Although Hollywood came to a standstill during 2023, when its screenwriters and actors went on strike simultaneously, we nevertheless had 12 months of powerful audiovisual projects.
If we are talking about series, 2023 was a year of daring surprises, such as The Last of Us, Poker Face, The Bear, Yellowjackets, Succession, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, Barry, Dead Ringers, and Reservation Dogs, to name a few. While it is true that the industry faced significant difficulties, the 2023 offerings were formidable.
Fortunately, each year the cycle of new series replacing old favorites continues, and 2024 will be no different. In the blink of an eye, we’ll see the big bets from TV networks and streaming services. The next chapter of the small screen will arrive loaded with titles that are enriching, entertaining, exhilarating, rejuvenating, gory, bizarre, heartbreaking, terrifying, and also baffling.
With so much on offer, we’ve made a selection of the key new releases coming out in the months ahead. One thing is absolutely clear to us: for the moment, the audiovisual artistic medium is in very good shape.
Without further ado, we share with you a list of the 10 most anticipated TV series of 2024. Needless to say, we are delighted to have you here!
True Detective: Night Country
HBO | Season Premiere | Release date: Sunday, January 14
The acclaimed crime anthology series, True Detective (2014-present) follows a team of detectives as they gather information on a seemingly unsolvable case. Each season revolves around a completely different cast and plot, so it’s always hard to guess what will happen.
In the new season of True Detective, eight men working at an investigation center suddenly disappear in Ennis, Alaska, a town that each year is plunged into darkness 24 hours a day for several weeks. Detectives Liz Danvers (Jodie Foster) and Evangeline Navarro (Keli Reis) are hired to find them, but to solve the mystery, they have to unravel the town’s dark history along with their own twisted past.
According to HBO’s official logline, the duo will “confront the darkness they carry in themselves, and dig into the haunted truths that lie buried under the eternal ice.”
True Detective: Night Country is being written, executive produced, and directed by Issa López (Tigers Are Not Afraid), who also serves as the primary showrunner. In addition to Jodie Foster and Kali Reis, the cast includes John Hawkes, Fiona Shaw, Anna Lambe, Christopher Eccleston, Aka Niviâna, Finn Bennett, Isabella Star Lablanc, and Joel D. Montgrand.
Mr. & Mrs. Smith
Amazon Prime Video | Season Premiere | Release date: Friday, February 02
Starring Donald Glover and Maya Erskine, this Amazon Prime Video series is a reimagining of the 2005 film of the same name, in which Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie played a married couple of rival spies who are unaware of each other’s professional identity.
It should be noted that the series is a reboot and not a remake of the Doug Liman-directed film. According to Prime Video’s description:
“In this version of Mr. & Mrs. Smith, two lonely strangers land jobs working for a mysterious spy agency that offers them a glorious life of espionage, wealth, world travels, and a dream brownstone in Manhattan. The catch? New identities in an arranged marriage as Mr. and Mrs. John and Jane Smith. Now hitched, John and Jane navigate a high-risk mission every week while also facing a new relationship milestone. Their complex cover story becomes even more complicated when they catch real feelings for each other. What’s riskier: espionage or marriage?”
Avatar: The Last Airbender
Netflix | Season Premiere | Release date: Thursday, February 22
Appa, yip yip! Nearly 20 years after the original animated series premiered, the popular anime finally gets the live-action version it deserves, with a culturally appropriate cast.
The synopsis, per Netflix, reads as follows:
“Water. Earth. Fire. Air. The four nations once lived in harmony, with the Avatar, master of all four elements, keeping peace between them. But everything changed when the Fire Nation attacked and wiped out the Air Nomads, the first step taken by the firebenders towards conquering the world. With the current incarnation of the Avatar yet to emerge, the world has lost hope. But like a light in the darkness, hope springs forth when Aang, a young Air Nomad — and the last of his kind — reawakens to take his rightful place as the next Avatar. Alongside his newfound friends Sokka and Katara, siblings and members of the Southern Water Tribe, Aang embarks on a fantastical, action-packed quest to save the world and fight back against the fearsome onslaught of Fire Lord Ozai. But with a driven Crown Prince Zuko determined to capture them, it won’t be an easy task. They’ll need the help of the many allies and colorful characters they meet along the way.”
It’s a coming-of-age story that follows Aang, a 12-year-old boy who is the key to saving the world. With powerful lessons about friendship, morality and the need to forgive, it’s no wonder Avatar: The Last Airbender is still so beloved after all these years.
Variety confirms that the first season of the series will have a total of eight episodes.
Bridgerton
Netflix | Season 3 | Release date: Part 1: Thursday, May 16/ Part 2: Thursday, June 13
“Gentle reader”, we are pleased to confirm that the third season of Bridgerton is coming sooner than you think. The new installment, like The Crown, will premiere in two parts: the first four episodes will premiere on May 16 and the next four on June 13.
This time the focus will be on the slow-burn romance between Colin Bridgerton and Penelope Featherington, as well as the early days of Kate and Anthony Bridgerton’s marriage; most of the cast of Bridgerton‘s second season will also return for the third.
The log line for Season 3 reads: “Penelope has finally given up on her long-held crush on Colin after hearing his disparaging words about her last season. She has, however, decided it’s time to take a husband, preferably one who will provide her with enough independence to continue her double life as Lady Whistledown, far away from her mother and sisters. But lacking in confidence, Penelope’s attempts on the marriage mart fail spectacularly”.
