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Apple TV Plus: Best Shows And Movies To Watch

It might have arrived late to the streaming party, but Apple TV+ has some of the best shows around right now. Since Netflix and Prime Video had long staked their claim as streaming service giants with big-name talent and enormous catalogues, Tim Cook and co. had some serious catching up to do. Fast-forward a few years, and Apple TV+’s consistency in producing big, audacious, starry, singular television has earned it a reputation as one of the best destinations for high-quality streaming series and original movies. Its approach is different to Netflix’s – all original content, all the time, and seasons are never released all in one go – and its steady stream of acclaimed shows has snowballed, with must-watch episodes dropping almost every week.

Not sure what to watch next? Check out Empire’s hand-picked guide to the best series and movies on Apple TV+, featuring a wide array of stories to get stuck into – in no particular order, you’ll find epic book adaptations, cerebral sci-fi, heart-pounding thrillers, indie dramas, animated wonders, supernatural adventures, stunning documentaries and more waiting for you.

And if you’d like more streaming recommendations to help you make the most of your subscriptions, you can read our lists of the best things on Disney+, and the best movies and TV shows on Netflix UK.

The Best Things To Watch On Apple TV+

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Bare white walls, endless maze-like hallways and awkward social interactions make up the curious world of Severance – one where office workers like Mark (Adam Scott), Irving (John Turturro) and newcomer Helly (Britt Lower) consent to a procedure that completely severs their work self from their personal one. It's a high-concept premise, delivered in a surreal, high-concept way. It might seem a little cold at first, but as the mystery of Lumon Industries unravels and we understand the implications of this most drastic approach to achieving work/life balance, Severance becomes an incredibly intriguing, unbearably tense ride, fleshed out with endlessly compelling characters. Plus, its final episode will leave you gasping for air, and very happy about the announcement of a second season.

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AKA The Little Movie That Could. Picked up by Apple for a record $25 million at the 2020 Sundance Film Festival, Siân Heder's CODA — which stands for Child Of Deaf Adults – catalogues the charm-filled story of Ruby Rossi (the excellent Emilia Jones), the lone hearing member of a deaf family who work on a fishing boat off the coast of Gloucester, Massachusetts. Ruby, though, has musical ambitions and a beautiful voice, and is encouraged by her music teacher, Mr. Villalobos (Eugenio Derbez). Soon, family commitments clash with choir practice, but the drama is never about petty issues. Adapted from French film La Famille Belier, CODA's secret weapon is Troy Kotsur and Marlee Matlin as Ruby's parents; passionate, funny, rude and never less than engaging. It went on to win three Oscars, including Best Picture.

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With a megawatt cast, lavish production values, and British filmmaking great Clio Barnard in the director's chair, The Essex Serpent is a prime example of how Apple TV+ is making its mark in the streaming world – going big with the budget, bringing in top-tier talent, and trusting its audience with slow-burn storytelling. Based on Sarah Perry's award-winning historical novel, The Essex Serpent stars Claire Danes as Cora, a newly-widowed naturalist drawn to Essex by rumours of a dangerous sea creature; Tom Hiddleston is William, a pastor who refuses to believe in the mythical titular serpent. Together they form an unlikely but deep bond, their romance eked out irresistibly against the backdrop of clashing morals, social panic and era-specific struggles. A gorgeous, Gothic delight that brought the genius of Barnard to the small screen.

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Apple's surprise jewel in the crown came out of seemingly nowhere, and proved something of a lifeline during the pandemic – momentarily keeping the doom scrolling at bay with its earnest portrayal of a bunch of people trying to do their best. Jason Sudeikis deserved (and got) all the awards as the moustachioed American football (or, 'soccer') coach tasked with shaking AFC Richmond into shape while wrestling with a messy porce. With football serving as more of a peripheral theme, Ted Lasso instead spotlights its band of charming, imperfect characters, from Brett Goldstein's foul-mouthed old-soul-with-a-heart-of-gold, Roy, to Juno Temple's peppy entrepreneurial model Keeley.

