With news that Netflix lost a record 200,000 subscribers this year, Apple TV+ must be standing in the wings, rubbing its metaphorical hands together with glee.
The streamer has recently come into its own with a run of excellent original series – Severance! Ted Lasso! Pachinko! The Morning Show! - leading people to sign up quicker than you can say “what cost of living crisis?”
Now they're adding another title to that must-watch list with a glossy new psychological thriller, Surface, which asks: what if you woke up one day and didn’t know your own secrets?
Sound up your street? Here’s everything you need to know about the show, plus how you can watch it for free:
What’s it all about?
A woman wakes up from a suicide attempt on a boat, but as she tries to remember anything prior to the accident, she draws a big blank. That’s until she pictures in her mind a shady character standing over her: was she pushed? And if so, what person involved intimately in her life is lying to her?
It’s a gripping premise from the start, and Gugu Mbatha-Raw (last seen as Ravonna Renslayer in Loki) is enthralling as Sophie, philanthropist wife to her venture capitalist husband, James (Oliver Jackson-Cohen) who is seriously struggling with her identity. The memories of her pre-accident life have been obliterated, but while she’s living a charmed, rich life in San Francisco (get ready for some serious house envy) there are dark secrets going on around her and in her past that she’s struggling to uncover. It’s a slick, smart and engaging series, not least because of the huge whodunnit hanging over the whole story.
Other familiar faces that pop up in the series include Marianne Jean-Baptiste (Secrets & Lies), Stephen James (If Beale Street Could Talk, Race) and Ari Graynor (The Sopranos).
The director (for half the series) is I May Destroy You’s Sam Miller, and Reese Witherspoon’s production company Hello Sunshine (who produced Big Little Lies) is behind the series. The actress has also jumped in the exec producer chair for Surface too.
How to watch Surface for free
Surface starts streaming on 29 July with the first three episodes released on the day, and a new episode of the eight-part series will be aired weekly. The last episode streams on 2 October, so if you can hold out until then, Apple TV+ are still running their seven-day free trial to the service, so there’s a whole week to binge the entire season. Alternatively, you can use the free trial to see if it's your cup of tea before you commit.
But if you’re due for an upgrade on an iPhone or any other Apple device – or have bought one in the last 90 days – you’ll get free Apple TV+ for three months, which by our reckoning should take you up to the finale: and the big reveals and twists of one of 2022’s most engaging thrillers.
Surface streams on Apple TV+ from July 29.
