5 must-watch movies & TV shows streaming right now

Welcome to Boston.com’s weekly streaming guide. Each week, we recommend five must-watch movies and TV shows available on streaming platforms like Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime, Disney+, HBO Max, Peacock, Paramount+, and more.

Many recommendations are for new shows, while others are for under-the-radar releases you might have missed or classics that are about to depart a streaming service at the end of the month.

Have a new favorite movie or show you think we should know about? Let us know in the comments, or email [email protected]. Looking for even more great streaming options? Check out previous editions of our must-watch list here.

Movies

“Call Me by Your Name”

Earlier this week, I published a list of the 30 best movies on Netflix right now, offering picks for basically every genre and mood to help guide your weekend watching. One must-see title that recently returned to the streaming service is “Call Me by Your Name,” Luca Guadagnino’s 2017 coming-of-age film that perfectly captures the fleeting, intoxicating feeling of a summer romance. Precocious teen Elio (Timothée Chalamet) falls for confident grad assistant Oliver (Armie Hammer), who is staying with Elio’s family at their Northern Italy villa. Watching the film will leave you with a sense of yearning — whether it’s for the sun-drenched Italian countryside, the sumptuous dinner spreads, or a summer love of years gone by. Chalamet is transcendent, but don’t sleep on Michael Stuhlbarg (“A Serious Man”) as Elio’s knowing father.

How to watch: “Call Me by Your Name” is streaming on Netflix.

“Twister”

In terms of legacy sequels that simply had to get made, “Twisters,” a followup to 1996’s “Twister,” seems like it should’ve been pretty far down Hollywood’s priority list. (After watching the film earlier this week, I’d argue that Hollywood should have left this IP alone.) Instead of wasting your money and time at the theater this weekend, take the Jan de Bont-directed original for a spin instead. Helen Hunt plays Jo Harding, a storm chaser driven by childhood tragedy to create technology that will help learn more about tornadoes and (hopefully) save lives. Her estranged husband, played by Bill Paxton, shows up ahead of one such storm to try to get his divorce papers signed. But as the funnel crowd grows, so does the cranky chemistry between the two leads. “Twister” is by no means a modern classic, but the interplay between Hunt and Paxton plus the surprisingly deep cast of supporting actors (Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Alan Ruck, Jeremy Davies) make the film a worthy watch.

How to watch: “Twister” is streaming on Max.

TV

“Cobra Kai”

After five fabulous seasons of serialized storytelling, it feels like Season 6 of “Cobra Kai,” is finally moving toward a conclusion. Not right away, though — Netflix is splitting the final season of this “Karate Kid” spinoff into three parts, and quite frankly, the first part left me wanting more until the very last of the five episodes. Johnny (William Zabka) and Daniel (Ralph Macchio) have merged their dojos and are preparing for a world karate tournament, and must go about deciding which of their young disciples should represent the Miyagi-do and Eagle Fang Karate dojos. There’s definitely potential for more exciting things to happen as the series wraps up, especially with a major cliffhanger we won’t spoil here, but teasing this story out into three parts might be stretching things a bit.

How to watch: “Cobra Kai” Season 6 is streaming on Netflix.

“Lady in the Lake”

Having only watched the first two episodes so far (other critics have seen all seven), I’m cautiously intrigued by “Lady in the Lake,” a 1960s murder mystery featuring Natalie Portman in her maiden leap from the big screen to the small one. Based on the 2019 Laura Lippman novel of the same name, Portman plays Maddie Schwartz, an unhappy Jewish housewife who leaves her husband (Brett Gelman) to pursue a career as a muckraking journalist in highly segregated 1960s Baltimore. Portman begins untangling two unsolved murders, one involving an 11-year-old Jewish girl and the other a Black activist and single mother named Cleo Sherwood (Moses Ingram). Cleo rises from the dead, so to speak, telling us her life story through disembodied narration, and we see how Cleo and Maddie’s respective paths mirror each other. There’s a chance all of this timeline-jumping will fall apart, but for now, I’m interested in watching more.

How to watch: “Lady in the Lake” is streaming on Apple TV+.

“Those About to Die”

Roland Emmerich has directed of cinema’s most beloved disaster films (“Independence Day,” “The Day After Tomorrow”) and many of its least essential (“Moonfall,” “Independence Day: Resurgence”). But even at his most incoherent, Emmerich is a master of spectacle. With the debut of his first TV series, the swords-and-sandals series “Those About To Die,” many of the German director’s hallmarks are on display, including wooden dialogue and garish CGI. Tenax (Iwan Rheon, “Game of Thrones”) is our guide, an orphan who has learned the ways of Rome’s streets and his trying to make his way in the cutthroat world of chariot racing. Your mileage may vary, but “Those About to Die” is exactly the type of trash TV I’ll gladly consume while waiting for “Gladiator 2” to hit theaters this fall.

How to watch: “Those About to Die” is streaming on Peacock.