Entertainment

Prime Video’s Latest 8-Part Action Series Has Quietly Outperformed Its Biggest New Shows of 2026

Published

on

When it comes to buddy comedies in TV and film, chances are male duos are the ones to come to mind first. From Bad Boys and Men in Black, to Rush Hour and 21 Jump Street, these are all movies that follow two main characters who rely on each other for everything, even as things begin to spiral downhill. In recent years, however, some female duos have joined the genre, like in The Heat or Peacock’s newly canceled Ponies, but no show has been as revered as Prime Video’s latest comedy series, Ride or Die.

Starring Ted Lasso star Hannah Waddingham and Oscar winner Octavia Spencer, the eight-episode series sees both actresses in a whole new light. While already established as beloved, award-winning actresses in their own way, Ride or Die sees Waddingham and Spencer blossom into bona fide action stars, and helps establish the series as one of Prime Video’s best new shows of the year. Just five days since its release on July 15, 2026, and Ride or Die is already a Prime Video must-watch.

Advertisement

What Is ‘Ride or Die’ About?

Ride or Die follows Debbie Claybourne (Spencer) and Judith Burton (Waddingham), two best friends who have been each other’s confidantes for over two decades. Despite years of book clubs, vacations, and antique shopping they’ve done together, Judith has been hiding a few secrets from Debbie — mainly, her job as a highly skilled assassin, not as a forensic accountant like she had pretended. One night, when one of Judith’s mission backfires at the same event where Debbie and her husband, David (Jamie Parker), are in attendance, Judith’s left with no choice but to come clean, and flee with her across Europe.

Also crucial to the series is the enigmatic man known only as The Director (Bill Nighy), Judith’s employer, who works under a mysterious shadow agency. Throughout the action-packed episodes, Debbie and Judith are pursued by not only Interpol law enforcement, the Albanian mob, but also by a bubbly yet ruthless killer named Ana (Sylvia Hoeks). “Series executive producer Ant-Man‘s Peyton Reed, who also directs the first two episodes, immediately sets the tone with high-octane action that keeps the pace moving,” Meredith Loftus wrote in her review for the show for Collider. “Car chases, kinetic fight scenes, and inventive fight choreography — it’s all there — and Waddingham is who makes many of those thrills work.”































































Advertisement

Collider Exclusive · Action Hero Quiz
Which Action Hero Would Be
Your Perfect Partner?

Rambo · James Bond · Indiana Jones · John McClane · Ethan Hunt

Five legends. Five completely different ways of getting out alive — with style, with muscle, with charm, with luck, or with a plan so intricate it probably shouldn’t work. Ten questions will reveal which action hero was built to have your back.

🎖️Rambo

Advertisement

🍸James Bond

🏺Indiana Jones

🔧John McClane

🎭Ethan Hunt

Advertisement

01

Advertisement

You’re dropped into a dangerous situation with no warning. What do you need most from a partner?
The first few seconds tell you everything about who belongs beside you.





02

Advertisement

You have to get somewhere dangerous, fast. How do you travel?
How you get there is half the mission.





03

Advertisement

You’re pinned down and outnumbered. What does your ideal partner do?
This is when you find out what someone is really made of.





04

Advertisement

The mission is paused. You have one evening to decompress. What does your partner suggest?
Who someone is when the pressure drops is who they actually are.





05

Advertisement

How do you prefer your partner to communicate mid-mission?
Good communication is the difference between partners and a liability.





06

Advertisement

Your enemy is powerful, well-resourced, and has the upper hand. How should your partner approach them?
The approach to the enemy defines the partnership.





07

Advertisement

Things go badly wrong and you’re captured. What do you trust your partner to do?
Who someone is when you need them most is the only thing that matters.





08

Advertisement

What does your ideal partner bring to the table that you couldn’t replace?
A great partner fills the gap you didn’t know you had.





09

Advertisement

Every partnership has a cost. Which of these can you live with?
No one comes without baggage. The question is whether you can carry it together.





10

Advertisement

It’s the final moment. Everything is on the line. What do you need from your partner right now?
The last question is the most honest one.





Your Partner Has Been Assigned
Your Perfect Partner Is…
Advertisement

Your answers have pointed to one action hero above all others. This is the person built to have your back — for better or considerably, spectacularly worse.

Rambo

Your partner doesn’t talk much, doesn’t need to, and will have assessed every threat in your immediate environment before you’ve finished your first sentence. John Rambo is not a man of plans or politics — he is a force of nature shaped by survival, loyalty, and a capacity for endurance that goes beyond anything training can produce. He will not leave you behind. He has never left anyone behind who deserved to come home. What you get with Rambo is the most capable, most quietly ferocious partner imaginable — one who has been through things that would have broken anyone else, and who chose to keep going anyway. You’ll never need to ask if he has your back. You’ll just know.

