Maika Monroe has been making movies since 2012. She’s worked her way up through supporting roles, some absolute stinkers (we’re looking at you Independence Day: Resurgence), and in 2026, she had her biggest role yet as the star of the wildly popular Reminders of Him. Still, horror has always been the sweet spot for Monroe.

Recently, she was the villain in Hulu’s The Hand that Rocks the Cradle reboot, she had viewers weeping in her short film spot for Resident Evil Requiem: Evil Has Always Had a Name video game, and soon, she’ll be starring in Victorian Psycho. Over the last decade plus, Monroe has become a scream queen. These eight films are among her best, and two are in the running for the best horror films of the 21st century.

8

‘Greta’ (2018)

Image via Focus Features

Co-written and directed by Neil Jordan, Greta stars Isabelle Huppert in the titular role, a piano teacher in New York City whose lost bag is returned to her by the lonely Frances (Chloë Grace Moretz). The two women bond and become friends, until Frances discovers that Greta might not be as nice and trustworthy as she first thought. The strange woman turns her sights on Frances and her friend Erica (Monroe) in a creepy game of obsession.

Huppert and Moretz are the stars of Greta, but Maika Monroe has an integral role, especially when it comes to the strength she shows in the shocking third act. It’s a silly, over-the-top movie at times, but the talent of Monroe and others keeps it from falling apart. This isn’t one of her best movies, but it shows what she can overcome with a lacking script.

7

‘Tau’ (2018)

Image Via Netflix

The same year Greta was released, Monroe landed the lead role in the Netflix film Tau. Directed by Federico D’Alessandro and co-starring Ed Skrein and the one and only Gary Oldman, our scream queen plays Julia, a woman kidnapped by Skrein’s Alex, a tech wizard who just so happens to be crazy too. How so? He keeps Julia trapped in his smart house, where an AI bot named Tau (Goldman) uses its unwilling human hosts to develop a more lifelike consciousness.

Tau is held back by an unrealistic plot filled with stereotypes. It’s a flawed film, but it’s Monroe doing what she does best as the woman pushed down by a man who must fight back and overcome if she’s to see another day. Having to spend many scenes acting alongside Goldman’s bodiless voice puts so much on Monroe, and she pulls it off.

6

‘Significant Other’ (2022)

Image via Paramount+

Significant Other, released on Paramount+, is hard to talk about without giving away the twist. Co-written and directed by Dan Berk and Robert Olsen, Monroe is Ruth, the girlfriend of Harry (Jack Lacy). Together, the struggling couple decides to go camping in the woods. Rather than running into some masked killer with a machete, they discover something more terrifying that will alter not just their lives but everyone’s.

Significant Other isn’t flawless, but it works by not telling you what’s going on. The viewer expects one type of movie and gets another. It’s part relationship drama, part sci-fi thriller, and part horror movie. Monroe carries it as the hero in a screenplay that only has a few characters to rely on. The film succeeds or fails on its lead. With Monroe in that position, this one is worth checking out.

5

‘Villains’ (2019)

Image via Gunpowder & Sky

Significant Other wasn’t the first time Monroe collaborated with Dan Berk and Robert Olsen — the trio actually worked together three years prior on the even better Villains. In the film, she is Jules, a lowly robber and the girlfriend of Bill Skarsgård‘s Mickey. You might think they’re the aforementioned villains of this movie when they break into what they think is an abandoned home, but when they find a tied-up girl in the basement, some much more terrifying antagonists are revealed.

More of a dark comedy than a straight-up horror thriller, the oddball approach might not be what some viewers are looking for, as you could argue that the silliness takes away from the tension of the plot. However, Monroe’s straightforward approach is by far the best part of Villains. She singlehandedly keeps it from floating away.

4

‘The Guest’ (2014)

Image via Picturehouse

2014 was the year of Maika Monroe and horror. We’ll get to the second film she made that year later, but first was The Guest. Directed by Adam Wingard, who also made You’re Next, Blair Witch, and two Godzilla vs Kong movies, Monroe is Anna Peterson, the sister of a man killed in the war in Afghanistan. They are surprised when one day a man named David (Dan Stephens), who says he was best friends with the brother, shows up at the family’s door out of the blue and ingrains himself in their lives. But is David who he says he is?

