Best TV and streaming shows in 2025 (so far)

This gut-punch drama sifts through the harrowing aftermath of the deadliest terror attack in British history, when a transatlantic Pam-Am flight was destroyed by a bomb and crashed into a rural Scottish town in 1988. Colin Firth is on top form as a grieving dad going to extreme and polarising ends to pursue justice for his daughter and the 269 other passengers, crew and Lockerbie residents who died. Powerful television that doesn’t pretend to have all the answers. 

Length of binge: 3 hours 20 mins

If you fused Kill List and Emmerdale Farm into a six-part ITV thriller starring British telly’s Martin Clunes, it would look, well, a lot like Out There. Clunes is impressive as Nathan Williams, a struggling farmer and diligent dad whose guileless son is drawn into a county lines drug trafficking operation. Nathan’s particular set of skills – farming, blasting drones out of the sky with a shotgun – means that the ‘avenging dad’ role isn’t a natural fit. It lends extra unpredictability to a gripping family survival tale that addresses some distressingly real social ills.

Length of binge: 4 hours 41 mins

For anyone who found grim-faced survival epic The Revenant too cheery, screenwriter Mark L Smith is back to really crank up the bleakness in this real-life western series. Constructed with maximum period detail in New Mexico, it recreates the little-known 1857 Mountain Meadows Massacre that set a ruthless Mormon militia, Utah settlers and Shoshone warriors at odds in spectacularly violent fashion. Veteran action-thriller filmmaker Peter Berg sends his Friday Night Lights muse Taylor Kitsch into this unforgiving landscape as a reluctant saviour for Betty Gilpin’s doughty homesteader. Not exactly fun but consistently gripping. 

Length of binge: 5 hours 4 mins

Reliably brilliant in every episode of It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, and as the damaged daughter in Hacks, Kaitlin Olson has finally landed a lead worthy of her immense talent. In this remake of a French series, Olson plays a ‘high potential intellectual’ – her IQ is 160 – who uses her advanced cognitive abilities to help clay-footed detectives solve crimes. A fashion-forward fusion of Monk and The Mentalist with a manic mother-of-three? It has a lot of potential. 

If there is one thing you can expect from Dan Fogelman, it’s an emotionally-charged twist. So sit back, grab some popcorn, and pull out any other self-care stop you need to mentally prepare yourself because Paradise delivers one of those after another. This Is Us showrunner delivers a genuinely fresh take on yet another US President show that’s part murder-mystery, part political thriller, and is peppered with tantalising clues and jolting flashbacks. Sterling K Brown is natural as ever as a Secret Service agent detailed to protect James Marsden’s persuasive President (his finest performance this side of Jury Duty). Not one to miss.

Length of binge: 

Does Steven Knight not sleep? The Brit currently rivals his compatriot Jesse Armstrong as one of the most prolific screenwriter/showrunners at work (look out for his Disney+ period boxing drama A Thousand Blows and a Peaky Blinders movie The Immortal Man to come). His World War II special forces origin story really hits its stride in a second season full of punkily ferocious Band-of-Brothers-on-Red-Bull energy. Jack O'Connell leads the way as the maverick SAS unit’s iconoclastic, poetry-loving leader Lieutenant Paddy Mayne in an eight-episode run with heart as well as muscle. Roll on season 3.

Length of binge: 5 hours 45 mins

A new Hirokazu Kore-eda in early 2025 – who knew? The Palme d’Or-winning filmmaker behind Shoplifters surprise-dropped a new Netflix series in January, and it’s exactly the delicate, family-orientated work you would expect from the man they call Ozu’s heir. Set over several months in 1979, Asura concerns four sisters whose lives are transformed after their elderly father has an affair. The exemplary cast offers a Who’s Who of J-cinema greats, too, including six-time Japanese Academy Award winner Rie Miyazawa.

Length of binge: 6 hours 52 mins