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Originally sparked by the compelling alt-history concept of Russia beating America to the Moon in the 1960s space race, For All Mankind spins its timeline in an ever-expanding arc away from ours as the world's boosted interest in space tech sparks societal change. Created by Star Trek and Battlestar Galactica veteran Ronald D. Moore – plus former Fargo writers Ben Nepi and Matt Wolpert – the show mixes riveting, scientifically-accurate space action with layered characters who age through the seasons and deal with their various dramas on Earth, which also leak into their work. It jumps ahead roughly a decade each season and in the current third run, the subject is the race for Mars. This is superior sci-fi – hailed by its devoted fans as the greatest show on right now that far too few people are watching.

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It only boasts a single Coen Brother behind the camera (Joel Coen, making his solo directorial debut), but this take on Shakespeare's king-killing classic is as deeply cinematic as you'd expect from one half of the all-time-great directing duo. The Tragedy Of Macbeth is stark, monochromatic Shakespeare – Coen really drawing out the horror in the Bard's tale of witchy prophecies and bloody betrayals with unsettling imagery and a doomy Carter Burwell score. Denzel Washington is masterful as ever as the monarch who murders his way to the top and soon begins to unravel, egged on by Frances McDormand's scheming Lady Macbeth. Elsewhere, the stacked cast includes the likes of Brendan Gleeson, Bertie Carvel, Corey Hawkins and Obi-Wan Kenobi's Moses Ingram – but the real standout is RSC veteran Kathryn Hunter, the theatrical contortionist who plays all three witches in a bravura performance of otherworldly, body-bending brilliance.

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Murder mysteries are enjoying something of a renaissance of late, and much like Rian Johnson's Knives Out, Christopher Miller's The Afterparty is a fun, fresh, highly entertaining take on the genre. Set during a school reunion that sees one of their classmates dead (the unbearable, Bieber-esque popstar Xavier, played impeccably by Dave Franco), a number of suspects including Aniq (Sam Richardson), Zoë (Zoë Chao), Yasper (Ben Schwartz), Chelsea (Ilana Glazer) and Brett (Ike Barinholtz) are questioned by Detective Danner (Tiffany Haddish) as she zeroes in on the culprit. The twist? Each person recounts their evening in a different genre – romcom, musical, animated, psychological thriller – giving every episode its own unique flavour, as well as playing out the whodunnit through-line. Haddish is having a whale of a time, Richardson marks himself as a wonderful leading man, and Jamie Demetriou is a scene-stealer as permanent outsider Walt. Don't be late to the (after)party.

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TV truly does not get more epic, emotional, or beautifully made than Pachinko. Adapted from Min Jin Lee's best-selling book, it tells the story of one family across several generations; in one thread, young Sunja (Kim Min-ha) uproots her life in rural Korea and moves to the urban, unwelcoming Japan; in another, she's much older (played by Oscar-winning Minari standout Youn Yuh-jung) and is visited by her ambitious banker grandson Salomon (Jin Ha), who's beginning to form a deeper connection with his family's past lives. As well as delivering an authentic depiction of the Korean immigrant experience during the Japanese occupation and its after-effects, Pachinko is a sweeping romance, an intense drama, and a simply stunning piece of filmmaking. Plus, it gives Peacemaker a run for its money for 2022's most fun title sequence.

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In one of his first roles post-Captain America, Chris Evans keeps the Infinity War-era beard (yay!) but puts in a very different turn – this time as a father having to defend his teen son Jacob (Jaeden Martell, perhaps best known for both chapters of IT) who's been accused of murdering schoolmate Ben. While Evans' Andy and his wife Laurie (Downton's Michelle Dockery) prepare to protect their family from the intense scrutiny of the media, the townsfolk, and the murder trial, they're left wrestling with the ultimate question: what if he did do it? Adapted from Williams Landay's novel into a standalone miniseries, Defending Jacob is a slick, star-studded thriller with all the twists and turns you'd expect given its page-turner origins, bolstered by an excellent supporting cast (JK Simmons! Cherry Jones! Get Out's Betty Gabriel!) and icy direction from Headhunters' Morten Tyldum.