The Guest is a smart film, and Wingard creates an atmosphere reminiscent of iconic horror movies like Halloween and The Terminator, but Monroe isn’t a rehash of what Jamie Lee Curtis and Linda Hamilton established. Anna is the window into the plot as the character who notices something wrong with David long before anyone else does. If her family is going to survive, it will be because she takes the fight to their unwanted guest.

3

‘Watcher’ (2022)

Image via IFC Midnight

Written and directed by Chloe Okuno, Maika Monroe is the one to watch in Watcher. She stars as Julia, a lonely wife new to Romania. With her husband gone all the time, Julia is often alone. That turns very bad when she notices a man (Karl Glusman) watching her from another building. Creeped out, Julia begins to follow him, convinced that he might be a serial killer on the loose, even though everyone else thinks she’s losing it.

Once again, Monroe is the put-upon woman who is aware when others aren’t. She is easily convincing as the smart character through whom a story can be told. Julia is a sad and quiet woman, but she’s not about to cower from a threat. Watcher‘s third act is absolutely terrifying. If you’ve never seen it, check out what you’ve been missing. It’s Monroe as a true horror scream queen.

2

‘Longlegs’ (2024)

Image via Neon

Longlegs was the talk of the horror community in 2024 thanks to Nicolas Cage‘s wild performance as the titular serial killer in Osgood Perkins‘ masterpiece. In an homage to ’90s thrillers like The Silence of the Lambs, Monroe is a young FBI agent named Lee Harker. She has a special talent no one else in the bureau does and is able to track down the killer, who might just have her lined up to be his next victim.

There is quite a contrast between Cage and Monroe’s energy. As we’re accustomed to, the Academy Award-winning actor is a ball of chaos. Monroe’s character, however, is very subdued — a woman with a highly traumatic past who uses her gifts to help others, even though she can barely help herself. It’s so easy to look at her and see Jodie Foster’s Clarice Starling. And there’s no forgetting the scene when Longlegs and Harker first meet.

1

‘It Follows’ (2014)

Image via RADiUS-TWC

This is where Maika Monroe became an iconic final girl and truly started her scream queen journey. In It Follows, written and directed by David Robert Mitchell, Monroe is Jay, a college student whose life is changed for the worse when she goes on a seemingly innocent date, only to come face to face with an entity attached to her through a sexual transfer. For the entire movie, it slowly stalks its victim. Will Jay and her friends be able to escape?

It Follows feels like a tribute to movies like Halloween and A Nightmare on Elm Street, with a group of friends in the suburbs battling an impossible monster. Mitchell purposely keeps things a bit off-kilter, and Disasterpiece‘s score is unnerving. As the victim of the entity, this is Maika Monroe’s movie. She spends the last two acts screaming and running for her life, but never backing down from a foe no one else can see except for her. Thankfully, a sequel is finally happening with Maika Monroe returning. We can’t wait!

Season 15 of “The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills” is nearing its end, and the cast has already filmed the reunion. Now, after sitting down with her co-stars and host Andy Cohen to hash out their issues, Kyle Richards is opening up about it. In addition to Richards, the “RHOBH” season 15 cast stars Dorit Kemsley, Sutton Stracke, Erika Jayne, Bozoma Saint John, Amanda Frances, and Rachel Zoe.

Kathy Hilton and Jennifer Tilly are friends of the show.

Kyle Richards Opens Up About The ‘RHOBH’ Season 15 Reunion

Richards hosted one of her Amazon Live sessions in March 2026, where she not only discussed products she uses from the retail giant but also teased the “RHOBH” season 15 reunion. During the stream, someone asked her to rate how “bananas” the reunion was, but she said she couldn’t do it.

According to her, “I think it would depend on the person you would ask. Some people it may have been a seven, some people it was probably a 10.” The “RHOBH” star continued, “It was rough.”

Kyle Also Discussed The Drama With Erika Jayne And Dorit Kemsley

Richards went on to mention the issues that she and Jayne are currently having with Kemsley, noting that they were also addressed at the reunion. Of course, she didn’t say if there was a resolution.

She explained, “Because, you know, the situation with Dorit, Erika, and myself is hard because we care about each other, and it’s gotten so bad. It’s just very difficult. So that part was for me, the most difficult part.

