Sonal Pandya

The first season of the psychological drama anthology Nine Perfect Strangers premiered in 2021, and it was adapted from Liane Moriarty’s novel. This time, creator David E Kelley and star Nicole Kidman, who is back as eccentric wellness guru Masha Dmitrichenko, have nothing new to add. A new group of ‘guests,’ who are treated more like guinea pigs, are introduced as the action moves to colder climes in the Austrian Alps. While the last season certainly was an undertaking to get through, this new season has been created just because the creators could.

Neil Burger’s Inheritance zips across the globe from New York to Seoul in a compelling thriller that features a heroine with a strong survival instinct. Bridgerton star Phoebe Dynevor is Maya, who gets a chance to repair her relationship with her father, Simon (Rhys Ifans). However, she soon realises that leopards don’t change their spots. The innovative feature of Inheritance, besides the fact that it’s filmed on location in Egypt, India, and South Korea, is that the film has been shot with an iPhone 13 Pro. The guerilla-style filmmaking works to a large extent, but it’s the suspense of what Maya will do next that keeps viewers locked in. New Yorker Maya (Dynevor) has just watched her mother die of cancer when her estranged father (Ifans) shows up at the funeral. Despite her sister Jess’s (Kersti Bryan) warnings, Maya agrees to accompany Simon on his work trip to Cairo. Soon enough, she remembers why the family kept their distance in the first place. Maya is pulled into a complicated operation spanning countries with several authorities on her case as Simon dubiously disappears. Will Maya be a dutiful daughter and complete the assignment? Or will she uncover more hidden secrets about the mysterious man?

The Weitz brothers, Chris and Paul, have adapted Martha Wells’ book series Murderbot and given it their unique spin. The Apple TV+ series is also aided by Alexander Skarsgård’s fantastic performance about a security robot trained to obey humans. After he hacks his own system and names himself Murderbot, he begins to find himself transformed by the humans around him. The ten-episode series takes a while to grow on you, but once you immerse yourself in its world, you’ll find yourself charmed by what you see. Murderbot (Skarsgård) is assigned to protect a crew from the Preservation Alliance who want to explore a more dangerous planet for scientific purposes. The robot tries to hide the fact he has free will, but the presence of an augmented unit, Dr Gurathin (David Dastmalchian), amongst the scientists trips him up. As the situation becomes more dangerous for everyone, with death looming around every corner, the security unit must think fast and use his instincts to survive amongst a group of distrustful humans.

The Royals packs in every bit of drama, comedy, and romantic tension in its eight episodes. Teeming with a large cast of characters, the series focuses on the romance between a Maharaja and a Madam CEO. While their love story anchors the show, the lives of the supporting characters too deserve a bit more attention. Co-created by Rangita Pritish Nandy and Ishita Pritish Nandy, the Netflix series is in a similar vein to Four More Shots Please! also produced by the same company. However, the Indian royal setting in Rajasthan adds that extra bit of glamour. Ishaan Khatter is Aviraaj Singh, the reluctant heir to the royal throne of Morpur, who meets his match in WorkPotato CEO Sophia Kanmani Shekhar (Bhumi Pednekar). Opposites attract and then proceed to spend much of the show denying their feelings for one another as they work to transform the palace Motibagh into a royal bed and breakfast. Around them, there are many saboteurs and well-wishers, and both Sophia’s company and the crumbling Morpur estate act as a hindrance. Then, of course, there are the other members of the royal family who are dealing with their own issues after the death of the previous Maharaja (Milind Soman).

With Maria, filmmaker Pablo Larraín completes the unofficial trilogy after Jackie (2016) and Spencer (2021). It’s his sad women universe. The first two films were on Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis and Princess Diana, and while Maria Callas was never married to a world leader or a royal, she knew something about pain. And there’s a lot of it in Maria, headlined by Angelina Jolie. The Oscar winner takes us into the diva’s final days in Paris, and she comes to terms with the loss of her voice and fame. Originally released in 2024 in select theatres in the US, the biopic Maria will release on Lionsgate Play on May 9. The biopic is set in Maria’s Paris apartment, where the former opera singer resides with her butler, Ferruccio (Pierfrancesco Favino), and housekeeper, Bruna (Alba Rohrwacher). Maria (Jolie), who is on several medications, blurs the past and the present. She imagines a young filmmaker (Kodi Smit-McPhee) interviewing her for a film, but mostly, the feature goes down memory lane as Maria tries to recapture her past glory and fails. It’s a tragic ending for the powerful singer who held the world at her feet with her performances. Maria also gives us parts of Maria’s affair with the billionaire Aristotle Onassis (Haluk Bilginer), who would go on to marry Jacqueline Kennedy. In a way, the film links back to Larraín’s 2016 film.

The six-part series Black, White & Gray - Love Kills looks at a string of murders by a young man in suspicious circumstances and tries to peel back the layers of the alleged truth. The crime thriller by Pushkar Mahabal takes a unique approach by dissecting the story into a dramatisation and a documentary. It decides to be impartial and present the versions of the ’truth’ to viewers, letting them decide. However, the storytelling twists work only up until a point, and dual perspectives may leave some confused. A faceless British journalist named Daniel Gray (voice of Edward Sonnenblick) is piecing together the story of a trail of murders in Maharashtra after a young couple goes missing. The young woman (Palak Jaiswal) is the daughter of a powerful politician (Anant Jog), while the young man (Mayur More) is the son of his driver. From the parents of the couple to innocent bystanders-turned-victims in the crime spree, the story looks at how the young man becomes the scapegoat of the whole affair. But at every point, there’s just enough leeway to make you doubt each version of the ’truth’ we are seeing.

Based on the characters by author Darcey Bell, the sequel to A Simple Favor (2018) returns with double the craziness and twists of the first film. Several familiar faces are back in Another Simple Favor, directed once again by Paul Feig. But it’s the weird bond between frenemies Stephanie Smothers (Anna Kendrick) and Emily Nelson (Blake Lively) that elevates this fun and freaky sequel. The Italian setting and the wedding venue lead to wild storytelling, which is only saved by the stars’ chemistry and banter. Emily, who is out of prison on appeal, invites her old bestie Stephanie to be her maid of honour at her Italian wedding to a wealthy Italian man, Dante Versano (Michele Morrone), who may or may not be in the mob. As the wedding festivities take off, the bodies begin to drop like flies, and unsurprisingly, mommy vlogger Stephanie is one of the suspects. Is this one of Emily’s tricky traps again?

There’s a lot of suspension of belief and logic in Jewel Thief: The Heist Begins. A master jewel thief goes so under the radar that the authorities can never quite catch him. And then there’s the actual heist which tries to pull the wool over audiences’ eyes over and over again. Produced by filmmaker Siddharth Anand, the Netflix thriller sets up a predictable narrative with familiar characters. Rehan Roy (Saif Ali Khan) is the world’s best jewel thief in exile after his father disowns him. But a blackmail scheme from art collector Rajan Aulakh (Jaideep Ahlawat) draws him back to India, where he could be arrested at any moment. The impossible mission he has been recruited for is to steal Africa’s Kohinoor, the Red Sun diamond, valued at over Rs 500 crore. Rehan and Rajan must work together and try not to kill each other before the heist is completed. The feature also adds in a complicated romance angle with the introduction of Farrah (Nikita Dutta), Rajan’s wife.