Jingle binge!
Just four channels and nothing on? It’s time for a visit from the Showmax Treat Yo-Self Elf with a Vodacom gift too.
Certain channels go on holiday early in December, leaving nothing but repeats, sport and dusty old movies for those of us who are staying home. So if you have family clamouring for entertainment, Showmax is the perfect early gift for everyone to enjoy. If you’ve got just a cellphone, get three months’ free access with Showmax and Vodacom (see right). You can scoop up hot new local shows, discover series that nobody else in SA has seen yet – no matter how fancy their TV package – or catch up on that nerdy hot-topic series that everyone has been talking about. Programming is available in an A-to-Z of languages, literally from Afrikaans to Zulu (plus Sesotho, Tswana and Tshivenda) and there are so many shows that everyone at home can see something new, every single day. It’s a gift that keeps on giving! Feeling spoilt for choice? Here’s a catch-up on what tvplus loved this year, as well as a peek at Showmax exclusives to enjoy…
TIME-HOP HAPPY
If you love sci-fi, unless you have been slowly digesting in a Sarlacc pit in the middle of the desert, you’ll have heard all about “Thirteen” – the first female incarnation of The Doctor in longrunning series Doctor Who (1963current), played by Jodie Whittaker. In November, Showmax landed the hottest scoop in space-time when they nabbed Doctor Who’s 11th season (along with the previously unseen in South Africa 10th season) to show them exclusively and first. Aside from seeing if we could spot the scenes filmed in sunny South Africa, we fell in love with Jodie’s joyful, exuberant, funny and terminally curious interpretation the moment that she cheerfully told one of her new friends that she had reformatted his phone, electrocuted herself, then built her own sonic screwdriver in episode 1.
LIVE YOUR FANTASY
Showmax is now the local home of critically acclaimed and audience-approved fantasy and sci-fi series like Game Of Thrones (2011- current), Westworld (2016current) and dystopian drama The Handmaid’s Tale (2017- current). So if you have been hiding your shame and nodding along quietly during dinner-party conversations, you can catch up completely over the holidays. Every episode that has aired onscreen is available for streaming at Showmax.com.
LOVE LOCAL
Showmax has the exclusive on the local shows that we can’t get enough of. Mzansi Magic’s dramatic Devious Maids-style shocker Housekeepers (2018- current) has new episodes popping up on Showmax right after they’re broadcast on the channel. Every time we see Linda’s devastated, innocent mother talking about her struggles in jail, we go through another box of tissues and hate the rich, cruel and rude Zwides that little bit more (they are TV’s most hiss-able villains right now, we swear).
As reality show fans on a budget, we were also thrilled to see the 2018 season of Survivor South Africa (2006- current) pop up on Showmax. Our contestants behave so unpredictably that it completely refreshes the game. This cast is dynamite and the strategies are either nail-bitingly good or forehead-slappingly daft – there’s no in-betweens. PS: Survivor fans can also find season 32 of the US edition of Survivor (2001- current) on the platform.
GROWN-UP TASTES
No matter your palate, Showmax has something to please. For connoisseurs, there are top- quality dramas like The White Queen (2013), Victoria (2016current), The Collection (2016- current) and Vanity Fair (2018). And for adult comedy fans, Showmax has exclusive access to Adult Swim shows like absurd sci-fi adventure series Rick And Morty (2013- current), brilliantly off-the-wall stop-motion animated anarchy from Robot Chicken (2005- current) and the blissfully funny Black Jesus (Gerald “Slink” Johnson) (2014), which shows what might happen if the world was given a distinctly urban, modern and compassionate saviour who reaches out to the poor and downtrodden in the United States.
VIP ACCESS
Do you live to be the first to view a new show? In December, Showmax will be the first platform in South Africa to air season 2 of Marvel’s Runaways (2017- current) and the second season of ’70s-era drama series The Deuce (2017- current). in November, they also offered up exclusives like period drama The Last Post (2017) and Future Man (2017- current). We couldn’t get enough of sci-fi comedy Future Man as cleaner Josh Futturman’s (Josh Hutcherson) only real skill – his expertise in computer game Biotic Wars – is called on. Two humans from a dystopian future tell him that the game is a recruiting device put together to find the one person who can save Earth, but the series of timetravelling missions end up revealing that it’s probably Josh who doomed the planet with his incompetence.