Later, a fan asked Richards to use three words to describe the reunion. According to her, “Torture, infuriating, and sad. Traumatic, long, I’m adding some words.”

Fans Have Mixed Opinions Of Season 15

Season 15 of “The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills” premiered in December 2025. While the show has maintained good viewership, some fans have expressed concern over its quality. One of the most notable is actress Sarah Michelle Gellar, who appeared on Cohen’s “Radio Andy” in March 2026.

She stated in the clip that she felt the season was “slow” compared to others, but that it was “picking up.” In addition to Gellar, many viewers have made their feelings known on social media. One person said on Instagram, “It’s Kyle. Kyle is the problem. If she goes, it will allow the show to go in a new direction.”

Someone else said, “Dorit should go. In my opinion. Nothing fun about her. Boz too.” Another person stated, “Amanda needs to get the boot- love Rachel Zoe. She’s amazing.”

The ‘Housewives’ OG Recently Opened Up About Amanda Frances

Elsewhere in her Amazon Live session, a fan asked Richards if she believed Frances would return for season 16 or if she would be a “one and done.” The “RHOBH” OG responded in the clip, “You know what, people just sometimes are misunderstood, and she communicates differently.

She went on to joke that she had previously said Frances communicates like “a millennial,” which is one of the differences she has with the rest of the cast.

Richards then said, “She’s actually a smart girl. I know her business has come under scrutany but she’s successful.” From there, she noted that Frances had purchased her old home, as evidence of Frances’s intelligence.

A New Report Says ‘RHOBH’ May Be Revamped

As mentioned, some fans haven’t been happy with season 15 of “Real Housewives of Beverly Hills.” According to a new report shared by The Real Housewives Zone, Bravo may feel the same way about the show.

The insider claimed, “Production staff are scared of being fired after the poor reaction to the latest season [of Beverly Hillls]. Bravo execs are not happy with the quality of the show, and Evolution Media has been made aware, including Alex Baskin.”

They then discussed the cast in general, saying, “As great as Rachel Zoe is she hasn’t lifted the show. Viewer reaction to Amanda Frances has been poor, but if it wasn’t for her, the show would be in dire straits. If anything, Amanda has kept the show afloat this season, so there is a strong chance of her returning next season.”

The source concluded about the future of “RHOBH,” “Bravo has Evolution Media on notice right now, the show must improve next season, or heads will be on the chopping block, expect a big shock firing after the reunion!”

“The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills” airs on Bravo on Thursday nights. Fans can stream new episodes on Peacock the day after they air.

There is no bad blood between Netflix, Prince Harry, and Meghan Markle, at least that is what the streaming giant’s exec is saying.

Word from Netflix’s headquarters is that all is well when it comes to their relationship with the former working royals who inked a deal with them after their exodus from the United Kingdom to America in 2020.

Meghan Markle announced earlier in March that her lifestyle brand “As Ever” was ending its partnership with Netflix to become an independent venture with possible roots in multiple countries outside America.

Netflix Exec Claims There Are Movies In The Works With Prince Harry And Meghan Markle

The streaming company’s executive, Bela Bajaria, disputed earlier claims made by news outlets that things went sour between the business partners after their joint interview with Oprah Winfrey in 2021 and Harry’s 2023 memoir “Spare.”

Bajaria, at the “Next on Netflix” event on March 18, debunked these reports and urged people not to believe everything in the news, especially if a little fact-checking can help clear all the doubts. The company’s Chief Content Officer added that Netflix still has a very great working relationship with the couple and talks about movie development, which has been ongoing for a while now.

Bajaria referred to the couple’s amazing documentary with Netflix, which was their first-ever project with the company. As shared by PEOPLE, Bajaria assured everyone that everywhere is buzzing for the couple, both on the TV and film side, adding, “Deals come and go all the time. There are deals that are deals we don’t renew.”

What Was The Alleged Inside Scoop From Netflix About?

According to Variety, six highly connected personalities within the company who are aware of the deals between Netflix and the Sussexes confirmed that there is more than meets the eye when it comes to their relationship. 

Describing it as majorly optics, the sources noted that Netflix got tired of selling repackaged versions of the same story, which is often about their exit from the royal world. The low ratings from some of their joint projects over the years did not help, as the company reportedly became doubtful of e-commerce being their best shot at anything fruitful with the royal couple.

