From the start of the year until now, my husband and I have watched over 25 series/movies on Netflix. That’s about one per week in the last 20 weeks. A hefty consumption of entertainment. And, it does not include daytime viewing, despite the Covid-19 lockdown.

I’ve worked from home for more than 20 years now. So it has been pretty much same, same for me. My in-built calendar instinctively can tell apart weekdays, weekends and public holidays. I don’t watch TV during the day. Hence, it was quite a surprise to me that so many hours had and is being spent sitting in front of the telly. I never figured myself as a TV or YouTube sort of person. I’d rather read than watch and yet I’d done a lot of watching. Maybe, that’s because not going out for dinners has given my husband and me more time in the evenings. 

Why did I make a list? This is the first series/movies list that I did and am still doing. Quite simply to remember not to forget what I had already watched. There have been times when I’ve been quarter or half way through a movie only to realise that the storyline is familiar, and I’ve seen it before. To avoid repeats and bolster my sieve-like memory, I have gone so far as to write a summary of these series and movies. Sounds pedantic but it’s quite an effective memory therapy. Particularly, remembering the names of characters, storylines and endings. 

So far, we have watched Blinded by the Light, Ford v Ferrari, The Kominsky Method, Motherless Brooklyn, Dark Waters, Big Fish, Virgin River, Tales of the City, The People Vs O.J. Simpson, Locke & Key, House of Cards (Season 6), Joy, You, The Stranger, The Bletchley Circle,  Safe, Ozark, The English Game, The Big Family Cooking Showdown 2018,  Sherlock Holmes (Season 4), Dirty John, After Life ( Season 1), Collateral, Marcella and now, Bloodline. A few others, we abandoned. Narcos, Just Call Saul and Breaking Bad, my husband watched solo.

I don’t do reviews and the following are not. That said, these are my personal top five series/movies worth being a couch potato for.  And, in no particular order, The Kominsky Method. A comedy about a long-standing friendship between two older men, an ageing acting coach played by Michael Douglas and his agent, recently widowed Alan Arkin. Brilliantly funny dialogue that resonated with my husband and me. Older and with life experiences of our own, we could relate to this series. We want more.

Dark Waters is a true story about a determined lawyer, Roger Bilott, and his 20-year legal battle with DuPont – a chemical manufacturing company that contaminated a town in the US with unregulated chemicals. People’s lives and health, plus livestock were affected. Mark Ruffalo, who played Bilott, displayed how it was and still is challenging to stand up to a well-funded and lawyer’ed-up large corporation. 

I enjoyed The Bletchley Circle. A series about four women, with different skills and interesting personalities, who worked as code-breakers at Bletchley Park, Britain’s wartime code-breaking centre. Post-WW11, the four unite to find a serial killer, after seeing a pattern to the killings. To me, what stood out was how intelligent and capable these women were, and yet after the war, they were either not working or doing jobs that didn’t fulfil their full potential in a very much male dominated world.    

I learnt about the history of football in The English Game. From a closely guarded sport by the wealthy in the 1870’s, it evolved with much opposition, to include the working class. I especially liked the leads Edward Holcroft, who played Arthur Kinnaird and Kevin Guthrie who took on the role as Fergus Sutter. A Scottish footballer, who was renowned for his passing skills.  A little predictable, but a worthy feel-good movie. 

Ozark is another series to watch. I almost didn’t because I don’t like shooting, killing, maiming or decapitating. I gave up after a few minutes into episode 1 of Ozark. My husband watched three episodes on his own, and said I should give it a try as it has a good storyline. He was right.  Good, yes, but overwhelming in parts. Good because we discussed and debated the episodes. I went to sleep and woke up thinking and worrying about some of the characters in it. Flawed, evolving, unpredictable, and unredeemable personalities. Greed, power, lobbying, wheeling and dealing and intermittent scary levels of violence (my cue to visit the kitchen). We binge watched all 3 seasons, and am looking forward to season 4.

Clever stories with numerous twists and turns. Multifaceted characters. Entertainment on the small screen. All in the safety of our own home. Nice.