Netflix Greenlit a Show Called Detective Hole and We Have to Talk About It

Netflix has greenlit a show called Detective Hole. That's the title. That's what it says on the poster. A Norwegian detective named Harry Hole solving ritualistic murders in Oslo, and nobody in the entire content pipeline — not the translator, not the marketing guy, not the woman with the clipboard at the table read — raised their hand and said, hey, in English, that's Detective Hole. Or they did raise their hand and they were told to sit down because the algorithm doesn't care. The algorithm wants crime, and Scandinavia, and a man with demons. The algorithm got Detective Hole. I am watching this immediately. I would watch nine seasons of Detective Hole. I would get a tattoo.

Meanwhile the rest of the week is a funeral. Let's get into it.

The Boys, Season 5 (Prime Video)

The final season. Supposedly. Homelander is still blonde, still smiling, still the most accurate portrait of an American CEO ever put on screen — a man who genuinely believes he is the victim of every room he walks into. Antony Starr has been doing Emmy work for six years while the Academy hands trophies to whichever prestige show had the saddest British woman that year. The show has lost a step since season two, everyone knows it, but a wobbly Boys is still better than 90% of what these platforms push out. Watch it. Prime Video.

Invincible, Season 5 (Prime Video)

The other Amazon superhero show, which is somehow more violent than the live-action one even though it's a cartoon. J.K. Simmons voices a mustachioed alien who beats his son through buildings. Steven Yeun is the son. It's great. It's also, and this is a compliment, the kind of show you watch while making dinner and suddenly a character's head comes off and you have to sit down.

The Pitt, Season 3 (HBO Max)

Noah Wyle has been in a fictional emergency room since 1994. He's been playing a doctor longer than most actual doctors have been doctors. At this point I think he IS a doctor. I would let him remove an appendix. The Pitt is the best medical drama on television — it's ER with budget cuts, which is to say it's ER plus realism. Season three is here. This is the show. HBO Max.

Detective Hole (Netflix)

I already did the bit. It's a Jo Nesbø adaptation, Tobias Santelmann plays Harry, Joel Kinnaman shows up to scowl in Norwegian. An episode is literally titled Duke Ellington's Piano. Early ratings are strong. I cannot type the name of this show one more time without laughing. Netflix.

Something Very Bad Is Going to Happen (Netflix)

A bride has a feeling something horrifying will happen at her wedding. Spoiler: something does, because otherwise there's no show, it's just a woman at a rehearsal dinner. Camila Morrone stars. Adam DiMarco from White Lotus is the groom, which is the universal TV shorthand for this guy is definitely hiding something. The title is a whole mood. It's also what my accountant says when he picks up the phone. Could be fun, could be the fourteenth wedding-goes-wrong show Netflix has made this year.

Grey's Anatomy, Season 23 (Netflix)

Season twenty-three. Meredith Grey has been in that hospital since the Bush administration. I have nothing else to say. If you're in, you're in. If you're out, you're never coming back.

Jujutsu Kaisen, new season (Netflix)

Teenager has a demon in him, goes to demon school, fights demons. Enormous globally. I am not the audience. You know if you are.

NCIS, Season 23 and The Rookie, Season 8

CBS procedurals that will outlive all of us. These shows will still be airing after the sun goes out. Nathan Fillion will file one last report from the smoldering crater of Los Angeles.

Monarch: Legacy of Monsters, Season 2 (Apple TV+)

Apple TV+ spending Apple money to make a Godzilla show where Godzilla appears for nine seconds per episode. This is the Apple playbook. Hire incredible actors — Anna Sawai from Shōgun here — put them in a lavishly produced series about a giant monster, and then show you the monster the way a waiter shows you the pepper grinder. A little sprinkle. A tease. Apple has $3 trillion and the emotional generosity of a Victorian landlord.

Bait (Prime Video)

Riz Ahmed plays a struggling actor who lands the role of a lifetime and spirals into a conspiracy thriller. Riz Ahmed is very good. I will try one episode. If it's all voiceover and hallway hallucinations I'm out.

Privileges (HBO Max)

A young inmate takes a job in a luxury Parisian hotel. Yes. Fine. It's French, it's handsome, a 3.9 on TMDb which is either a travesty or a warning. Skip unless you're already pretending to learn French.

Ready or Not: Texas (Netflix)

Korean reality show where two guys go to Texas with no plan. I love this genre — people from functional societies wandering through ours like they're visiting a ruin. I guarantee somebody eats a 72oz steak and cries.

The Movies

Hannah Montana 20th Anniversary Special (Hulu/Disney+) is hosted by Alex Cooper. Of course it is. Everything is hosted by Alex Cooper now. She's going to host my funeral. Miley walks through recreated sets, cries in the Hannah closet, we all reflect on the fact that 2006 was twenty years ago and we are going to die. BTS: THE RETURN (Netflix) — the army is back, the army never left, the army has infiltrated your local government. The Red Line (Netflix) is a Thai thriller about three women hunting down phone scammers. That one I'd actually watch.

Pick of the Week

It's The Pitt. Season three of the best drama on television that's pretending to be a network show. Noah Wyle in scrubs, twelve-hour shifts shot in real time, no copaganda, no billionaire savior, just people doing a hard job inside a system that's falling apart. It's the rare streaming show where you finish an episode and feel something other than contempt for the people who made it. If you're not watching The Pitt you are, to put it gently, wrong.

See you next week. Somebody's getting fired between now and then. I can feel it.