd’s attempt to go from “the YouTube rapper with the small dick” to a professional, respected rapper. The show mocks privilege (he takes out bar mitzvah money from the bank to buy a feature verse from the rapper YG) and coded language (he calls a beat “urban,” prompting a Black producer to ask why he speaks like a mayor). But Burd put his lifelong insecurities about his penis at the show’s, uh, heart.
Too Hot to Handle: Season 2 (Netflix, June 23)
Claire McNear: Too Hot to Handle’s premise takes many of reality television’s favorite tropes—10 dashing young people, whisked away to a secluded island paradise where they and their mostly dreadful personalities can clash ad nauseam—with a record scratch: On this island, there will be no sex. Ditto “heavy petting” or even, ahem, “self-gratification.” The show informs the contestants that a pool of $100,000 awaits a winner or winners at the month’s end, which is apparently a surprise to all present. It is unclear what exactly the contestants did know about what they were signing up for: It is not made clear, to the players or the audience, what the rules of the contest are or how a winner will be selected until the finale, and nobody on the show even seems particularly worked up about not knowing. Either way, there is a catch: Any hanky-panky by any member of the group in the interim will result in a fine taken, according to its severity, from that hundred large. In short: A smooch on one is a smooch on all, and that shall not stand.
Some New-ish Things You Might’ve Missed
Because it’s hard to keep up with everything, here are a few things that have premiered somewhat recently that may be worth catching up on.
The Underground Railroad (Amazon Prime)
Justin Charity: It’s called “The Underground Railroad,” it’s a period drama, and it’s got all the costumes, accents, and brutality that you’d expect to see in such a project. It also has captivating camerawork, great characters, tremendous performances, thoughtful storytelling, and a gorgeous score.
Army of the Dead (Netflix)
Castlevania (Netflix)
Charity: In four seasons, Castlevania embellishes the primary conflict with several deaths and betrayals. But the primary conflict isn’t quite where I’d locate the intrigue and brilliance in Castlevania. Rather, Castlevania prioritizes its characterizations over the larger plot. Its characters can never resist the urge to go off on colorful tangents. The tangents always serve the characterizations but only sporadically illuminate the core story line. Castlevania isn’t a series about the long struggle against Dracula so much as Castlevania is a series about friends, lovers, and strangers mulling over the meaning of life and roasting each other constantly.
Ziwe (Showtime)
Herman: The Instagram sessions grew big enough to earn Ziwe glowing profiles, a book deal for an essay collection, and finally, a TV show produced by the Oscar-winning, ultra-hip A24 (and aired on Showtime, which also hosts Ziwe’s former employers Desus and Mero). Along the way, Ziwe earned praise for what she brought out in her guests: a kind of flustered embarrassment when asked to identify Louis Farrakhan, or what they like about Black people, or why they hate Black women. But even as it confronted others’ hidden biases, Ziwe’s comedy has always taken equal aim at herself—an already intricate parody that gains an extra layer of context when thrust into the ossified landscape of late-night TV.
The Mitchells vs. the Machines (Netflix)
Alone (Hulu)
Miles Surrey: As far as low-profile genre filmmakers go, you can’t do much better than John Hyams. Hyams has carved out a quietly impressive career, highlighted by two excellent straight-to-DVD Universal Soldier movies made with an unexpected level of craftsmanship and art-house sensibilities. Hopefully, one day, a major studio exec will give this guy a fat check to do his thing; in the meantime, Alone is another worthy addition to Hyams’s underappreciated résumé.
Hacks (HBO Max)
Herman: There have been many, many shows about stand-up comics: stand-ups navigating single parenthood; stand-ups going through a divorce; stand-ups sharing petty gripes with their friends; stand-ups exploring gender norms in the late 1950s. What there hasn’t been is a show about a Mrs. Maisel–type comic in the jaded twilight of her career, not its scrappy beginning. Enter Hacks, the story of two difficult, defensive women who form an unlikely bond across the generational divide.
