April TV Preview (2024)
To help you plan your viewing options, our editors have selected the most interesting TV and movie titles debuting at home in April 2024, listed in order by premiere date.
tbd Ripley
Limited series
Premieres April 4 on Netflix
Andrew Scott (Fleabag) stars in an eight-episode adaptation of Patricia Highsmith's Tom Ripley novels (previously adapted into the 1999 feature film The Talented Mr. Ripley). Directed and written in its entirety by Steven Zaillian (The Night Of)—and filmed, rather unusually, in black and white—the stylish, 1960s-set thriller follows the titular con man (Scott) as he is enlisted by a wealthy man to locate his son in Italy and return him to New York City. Dakota Fanning, John Malkovich, and Johnny Flynn also star in Ripley, which was originally ordered (and fully produced) by Showtime before that network offloaded the completed series to Netflix in a cost-cutting move.
tbd Mary & George
Limited series
Premieres April 5 on Starz
Julianne Moore and Nicholas Galitzine star as the titular Countess and Duke of Buckingham in a seven-part British historical drama set during the reign of King James I in the early 17th century—a period during which George and the king may have been lovers. It's an adaptation of Benjamin Woolley's book The King's Assassin, but this isn't a dry retelling of history: Expect lots of humor—and more than one orgy—in this very adult series from Killing Eve writer D.C. Moore.
tbd Sugar
New drama series
Premieres April 5 on Apple TV+
Originally ordered by Apple in 2021 after a bidding war that also involved Netflix, this secretive "gender-bending" detective series from screenwriter Mark Protosevich (The Cell, I Am Legend) stars Colin Farrell as the titular L.A. private investigator John Sugar, who is hired to find the missing granddaughter of a legendary film producer, Amy Ryan, James Cromwell, Anna Gunn, Kirby Howell-Baptiste, Nate Corddry, and Dennis Boutsikaris also star in the modern noir series, while Fernando Meirelles (City of God, The Constant Gardener) and Adam Arkin share directing duties. The first three (of eight) episodes stream on day one. Note that critics have seen every episode, and some aren't fully on board with a major twist that changes the nature of the series toward the season's end.
Hapless
New (to you) comedy series
Premieres April 10 on Peacock
Often compared to Curb Your Enthusiasm, the Tim Downie-led Britcom Hapless makes its American debut this month as all 14 episodes from seasons 1 and 2 arrive on Peacock. (Just to make things a bit more confusing, the show is a Netflix original in the UK and once briefly streamed in Britain on Prime Video as well.) The comedy finds the Outlander (and Upstart Crow) star playing a neurotic journalist for the fictitious Jewish Enquirer, the UK's fourth-largest Jewish publication.
tbd Fallout
New sci-fi series
Premieres April 11 on Prime Video
The latest videogame franchise to make the jump to the small screen is Bethesda's Fallout, a long-running post-apocalyptic RPG series. Created by the Westworld team of Lisa Joy and Jonathan Nolan, the TV version of Fallout is set in a future Los Angeles following a nuclear war and borrows a retrofuturistic, 1950s-influenced visual style from the games but tells an original story (the details of which have yet to be revealed). Walton Goggins, Kyle MacLachlan, and Ella Purnell head a cast that also includes Michael Emerson, Sarita Choudhury, Leslie Uggams, Johnny Pemberton, Zach Cherry, and Frances Turner. Nolan directs the first three episodes, and all of those—plus the remaining five—stream on day one.
tbd Franklin
Limited series
Premieres April 12 on Apple TV+
Michael Douglas stars as Benjamin Franklin in an eight-episode historical drama about the statesman's game-changing mission to France beginning in 1776. adapted from Stacy Schiff's book A Great Improvisation. The series comes from Kirk Ellis (John Adams) and Howard Korder (Boardwalk Empire) and is directed by Tim Van Patten. The first three episodes stream at launch.
Good Times
New animated comedy series
Premieres April 12 on Netflix
An animated reboot of Norman Lear's 1970s CBS sitcom, Netflix's Good Times features the voices of Jay Pharoah, Yvette Nicole Brown, Marsai Martin, JB Smoove, and Gerald Anthony Johnson. The late Lear is even among the producers of the new show—he also voices a role for good measure—as are Seth MacFarlane and Stephen Curry, though Ranada Shepard (Born Again Virgin) serves as showrunner. Might MacFarlane be a bigger influence on the new series than Lear? The first trailer certainly suggests that will be the case.