Three insiders from Netflix reportedly confirmed that Netflix chief Ted Sarandos has had enough with the pair and has voiced his frustration directly to the Co-CEO about their projects. Bajaria was also mentioned in the discussion, as she has grown very tired of their partnership with the couple. 

Netflix Spokesperson Denies The ‘Absolutely Inaccurate’ Stories From The Sources

Aside from her comment at the event about the fate of the couple with Netflix, Bajaria also earlier reacted to the Variety story. In her words, Harry and Meghan’s company, Archewell, has been a very thoughtful and collaborative partner who has made their partnership awesome. “They’re deeply engaged in the storytelling process and bring a unique, global perspective that aligns with the kinds of impactful projects our members respond to,” the executive added.

More close sources in Netflix also added that Sarandos and his wife, Nicole Avant, are frequent callers at Meghan and Harry’s social circle, in addition to their proximity as neighbors in Montecito. The Sussexes’ lawyer, Michael J. Kump, also debunked claims that the Netflix chief is insisting on only holding meetings with the couple in the presence of an attorney.

Last August, a second set of episodes from “With Love, Meghan” performed poorly compared to the first round. The company also reportedly sat on a surplus of products from “As Ever,” reaching up to $10 million in value, and the company had to start giving inventory to employees for free, and put the goods on card tables in various office buildings.

The Duchess Is Reportedly Eyeing An Independent Frontier For Her Brand

Following the end of their partnership, The Blast shared that the company and Netflix agreed on their respective problems, and their decision to part ways was an amicable one with lots of good wishes for everyone involved. Netflix wished the Duchess of Sussex well in her new endeavors with the brand, noting that it was proud to have been involved in the early stage of the brand’s development.

“As it was always intended, Meghan will continue growing the brand and take it into its next chapter independently, and we look forward to celebrating how she continues to bring joy to households around the world,” Netflix added. A statement from the former actress noted that her business witnessed immense growth in just one year with Netflix, and this has fueled their confidence to move ahead on its own and expand its wings to other areas.

Meghan Markle’s Camp Addressed Expansion Speculations

The “Suits” actress’ current standing with Netflix fueled rumors that the media personality has her eyes on expanding to other continents, especially as news dropped that she would be touring Australia alongside her husband in a few months.

As stated by The Blast, the speculations stated that she was looking to sell her brand in Australia rather than in the United Kingdom due to the tense relationship between herself and the royal family. However, a spokesperson for the brand affirmed to the press that while the team is strongly considering growth and international expansion, the direction and timeline to unleash the plan is yet to be determined.

The source shared that breaking into a new market is a process, and the brand knows this, but it is excited to grow in that direction and is strongly considering it in the future. Meghan launched the lifestyle brand in April 2025 in the United States, and the products dropped in conjunction with the first season of the former actress’s lifestyle series “With Love, Meghan” on Netflix.

Will the rumors about Meghan Markle, Prince Harry, and Netflix slow down now?

Spanish authorities have confirmed that the body they found on Thursday, March 19, does in fact belong to University of Alabama student James “Jimmy” Gracey.

The remains were discovered in the Somorrostro section of Barcelona, where Gracey had disappeared the morning of Tuesday, March 17, following a night out with friends who are studying abroad.

Gracey’s body was found not far from the popular beachside club where the 20-year-old was captured by surveillance cameras as left with an unknown individual.

At this point, investigators are handling Gracey’s death as an accident, and said there is nothing to suggest foul play in this case.

Gracey was last seen on March 17 at around 3 a.m. outside Shôko nightclub in the Port Olímpic area.

Gracey, who was known as Jimmy to friends and family, was last seen wearing a white T-shirt, dark pants, and a gold chain with a rhinestone-encrusted cross.

Related: Police Charge a Tennessee Woman With Her Girlfriend’s Murder

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A Tennessee woman went from person of interest to alleged killer soon after being questioned by police about the shooting death of her girlfriend, Us Weekly has learned. The body of Gracey Adams, 25, was found the morning of Saturday, January 3, in Nashville. Adams was found shot to death in her bedroom, Nashville Police […]

As friends were ready to go home, Gracey reportedly stayed behind at the club.