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Documentaries about musicians aren't new, but recent years have seen an influx of films where some of the world's biggest popstars share their rawness and vulnerability in a more up-close-and-personal way than we've ever seen before – Lady Gaga's Five Foot Two, Taylor Swift's Miss Americana and Katy Perry's Part Of Me, to name a few. With Billie Eilish: The World's A Little Blurry, this closeness feels intensified. Director RJ Cutler followed the teenage pop phenomenon for almost two and a half years, charting the making and release of her album 'When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?' and her propulsion into superstardom, climaxing in her 2020 Grammy awards sweep. Juxtaposing sold-out concerts with the small childhood bedroom in which Billie and brother Finneas make their magic, The World's A Little Blurry is especially potent given it is, perhaps, the first film of its kind to focus on a star so familiar with living their life through a camera, with the lens of social media such an ingrained presence.

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If you like your sci-fi with a heavy side-portion of sobbing, writer-director Benjamin Cleary's feature debut Swan Song is as big on emotional weight as it is weighty ideas. Set in the not-too-distant future, Mahershala Ali plays terminally-ill man Cameron, who secretly takes himself away to a cloning facility where he can be replaced by an exact replica of himself without his family knowing, to save his wife (Naomie Harris) and young son the grief of losing him. But while he's there, he wrestles with what it'll truly mean to die, to be replaced, and to deny his loved ones the chance of knowing he's really gone (or will he actually be gone?). Ali is astonishing in a double performance, while Glenn Close and Awkwafina bring heft in supporting roles as the director of the cloning facility and a fellow patient respectively. Beautifully done – but bring tissues.

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If Jurassic World Dominion didn't quite give you the dinosaurs-in-the-wild rush that you hoped for, then Prehistoric Planet will delight you. Anyone who fondly remembers BBC favourites Walking With Dinosaurs and Walking With Beasts will get a huge kick out of this series, which takes the same dino-doc premise and ups the ante with contemporary science (feathered dinosaurs!), photo-real visual effects, and the likes of Jon Favreau, David Attenborough, and Hans Zimmer (as executive producer, narrator, and composer respectively) on board. Across five episodes, the series portrays slices of dino-life in a documentary style – depicting turkey-like Velociraptors prowling for prey on cliffs, broody Quetzalcoatlus' protecting their nests, and T-rexes swimming to find a new home. Yes, swimming. The science is mind-blowing, the presentation utterly believable, the effect entirely enchanting.

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48-year-old film director Alice (Ayelet Zurer), hit by professional ennui, is lured out of retirement by young screenwriter Sophie (Lihi Kornowski), who by chance has written a script that will star Alice's husband (Gal Toren). On paper, this premise for Losing Alice sounds like we are deep in Nicole Holofcener country but, when Alice agrees to take the reigns after the initial director has mysteriously disappeared, it sets in motion a nexus of intrigue, distrust and the blurring of every kind of boundary (witness Alice directing her husband in a sex scene with Sophie). Writer-director Sigal Avin's eight-part Israeli series injects class into the psychological thriller genre, spinning twist and turns without any of the cheese of Netflix. At once beautifully shot yet slightly off-kilter, the whole thing is perfectly anchored by Zurer (Munich, Angels & Demons, Superman's mum in Man Of Steel), who can spin suspicion, over-sensitivity and cunning on a dime.

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One can only imagine the meeting in which Steven Knight pitched this post-apocalyptic sci-fi drama in which everyone in the world is blind and a mad queen wank-prays furiously before sending out witchfinders in search of sighted folk. However, despite its gonzo premise, the Peaky Blinders creator struck gold with See, with its rich world-building, inspired blind-fighting and engaging generational character drama. Shot on location in the Canadian wilds, every frame is stunning and Jason Momoa has created a hero for the ages in lethal paterfamilias Baba Voss. Watch it for the masturbatory piety; watch it for an epic Season 2 face off with Dave Bautista; watch it for the chance to witness a blind Momoa punch a grizzly bear. But watch it you must.

