Blogocentric Formulations

Watch List - January 2026

Methodology ▶︎

To qualify for my Watch List every month, a title has to be something that I've watched that's new to me. It doesn't necessarily have to be a current show, but it can't be reruns or rewatches of something I've already seen. If I'm including it in this list, it means this month is the first time I've watched it.

I'll put "DNF" (Did Not Finish) next to anything that I stopped watching and have no immediate plans to finish.

If I'm watching an ongoing season of a series across multiple months, I'll try to only list it once.

Movies

         Elevation
         Greenland
         Greenland 2: Migration
         Mercy
         People We Meet on Vacation
         The Woman in Cabin 10

I didn't love any of the movies I watched this month. Of all of them, Mercy was an entertaining faced-paced thriller that was pretty well done, and I thought the first Greenland was surprisingly tense and emotional. The sequel felt more like a paint-by-numbers money grab to replicate the success of the original without much heart, and Elevation was a good idea for a sci-fi horror movie but ended up veering into B-movie territory pretty quick. People We Meet on Vacation was a decent romantic comedy; Netflix seems to have found their sweet spot for these types of movies. They find a charimastic couple of actors, write a few decent jokes and set pieces, and set it to some good music and it gets the job done. The Woman in Cabin 10 is based on a book I've been meaning to read but now probably won't because I already know how the murder mystery ends and I wasn't that impressed by it.


Documentaries

         Billy & Molly
         DisneyNature's Bears

We've been trying to find stuff for our kids to watch that isn't just pure entertainment, and they both seem to really enjoy animals, so we checked out a couple of Disney+ documentaries. Billy & Molly was a really sweet documentary about a guy (Billy) living on the Shetland Islands north of Scotland who befriends an otter (Molly) and bonds with her. And DisneyNature's Bears was one that the kids really enjoyed also.


Television

          Emily in Paris (Season 5)
          Murder in a Small Town (Season 1)
          Run Away (Season 1)
          Stranger Things (Season 5)
          Task (Season 1)

My favorite television series that I watched this month was Task. It started a little slow, but got really compelling as it went on. It was well-acted and tense, and I'm thrilled they renewed it for a second season. The fifth and final season of Stranger Things was good (definitely better than the last two seasons), but it felt more like they were ending it because they had to rather than because it was a good time or narratively satisfying to do so. I absolutely loved the first season of this show, but it felt like every subsequent season failed to live up to the promise of the first. Run Away was just an okay thriller based on a Harlan Coben book, and Murder in a Small Town is a VERY Canadian procedural/drama series that I couldn't make it past a couple episodes of. And Emily in Paris I can't really honestly recommend to anyone, but my wife likes it so we continue to follow along with Emily and her group of Parisian friends who are all super good looking, super fashionable, and complain to each other about how opportunities of a lifetime that fall into their laps time and time again just aren't the perfect thing they're looking for.


Webseries

          Tales from Woodcreek

One of the YouTube TTRPG channels that I follow (Dungeon Dudes) helped produce this webseries, which was a live-play game run by actress Deborah Ann Woll (of Daredevil fame, among other things). It was a really cool mix of both TTRPG play (sitting around with your friends, telling a story by rolling dice) and LARP (live action roleplay, where you act out what your character does).

She basically had each player pretend to be their character and carry their character sheets around on lanyards around their neck as she physically took them to an abandoned town that had been fitted with puzzles and challenges that matched what their characters were experiencing. So instead of just sitting around a table and imagining, she'd be like, "Quick, to the old schoolhouse!" and they'd all run to the old schoolhouse and she'd show them a puzzle or prop that she was describing and they had a chance to interact with physically as they figured the story out.

It was honestly a really, really cool idea for a game, and her players (two of which were the titular Dungeon Dudes, and others which included Woll's actor friends) absolutely loved it. I hear there's already talk of a second season and, if true, I'm definitely in for another go-round. While the story itself didn't blow me away, the creativity and work that must have gone into setting this up to be a memorable experience for the players was well worth the watch for anyone who admires game design and unique gameplay.

TOP PICK:
Tales From Woodcreek