In the first episode of Melodownz’ new show, Kava Corner, John Campbell got a bit lit on kava, and it was utterly bloody delightful. Watching John Campbell do just about anything is guaranteed to make your day a bit better. His calm, empathetic style has been a balm to the nation for ages now, as … Read more
Just over a week ago, Auckland had a full slate of live events going ahead. But this week and next? Silence. Sam Brooks reports on how returning to lockdown has affected Auckland’s live scene. If you were an Aucklander leaving the house on Tuesday morning, you might have been leaving that house with a full … Read more
Forget John Connor. Terminator: Dark Fate, now streaming on Neon, proves that Sarah Connor is humanity’s real saviour, writes Sam Brooks. When you think of Sarah Connor, there’s one image that comes to mind immediately. It’s not from the first Terminator film, which presents Linda Hamilton as a waitress with bangs higher than heaven who … Read more
In the third episode of all new Bad News, Alice recounts her overwhelmingly positive experiences with the health system and wonders: why isn’t it the same for all New Zealanders? With an average lifespan seven years shorter than Pākehā, Māori have long suffered systemic inequity in our healthcare system. Alice, on the other hand, hasn’t … Read more
A new season of reality series Selling Sunset just landed on Netflix. Tara Ward finds that if you set your expectations low, you won’t be disappointed. If you threw Real Housewives of Beverly Hills, Million Dollar Listing and The Hills into a reality TV juicer, you’d pour out a long, tall glass of Selling Sunset. … Read more
Some of the best shows on Neon will take between a day and weeks to get through. Here’s a guide to the classics you’ve been holding off on, how long they take to watch, and why you should watch them. It’s a scientific fact that there’s too much TV and nobody has enough time. There’s … Read more
From the trusty old blue disposable medical face mask to a bandana made out of a pair of gruts, New Zealand’s TV news and current affairs shows have been a veritable parade of PPE this week. José Barbosa has compiled all the best examples here: The news that Auckland was moving back to level three … Read more
It’s Amazon Prime Video’s new show about the most extreme adventure race in the world, and host Bear Grylls wants us to enjoy it from the comfort of our couch. I tried to kill Bear Grylls in You Vs Wild, really I did. I made him swim with crocodiles, I forced him to eat termites … Read more
Opinion: Why is JK Rowling so mad about periods, and why are so many people mad at JK Rowling? Alice Snedden waded into the volatile waters of Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminism for the latest episode of Bad News. After the horrible year we’ve had, the last thing anybody needed was for JK Rowling to make … Read more
In the second episode of Alice Snedden’s Bad News, Alice goes to an event at parliament to try to talk with a group of ‘gender critical’ feminists – but things don’t go quite as planned. You’ve probably heard the term used in relation to high-profile people like JK Rowling, but what are Terfs, or Trans … Read more
A new New Zealand-made drama about life in lockdown was dropped from Prime’s schedule, just days before it was due to start. What’s going on? Peter Salmon reckons the perfect time to watch a New Zealand drama about a second-wave Covid lockdown is during a second-wave Covid lockdown. Prime disagrees, having removed new short drama … Read more
The first episode of the all new Alice Snedden’s Bad News asks why migrant sex workers aren’t legally allowed to operate in New Zealand. Sex work was decriminalised in New Zealand in 2003, but not for everyone – it remains one of the only jobs migrants aren’t allowed to do. But is the law successfully … Read more
She’s Cheryl West, she’s Ellen Crozier, she’s the woman who makes headlines for throwaway jokes online. Sam Brooks talks to Robyn Malcolm, actor and activist. There’s nothing more compelling on a New Zealand screen than Robyn Malcolm wanting something. Whether it’s Cheryl West trying to get a lingerie business off the ground, Ellen Crozier shaking … Read more
Looking for a wonderfully trashy movie to watch? TVNZ OnDemand now have some of Lifetime’s best dramas for your viewing pleasure. In a world of serious and credible television, the arrival of Lifetime to TVNZ OnDemand is joyous news. Lifetime is an American cable channel that churns out emotional drama after emotional drama, and it’s the best … Read more
