Summer is firmly here and the temperatures are feeling borderline apocalyptic in much of the northern hemisphere. Why not avoid the angry sun and stay inside where it’s (hopefully) cooler and distract yourself with some of the best movies on streaming right now?
Your choices are notably rich too. The spring hit sci-fi movie Project Hail Mary, about the global freeze threatening Earth as a result of the sun mysteriously going out, is now on Prime Video, after winning theater audiences over with the help of an adorable pile of pebbles. If, however, you want to embrace the flames, you’ll find some like minds in Avatar: Fire and Ash on Disney+, where a violent new tribe of Na’vi just want to see the world (well, a semi-sentient living moon) burn.
If you instead find the heat hellish, then a double bill of Satanic panic might be more fitting. Both Ready or Not 2, also on Disney+, and They Will Kill You on Hulu tap into a previously unexplored yet surprisingly rich subgenre of “estranged sisters with melee weaponry killing murderous cultists”—insert the “weird it happened twice” meme here, but just go with it. Or if you prefer not to switch your brain entirely off for entertainment, there’s also the far more cerebral Archive or the dark dystopia of The Long Walk to take your mind off the unbearable heat.
Here are WIRED’s picks of the best movies to watch right now.
Project Hail Mary
Waking up aboard a spaceship to find himself the only crew member still alive, amnesiac middle school science teacher Ryland Grace (Ryan Gosling) makes for an unlikely astronaut. Even worse, he’s Earth’s last hope for survival, sent out into space in search of a way to stop a strange phenomenon devouring the sun itself—and almost every other star in the sky. It’d be an impossible task solo, but luckily Ryland has back-up in the form of Rocky (James Ortiz), the first alien humanity has ever met, a five-legged stone creature who communicates in song.
Adapted from the book of the same name by Andy Weir (author of The Martian), Project Hail Mary is a fantastic slice of survival drama and hard science fiction, but the real heart of the movie is Ryland’s and Rocky’s growing friendship. Prepare to fall in love with an excitable rock spider-thing—fist my bump, friends.
Avatar: Fire and Ash
Picking up from 2022’s The Way of Water, human-soldier-in-a-Na’vi-body Jake Sully (Sam Worthington) and his family are in mourning following the death of their eldest son Neteyam, leading wife Neytiri (Zoe Saldaña) down a dark path. As the family struggles to stay together, the colonialist human forces led by Miles Quaritch (Stephen Lang) forge a deadly alliance with a warmongering tribe of fire-worshipping Na’vi ruled by the nihilistic Varang (Oona Chaplin)—who aims for destruction to spite the Na’vi’s god, Eywa. James Cameron’s almost inconceivably ambitious saga returns with a visually spectacular outing taking viewers through striking new regions of the lush jungle moon Pandora. Fire and Ash is no jumping on point, but thankfully you can binge the entire trilogy (for now; Avatar 4 and 5 are planned) on Disney+.
Ready or Not 2: Here I Come
The first Ready or Not from 2019 was something of a sleeper hit. A gory slasher with a sense of humor, it played with the fears and uncertainties of marriage and joining a new family, with bride-to-be Grace (Samara Weaving) caught in the murderous traditions of her fiance’s clan. This sequel, helmed by returning codirectors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett, picks up right after that first film’s credit roll, leading to Grace’s reunion with her estranged sister Faith (Kathryn Newton)—just in time to be swept into another murder game against a cabal of billionaires and aristocrats looking to fill a power vacuum left by Grace’s almost-inlaws. Schlocky, campy comedy horror, elevated by the presence of Sarah Michelle Gellar in an almost anti-Buffy role, Ready or Not 2 isn’t high art but it’s a hell of a lot of fun.
They Will Kill You
If Ready or Not 2 is schlock, then They Will Kill You is a step up the ladder—an almost exploitation-level hack-’em-up that takes liberal inspiration from Sam Raimi’s original Evil Dead trilogy and smashes it unapologetically together with Gareth Evans’ one-man-against-a-tower-block action epic The Raid.