The top 20 best Amazon Prime Video original series
From the phenomenon The Boys to the sumptuous epic of the Rings of Power, passing by the Fabulous Mrs. Maisel, the great historical drama The Underground Railrod, or nuggets like Upload and Invincible…
Beyond its fantasy blockbuster from the Lord of the Rings, Amazon Prime Video has already filled its catalog with highly successful original creations. “House” series that are still too little known to us, even if some are little gems to discover absolutely.
The Top 10 Best Amazon Prime Video Original Movies
20) THE WHEEL OF TIME (2021)
Serial adaptation of a franchise in 14 volumes, started in 1990 in bookstores, this vast fantasy story transports us to another world in which a great witch capable of using the magic of the “Unique Power” launches out in search of the ” Reincarnated Dragon”, a mythical being who will change the destiny of the Continent… All the elements of a great fantasy adventure are brought together, for fans of the genre, with the actress of Gone GirlRosamund Pike, against the grain.
Actual status : season 1 was released at the end of 2021 and season 2, filmed immediately after, is in the box. No date yet.
19) CARNIVAL ROW (2019)
A great fantastic saga, carried by the ultra-glamorous couple Orlando Bloom and Cara Delevingne. A splendid original fiction. Breathtaking aesthetics wrapped in meticulously crafted mythology, even if the story struggles a bit to get started.
Actual status : season 2 has finished filming and is expected to be released by the end of 2022.
18) JACK RYAN (2018)
After Harrison Ford, Ben Affleck or Alec Baldwin, in the cinema, it is John Krasinski who puts himself in the shoes of the hero created by Tom Clancy. Up-and-coming CIA analyst Jack Ryan investigates around the world to fight terrorism in this big action series with big money.
Actual status : season 3 is expected by the end of 2022 and season 4, which will be the last, has been ordered.
17) MIXED (2021)
Between teens and period series, this original French creation takes us back to France before 1968, to tell the story of the first high school girls mixed with high school students. The painting of an era, tender and uplifting. A nice series on the youth of our parents or our grandparents, which will speak to all generations.
Actual status : a season 2 will not see the light of day. The series has been cancelled.
16) MOZART IN THE JUNGLE (2014)
Crowned Best comedy of the year in 2016, to everyone’s surprise at the Golden Globes, the series also allowed Gael Garcia Bernal, the Mexican star, to collect a trophy. He embodies Rodrigo, a brilliant and lively conductor, freely inspired by the famous Gustavo Dudamel.
Actual status : the series ended after season 4, in 2018.
15) THE MAN IN THE HIGH CASTLE (2015)
This adaptation of Master of the High Castle was one of the most ambitious of Amazon, which has put the means to recreate the uchronic world of Philip K. Dick. An absolutely morbid and fascinating world, in which the Nazis and their Japanese allies won the Second World War and now share the world. A great adventure as thrilling as it is mysterious.
Actual status : the series ended in November 2019 after 4 seasons.
14) UNDONE (2019)
First of all, we have to talk about the form. Visually, Undone is a series like we have never seen or almost. An animated series but not really, since it uses real actors (Rosa Salazar, Bob Odenkirk among others), recreated using the technique of rotoscoping. A technique which consists in raising image by image the contours of a figure filmed in live action to transcribe its form and actions in an animated film. A process used to place the characters in a hallucinating and hallucinated fantastic world. A lush painting, which constantly flirts with phantasmagoria and which totally carries us away.
Actual status : the series has been renewed for a season 2, which was released in the spring of 2022.
13) GOLIATH
The dad ofAlly McBealDavid E. Kelley, returns to the legal series, and shows that he has lost none of his talent, with this legal drama in the vein of Damages, beautifully embodied by Billy Bob Thornton. Moreover, the American actor was honored with a Best Actor award at the Golden Globes!
Actual status : Season 4 aired in September 2021. It was the last one.
12) GOOD OMENS (2019)
A linear transcription of the novel by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett, published in 1990, which tells how a good and charitable Angel will make an alliance with a cheeky Demon, to save Humanity, because the Antichrist has arrived on Earth… David Tennant and Michael Sheen are the Alpha and Omega of this wacky and irreverent theological comedy.
Actual status : initially planned as a mini-series, a season 2 was finally ordered in 2021.
11) OUTER RANGE (2022)
Josh Brolin tries the splits between Lost And Yellowstone and the face is a bit tricky. But this half-modern western, half-philosophical SF has everything of an attractive mystery drama embodied by a powerful cast. Both an allegory of the absence of God in the wilds of the West and a metaphor for the decline of the American empire, this unique series does not lack arguments.
Current Status: Season 1 went live in Spring 2022. Season 2 has not yet been ordered.