The synopsis also adds “meanwhile, Colin has returned from his summer travels with a new look and a serious sense of swagger. But he’s disheartened to realise that Penelope, the one person who always appreciated him as he was, is giving him the cold shoulder. Eager to win back her friendship, Colin offers to mentor Penelope in the ways of confidence to help her find a husband this season. But when his lessons start working a little too well, Colin must grapple with whether his feelings for Penelope are truly just friendly. Complicating matters for Penelope is her rift with Eloise, who has found a new friend in a very unlikely place, while Penelope’s growing presence in the Ton makes it all the more difficult to keep her Lady Whistledown alter ego a secret”.
House of the Dragon
HBO | Season 2 | Summer 2024
More fire, more blood!
The first season of The House of the Dragon concluded with Queen Alicent placing her son Aegon on the Iron Throne and ultimately usurping Rhaenyra’s birthright. The dramatic denouement set the stage for the civil war for Westeros.
The exact plot of House of the Dragon’s second season is under wraps, but series showrunner Ryan Condal told The Hollywood Reporter that many new characters will appear. “We are thrilled to be shooting again with members of our original family as well as new talents on both sides of the camera,” he said. “All your favorite characters will soon be conspiring at the council tables, marching with their armies and riding their dragons into battle. We can’t wait to share what we have in store.”
In the trailer for the second season of House of the Dragon, we see the rivalry between Rhaenyra Targaryen and Alicent Hightower come to a boiling point. Without giving too much away, we get a glimpse that the plot revolves around the philosophy of the dread Daemon: “An eye for an eye, a son for a son.”
According to Deadline, the new season will be slightly shorter than the first, with eight episodes.
The Penguin
Max | Season Premiere | Release date: To be announced
Matt Reeves’ DC Universe began its epic journey with The Batman in 2022 and will continue its trajectory with the original series The Penguin, in which Colin Farrell reprises his iconic role as the villain. This fiction follows the character’s story after the first film and promises to reveal uncomfortable truths about the infamous penguin.
Of note, Matt Reeves’ BatVerse is part of a separate universe from the main DC Universe and will be built under the direction of James Gunn and Peter Safran.
From what we’ve seen in the teaser, Oswald Cobblepot looks set to climb the ranks of the underworld. This crime drama gives us a detailed look at the mechanics of Gotham’s organized crime. It is likely to be inspired by the Batman comic book No Man’s Land.
Aside from The Penguin series, Matt Reeves is also developing a drama about the Gotham Police Department and Arkham Asylum.
Squid Game
Netflix | Season 2 | Release date: To be announced
Let the new games begin!
Once the dystopian thriller series, Squid Game, hit the screens in September 2021, it quickly became the number one show on Netflix in 90 countries, and broke all kinds of records.
At the end of the first season of Squid Game, Gi-hun managed to beat the game against all odds. But the game is not over yet. After the death of Squid Game’s creator, Gi-hun discovers that the competition is still going on with new recruits.
It seems that the story will continue with Gi-hun again taking center stage, doing his best to stop the game as he swore in the final moments of the first installment.
It has been announced that Park Gyu-young, Kang Ae-sim, Lee David of Itaewon Class, Roh Jae-won, Lee Jin-uk, singer Jo Yu-ri, rapper Choi Seung-hyun will join the cast.
It is to be added that, this Korean drama was so successful that it spawned the intriguing Squid Game: The Challenge, a visceral reality show with the biggest cash prize in the history of the genre. The reality series showed us hundreds of contestants competing fiercely to win a mind-blowing prize.
The Sympathizer
HBO Max | Limited series | Release date: To be announced
The espionage thriller The Sympathizer features the formidable forces of A24, HBO Max, Park Chan-wook (Oldboy) and Robert Downey Jr.
Based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel of the same name written by Professor Viet Thanh Nguyen, The Sympathizer revolves around Captain, a communist spy.
Here is the official logline for The Sympathizer from HBO Max:
“The Sympathizer is an espionage thriller and cross-culture satire about the struggles of a half-French, half-Vietnamese communist spy during the final days of the Vietnam War and his resulting exile in the United States.”
Specifically, after the fall of Saigon in 1975, the Captain is forced to leave the country and emigrates to Los Angeles. There he finds work as a consultant for Hollywood productions, but his past haunts him when he is asked to return to Vietnam to apprehend communists.
The Sympathizer’s creative team is impressive, with Park Chan-wook serving as co-director, executive producer and director of the first three episodes of the limited series.
Star Wars: The Acolyte
Disney+| Season Premiere | Release date: To be announced
The upcoming Disney+ series will take place approximately a century before the events of 2001’s The Phantom Menace, so many beloved characters like Qui-Jon Jin and Obi-Wan Kenobi wouldn’t even have been born yet.
Although details of its plot are being kept tightly under wraps, Lucasfilm described The Acolyte as “a mystery-thriller that will take the audience into a galaxy of shadowy secrets and emerging dark side powers in the final days of the High Republic era.”
Part crime thriller, part space adventure, the series focuses on the rise of Sith powers in the galaxy in the final days of the High Republic era. In the midst of a series of crimes, a former Padawan reunites with her Jedi master to investigate, but the forces they face are more sinister than they could have ever imagined.
The Boys
Prime Video | Season 4 | Release date: To be announced
The Boys season 4 teaser suggests that things will not go well for Billy this time around.
“In season 4, the world is on the brink. Victoria Neuman is closer than ever to the Oval Office and under the muscly thumb of Homelander, who is consolidating his power. Butcher, with only months to live, has lost Becca’s son as well as his job as The Boys’ leader. The rest of the team are fed up with his lies. With the stakes higher than ever, they have to find a way to work together and save the world before it’s too late.”
Showrunner Eric Kripke confirmed that the fourth season will revolve around the struggle between the Butcher and Homelander over Ryan’s care and parenting.