Read more on pastemagazine.com

While Amazon might not have the quantity of new TV series of its competitor Netflix, the online retail giant has invested heavily in its narrower band of original programming. That will be most apparent come this September when Amazon Prime Video launches The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, but it can already be seen in its recent releases. Here we’ll keep track of every new series available for Prime members to stream for free. In the last few months, that’s meant action-adventure, animation, comedy, fantasy and drama. Here are the 10 newest TV shows on Amazon Prime.

1. Outer Range

Amazon Prime Release Date: April 15, 2022
Creator: Brian Watkins
Stars: Josh Brolin, Lili Taylor, Tamara Podemski, Tom Pelphrey, Imogen Poots, Lewis Pullman, Noah Reid, Shaun Sipos
Genre: Mystery, Western

Watch Now

Created and executive produced by Ben Watkins and starring Josh Brolin, Imogen Poots, Lili Taylor, Tamara Podemski, Lewis Pullman, Tom Pelphrey, Noah Reid, Shaun Sipos, Will Patton, and The Haunting of Hill House’s Olive Abercrombie, Prime Video’s eerie, Wyoming-set speculative mystery series is so damn unhurried it’s easy, half the time, to forget you’re watching a mystery at all. Hell, it’s easy, half the time, to forget you’re watching anything. Just stretched-wide vistas, a vast, open sky, and a giant, supernatural hole whose secrets no one—or at least, no one with any meaningful narrative power—has the slightest interest in plumbing. In short: If an entire landscape could be laconic, that’s how I’d describe the fictional Amelia County of Watkins’ Outer Range. This isn’t a failing. An economy of dialogue and a protraction of plot serve Outer Range well, as the mystery of the big spooky hole in the Abbotts’ west pasture isn’t the point of the series so much as its psychological fulcrum. That is to say, what the hole is is far less important than what it represents—to Royal (Brolin), who seems to see it as proof God has abandoned humanity to a great void; to Autumn (Poots), who seems to see it as a portal to a world whose bones she might better fit; to Wayne Tillerson (Patton), who seems to see it as the next frontier that’s rightfully his to conquer; to whoever else might stumble across it, they might see in it their darkest inner truth. It’s the ultimate blank space against which any broken person can project their deepest fears; the ultimate well into which they can cast their most shameful secrets. It is both a precursor to and object of a kind of frontier-born religious ecstasy, a pine madness, a theia mania that overtakes every major player by season’s end. —Alexis Gunderson

2. The Outlaws

Amazon Prime Release Date: April 1, 2022
Creators: Stephen Merchant, Elgin James
Stars: Rhianne Barreto, Stephen Merchant, Christopher Walken, Darren Boyd, Gamba Cole, Jessica Gunning, Clare Perkins, Eleanor Tomlinson, Charles Babalola
Genre: Thriller, Comedy

Watch Now

One of the best things about The Outlaws is that it knows exactly what it is, and tells us so right off the bat. Essentially: a heartwarming heist. The six episode UK comedy-crime series from Stephen Merchant (The Office) and Elgin James (Mayans M.C.) has a fairly simple setup—a motley crew of petty criminals doing community service end up embroiled with a dangerous drug gang after a bag of cash is found—but despite its familiar framework, it manages to make its story unique in small yet important ways. Playing with types and tropes (from flashback cold opens to the self-aware stereotyping of the gang to begin with) that both reinforce and subvert viewer expectations, the series is a quick and strangely comforting watch. To give any more specifics is really to ruin the delightful show, but suffice it to say that many of the reveals along the way come as genuine, gentle surprises. Most importantly, as the oddball gang come together and forge real friendships—and make real mistakes—there’s something genuinely heartwarming about it that leaves you with a smile. —Allison Keene

3. Lizzo’s Watch Out for the Big Grrrls

Amazon Prime Release Date: March 25, 2022
Creator: Lizzo
Genre: Reality Competition

Watch Now

If you’ve seen Lizzo in concert—well, first off, you’ve had a good time, but you also know that her back-up dancers are a big part of the show. Her new reality competition show for Amazon is a search for plus-sized dancers to join her on her next world tour. As she wrote on her Instagram when announcing the show last month, “This is the greatest moment of my career yet. Y’all know how hard it’s been finding dancers that look like me. But if I gotta get a TV show to get the world to see the value in us big grrrls BITCH IMMA DO IT.”