Advertisement

James Bond

Your partner will arrive perfectly dressed, perfectly briefed, and with a cover story so convincing it’ll take you a moment to remember what’s actually true. James Bond is the most professionally dangerous person in any room he enters — and the most disarmingly charming, which is the point. He operates in a world of layers, where nothing is what it appears and every advantage is used without apology. You’ll never be bored. You’ll occasionally be furious. But when it matters — when the mission is genuinely on the line and the margin for error has collapsed to nothing — Bond is exactly the partner you want. He has survived things that have no business being survivable. He does it with style. That is not nothing.

Advertisement

Indiana Jones

Your partner will know the history, the language, the cultural context, and exactly why the thing everyone else is ignoring is actually the most important thing in the room. Indiana Jones is brilliant, reckless, and occasionally impossible — but he is also one of the most resourceful, most genuinely knowledgeable partners you could find yourself beside. He approaches every situation with a scholar’s eye and a brawler’s instinct, which is an unusual combination and a remarkably effective one. He hates snakes and gets personally attached to objects of historical significance, both of which will slow you down at least once. It doesn’t matter. What Indy brings is irreplaceable — and the adventures you’ll have together will be the kind people write books about. Assuming you survive them.

John McClane

Advertisement

Your partner was not supposed to be here. He does not have the right equipment, the right information, or anything approaching the right odds. He has a sarcastic remark and an absolute refusal to accept that the situation is as bad as it looks. John McClane is the greatest accidental hero in the history of action cinema — a man whose superpower is stubbornness, whose contingency plan is improvisation, and whose capacity to absorb punishment and keep moving would be alarming if it weren’t so useful. He will complain the entire time. He will make it significantly more chaotic than it needed to be. And he will absolutely, unconditionally, without question come through when it counts. Yippee-ki-yay.

Ethan Hunt

Your partner has already run seventeen scenarios by the time you’ve finished reading the briefing, and the plan he’s settled on involves at least two things that should be physically impossible. Ethan Hunt operates at the absolute edge of human capability — technically, physically, and intellectually — and he brings the same relentless precision to protecting his partners that he brings to dismantling organisations that shouldn’t exist. He is not easy to know and he will never fully tell you everything. But he will carry the weight of the mission so completely, so absolutely, that your job is simply to trust him — and the remarkable thing is that trusting him always turns out to be the right call. The mission will be impossible. He will complete it anyway.

Advertisement

Advertisement

‘Ride or Die’ Is One of Prime Video’s Biggest Wins of 2026

Hannah Waddingham, Octavia Spencer, and Ed Skrein in ‘Ride or Die’
Image via Prime Video

On Rotten Tomatoes, the series has scored an impressive 96% percent from critics, overperforming many of the platform’s recent releases, including Off Campus, Elle and Every Year After. From the numbers alone, it’s clear that Ride or Die is a force to be reckoned with for the streaming giant. After all, by standing out in the already crowded streaming landscape, where new releases can disappear in a matter of days, Ride or Die has distinguished itself through overwhelmingly positive reviews, outperforming many of Prime Video’s recent originals and giving viewers all the more reason to add it to their watchlist.

The secret to the show, of course, lies in Spencer and Waddingham’s lived-in and effortless chemistry together onscreen. After all, while Ride or Die delivers globe-trotting action, high-stakes assassin missions, and plenty of comedic set pieces, its greatest strength is their buddy duo. Their believable friendship provides an emotional anchor that keeps the series grounded even as the story escalates into increasingly outrageous situations. Rather than relying solely on action, the series succeeds because it invests in the bond between its two leads, making every dangerous mission feel like a test of a relationship audiences genuinely want to see succeed. “The overall success of Ride or Die lives and ‘dies’ by its two leads (pun intended), and Debbie and Judith’s friendship is ultimately why it sticks the landing,” Loftus wrote in her review. “It’s an exhilarating ride with plenty of action thrills, but it’s primarily about the rare people in your life who will stick with you through thick and thin, have your back when life throws you for a loop, and even jump off a moving train with you while evading assassins.”

Advertisement

With that said, as Ride or Die continues to find its viewers with just a few days since its release, the series is proving that it has the perfect combination of action, humor, and heartfelt character dynamics. By balancing entertaining storylines with a friendship that feels authentic, the show offers something more memorable than a standard spy thriller, or a silly comedy for that matter, and proves that strong character relationships can be just as important, and binge-worthy, as explosive action.


Advertisement


Release Date
Advertisement

2026 – 2026-00-00

Network

Prime Video

Advertisement

Showrunner

Matt Miller

Advertisement

Directors

Peyton Reed, Lauren Wolkstein, DeMane Davis, Allison Liddi-Brown

Writers
Advertisement

Tessa Coates

Advertisement

Advertisement


Advertisement

Source link

Advertisement

You must be logged in to post a comment Login

Leave a Reply

Cancel reply

Trending

Exit mobile version