10) HARRY BOSCH (2015)
The character created by Michael Connelly is brilliantly embodied by the former Lost, Titus Welliver. He embodies this rough detective from the Los Angeles Police Department, who we follow in various investigations, dark and perfectly rhythmic. To binge-watch as one would devour a good thriller!
Actual status : the series ended after 7 seasons, but a spin-off about her daughter, Bosch: Legacywas launched in 2022.
9) UPLOAD (2020)
Who wants to download their consciousness into a machine? Eternal life in digital is sketched in a dark and brilliant way by the creator of The Office. A sharp criticism of our civilization which never stops living connected (and which tomorrow will die connected), coupled with an SF fable with exciting thriller overtones, mixed with a rom-com 3.0. In short, a unique comedy of anticipation, with caustic black humour.
Actual status : Season 2 aired in 2022 and Season 3 has been ordered.
8) INVINCIBLE (2021)
It’s not easy to be a completely ordinary 17-year-old teenager, when his father is not Omni-Man, the greatest superhero on Earth! Robert Kirkman’s fabulous comic strip – created before walking dead – has the right to its adaptation into an animated series. A clever and bloody re-reading of superheroes boosted by absolutely insane and hemoglobin-rich action scenes. Pure fun.
Actual status : season 2 is ready and expected by the end of 2022. Season 3 is also ordered.
7) TOO OLD TO DIE YOUNG (2019)
A brutal nightmare between Drive and David Lynch. The Danish director, Nicolas Winding Refn, signs an atmospheric and ultra-violent thriller set in Los Angeles, led by Miles Teller, who plays an LAPD cop who turns at nightfall into a fearless vigilante, punishing the worst bastards in the city: rapists, pedophiles, disgusting pornographers…
Actual status : there are no plans for a season 2.
6) THE EXPANSE (2015)
Not originally an original series, but this interstellar western was picked up by Amazon after it was canceled on Syfy. A great SF show that abandons space opera and opens up new horizons. The move to the platform was perfectly successful.
Actual status : the season 6 finale went live in December 2021.
5) TRANSPARENT (2014)
One of the great successes of the platform so far. A moving and surprising drama, perfectly in tune with the times, which tells how Morton Pfefferman, an old patriarch without history, decides to change sex to become Maura. A vibrant plea for the transgender cause, rewarded with a shower of Emmy Awards and Golden Globes.
Actual status : following the accusations against Jeffrey Tambor, the series ended with a musical finale broadcast in September 2019.
4) THE FABULOUS MRS MAISEL (2017)
The adventures of Midge, a 1950s New York stay-at-home mom who discovers a talent for comedy and stand-up comedy, have enchanted critics and viewers around the world, to the point of collecting numerous Emmys and Golden Globes. , in 2018, then in 2019. A dramatic and historical comedy, touching and funny, which captures the evolution of the condition of women as rarely.
Actual status :Season 4 was released in December 2021. Season 5 has been ordered and will be the last.
3) THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE RINGS OF POWER (2022)
Tolkien’s adaptation for the small screen cost Amazon hundreds of millions of dollars. Time will tell if the investment was worth it. In any case, for the moment, he sees himself on the screen. Prime Video’s fantasy series is almost unparalleled in beauty on television. This return to Middle-earth does not have much to envy, visually, to the two trilogies of Peter Jackson. And beyond the rapture, the story of the creation of the rings and the first war against Sauron is a grandiose epic, in which the young Welshwoman Morfydd Clark shines, astonishing Galadriel.
Actual status : season 1 is in progress and season 2 is already ordered.
2) THE UNDERGROUND RAILROAD (2021)
Despite the somewhat too mannered style of Barry Jenkins, the Oscar-winning filmmaker for Moonlight discusses a hot topic on television. While not the definitive slavery series it could have been, the strength of The Underground Railroad lies in the reversal of the gaze imposed by the director. Through the epic of the African-American experience in its diversity and from within. And by asking the question of the gaze, that of white slavers, that of a black woman on her own condition as a woman, black, slave, that of the men who exploit her. And above all the gaze of the spectator, constantly questioned through the frontal close-ups of his heroine.
Actual status : the mini-series only has ten episodes and will not have a sequel.
1) THE BOYS (2019)
A great slap! The adaptation of the comics by Garth Ennis is a cheerful little bombshell, imbued with a biting cynicism and a trashy humor that brings back the Justice League in the Stone Age! Homelander and his superhero comrades fight villains, crime and terrorists, but they are above all a brand, marketed and declined as desired in derivative products. These “supers” are super celebrities, who generate billions of dollars every year. And inevitably, it will turn out badly…
Actual status : season 3 was released in 2022. Season 4 will begin filming and a spin-off, Gen V, is planned.
