That pretty much sums up a hugely underwhelming lineup from streaming services, which burned through their best shows in the spring and have little to offer for the start of the traditional fall TV season. That’s not to say there aren’t a handful of promising shows — there are — but is one decent new show per service worth the price of multiple monthly subscriptions? Almost certainly not.
Consumers can take full advantage of cord-cutting with a churn-and-return strategy — adding and dropping streaming services each month. All it takes is good planning. Keep in mind that a billing cycle starts when you sign up, not necessarily at the beginning of the month, and keep an eye out for lower-priced tiers, limited-time discounts, free trials and cost-saving bundles. There are a lot of offers out there, but the deals don’t last forever.
Play, pause or stop? Play. Even in a month with few premieres, Hulu is head and shoulders above the rest. But be warned, Disney is jacking up the price of ad-free Hulu to $17.99 in October.Amazon’s Prime Video In fairness, it’s a relatively blockbuster month for Amazon’s AMZN, +0.12% Prime Video. Netflix It’s an unusually slow month for Netflix NFLX, +1.09%, but there is one highlight: the fourth and final season of the excellent British high-school dramedy “Sex Education” . Asa Butterfield, Ncuti Gatwa, Emma Mackey and Gillian Anderson return as the raunchy yet sweet coming-of-age story shifts the students to a new, ultra-progressive school, where they’ll try to fit in amid new challenges.
Max recently announced a partnership with AMC+ that will see seven AMC series — “Fear the Walking Dead”, “Anne Rice’s Interview with the Vampire,” “Dark Winds,” “Gangs of London,” “Ride with Norman Reedus,” “A Discovery of Witches” and “Killing Eve” — stream on Max for two months starting Sept. 1. It’s a good lineup too, with “Interview with the Vampire,” “Dark Winds,” “Gangs of London” and the first season of “Killing Eve,” in particular, worth checking out.
Play, pause or stop? Stop. What a dramatic shift from spring’s monster lineup. Once “Winning Time” ends, there’s little to justify the cost.The forgettable live-action version of “The Little Mermaid” makes its streaming debut, and “I Am Groot” — the animated “Guardians of the Galaxy” spinoff — returns for its second season of shorts, along with a handful of “behind-the-scenes” Marvel and “Star Wars” specials.