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We're glad that Tomm Moore, Ross Stewart and the Cartoon Saloon's latest animated treasure got the chance to reach a decent audience, even if it perhaps deserved a delay until it could have a cinematic release. The studio's conclusion to its Irish Folklore Trilogy, Wolfwalkers is another hand-crafted delight, with this one set in the 17th century days of England's encroaching on Ireland's forests. A young hunter's daughter, the rebellious Robyn Goodfellowe (voiced by Honor Kneafsey), meets one of the Wolfwalkers of the title, a troublemaker named Mebh (Eva Whittaker) whose spirit becomes a wolf when she sleeps. It's a touching coming-of-age tale blended with a trenchant look at colonialism and adventure, but mostly this is just a gloriously animated fairytale with bags of imagination and style to spare.

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Astonishing actor, chart-topping singer, Oscar-nominated at just 15 – to say Hailee Steinfeld is an overachiever is one hell of an understatement. With Dickinson, she embodies revered American poet Emily Dickinson in her youth. A genius who was underappreciated in her own time, the series charts her grappling with her talents, her identity, and the kind of legacy she wishes to leave behind, expanding in scope in the final third season by exploring her relationship to the Civil War raging around her. Surreal sequences that take us inside Emily's imagination and a modern approach to the dialogue keep the period setting feeling fresh, as does the queer romantic longing between Emily and her sister-in-law Sue, played by Ella Hunt. It's a remarkable vehicle for one of the greatest young actors of her generation, which also features rapper Wiz Khalifa as the personification of Death. Sold.

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Isaac Asimov's Foundation books are mind-blowing, boundary-pushing, and overflowing with radical ideas. They are not, however, packed with compelling character drama. David Goyer's adaptation changes all that, finding ingenious ways to keep a constant cast of characters in a galaxy-spanning saga set over a thousand years. Lavishly-staged, with effects, set, and costume design your average blockbuster would kill for, it depicts a future in which mankind has become decadent and corrupt, with a vast galactic empire ruled by a triumvirate of revolving clones (Lee Pace's Brother Day being the MVP). Then, Jared Harris' scientist predicts the fall of the Empire, the dynasty, and civilisation as they know it with his mathematical algorithm. The basic premise barely scratches the surface of what Foundation truly is (Goyer is planning eight seasons to fully explore it), the decade-spanning time jumps can be discombobulating, and there's a whole plot thread that hinges on someone being secretly colourblind – but this is television writ large, as epic and ambitious as anything you've ever seen.

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Possibly the most Stephen King of all Stephen King TV or film adaptations, this complex eight-parter is entirely written by King himself, based on his own 2006 novel, dealing with the death of a hugely successful author (Clive Owen) and how the subsequent fallout affects his wife, Lisey (Julianne Moore), and their extended family. The main Misery-esque plot concerns a psychopathic obsessive fan (Dane DeHaan) who stalks Lisey, but the fractured narrative also goes down wild paths, including a bewildering mind palace called "Boo'ya Moon". It's not quite as great as a series directed by Pablo Larraín (Spencer), and shot by the legendary Darius Khondji, should be, but it's full of extraordinary moments.

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Rob McElhenney leaves the drunken debauchery of Always Sunny back in Philly for Mythic Quest, a very different, significantly sweeter workplace comedy. As Ian Grimm, Creative Director of a wildly popular video game studio, he channels the same all-front hyper-masculine energy as Mac, his Always Sunny character, but is balanced out by a melange of delightful, passionate oddballs. It's hard to pick a standout from the gang, which includes F. Murray Abraham as the eccentric head writer C.W. Longbottom or Community's Danny Pudi as the company's ruthless head of monetization. But as Poppy, Ian's lead engineer, Charlotte Nicdao soars above this talented ensemble as a peppy, snack-snaffling nerd on a constant mission to prove herself (mostly to herself).

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The history of Greyhound might sound a tad dry (a group of US Naval ships attempt to cross a U-boat-strewn stretch of the Atlantic during World War II), but Aaron Schneider's film is actually a pulse-pounding 90-minute action movie, avoiding getting bogged down in unnecessary detail and instead plumping for a slick and streamlined get-from-A-to-B survival thriller. At the centre of it all is the ever-calming presence of Tom Hanks (who, as a major war history buff, also wrote the screenplay here) playing Commander Ernest Krause, the Naval officer tasked with getting a convoy of Allied ships through treacherous waters with no air support, while enemy submersibles prowl under the surface ready to blow them to smithereens. His commanding performance and the clean staging of the aquatic action makes for a surprisingly gripping watch – hence Apple Studios pursuing a sequel.