The Illinois native never made it back to his Airbnb, according to his mother, Therese Marren Gracey, who shared a Facebook post on Tuesday, March 17, about her missing son.

“My son is a university of Alabama student who is visiting friends in Barcelona who are studying abroad,” reads the missing man’s mother’s post, which was shared to a Students in Barcelona 2026 Facebook group. “They went to Shoko last night. … But he didn’t make it back to the air bnb. Has anyone seen him?”

Police have not said when Gracey first arrived in Barcelona, but relatives had noted he was due to return to the states on Saturday, March 21.

Gracey’s father had flown over to Spain on Wednesday, March 18, to assist police in any way he could.

It was unclear what method the police employed to confirm the body was Gracey’s.

There have been questions surrounding the location of Gracey’s phone, after Therese initially announced that police had found it soon after he vanished. However, investigators said they couldn’t confirm either way if they had the device in their possession.

A University of Alabama spokesperson could not be reached for comment on Gracey’s death.

Gracey had announced back in the fall that he had been elected to serve as the chaplain of the Alpha Phi Chapter of the Theta Chi fraternity.

Gracey was the nephew of CNN senior producer David Gracey, according to CNN and statements his family have made.

Funeral arrangements for Gracey had not been announced by press time.

Perfection in movies is a dangerous word, which is exactly why I like using it. It makes people uncomfortable. Good. It should. Because the second you call a film perfect, you are not just saying it is well-made. You are saying it leaves no dead space in your mind. You are saying it completely knows what it is, what it wants, how it should feel, how long it should withhold, when it should wound you, when it should turn the knife, and when it should mercifully stop.

And the last 15 years have given us more of these than people admit. Not just great films, not just awards-season darlings, not just movies that start discourse and then quietly age into respectable shelf pieces. I mean movies that feel terrifyingly complete. Movies that hit with such authority that every scene seems inevitable in retrospect, even when it blindsides you in the moment. These ten films do not resemble one another much on the surface. And that’s why this list would be bitter because perfection is not one tone.

10

‘The Banshees of Inisherin’ (2022)

Image via Searchlight Pictures

I love movies that sound small when you describe them badly. It’s about one man suddenly deciding he doesn’t want to be friends with another man anymore. Fine. That is technically true. It is also nowhere near enough. The Banshees of Inisherin is one of the cruelest, saddest, funniest films of the last 15 years because it understands that rejection can feel apocalyptic when it arrives without language you can live with.

The film follows Pádraic (Colin Farrell) who cannot absorb what is happening because he is a decent, limited, open-faced man who believes niceness is still enough to hold a life together. Farrell plays him with such naked confusion and injury that the film gets under your skin almost immediately. Then there is Colm (Brendan Gleeson), played as a man who has been overtaken by a grim, almost embarrassing panic about mortality and artistic worth. That is why the film is so good. It never lets either side become easy. Colm is cruel, yes, but he is not fake. Pádraic is lovable, yes, but he is not purely innocent either. Everyone bleeds. Everyone diminishes. Everyone hardens.

9

‘Mad Max: Fury Road’ (2015)

Image via Warner Bros. Pictures

There are movies with momentum, and then there is Mad Max: Fury Road, which feels like it has escaped from the laws that normally govern filmmaking. It does not move. It detonates forward. It is one of the few films of the last 15 years that made me feel, while watching it, that cinema as a physical medium was still capable of embarrassing almost everything else around it. What George Miller does here should be impossible. This movie is essentially one long chase, then a turn, then another chase, and somehow every minute of it feels newly invented.

And beneath the chrome and fire and sand and screaming engines, the film has something a lot of action masterpieces do not: anguish. Furiosa (Charlize Theron) gives the whole thing a human center strong enough to carry its mythic scale. Her hope is not abstract. Her grief is not decorative. That is why I think Mad Max: Fury Road is perfect. It’s better than its ancestors. And in addition to being technically jaw-dropping. It has moral velocity too. It knows exactly what this world is built on — ownership, rape, hoarding, domination and it turns a chase movie into a liberation movie without ever losing one ounce of speed.

