Sam Cooper plans to spend his senior years living quietly at a leafy village until something sinister starts stalking the neighbourhood. NICK OVERALL says that while wrapped up in a chilling, sci-fi mystery, The Boroughs is ultimately a story about ageing.

Like Stranger Things, but with seniors. That’s how Netflix’s new sci-fi mystery series is being described as it hits the platform this week.

It’s called The Boroughs and it’s produced by Matt and Ross Duffer, the brothers behind Stranger Things.

The setting here though is far flung from the nostalgia of ’80s suburbia.

Instead, The Boroughs takes place in a retirement home in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

The story follows Sam Cooper (Alfred Molina), a new resident at the seemingly quiet, leafy village who plans to spend his senior years living quietly. 

But when strange, supernatural anomalies begin to disturb the peace, Sam is forced to investigate, eventually becoming convinced something sinister is stalking the neighbourhood.

When the authorities refuse to believe him, he teams up with fellow residents Judy (Alfre Woodward) and Wally (Denis O’Hare) to uncover what lies beneath the retirement home.

What they discover, it turns out, might just be threatening the one thing this trio of misfit retirees values most: time. 

Bill Pullman and Geena Davis are also amongst the charismatic cast here for the eight-episode series that’s now available to watch.

Exploring grief and resilience while wrapped up in a chilling, sci-fi mystery, The Boroughs is ultimately a story about ageing that seems to have all the right elements to age well itself.

MURDER, blackmail, youth soccer. It’s the deadly mix at the centre of Apple TV Plus’ new, dark comedy, thriller show.

Maximum Pleasure Guaranteed stars Tatiana Maslany as Paula, a newly divorced mother who’s already trying to navigate a messy custody battle and an identity crisis when her life gets thrown into even more turmoil.

After witnessing a crime online, she’s pulled into a chaotic conspiracy where she becomes the chief detective, soon learning this dangerous puzzle may also hold the keys to getting her own life back on track. 

Maslany, a Canadian actress perhaps best known for her role in the sci-fi series hit Orphan Black, is the linchpin of this 10-episode show, bringing a funny yet endearing charisma to this character whose life is falling apart.

The first two, half-hour episodes launch on Apple TV Plus this week with one following every week afterwards.

Here’s hoping Maximum Pleasure Guaranteed is one that lives up to its title.

IT may be the most controversial adaptation of a classic ever.

Wuthering Heights, starring Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi, is now streaming on HBO Max.

Loosely (and I mean very loosely) based on the novel by Emily Bronte, this two-hour romp is considered by director Emerald Fennell to be a “reinterpretation” of the book that “recreates the feeling of a teenage girl reading it for the first time.”

With its star duo and huge marketing push, Wuthering Heights proved a box-office hit, raking in a quarter of a billion dollars at the movies.

Reviews were certainly more mixed, though. Literature purists hated it. Others say it’s already a modern cult classic.

One thing that can’t be denied. The film is visually stunning.

From the grandiose, foggy landscapes of northern Yorkshire to the ostentatious halls of the country estates that punctuate them, the sets, costumes and scenery are all treats for the eyes.

They form the backdrop for this gothic love story about the daughter of a wealthy landowner who falls in love with a poor orphan her father brings home.

Their class differences though make this romance forbidden, sending the star-crossed lovers down a life-long path of obsession and revenge.

Eye-roll-inducing dialogue and smutty melodrama can make the film a test of endurance, but stylistically Fennell has created something truly special here.

There’s an appeal to the audacity of its reinvention of the novel, even if it does miss many of the core emotional elements that made Brotne’s work the masterpiece its still known as today.

Wuthering Heights is a film that will continue to split opinion, but, like it did in the cinema, its bold, bombastic approach is sure to woo streaming audiences as well.