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From the people who brought you Netflix's wonderful, gone-too-soon wrestling series GLOW, Roar is an anthology series of short, surreal stories, each exploring a facet of the female experience – including Nicole Kidman playing a woman who eats photographs, Alison Brie solving her own brutal murder, and Cynthia Erivo trying to 'have it all' and finding bite marks on her skin in the process. The feminist allegory underlying each episode is hardly subtle, but the stellar cast, variety in setup, sleek filmmaking, and pacy writing make each instalment extremely enjoyable – and no matter how on-the-nose the execution, there's always a certain satisfaction in seeing woman-led projects writ large, especially ones as experimental and interesting as Roar.

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It's sometimes seen as the anti-le Carré, but this show, adapted from Mick Herron's novel series, is more a natural descendant, blending dark, very British comedy with spy craft. Le Carré-on, then. Anchored by Gary Oldman playing every burping, farting note of chief agent Jackson Lamb, Slow Horses follows a group of MI5 types who've all screwed up in their careers and are banished to "Slough House": a scummy satellite office that sits far from the agency's top stars in their shiny Regent's Park base. And yet, this team gets things done, solving a tricky kidnapping case. A stacked cast (Jack Lowden, Saskia Reeves, Olivia Cooke, Kristin Scott Thomas and many more) ensure the performances match the sly scripts. It's hardly a shock that this one was renewed for seasons three and four recently.

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Morning TV in the States is a curious beast – a giant televisual industry that throws even the likes of the legendary Lorraine Kelly into shadow, like a Star Destroyer pulling alongside a rebel blockade runner. How much you enjoy The Morning Show might depend on whether you can tune in to its blend of occasional loopiness and serious issues. It doesn't always land, but when it does, it's a whole lot of fun. Jennifer Aniston and Reese Witherspoon are naturally great, though keep an eye out for the likes of Bel Powley and Mark Duplass in smaller roles. Plus, there's Billy Crudup as the scene-stealing executive Cory Ellison. Tackling real-world themes and creating characters you either love or hate, it's always an intensely entertaining watch.

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Cooper Raiff's Sundance hit sees wayward graduate Andrew (Raiff) return home with no idea what to do with himself. When a serendipitous trip to a bar mitzvah introduces him to Domino (Dakota Johnson) and her autistic daughter Lola (Vanessa Burghardt), Andrew finds a new lease on life, plus a new job as a "hype man" for the community party circuit. Raiff's astute observations of everyday life, paired with deeper emotional insight, make Cha Cha Real Smooth a sweet and tender watch, and marks the 25-year-old writer, director and actor as a rising star.

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Starring and produced by the mighty Samuel L Jackson and adapted from Walter Mosley's novel by the writer himself, this powerful six-part limited series has a deliberately off-kilter edge to the storytelling, dramatising the mental state of 91-year-old main character Ptolemy Grey (Jackson), who has dementia. When he's suddenly left without his nephew and trusted carer, orphaned teenager Robyn (Dominique Fishback) takes over the job, and Ptolemy signs up for an experimental treatment to restore his confused memories. Together they embark on a disturbing investigation into his nephew's death. Jackson is as brilliant as you'd expect, but Fishback is a revelation.

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Todd Haynes is no by-the-numbers filmmaker, and The Velvet Underground is no by-the-numbers rock doc. Rather than a standard soup-to-nuts story of Lou Reed and John Cale's avant-garde experimentalists, the Carol director mounts an impressionistic tour de force, using ever-present split screen to contrast interviews with adverts, newsreel, photographs and archive footage of the band. The approach is surprisingly cogent in giving you the history of the band — the formation, Warhol's Factory, the fights, the break-up — but also doubles as a compelling snapshot of a cultural moment. For, taken together with Haynes' glam-fest The Velvet Goldmine and oddball Dylan biopic I'm Not There, The Velvet Underground remembers a time when music, film and art came together, allowing the iconoclasts to become kings. The result is much more fun than any 'radical documentary' has the right to be.