4. The Boys Presents: Diabolical

Amazon Prime Release Date: March 4, 2022
Creator: Garth Ennis
Stars: Michael Cera, Kieran Culkin, Jason Isaacs, Simon Pegg
Genre: Superhero, Animation

Watch Now

This anthology spin-off of Amazon’s hit superhero series features eight episodes each in their own animation style, ranging from Justin Roiland’s Rick and Morty drawings to Naz Ghodrati-Azadi’s French comics-inspired animation. A product of Covid-19 restrictions that delayed a new season of the live-action series, Diabolical looks like it was as fun to create as it is to watch. Producers enlisted a wide array of writers, including Seth Rogen, Ilana Glazer, Awkwafina, Aisha Tyler, Andy Samberg and series creator Garth Ennis.

5. Reacher

Amazon Prime Release Date: Feb. 4, 2022
Creator: Nick Santora
Stars: Alan Ritchson, Malcolm Goodwin, Willa Fitzgerald, Chris Webster, Bruce McGill, Maria Sten
Genre: Action, Thriller
Paste Review Score: 8.0

Watch Now

Tom Cruise may have played Jack Reacher in two separate films, but when it comes to the embodiment of the character from the popular Lee Child novels, the actor doesn’t quite match the description. In the long-running book series, Jack Reacher is described as being 6’ 5,” around 250 pounds, with dirty blonde hair and blue eyes. That’s a far cry from the 5’7” star of Mission Impossible and Top Gun. The height of a lead actor for a television series may seem unimportant, but not in this case. Reacher’s imposing size is part of the character’s identity, something more appropriately personified in the brawny 6’2” Alan Ritchson (Titans, Smallville), who takes over the role in the TV series. Thankfully for viewers, there’s a lot more to Reacher than looking like an intimidating NFL defensive lineman; all of his unique character traits from the Lee Child novels have made their way into the series, as well as his compelling backstory. –Terry Terrones

6. The Legend of Vox Machina

Amazon Prime Release Date: Jan. 28, 2022
Creator: Matthew Mercer
Stars: Laura Bailey, Taliesin Jaffe, Ashley Johnson, Matthew Mercer
Genre: Animation, Fantasy
Paste Review Score: 8.0

Watch Now

Amazon Prime Video’s The Legend of Vox Machina arrives just as D&D’s corporate owners are also making moves to bring the property back to the big screen. While the show doesn’t have any official connection with the game, Critical Role—the web show the characters and world are based on—is transparently grounded in the storytelling of the tabletop roleplaying game that game master Matt Mercer is running, and the characters his group of professional voice actor pals are portraying. If, like me, you believe adapting something like D&D should be less about overblown lore and more about the feeling of getting together with a bunch of your pals to mainline pizza and crack jokes while you collaborate on how to best the monsters in a friend’s bespoke adventure (that is peppered with references to whatever books or movies they’ve just watched), then The Legend of Vox Machina could serve as a proof of concept for that approach. The Legend of Vox Machina takes the setting and characters from the Critical Role show, removes the inconvenience of dice, movement restrictions, and spell slot limitations, and turns it into a proudly R-rated cartoon. Vox Machina is the name of the eponymous group of mercs at the center of the show’s story, a down-on-their-luck crew of murder hobos whose immediate concerns include an astronomical bar tab and poor local reputation. And while the series won’t net Hasbro any royalties, it unquestionably moves the phenomenon of adapting role-playing games to the screen one step deeper into the mainstream. —Kenneth Lowe

7. As We See It

Amazon Prime Release Date: Jan. 21, 2022
Created by: Jason Katims
Stars: Rick Glassman, Albert Rutecki, Sue Ann Pien, Sosie Bacon, Chris Pang, Joe Mantegna
Genre: Comedy, Drama
Paste Review Score: 9.2

Watch Now

As We See It, executive producer Jason Katims’ Prime Video dramedy, is a refreshing take on both the coming-of-age story and on TV’s depictions of people on the Autism spectrum. Led by a cast of actors who have ASD, the series doesn’t sugar-coat the disorder or coddle the three main characters. It shows them falling in love, making mistakes and learning how to navigate careers and friendships. And while these characters may struggle to find their places in a neuro-typical world, viewers without ASD may find that the challenges the trio face aren’t that different from theirs. —Whitney Friedlander

