Paramount+ has you more than covered this week with an incredible lineup of truly standout mixes of fresh dramas, returning favorites, animated gems, and timeless classics. This week’s top 10 shows on Paramount+ offer something for everyone, whether you’re looking for an intense psychological thriller, light-hearted comedies, or crime sagas! Let’s dive into some standout TV series you will be itching to put on your must-watch list this week!
The Chi
The Chi, created by Lena Waithe in 2018, stars Yolanda Ross (Jada), Jacob Latimore (Emmet Washington), Michael Epps (Jake Taylor), and Shamon Brown Jr. ( Stanley ‘Papa’ Jackson/Papa Jackson), as well as so many more! This series is a Chicago South Side coming-of-age drama depicting interwoven lives amid violence, hope, and systemic challenges.
Season seven premiered a few months ago and really dives into power shifts, along with the continued exploration of the dominant female characters. Viewers who are drawn to character-driven dramas will find that The Chi is an incredibly compelling portrait of resilience and community! One thing to know about this series is that it’s available on Paramount+, of course, but you have to have the Paramount+ with Showtime package; it’s more than worth it!
Tulsa King
Created by Taylor Sheridan (you’re already interested aren’t you?), and after spending 25 years in prison, Dwight “The General” Manfredi (Sylvester Stallone) is sent from New York to Tulsa to rebuild a crime empire, that has zero mob presence, or at least that’s what they first think. However, he ends up adapting to small-town life a little too well for his New York counterparts, which is when the magic really happens in this excellent blending of crime, culture, and mobster aesthetic!
Tulsa King also stars Jay Will (Tyson), Garrett Hedlund (Mitch Keller), Frank Grillo (Bill Bevilaqua), Dana Delany (Margaret), Martin Starr (Bodhi), and Andrea Savage (Stacy Beale), and more, which helps to make Stallone’s first scripted TV lead role is one that you can’t miss out on!
Mayor of Kingstown
Mayor of Kingstown is an amazing look at a town built on prisons, where the McLusky family, led by Mike McLusky (Jeremy Renner), mediates crime, corruption, and justice. I have to say, I find this to be one of Jeremy Renner’s best roles as he does an exceptional job of showcasing Mike being emotionally worn throughout the series while remaining fiercely protective at the same time. The supporting cast of Dianne Wiest (Miriam McLusky), Taylor Handley (Kyle McLusky), Hugh Dillon (Ian), Tobi Bamtefa (Deverin “Bunny” Washington), and Aidan Gillen (Milo Sunter), does an incredible job of bringing together a show that raises the stakes in one ground-breaking crime thriller!
With themes of addiction, redemption, power, and moral compromise, and being another riveting Taylor Sheridan creation, Mayor of Kingstown does an excellent job of exploring the American carceral system with nuance. Season four’s renewal is confirmed according to social media reports, filming has finished, making now an excellent time to binge-watch the first three seasons to get ready!
The Agency
This spy thriller is a reimagining of the early 2000s CBS series, offering a modern take on life inside the CIA! The Agency is set in a complex world of international espionage and follows elite agents as they tackle covert operations, global threats, and even betrayals within their own ranks. Starring Michael Fassbender as Daniel Kincaid, a former field operative pulled back into the game after a global intelligence leak, Kristen Stewart as Lena Hart, a brilliant cyber security specialist with a past, Giancarlo Esposito as Director Marcus Weller, the head of the CIA who doesn’t seem to mind blurring ethical lines, and John Cho as Tom Reyes, a deadly operations officer that caught between disillusionment and duty!
The Agency does an excellent job of combining cerebral storytelling with intense action, which highlights both the personal and political stakes of intelligence work while drawing from real-world events and conflicts to explore the sacrifices and moral ambiguities behind national security work.
Star Trek: Lower Decks
Star Trek: Lower Decks is an animated addition to the Star Trek universe that tells the story of the lower-ranking crew aboard the U.S.S. Cerritos, one of Starfleet’s least important ships. This series does a great job of exploring life in Starfleet through a comedic lens, with a cast that includes Jack Quaid as Ensign Brad Boimler, Tawney Newsome as Ensign Beckett Mariner, Jerry O’Connell as Commander Jack Ransom, and many more outstanding actors voicing these characters.
Whether it’s surviving alien pathogens or fumbling through first contact, this animated series is considered a love letter to Star Trek fans, full of jokes and heartfelt moments for those who want something a little lighter while not losing the soul of the overall franchise!