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Based on the novel by Lauren Beukes, Shining Girls once again stars Elisabeth Moss as a woman haunted by trauma, giving as staggering a performance as you'd expect. But there's a timey-wimey twist here – Kirby's (Moss) entire world can change at a moment's notice, connected to a brutal attack she experienced by a serial killer still on the loose, seemingly murdering women in a non-chronological order. Not one to watch whilst simultaneously scrolling on your phone, this is a complex, carefully-plotted show that demands your attention. Wagner Moura and Chris Chalk provide excellent supporting performances as a reporter helping Kirby crack the case and her photographer-slash-husband respectively, and Jamie Bell is on top form as a looming, dangerous antagonist.

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Whereas Slow Horses is about spies ousted to the fringes of their organisation thanks to past mistakes, Apple TV+'s other espionage series, Tehran, is about intelligence agents at the top of their game. The first season sees Israeli Mossad agent Tamar (Niv Sultan) infiltrate the titular Iranian city, only to find herself stuck there when the mission goes sideways. In the second series, she's still trying to extract herself – and the addition of the iconic Glenn Close to the cast as the mysterious Marjan gives a menacing, mega-star sheen to this already incredibly tense, anxiety-inducing, twisty-turny thriller. One for Homeland fans looking for their next fast-paced secret-agent fix.

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Taking a break from the director's trademark dream-y-weam-y ness, Sofia Coppola's On The Rocks is as fizzy and intoxicating as a glass of champagne. It's basically a two-hander, as Rashida Jones' writer Laura teams up with her ageing Lothario father Felix (Coppola's Lost In Translation cohort Bill Murray) to spy on her seemingly perfect husband Dean (Marlon Wayans), whom Laura suspects is cheating on her. Perhaps it's the Manhattan setting, but there is something of old-school Woody Allen (without the ick factor) about Coppola's caper, tenderly etching a dad-daughter relationship within the more overtly comedic shenanigans (it's fun to read the film as a thinly veiled portrait of Sofia's relationship with father Francis). It's a slight picture but beautifully shot and played, Jones engaging as a woman trying to retain her sense of self within marriage and kids, and Murray completely winning as a man out of time but still with some moves; a scene where Felix charms cops into letting him off a speeding ticket is as delightful as movies get.

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Amid all the glitzy epic series made by world-renowned creatives, this a very different kind of gem in Apple TV+'s slate of originals. It's a returning comedy (the third season is about to arrive) starring Rafe Spall and Esther Smith as a North London couple increasingly desperate to have a child. After exhausting all the other options, they decide to go down the adoption route, and it proves to be a long, challenging journey. Expertly written by Andy Wolton (though it's his first ever scripted series), it's a joy to watch a show about regular, messy human beings with unglamorous jobs who are also deeply engaging and very funny, much like the show itself.

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One of Apple's very first original shows, M. Night Shyamalan's Servant continues to be one of its most daring. Following a couple, Dorothy (Lauren Ambrose) and Sean (Toby Kebbell) with an unusual baby, and their even more unusual live-in nanny Leanne (Nell Tiger Free), this is a dark, horror-inflected, supernatural-tinged mystery box which, even after its horrifying reveal near the end of Season One, continues to escalate to new levels of creepiness and chaos. With a fourth and final season on the way, we can't wait to see what other surprises are in store.

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Like Greyhound, Finch was Apple picking up a Sony project starring Tom Hanks. But unlike the World War II drama thriller, this is cockle-warming sci-fi that plays more like a dystopian take on Cast Away. Ten years after a solar flare roasted much of the Earth's surface and made it highly dangerous (not to mention flammable) to be out during the day, robotics engineer Finch Weinberg (Hanks, bringing all his considerable empathy to bear) looks to survive, but knows his days are limited. He throws himself into building a robot to take care of his dog, Goodyear, when he's gone. The resulting three-hander (two-hand-one-pawer?) is a sad, funny, weird story brought amiably to life by director Miguel Sapochnik and writers Craig Luck and Ivor Powell.