tbd The Sympathizer
Limited series
Premieres April 14 on HBO and Max
A24's seven-part adaptation of the 2015 Pulitzer-winning novel by Viet Thanh Nguyen comes from Park Chan-wook (Oldboy, Decision to Leave) and Don McKellar and stars Robert Downey Jr. in multiple roles. A mélange of cultural satire, dark comedy, historical drama, mystery, and espionage thriller, The Sympathizer follows a half-Vietnamese, half-French communist spy known as "The Captain" (Cowboy Bebop's Hoa Xuande) during the closing days of the Vietnam War and his later exile in the United States (and work in Hollywood) following the fall of Saigon. Sandra Oh also stars, and Park directs the first three episodes, including the opener, with Fernando Meirelles and Marc Munden handling the remaining four.
tbd Under the Bridge
Limited series
Premieres April 17 on Hulu
For their first project since winning an Academy Award for Killers of the Flower Moon, Lily Gladstone heads the cast of an eight-episode adaptation of Rebecca Godfrey's true-crime book about the investigation into a group of teenagers accused of the murder of 14-year-old Reena Virk in British Columbia in 1997. Riley Keough also stars in the miniseries, which launches with a pair of episodes on the 17th.
tbd Conan O'Brien Must Go
New reality series
Premieres April 18 on Max
The late night host turned podcaster returns to TV with a new series modeled after his Conan Without Borders travel specials. All four episodes—which take O'Brien to Ireland, Norway, Thailand, and Argentina, where he meets up with superfans of his podcast and experiences local culture— stream at once.
Dinner With the Parents
New comedy series
Premieres April 18 on Amazon Freevee
An Americanized adaptation of the excellent UK comedy series Friday Night Dinner stars Michaela Watkins, Dan Bakkedahl, Carol Kane, Henry Hall, Daniel Thrasher, and Jon Glaser, while guests include Rob Delaney. Like the original series, Parents finds two 20-something brothers returning home once a week to have dinner at the family home, where things never quite go right. Speaking of going awry: Despite a seemingly universal premise, three (!) previous attempts to bring FND to the States (including one from The Office's Greg Daniels) ended in failure, but this fourth one appears to have stuck, and original series creator Robert Popper is even credited here as a producer. Four episodes stream at launch, followed by two more each Thursday through May 9.
tbd The Jinx–Part Two
Limited series
Premieres April 21 on HBO and Max
Andrew Jarecki's riveting 2015 HBO miniseries The Jinx featured one of the most shocking endings in the history of true-crime TV before going on to win a pair of Emmys, a TCA Award, and a Peabody. Now Jarecki and his team of producers return for a follow-up series covering the final eight years in the life of Robert Durst—a period that saw him finally convicted of murder and charged with yet another crime just prior to his 2022 death while in custody. The first of six episodes airs tonight.
tbd Dead Boy Detectives
New fantasy/dramedy series
Premieres April 25 on Netflix
Originally ordered by HBO Max in 2022 as a Doom Patrol spinoff but later sold to Netflix (where it is now an extension of the Sandman universe), producer Greg Berlanti's latest DC Comics adaptation is based on characters created by Neil Gaiman and Matt Wagner. Specifically, those characters are a pair of ghosts (played by relative newcomers George Rexstrew and Jayden Revri) who pair up after death to investigate supernatural crimes on Earth. Adapted by Steve Yockey (The Flight Attendant, Supernatural), who serves as showrunner alongside Sweet Tooth's Beth Schwartz, the eight-episode series also stars Briana Cuoco, Ruth Connell (reprising her Doom Patrol role as the Night Nurse), Kassius Nelson, and Lukas Gage.
tbd Knuckles
Limited series
Premieres April 26 on Paramount+
A miniseries spinoff from Sonic the Hedgehog 2 that's set between the events of that film and its upcoming sequel, Knuckles finds four-time Emmy nominee Idris Elba returning from that film as the voice of the title character, an animated echidna and friend to Sonic the Hedgehog. Adam Pally, Cary Elwes, Edi Patterson, Kid Cudi, Stockard Channing, and Ellie Taylor also star, while Ben Schwartz will reprise his voice role as Sonic as a guest star. All six episodes stream on day one.
tbd The Veil
Limited series
Premieres April 30 on Hulu
Elisabeth Moss stars in a six-episode FX limited series (exclusive to Hulu). Kicking off with its first two episodes, the spy thriller comes from Steven Knight (Peaky Blinders) and jumps between Istanbul, Paris, and London as it follows a CIA agent teaming with a French counterpart as they attempt to prevent a potential disaster. Joining Moss in the cast are Josh Charles and Dali Benssalah.