Every month, Netflix adds movies and TV shows to its library. Here are our picks for some of May’s most promising new titles for U.S. subscribers. (Note: Streaming services occasionally change schedules without giving notice. For more recommendations on what to stream, sign up for our Watching newsletter here.)
‘The Four Seasons’ Season 1
Starts streaming: May 1
Alan Alda’s hit 1981 romantic comedy “The Four Seasons” is about three couples whose regular shared vacations are disrupted by a divorce. Tina Fey, Lang Fisher and Tracey Wigfield created this updated take on the film, which examines how marital dissatisfaction persists even as times change. Fey plays Kate, the group’s persnickety planner, whose marriage to the genial college professor Jack (Will Forte) is rattled when their friend Nick (Steve Carell) announces that he is bored with his wife, Anne (Kerri Kenney-Silver). The third couple, Danny (Colman Domingo) and Claude (Marco Calvani), seem less stressed, but secretly they also wonder if they can make it to the “grow old together” phase of their relationship. Fey and company set aside the wackiness of their past series “30 Rock” and “Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt,” instead finding more down-to-earth humor in middle-aged melancholy.
‘Forever’ Season 1
Starts streaming: May 8
Adapted from the controversial 1975 young adult novel by Judy Blume, “Forever” is about two Los Angeles high schoolers who meet at a party and fall for each other, then find their romance complicated by the near-constant drama that is adolescence. Lovie Simone plays Keisha, a budding track star with a bad reputation among some of her classmates. Michael Cooper Jr. plays Justin, a sweet-natured basketball player with a learning disability and demanding parents. Created by Mara Brock Akil (best known for the sitcom “Girlfriends”) and executive produced by Regina King, among others, this series deals with sex, race, class, peer pressure and the highs and lows of living in Los Angeles. (King also directs a few episodes.) But it is mainly about the intensity of young love.
‘Bad Thoughts’ Season 1
Starts streaming: May 13
The comedian and podcaster Tom Segura created this sketch comedy series, which takes common scenarios from both pop culture and everyday life and then presents them in their sickest, darkest, most unapologetically disgusting “what if” versions. Like: What if a hit man shot the wrong target … and then had explosive diarrhea? Segura takes the lead role in some of these vignettes, bringing a vibe similar to the one in his stand-up act, playing the goofy Everyman unafraid to say inappropriate things. “Bad Thoughts” also features writing and directing contributions from Jeremy Konner, one of the brains behind the similarly raunchy and unfiltered “Drunk History.”
‘Sirens’
Starts streaming: May 22
The playwright Molly Smith Metzler — who previously created the Emmy-nominated Netflix mini-series “Maid” — adapts her own play “Elemeno Pea” for this satirical drama, set during one busy weekend at a high-end beachfront estate. Meghann Fahy plays Devon, a working class Buffalo gal who becomes tired of shouldering all the responsibility for her ailing father (Bill Camp) and decides to confront her estranged sister, Simone (Milly Alcock), who has been working as the personal assistant to the billionaire environmental activist Michaela (Julianne Moore). Metzler and the cast (which also includes Kevin Bacon as Michaela’s husband and Glenn Howerton as Simone’s boyfriend) compares the insular, almost cultlike world of the superrich with the bullheadedness of Devon, who refuses to be polite and deferential to anyone.
‘Department Q’ Season 1
Starts streaming: May 29
Jussi Adler-Olsen’s “Nordic noir” novel series “Department Q” gets an English-language TV adaptation, set in Scotland and written and directed by Scott Frank (“The Queen’s Gambit”). Matthew Goode plays Carl Morck, a surly police detective who is still recovering from a deadly ambush at a crime scene when he gets a new career opportunity: leading investigations of cold cases chosen by the prosecutor Merritt Lingard (Chloe Pirrie), who wants to reassure citizens that the bad guys won’t get away clean. Morck partners with Akram Salim (Alexej Manvelov), a refugee Syrian cop whom no one else on the force wants in their division. Fans of the Apple TV+ series “Slow Horses” will recognize some similarities here, in the story of institutional outcasts who just need another chance to prove their use.
Also arriving:
May 1
“The Biggest Fan”
May 2
“Unseen” Season 2
May 4
“Conan O’Brien: The Kennedy Center Mark Twain Prize for American Humor”
May 5
“Britain and the Blitz”
“Mighty Monsterwheelies” Season 2
May 6
“The Devil’s Plan” Season 2
“Untold: Shooting Guards”
May 7
“Full Speed” Season 2
“Last Bullet”
May 8
“Blood of Zeus” Season 3
“Heart Eyes”
“Karol G: Tomorrow Was Beautiful”
May 9
“Bad Influence”
“A Deadly American Marriage”
“Nonnas”
“The Royals”
May 11
“ABBA: Against the Odds”
May 12
“Tastefully Yours” Season 1
May 13
“Untold: The Liver King”
May 14
“American Manhunt: Osama bin Laden”
“Fred and Rose West: A British Horror Story”
“Snakes and Ladders” Season 1
May 15
“Bet” Season 1
“Love, Death & Robots” Season 4
“Franklin” Season 1
“Pernille” Season 5
“Secrets We Keep” Season 1
“Thank You, Next” Season 2
“Vini Jr.”
May 16
“Dear Hongrang” Season 1
“Football Parents” Season 1
“The Quilters”
“Rotten Legacy” Season 1
May 20
“Sarah Silverman: Postmortem”
“Untold: The Fall of Favre”
May 21
“Newly Rich, Newly Poor” Season 1
“Real Men” Season 1
“Sneaky Links: Dating After Dark” Season 1
May 22
“Tyler Perry’s She the People” Season 1
May 23
“Air Force Elite: Thunderbirds”
“Big Mouth” Season 8
“Fear Street: Prom Queen”
“Forget You Not” Season 1
“Off Track 2”
May 24
“The Wild Robot”
May 26
“CoComelon” Season 13
“Cold Case: The Tylenol Murders”
“Mike Birbiglia: The Good Life”
May 28
“F1: The Academy” Season 1
May 30
“The Heart Knows”
“A Widow’s Game”