8

‘Oppenheimer’ (2023)

Image via Universal Pictures

I know people want to reduce Oppenheimer to an important biopic but make it loud, and I honestly think that reading misses how unnervingly specific the film is. This is not a cradle-to-grave prestige movie in the safe old sense. It is an engine of obsession, ego, paranoia, guilt, power, and self-mythology, built around a man brilliant enough to split the world open and vain enough to imagine he might still be able to control what that meant afterward.

Cillian Murphy’s performance is the reason the film has real poison in it. He plays Oppenheimer as a man whose mind is always running ahead of ordinary emotional behavior, a man whose brilliance becomes inseparable from vanity, and whose guilt is real but never pure. That matters. The Trinity test sequence is staggering not simply because of the explosion, but because of the unbearable silence before the sound finally arrives. That delay feels like history inhaling. And then the film keeps refusing relief. It will not let the bomb remain a triumph. It will not let political humiliation remain merely procedural. It ends where all truly great films about genius should end: with the horrible realization that achievement is not remotely the same thing as wisdom.

7

‘Saltburn’ (2023)

Image via Amazon MGM Studios

I do not care how divisive this movie is. Or perhaps disgusting to some. I admire divisive movies when the division comes from nerve rather than incompetence, and Saltburn has nerve pouring out of its walls. Emerald Fennell made a film so intoxicated by envy, class desire, erotic humiliation, performance, and fantasy that people mistook its excess for a lack of control. I think the opposite. I think it knows exactly how poisonous and ridiculous it wants to be.

What makes Saltburn so alive is that it understands yearning can be disgusting. Not in a moralizing way. In a human way. Oliver (Barry Keoghan) is given such watchful, craving, shape-shifting intensity that every scene turns into a question of appetite. Is he desperate to belong? To possess? To imitate? To consume? The answer is yes, and the movie is smart enough to know those distinctions blur when class desire gets eroticized. Felix (Jacob Elordi), in contrast, is not just the object of fascination; he is the kind of beautiful, careless center around which less powerful people destroy themselves while pretending they are merely in love with a lifestyle. That is one reason the film lands so hard. And yes, the movie is outrageous. It should be. This is a movie about rot in silk gloves.

6

‘Parasite’ (2019)

Image via NEON

Some movies become instant classics because they are widely admired. Parasite became one because it is a trap that snaps shut more brutally each time you revisit it. The first time, you’re dazzled by how sharp, funny, and fluid it is. The second time, you realize the whole thing was already wired for disaster from the beginning. The third time, it starts to feel almost cruel in how perfectly it manages tone.

The Kim family are funny, loving, cunning, selfish, desperate, and inventive. The wealthy family are not cartoon demons. The film is too honest for that. Everyone exists inside a structure that has already arranged dignity unequally. The architecture of the house matters. The stairs matter. The smell matters. The weather matters. The basement matters. Every detail hardens into fate. The birthday party climax is amazing. The ending is devastating. Parasite refuses the fantasy it knows you want. It lets hope appear just long enough to expose how expensive hope is under a system built to keep people in place. That is not just great filmmaking. That is ruthless intelligence.

5

‘The Zone of Interest’ (2023)

Image via A24

I have very rarely left a movie feeling as sick, stunned, and morally scraped raw as I did after The Zone of Interest. This is not a Holocaust film in the conventional dramatic sense, and that is exactly why it is so horrifying. What the film does with sound should be studied forever. You hear the camp more than you see it. Screams, gunshots, machinery, dogs, distant terror, the whole sonic environment is contaminated. And yet the family at the center of the film keep gardening, eating, planning, swimming, hosting, arranging. That is the film’s unbearable thesis: human beings can normalize almost anything if it preserves comfort and status.

Hedwig Höss (Sandra Hüller) is committed to her home, her space, her little kingdom of domestic pride. Instead of a theatrical monster, her normality is horror. Rudolf Höss (Christian Friedel), meanwhile, moves through administrative evil with the deadness of a man who has professionalized his soul into absence. The Zone of Interest is perfect because it does not try to emotionally instruct you in the usual way. It does something braver and more punishing.

4

‘Whiplash’ (2014)

Image via Sony Pictures Classics

I have almost no patience for people who reduce Whiplash to an intense drumming movie. That’s like calling a knife fight a conversation about kitchen utensils. Whiplash is one of the great obsession films because it understands that ambition can feel holy and degrading at the same time. It understands the sick thrill of being told you might be special, and the even sicker thrill of enduring abuse because some part of you believes greatness might be hiding on the other side of it.

