Television and streaming: series highlights for 2025

This year there are new episodes of several hit series, including the second season of “Severance” (Apple TV+), third seasons of “Squid Game” (Netflix), “Diplomatic Relations” (Netflix) and “And Just Like That” ( Sky).

The fourth season of “The Bear” (Disney+) and the sixth and final season of “The Handmaid’s Tale” (Magenta TV) have also been announced, as well as the now sixth season of “LOL – Last One Laughing” ( Prime Video) with Michael “Bully” Herbig and guests.

A selection of what TV and streaming fans can look forward to in the new year:

“Maxton Hall” – Season 2

“Maxton Hall – The World Between Us” was one of the surprise hits of last year in the streaming world. The series has created fans and a real hype all over the world. The series will return for a second season on Prime Video in 2025. The audience is once again taken into the world of Ruby and James.

Ruby Bell (Harriet Herbig-Matten), an ambitious student, has landed a scholarship to the exclusive Maxton Hall Academy. There she meets James Beaufort (Damian Hardung), the rich, charming but also arrogant school crush. The first season ended dramatically with James learning of his mother’s sudden death. Ruby has no idea what problems are coming her way.

“The White Lotus” – Season 3

The social satire “The White Lotus,” which has won several Emmys and is about rich people on luxury vacations, is entering its third round. This time, Mike White’s eight-part series travels to Hawaii and Sicily to a posh Thai resort.

Among others, the German actor Christian Friedel (“The Zone Of Interest”) is there as the hotel director. There is a reunion with the ambitious spa manager Belinda (Natasha Rothwell) from season 1. The third season starts on February 17th on Sky and on the streaming service Wow.

Part one became a darkly funny series hit, and in 2025 Jenna Ortega will return to the Nevermore Academy as the title character “Wednesday”. At the beginning of December, Netflix announced that the second season of the horror series “Wednesday” was in the can. The streaming provider has not yet announced when exactly the second part of the “Addams Family” spin-off can be seen. The second season will be “wonderfully dark, crazy and mysterious,” said an announcement.

As in the first season, Catherine Zeta-Jones and Luis Guzmán play Wednesday’s cranky parents Morticia and Gomez Addams, Emma Myers as Enid Sinclair and Joy Sunday as Bianca Barclay are also back.

“Black Mirror” – Season 7

It’s getting dystopian again at Netflix: The streaming service has announced six new episodes of Charlie Brooker’s anthology series “Black Mirror” for 2025, which revolves around the negative effects of technology and media on society and people. The individual episodes always show different scenarios that do not build on each other in terms of content.

According to an announcement from Brooker, this will probably be different for the first time in season 7: One of the episodes will be a continuation of the start of season 4, i.e. the Emmy-winning sci-fi episode “USS Callister”.

“Fans of the series will recognize the cast of a particular spaceship from one of our episodes,” Brooker said. “We’ve made a sequel to ‘Black Mirror’ for the first time in history.” Otherwise, he announced a mix of different genres and styles for the new season – as was actually the case with previous episodes.

Prestige project from ARD (script: Alexander Osang), which is set in Berlin and starts on January 24th in the media library and then runs on Erste. Lisa Vicari plays the main role of an investigative journalist, Jens Harzer can be seen as a cold businessman who has betrayed his anti-system ideals.

According to ARD, the title “The Next Level” stands for the temptations of the pulsating metropolis of Berlin. “The mysterious drug-related death of a young US tourist who dies after a night of dancing in a techno club provides the starting point for the six-part drama series that looks behind the scenes of club culture, gentrification and commercialization in the capital.”

“Stranger Things” – Season 5

Fans of “Stranger Things” had to wait almost three years for the new season of the sci-fi mystery series from Netflix. And that’s after the fourth one ended with a spectacular cliffhanger. Hopper (David Harbour) was reunited with Joyce (Winona Ryder), Eleven (Millie Bobby Brown) and Mike (Finn Wolfhard). But their small town of Hawkins seemed doomed in the last episode so far.

Since then, a brand new “Stranger Things” play has premiered on London’s West End. But that only tells the backstory of the cult series about the diabolical Vecna ​​(Jamie Campbell Bower), who later brings disaster to Hawkins in the series. So now it should finally continue on television.

The fifth and final season of “Stranger Things” takes place in 1987. The eight episodes, whose titles have already been published by series creators Matt and Ross Duffer, are each intended to be feature length and clarify all open questions. However, it is not yet known when exactly the grand finale of “Stranger Things” will begin on Netflix.

The Netflix thriller series “Cassandra” is about the oldest smart home in Germany. The old hi-tech system comes to life after more than 50 years – and with it the electronic household helper, played by Lavinia Wilson.

When Samira (Mina Tander) moves into the empty house with her family, she doesn’t suspect anything bad. But she soon finds herself confronted with an outdated worldview and the dark intentions of Cassandra, who was created in the 1970s. The six-part series was filmed in Cologne and the surrounding area. The director and screenwriter is Benjamin Gutsche (“All You Need”).

After Jeffrey Dahmer and Lyle and Erik Menendez, the next killer is already in the starting blocks for the anthology series “Monster” at Netflix. Series creator Ryan Murphy has hired series star Charlie Hunnam (“Sons of Anarchy”) as the lead actor. The actor is set to play Edward “Ed” Gein, a brutal serial killer in 1950s Wisconsin. The series probably won’t start until the end of 2025 at the earliest.