Netflix Picks - 13th February 2015

The Weekend is here once again, frustrated you can’t enter Mr Grey’s room or just want to chill out over the weekend, check out our picks for Netflix Picks 13th February…..

New to Netflix – Better Call Saul

The highly anticipated spin-off of Breaking Bad, Better Call Saul, is now available to watch on Netflix. The series is set in Saul’s early days, when he was known as Jimmy McGill, the public defender, talking his way out of anything like he usually does. The show has been compared more to Men than Breaking Bad, which shows Vince Gilligan isn’t just trying to drag out the success of the critically-acclaimed series that finished in 2013, rather he is creating a new show, giving us an insight into an enigmatic, and incredibly funny, character that we didn’t get to see enough of before. We see Saul in the present day, working at Cinnabon, paranoid and reclusive and then in 2002, where Jimmy is underpaid and doesn’t have many prospects in his role of ‘Albuquerque public defender’, as he struggles to get clients and pay for parking tickets. It is definitely worth the watch if you were a fan of Breaking Bad and want to see the world that shaped Saul Goodman into the smooth-talking, world-weary criminal lawyer he was when Walter and Jesse met him. Read Our Review: Episode One

Horror Film – Friday the 13th: Part VI – Jason Lives

Since it’s Friday the 13th, it only seems fitting to watch a Jason Vorhees slasher! Netflix has a few Friday the 13th films to pick from, but one of the best is part 6 – Jason Lives. Tommy Jarvis (played by Thom Matthews), who killed Jason when they were younger, accidentally manages to resurrect Jason’s corpse by impaling him with a metal pole which is then struck by lightning. Jason wakes as a supernatural zombie and taunts the locals of Camp Crystal Lake once again, which is now renamed as Camp Forest Green, in hopes of ridding Jason’s curse. The script is quite witty and has some entertaining characters, as well as a number of gruesome deaths. This film is great if you enjoy a bit of senseless horror and want to see the Friday the 13th franchise dragged on beyond reason (there’s a few more afterwards as well!).

Classic Series – That 70s Show

The series that began the careers of a number of actors and actresses seen on screens today, That 70s Show, is now in its entirety on Netflix. Set in the days of Nixon’s presidency, Led Zeppelin, and big hair-dos, this comedy follows Eric Foreman, played by Topher Grace, and his gang of friends trying to survive adolescence in 1970s Wisconsin. Amongst his friends are a young Mila Kunis, Ashton Kutcher, Laura Prepon (who recently found fame with the Netflix original ‘Orange is the New Black’) and Wilmer Valderrama (playing the foreign exchange student, Fez). Eric’s parents, played by Kurtwood Smith and Debra Jo Rupp, are quintessentially 70s – fulfilling the roles of extremely strict father and overprotective mother. This coming-of-age show spanned 8 seasons and hardly leaves Eric Foreman’s basement, yet remains wildly funny and entertaining.

Guilty Pleasure – Date Movie

Yes, it’s one of those films, directed by Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer – featuring an overweight Alyson Hannigan, with no boyfriend (which of course is the be-all-and-end-all of date movies), however after being made beautiful and thin by the guys at ‘Pimp My Ride’, she ends up with a Hugh Grant impersonator for a boyfriend, Grant, who has a crazy family and a hot ex-girlfriend. Jennifer Coolidge parodies Barbara Streisand’s role in Meet the Parents excellently, and there are appearances from Eddie Griffin, Carmen Electra and rapper Lil Jon. Prepare yourself for a flatulent cat, plenty of toilet humour and terrible pop references, but if you’re in need of an alternative to the soppy Valentine’s Day Rom-Coms this year, then Date Movie is the film for you. If you want to read more about Date Movie and why Friedberg and Seltzer’s films are my guilty pleasure then read my feature here.