Best new movies and TV series on Amazon Prime Video Australia: December 2021

Each month, new films and TV shows are added to Amazon Prime Video‘s Australian library. Eliza Janssen presents her picks for titles worth watching. For the full list of everything arriving on the platform, scroll down.

Top picks

The Protégé (December 3)

Assassins are severely overrepresented in cinema. At least I hope so: surely there aren’t this many badass, leather-wearing, emotionally scarred hit-women covertly slaying their corrupt targets in real life…If the story of a highly-skilled killer lady seeking vengeance feels fresh to you, by all means please enjoy The Protégé.

But even for those of us who’ve already seen too many of these things (from Luc Besson’s obsessive canon to this year’s Kate), star Maggie Q is worth watching. Her supporting cast here includes Sam Jackson and Michael Keaton, and she’s the IRL martial arts protégé of Jackie Chan, which should be all you need to know.

Encounter (December 10)

Riz Ahmed will do anything to protect his kids in this emotional sci-fi feature. Is he capable? Sure, he’s a grizzled military vet with a survival plan in mind. Is he hot? Yes, I would love to Encounter him if ya know what I mean. But is he right?

The question at the centre of the boys’ journey is whether or not dad is delusional about the impending, mysterious threat he’s been prepping for. Like Take Shelter, the resulting chaos and uncertainty should lead to to some stirring moments for the Oscar-nominated actor and his kids, as they get hunted to the ends of the earth by shadowy government forces.

Being The Ricardos (December 21)

No disrespect to Nicole Kidman and Javier Bardem, who I’m sure will do great impressions here of Hollywood power couple Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz. But Being The Ricardos is most alluring as a self-reflexive story of TV’s past and future: a big, flashy, red-headed thermometer, stuck down the throat of the medium to see just where we’re at.

We’ll switch between black-and-white reconstructions of I Love Lucy’s greatest moments, and colourful behind-the-scenes arguments in writer-director Aaron Sorkin’s dizzying trademark style. Desilu Studios made its fortune back when there were live, laughing studio audiences and three TV channels: now, their mythic story is retold for the streaming era, on one of the hundreds of platforms bawling like Lucy for our attention.