The streaming debut of “Project Hail Mary” and Myles Smith's debut album are some of the new television, films, music and games headed to a device near you.
Also among the streaming offerings worth your time this week, as selected by The Associated Press’ entertainment journalists: Colin Farrell plays an alien on Earth in “Sugar,” a Square Enix game that evokes “Chrono Trigger” and “Released At Last,” a collaboration between Big Freedia and the late
artist Sophie.
— “Project Hail Mary,” one of the biggest hits of the first half of the movie year, begins streaming Thursday, June 18, on MGM+. Phil Lord and Chris Miller’s sci-fi adventure stars Ryan Gosling as Ryland Grace, a science teacher who wakes up on a ship sent into space on a mission to save dying stars. Sandra Hüller co-stars, as does an alien named Rocky played by puppeteer James Ortiz. In her review, AP Film Writer Lindsey Bahr called it “a clever, sincere, most-ages crowd-pleaser that’s full of life, energy and a love of science.”
— In “How to Make a Killing” (June 19, HBO Max), Glen Powell stars as a working-class man who sets out to murderously reclaim his inheritance. The film, written and directed by John Patton Ford (“Emily the Criminal”), is inspired by the great Alec Guinness Ealing comedy “Kind Heart and Coronets.” But such tonal deftness is lacking, I wrote in my review, in “a disappointingly flat almost-remake that has neither the biting farce nor the chilling darkness to match its black-comedy ambitions.”
— “Voicemails for Isabelle” hopes to separate from the pack of a long line of Netflix rom-coms. In writer-director Leah McKendrick’s film, Zoey Deutch stars a woman grieving her sister’s death who, to cope, leaves voicemails on her phone. When that number is reassigned to Austin real estate agent (Nick Robinson), the two are drawn together. It debuts Friday, June 19.
— AP Film Writer Jake Coyle
— On Friday, Myles Smith will release his debut album, “My Mess, My Heart, My Life.” It is a bit hard to believe, because the English singer-songwriter already has a three-times platinum single under his belt. His 2024 song “Stargazing” was a folk-pop megahit from a once-unknown performer. And on his first full-length album, he aims to keep up the momentum.
— The music world lost a nascent pop hero in 2021, when Sophie, the Grammy-nominated Scottish disc jockey, producer and recording artist who had worked with the likes of Madonna and Charli XCX, died following an accident in the Greek capital of Athens. She was 34. Her music continues to resonate, and her influence continues to be heard across the underground and mainstream alike. On Friday, the New Orleans icon and Queen of Bounce music Big Freedia will drop “Released At Last,” a three-song EP she recorded with the late Sophie back in 2016. It serves as a reminder: The club is open.
— AP Music Writer Maria Sherman
— You could call it “The Baby-Sitters Club” for ballers. In the new docuseries “Million Dollar Nannies,” cameras follow a boutique agency in Ibiza that offers babysitting for the children of wealthy parents. These clients are VIPs who have big expectations to match their big lifestyles. There are NDA’s, private planes and kids who eat caviar. All episodes drop Thursday, June 18 on Hulu.
— Colin Farrell returns as an alien disguised as a human in Season 2 of “Sugar” for Apple TV. Premiering Friday, June 19, Farrell’s character goes by the alias John Sugar, a private investigator in Los Angeles. The series is a noir-style detective drama with a central mystery that lasts all season. Sugar has two jobs. One is to solve his case du jour and the other is to secretly monitor people here on Earth.
— AP Writer Alicia Rancilio
— Square Enix’s “The Adventures of Elliot: The Millennium Tales” takes place in a land called Philabieldia, “a beautiful but savage land” that sounds just like our own Pennsylvania city, only without cheesesteaks. After some mysterious ruins are discovered, the gutsy Elliot and his fairy sidekick, Faie, are sent on a journey that goes back and forth in time across 1,000 years. The pixelated art will look familiar to fans of developer Clay Tech Works’ role-playing fantasy “Octopath Traveler,” but the action is more arcade-like. And the time-jumping story is reminiscent of Square’s 1995 classic “Chrono Trigger.” Start making history Thursday, June 18, on PlayStation 5, Xbox X/S, Switch 2 and PC.
— Lou Kesten