8. With Love

Amazon Prime Release Date: Dec. 17, 2021
Created by: Gloria Calderón Kellett
Stars: Emeraude Toubia, Mark Indelicato, Isis King, Vincent Rodriguez III, Rome Flynn, Desmond Chiam
Genre: Romantic Comedy

Watch Now

Creator and executive producer Gloria Calderón Kellett’s new Amazon Prime series With Love, portrays a successful Latino family living in Portland with characters who are perse in terms of age, sexual orientation, ethnicity and gender identification. The five-episode series follows siblings Lily (Emeraude Toubia) and Jorge Jr. (Mark Indelicato), their parents Beatriz (Constance Marie) and Jorge Sr. (Benito Martinez), their non-binary cousin Sol (Isis King) and their respective significant others through a year marked by holidays beginning with Nochebueno (Christmas Eve) and ending with Dia de los Muertos. Kellett, who plays the hilarious Tia Gladys on the series, wrote the show during the pandemic. The result is a series that is charming, funny, poignant, and groundbreaking. Two doctors meet and fall in love. One is resistant to opening themselves up to a relationship. The other is coming off a difficult porce. It’s a story we may have seen before, but this time Sol is a trans, non-binary character. —Amy Amatangelo

9. Harlem

Amazon Prime Release Date: Dec. 3, 2021
Created by: Tracy Oliver
Stars: Meagan Good, Grace Byers, Shoniqua Shandai, Jerrie Johnson, Tyler Lepley
Genre: Comedy
Paste Review Score: 7.4

Watch Now

Harlem isn’t the spiritual successor to Insecure that it perhaps hopes to be. Similar in structure and from a writing team that has worked on First Wives Club and the hit film Girls Trip, the show follows four women in Harlem as they deal with the rollercoaster of drama of their own personal and professional lives. Camille (Meaghan Good), the show’s central character, is an anthropology professor at Columbia who is desperate for both tenure and a way to get over her ex who is unexpectedly back in town. Tye (Jerrie Johnson) is a queer tech start-up founder whose product is about to make it big, while Quinn (Grace Byers) and Angie (Shoniqua Shandai) are a pair of roommates who have different views on everything from money to men. There are shades of the Issa Rae-led comedy throughout, and it’s hard not to compare the two shows in premise and execution. If Camille is Harlem’s Issa, she lacks a lot of the personality that was infused in Issa’s one-liners and mirror alter-ego. Still, the characters are fun to hang out with, and the show makes for a quick and enjoyable binge that doesn’t require too much thought. Harlem isn’t as groundbreaking, tight, or fresh as Insecure was, but perhaps the comparison is incorrect—Harlem isn’t trying to be anything other than another show about young, successful Black women thriving. And no matter the packaging, Hollywood needs more of these stories. —Radhika Menon

10. The Wheel of Time

Amazon Prime Release Date: Nov. 19, 2021
Created by: Rafe Judkins
Stars: Rosamund Pike, Daniel Henney, Zoe Robins, Madeleine Madden, Josha Stradowski, Marcus Rutherford, and Barney Harris
Genre: Fantasy
Paste Review Score: 8.5

Watch on Amazon Prime

“The wheel weaves as the wheel wills,” and for Amazon Prime Video’s new fantasy series, it wills it quickly. Running an economic eight hourlong episodes, The Wheel of Time is a brisk entry to Robert Jordan’s massive novel series, which evidently contains 2,782 distinct characters. Amazon’s version doesn’t have quite that many, not yet, but I can genuinely say that as a newbie to the franchise it took me several episodes and many tabs to understand what anyone’s name actually was. And yet, this adaptation—developed by Rafe Judkins—does everything it can to be accessible to viewers unfamiliar with the source material. It doesn’t hurt that the fantasy beats are familiar: There is a battle between light and dark, as well as a Chosen One (the “Dragon Reborn”) who will fight to save humanity—or destroy it in the process. There are critters and creatures and a magic that can only be wielded by women, plus a cult looking to eradicate the use of magic, pretenders to the would-be throne, and a hellish army of darkness. Navigating all of this are four young adults (any of whom could be the fabled savior) shepherded by a powerful sorceress named Moraine (Rosamund Pike). The Wheel of Time teases out so much, but whether or not it eventually fills that out—or if its surface-level telling of this story will lead viewers to a deeper connection with the series itself—is uncertain. For now, it’s a fun ride. —Allison Keene