Firm Favourites

In a television year filled with endings – we bid farewell to such beloved series as Succession, This Is Us, Riverdale, New Amsterdam and The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel

– there were also some fabulous beginnings.

Yes, 2023’s small-screen output might have been slightly curtailed by the lengthy twin writers’ and actors’ strikes, but there was still plenty of fresh storytelling and viewing to get excited about – and addicted to. Stuff to Watch has taken a look back over the past 12 months and come up with this list of our six favourite new shows.

Deadloch (Prime Video)

This Australian crime-comedy was the best thing about this past winter. Former Rake star Kate Box and New Zealand’s own Madeleine Sami (left) make for magnificent sparring partners, as their extremely disparate law enforcers have to team up to try to solve a rapidly increasing number of murders in the sleepy seaside Tasmanian hamlet of the title. Filled with fabulous one-liners, hilarious characters (Nina Oyama’s naive, true-crime podcast-loving

Constable Abby Matsuda the standout) and brilliantly conceived scenarios, this was a truly addictive treat.

Hijack (Apple TV+)

This seven-part thriller follows the high-stakes journey of a plane bound for London as it is taken over by ne’er-do-wells. As authorities on the ground scramble for answers, back on board, Idris Elba’s Sam Nelson (above) attempts to use his business negotiating skills to try to save the lives of all the passengers. A compelling cross between the playing-out-in-real-time thrills of

24 and the cinematic mile-high heists of Flightplan, Air Force One and United 93, this does a terrific job of keeping you glued to the action.

Guy Montgomery’s Guy Mont-Spelling Bee (ThreeNow)

The local television shock of the year.

A new, original Kiwi comedy panel show that’s actually funny. Forget all the reimagined 7 Days, its rip-off Have You Been Paying Attention?, the tortuous trans-Tasman rivalry of Patriot Brains and the exhumation of the truly-awful-when-itfirst-aired-in-the-1980s Give Us A Clue,

this was the fresh, funny and fabulously conceived format we needed in our sometimes troubled lives right now.

What could have been a truly awful update of noughties duo the Dominic Bowden-hosted Are You Smarter Than A 10 Year Old? or Mark Leishman’s shortlived The Great New Zealand Spelling Bee was, instead, an absolute hoot.

Lessons In Chemistry (Apple TV+)

Brie Larson headlines this pitch-perfect, eight-part adaptation of Bonnie Garmus’ 2022 best-selling novel.

Set in the early 1950s, she plays Elizabeth Zott, a woman whose dream of being a scientist is thwarted by a patriarchal society. When she finds herself fired from her lab, she accepts a job as a TV cooking show host, where she sets about teaching a nation of overlooked housewives – and their now engrossed husbands – a lot more than recipes.

While there are plenty of one-liners and other memorable dialogue, it’s the story’s twists and turns that will keep you hooked.

Poker Face (TVNZ+)

Having established his credentials as the master of the modern-day, cinematic Hollywood whodunit via Knives Out and Glass Onion, Rian Johnson turned his attention to the small screen and a series of “howcatchems”.

Yes, in this 10-part

comedic crime drama, viewers find out the perpetrators of each “crime-of-theweek” fairly early on, the show’s true delights coming from watching how our seriously flawed, wildly eccentric, caustically acerbic, but keenly observant protagonist points the finger at the right person each time.

The secret of Charlie Cale’s (Natasha Lyonne) crime-solving success? An innate ability to tell if someone is intentionally lying.