CBS Sports: Pulisic
Pulisic is an excellent biographical sports documentary available on Paramount+, focusing on the life and career of Christian Pulisic, who is the captain of the U.S. Men’s National Soccer Team and current winger for AC Milan. While only a one-hour special, you get a deep dive into his early beginnings in Hershey, Pennsylvania, and how he became a Champions League winner with Chelsea and a leading force in the Premier League. It showcases Pulisic’s talent, grit, and evolution on the world stage with key interviews from not only Pulisic himself, but the U.S. Men’s National Team coach Gregg Berhalter, former Chelsea teammates, and other family members and coaches.
The greatest thing about this documentary is that you don’t have to be a soccer fan or a sports fan, even, as it’s just an excellent display of drive, identity, and breaking boundaries that anyone can find inspiring and enjoyable!
The King of Queens
As for a classic American sitcom, The King of Queens is always at the top of my watch list, and it appears many are sharing that idea; it’s easily on the top 10 shows on Paramount+ for this week! Following Doug Heffernan (Kevin James) and Carrie Heffernan (Leah Remini), as they live their lives in Queens, New York, and have to deal with that life being turned upside down when Carrie’s father, Arthur Spooner, played by the incomparable Jerry Stiller, moves in!
The humor throughout the series is driven by everyday domestic chaos, typical marriage dynamics, and some of the most incredible one-liners! It’s as much a comforting, laugh-out-loud sitcom as any, and it remains a huge stable in American comedy and should be on your watch list either as someone looking to laugh hysterically for the first time as it’s available to stream, or as someone like me that can have it on at any time, for any reason, and get some really good laughs, no matter how many times I’ve seen it!
Yellowjackets
Yellowjackets is another must-watch series for this list of the top 10 shows on Paramount+ this week, but it’s also another show where you will need to get that upgraded Paramount+ with Showtime package! This series is a chilling, genre-blending psychological thriller, drama, and mystery that follows a high school girls’ soccer team whose plane crashes into the wilderness.
What starts as a survival story quickly becomes something much darker as it weaves between the 1990s crash timeline and the survivors’ adult lives a whole decade later. The Adult timeline cast includes Melanie Lynskey as Shauna, Juliette Lewis as Natalie, Christina Ricci as Misty, Tawney Cypress as Taissa, and the teen versions being played by Sophie Nelisse, Samantha Hanratty, Jasmin Savoy Brown, and more! As the series goes on and as we get more and more details from the back and forth between timelines, secrets begin to become uncovered that they have been so desperate to try to keep buried.
The Amazing Race
The Amazing Race is one of the longest-running reality competitions on TV, and it’s thrilling, family-friendly, and educational, which helps to place it on this week’s top 10 shows on Paramount+! In the series, they send teams of two on a global adventure packed with physical and mental challenges while offering new cultural experiences, obstacles, and travel mishaps as teams compete for a million-dollar prize!
Hosted by Phil Keoghan, you can follow the teams from urban megacities to remote villages, witnessing the emotional dynamics between the teammates that add an extra layer of drama but also insight into humanity!
NCIS Origins
One of my personal favorites for this week is NCIS Origins. This Paramount+ crime procedural and prequel drama takes fans back to the early days of TV’s most iconic investigator, Leroy Jethro Gibbs. The series, set in the early 1990s, follows a younger Gibbs, played by Austin Stowell, as he starts on his NCIS journey while fighting through losing his family in a terrible murder and transitioning from military service to investigative work. If you’re a fan of NCIS, you’ll also get a look into Mike Franks (Kyle Schmid), who is Gibbs’ mentor and NCIS legend, as the two work side by side along with new recruit Special Agent Lila Gomez (Mariel Molino) and more.
To top it off, the series is narrated by none other than the original Gibbs, Mark Harmon himself, as a way to connect the past to the present. While on NCIS, you learn things about Gibbs and his background, on NCIS Origins, you get a much deeper dive into Gibbs’ psyche, some serious 90s nostalgia, and fresh cases, and it’s done quite brilliantly!
Wrap up!
From high-stakes espionage to nostalgic sitcom laughs and even globe-trotting reality TV competitions, this week’s top 10 shows on Paramount+ showcase just how much versatility this streaming platform has for its viewers, and that includes taking the chance on upgrading to the Paramount+ with Showtime tier to witness shows like The Chi and Yellowjackets! So, get the popcorn, and get comfy, as the hardest part of all of this will be what to start binge-watching first!