Andrew (Miles Teller) is ambitious enough to accept a warped value system if it gets him closer to transcendence. That is what makes the film so tense. You are not watching a young artist being brutalized. That’s a loser mindset. You are watching him collaborate with that brutality because he wants what it promises. And Fletcher (J.K. Simmons) — good lord. He is terrifying because the movie understands charisma can attach itself to cruelty when institutions keep rewarding results. He knows exactly how to weaponize shame, uncertainty, and the myth of genius. Every scene with him feels like someone tightening a wire around your throat. And yes, teachers like him aren’t really ideal in real life. But what if they are? That’s what iWhiplash leaves you with.

3

‘The Worst Person in the World’ (2021)

Image via Neon

The Worst Person in the World refuses to simplify a kind of confusion that lesser films either romanticize or condescend to. Julie (Renate Reinsve) is not a symbol of modern aimlessness. She is not a cautionary tale, not a quirky disaster, not a generation think-piece with cute haircuts. She is a person whose inner life keeps outrunning the identities available to her, and the film treats that instability not as a joke or flaw to correct, but as something intimate, painful, and achingly recognizable.

The film’s structure is part of its magic. It moves in chapters, digressions, bursts of fantasy, erotic shifts, and emotional recalibrations that somehow feel both playful and inevitable. The frozen-city sequence is one of the most intoxicating romantic gestures of the last decade, and the movie is wise enough not to let that intoxication become the whole truth. Life keeps arriving after the rush. Bodies change. Time advances. People become memories while they are still alive. And then, quietly, the film becomes devastating.

2

‘Aftersun’ (2022)

Image via A24

Some films break your heart in the scene you are watching. Aftersun does something much crueler. It lets the heartbreak gather invisibly until you realize, too late, that the entire movie has been building an emotional truth you can no longer defend yourself against. That delayed devastation is part of why I think it’s one of the most perfect films of the last 15 years. On the surface, so little happens. A father and daughter go on holiday. They swim, talk, wander, laugh, play, drift.

But that’s the film reconstructing the way memory clings to textures, glances, awkward silences, cheap camcorder footage, half-heard remarks, and emotional absences you were too young to interpret in the moment. Calum (Paul Mescal) is one of the most beautiful performances I have ever seen because Mescal never forces the tragedy. Calum is loving, playful, trying, attentive, and yet always slightly elsewhere, as if some part of him is unreachable even when he is physically present. Sophie (Frankie Corio) is just as essential, because her love for him is total in the uncomplicated way children can love before they understand adult damage. A heads up though: this is a sad film and it will break you.

1

‘Portrait of a Lady on Fire’ (2019)

Image via Pyramide Films

I do not think Portrait of a Lady on Fire is just the most perfect movie of the last 15 years. I think it is one of the most perfect films ever made, period. There is not a false note in it. Not one rushed beat, not one sentimental shortcut, not one lazy line, not one visual choice that feels merely decorative. Every scene breathes with intention. Every silence means something. Every look is earned.

Marianne (Noémie Merlant) and Héloïse (Adèle Haenel) are astonishing. They are intelligent women feeling their way toward each other through caution, curiosity, resistance, and recognition. The film respects their minds as much as their longing. That matters. And then the film keeps getting deeper. The abortion subplot is handled with such calm humanity that it broadens the film’s entire moral world. The nighttime fire sequence feels like a vision. The first time Héloïse says “Turn around,” the movie practically changes temperature. And the ending. God, the ending. The final concert scene is one of the greatest endings I have ever seen — memory can be both consolation and renewed violence.

It’s a little strange, honestly, how easy Bosch is to overlook. Not because it’s small — seven seasons isn’t small, and neither is spinning off into two (now three) additional series — but because it never really behaves like the kind of show that demands attention. No massive twists engineered for social media, no constant reinvention, it just keeps going, and, somewhere along the way, it got better than most of the shows that made a lot more noise.

What started on Prime Video as a fairly traditional adaptation of Michael Connelly’s novels has quietly grown into a full-blown franchise — Bosch, Bosch: Legacy, and Ballard—that feels less like a collection of shows and more like one long, continuous story that just refuses to end.