Paige Tapara is a fast-rising young singer-songwriter whose debut EP explores themes of sexuality, coming of age, mental health and relationships. We asked her how it came together, and why she thinks it’s so important for NZ music to include voices like hers. Paige swoops into the room, a cream doughnut in one hand and a … Read more
You probably shouldn’t expect any happy endings from buzzed-about new Neon show Gangs of London, but maybe that’s not such a bad thing. The Hero’s Journey, a 17-stage literary structure popularised by the 20th century work of literature professor Joseph Campbell but present through centuries of storytelling, lays out for creators and consumers a well-trodden … Read more
What happens when New Zealand’s queen of K-Pop rallies a room full of kids to become homegrown popstars? You get TVNZ On Demand’s K-Pop Academy. Korean pop music – or “K-pop” – is, arguably, the biggest musical genre on the planet. BTS is its most famous name, but South Korea is home to plenty of … Read more
Announcing eight new episodes coming soon to The Spinoff and RNZ. Good news for people who love Bad News – Alice Snedden’s docu-comedy series tackling some of Aotearoa’s most contentious social and political issues is back for a second season. Like the first, which saw Alice go head-to-head with Don Brash in an episode about … Read more
What are you going to be watching in August? The Spinoff rounds up everything that’s coming to streaming services this month, including Netflix, Amazon Prime, Disney+, Apple TV+, Neon and TVNZ OnDemand. Click here to see our listings from July. The biggies Dirty John: The Betty Broderick Story (on Netflix from August 14) The original … Read more
Finished watching Floor is Lava and looking for your next dose of bonkers TV? Cannonball is the show for you. The world is going to Hades in a handcart, and for one hour each week, I need the distraction of blue skies, warm sunshine and beautiful people volunteering to make fools of themselves on television. … Read more
Muppets Now, the troupe’s first foray into the world of streaming, takes on the YouTube era with hilarious – if somewhat disjointed – success. If you can’t be funny, be happy, and if you can be both, then you’re probably doing pretty well at life. The Muppets have spent the better part of a half-century … Read more
Taylor Swift’s surprise album is a step away from noisy popstardom and into the quiet woods, writes Sam Brooks. I spent most of quarantine dreading the kind of art that would come out of it. I was expecting movies shot on Zoom, TV shows about unlikely flatmates being stuck together, and plays about how we … Read more
Tara Ward takes a trip back in time with this classic 1980s New Zealand tourism video. Be warned, it contains bare buttocks. Covid-19 has made us tourists in our own country, so there’s no better time to wrap your optic nerves around the classic tourism film Come On to New Zealand. It was a 34-minute … Read more
It’s our tucker, sure, but how do the items on the new song hold up against a good ol’ ranking? Sam Brooks puts his New Zealand passport on the line to rank them. How many fast food items do you know that have their own song? Not many, if any, am I right? Well, even … Read more
A new sketch show on Comedy Central has heralded a new era for Pacific voices. But it’s not all big laughs and dick jokes – it’s much more sophisticated than that. The trailer for new comedy sketch show Sis, released in late June, is bloody funny. As a good trailer should, it takes some of … Read more
Last night Seven Sharp revealed to New Zealand children that the Tooth Fairy is not who they thought it was. Tara Ward relives this shocking moment. Something wild happened on Seven Sharp last night, and I don’t mean Jeremy Wells saying “light bladder leakage” after the first ad break. Wells was joined by Toni Street … Read more
Sam Brooks reviews the latest Netflix movie of the week: the mildly erotic sex thriller Fatal Affair. It has to be said that most rip-offs of Fatal Attraction usually have the sense of mind to change both words in that title. We’re all familiar with the plot of Fatal Attraction, even if we’ve never seen … Read more
As one of the few places on earth where live events are still taking place, New Zealand is seeing its Facebook events pages overrun by scammers trying to trick fans out of cash. Sherry Zhang explains how it works, and shares her own exchange with a ticket scam bot. Ticket scams? Bots? What’s all this … Read more
Under Cover is a new series that brings musicians together via video link to bond, chat and play each other’s songs. The fifth episode features Troy Kingi and Warren Maxwell. Troy Kingi and Warren Maxwell have shared stages and many musical memories together. Kingi still cites opening for Maxwell’s band Trinity Roots at the Leigh … Read more