Anna Daniels
The rest of Netflix’s list of its top ten movie and TV offerings of 2019 isn’t quite so surprising. In second place is Stranger Things 3, which set viewership records of its own for an original series; fans absolutely ate up the third season of the hit show, and it’ll surprise nobody if Stranger Things 4 (which promises to resolve a cliffhanger or two) performs similarly when it drops, likely sometime in 2021.
Coming in third was 6 Underground, the Ryan Reynolds-starring explosion-fest directed by that most reliable Kaboomsmith Michael Bay. That flick was followed by the only theatrical release in the overall top ten: Incredibles 2, which should be departing to head over to its permanent home on Disney+ sometime this summer. In the number five spot: Scorsese’s The Irishman, which we’re honestly surprised isn’t higher on the list. The Robert De Niro starrer brought Al Pacino into the Scorsese fold for the first time, Joe Pesci was coaxed out of retirement for a supporting role, and the flick was named the best of the year by more than one critics’ organization; if only it had featured more explosions and possibly Adam Sandler, it may have performed better.
The Witcher came in sixth, although again, its final position could change once it’s been streaming for a full 28 days. The Henry Cavill-starring series, based on the iconic video game series of the same name (which is in turn based on a series of novels by Polish author Andrzej Sapkowski), has generated massive amounts of buzz since it dropped, and while critics haven’t taken too kindly to it, Murder Mystery‘s numbers prove definitively that this doesn’t matter in the least.
The original actioner Triple Frontier, which starred such big names as Ben Affleck, Oscar Isaac, and Pedro Pascal, came in at number 7, followed by the Ted Bundy drama Extremely Evil, Shockingly Wicked and Vile, which featured Zac Efron channeling the notorious serial killer to chilling effect. Season 2 of the acclaimed superhero series The Umbrella Academy came in ninth, and the top ten was rounded out by the Kevin Costner/Woody Harrelson period drama The Highwaymen.
Notable entries on the top ten list of TV series include the second season of You at number 5, even though it only just dropped on December 26; we expect that its final position might be decidedly higher after the 28-day window. The limited series When They See Us and Unbelievable also made the cut, as did the third and penultimate season of 13 Reasons Why.
Rounding out the list of top ten movies (the top seven of which made the overall list) were the Oscar-winning animated flick Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, the animated sequel Ralph Breaks the Internet, and the Brenda Song-starring original thriller Secret Obsession.
Overall, it’s been a pretty good year for Netflix originals, and the streamer will want to keep dumping money into those exclusive offerings if it wants to fend off the advances of Disney+, which will slowly be absorbing all of the Disney, Marvel, Pixar, and Star Wars content over the coming year — not to mention fielding its own original releases, including season 2 of the pop culture-saturating hit The Mandalorian and the MCU-set Falcon and the Winter Soldier. We say let the two monoliths duke it out — the end result can only be more and more excellent content for us, the streaming public.
Written by: Looper
