In our many weeks of publishing the best new streaming movies of the weekend, we have never come across a three-day period responsible for the debut of so many bad, bad films. But Weekend Watch never gives up until we find something new for you to watch and this column is no exception.
The top films debuting from Friday through Sunday (April 9-11) on Netflix, HBO Max, Hulu, Amazon Prime and Disney+ include:
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* Thunder Force, a Netflix original comedy film starring Melissa McCarthy and Octavia Spencer as accidental superheroes. (The early reviews are not good. At all.)
* The Stand-In, the 2020 comedy film (on Netflix) starring Drew Barrymore as a washed-up comedian who’s persuaded to return to the job by her former TV stand-in, also played by Drew Barrymore. They then trade places which is where the comedy is supposed to begin, but the reviews are not good here, either.
* The New Mutants, a 2020 horror film (on HBO Max) featuring a band of superhero teenagers who try to use their super powers to redeem themselves after each accidentally caused a horrible tragedy. Unfortunately, the reviews call the movie a tragedy as well. “Rendering a list of potentially explosive ingredients mostly inert, The New Mutants is a franchise spinoff that’s less than the sum of its super-powered parts,” states Rottentomatoes.com.
* Stars Fell On Alabama, a 2021 romantic comedy (on Hulu) starring James Maslow as a Hollywood agent who returns to his native small Alabama town for a 15-year high school reunion and discovers many life lessons. This may sound predictable, and frankly, the reviews for this film are not great, either. But some critics did like it, albeit not a lot.
* Man Of the House, a 2005 comedy film (on Disney+) starring Tommy Lee Jones as a Texas Ranger who goes undercover to protect a group of teenagers who witnessed a murder. Yes, it’s a comedy (we double-checked) and Rotten Tomatoes gives it a score of just nine percent. Oh, dear.
Okay, we came up empty this weekend. The new films are pretty much all bad. But we promise to do better next weekend.
Here is the complete list of new movies coming this weekend on the top streaming services:
Netflix
Friday, April 9
Have You Ever Seen Fireflies? (Netflix Original)
Night in Paradise (Netflix Original)
Thunder Force (Netflix Original)
Saturday, April 10
The Stand-In
HBO Max
Friday, April 9
Intemperie (Aka Out In The Open), 2019 (HBO)
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April 10
The New Mutants, 2020 (HBO)
Hulu
Friday, April 9
The Standard (2020)
Stars Fell on Alabama (2021)
Saturday, April 10
Desierto (2015)
Knuckledust (2020)
Disney+
Friday, April 9
Man of the House
Mark Twain and Me
Squanto: A Warrior’s Tale (1994)
Cesar Millan: The Real Story
Amazon Prime is not debuting any new films this weekend so we can’t say how bad they may be.
Have a question about new TV technologies? Send it to The TV Answer Man at swann@tvpredictions.com. Please include your first name and hometown in your message.
— Phillip Swann