What Is the ‘Bosch’ Franchise About on Prime Video?

Image via Amazon MGM

At a glance, it’s familiar territory: a homicide detective in Los Angeles has a string of cases that never quite stay contained. You’ve seen versions of this before, but Bosch — anchored by Titus Welliver — leans into something a little less flashy and a lot more patient. Cases don’t wrap up neatly, personal baggage doesn’t conveniently disappear, and connections will lead to other connections, or sometimes to something from long ago that is more chaotic. This show asks the viewer to sit with it, which, to be honest, isn’t the standard (or typical) of a working-class investigation show.

The earlier, slower pace had potential viewers confused at times. The first season got tagged as solid but conventional — well-acted, well-constructed, maybe a bit too comfortable. And yeah, at the time, that wasn’t entirely wrong. It did feel like it was playing within the lines. But here’s the thing — those lines start to blur the longer you stick with it.

By the later seasons, the show isn’t trying to impress you anymore, and it just settles in. As the writing gets tighter, and the characters get more complex, Los Angeles starts taking over the whole room, being dirty, large, uncontrollable, and by far the most influential character. The change in how you think about the city is usually a gradual change and stays below your radar.

How ‘Bosch: Legacy’ and ‘Ballard’ Expand the Prime Video Universe

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This is usually where things fall apart: spinoffs have a habit of stretching a good idea until it snaps. You can almost feel when a franchise is running on fumes, but that’s not what’s happening here. Bosch: Legacy doesn’t reinvent anything; it just moves the camera. Bosch himself steps into a different phase of his life, while Maddie (Madison Lintz) takes on a bigger role, and suddenly the world feels wider without losing its center. It’s still recognizably Bosch. Same tone, same pacing, same refusal to rush.

Then Ballard comes in — led by Maggie Q — and, on paper, it shouldn’t feel as seamless as it does with its new lead, new perspective, and slightly different energy, but it works — surprisingly well, actually. The connective tissue is still there, even when Bosch himself is barely in the frame, and that’s probably the smartest thing the franchise has done: it lets other characters carry weight without pretending the original didn’t matter.

Most shows burn bright early and spend the rest of their run trying to get back to that peak; Bosch kind of does the opposite. It improves in ways that aren’t immediately obvious. The pacing gets more confident — slower, but more intentional, the dialogue relaxes a bit, feels like people actually talking (with all the messiness that comes with that). Even the cases themselves start to carry more weight because they linger rather than become bigger.

Will the Bosch Franchise Continue After ‘Ballard’? What’s Next

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At this point, it doesn’t feel like it’s slowing down; if anything, it’s doing the opposite. There’s a prequel series on the way (Bosch: Start of Watch), which — if we’re being honest — could go either way. Prequels are tricky because you already know where the character ends up, so the tension has to come from somewhere else. Still, given how carefully this franchise has handled everything so far, it’s hard to write it off completely.

And even as the focus shifts, Bosch himself hasn’t really gone anywhere. He’s still around, still popping in, still acting as the thread tying everything together. Not the center anymore, but not gone, either. Because of all the expansion, new faces, and shifting perspectives, the franchise hasn’t lost track of what made it work in the first place. It has gotten more comfortable sitting in its own lane and doing it better than most.

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Release Date

2015 – 2021-00-00

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Network

Prime Video

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Showrunner

Eric Ellis Overmyer

Directors

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Alex Zakrzewski, Ernest R. Dickerson, Patrick Cady, Aaron Lipstadt, Adam Davidson, Daisy von Scherler Mayer, Kevin Dowling, Neema Barnette, Tim Hunter, Zetna Fuentes, Christine Moore, Jim McKay, Laura Belsey, Matt Earl Beesley, Phil Abraham, Roxann Dawson, Sarah Pia Anderson, Stephen Gyllenhaal, Tara Nicole Weyr, Thomas Carter, Hagar Ben-Asher

Writers

Jeffrey Alan Fiskin, Tom Bernardo, Elle Johnson, John Mankiewicz, Shaz Bennett, Alex Meenehan, Katie Pyne, Osokwe Vasquez, Lolis Eric Elie, Jessica Kivnik, Mitzi Roberts

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