IMDb Staff Picks for February: Kashika S.

After Big Little Lies, The Undoing, and Nine Perfect Strangers, Nicole Kidman has perfected the role of a tortured wife/mom who suffered a devastating loss. She insists on carrying on as if nothing is wrong but is constantly on the verge of a breakdown. In Expats, we don't know what loss Nicole's character has suffered when we first meet her, but it's obvious that something terrible has happened. The other two expats living in Hong Kong, played by Sarayu Blue and Ji-young Yoo, also seem to be barely holding on. How can you not want to know what's going on? How can you not want to reach inside your screen and hug them, while also worrying that they'll slap you? Based on a novel by Janice Y. K. Lee, and in the adept hands of Lulu Wang, Expats is here to ask you one central question: how long can you pretend that everything is okay before you break?

Streaming on Prime Video

One Day is the story of two college friends, Emma and Dexter, who meet on their graduation day. For the next 20 years, we revisit their life on this one day to see if they're still friends or lovers or even on speaking terms. I read the book by David Nicholls when I was 21, shook by the urgency and intensity of the connection between these two people. They made a fairly average movie based on this book starring a British-accented Anne Hathaway in 2011, but a movie cannot do justice to the love and friendship of Em and Dex. You need 10 episodes (or more!) to fully capture the magic of two people who are often not friends and not lovers, but calling them anything less than that would be like putting a dagger to their heart. Starring Ambika Mod and Leo Woodall (the 'nephew' of the gays from The White Lotus 2), the trailer already looks like it'll destroy me. I'm ready!

Series premieres Thursday, Feb. 8 on Netflix

Starring acting heavyweights Bhumi Pednekar, Sanjay Mishra, Sai Tamhankar, and Aditya Srivastava, Bhakshak is the story of an investigative journalist trying to uncover the horrors that go on behind closed doors in a young girls' shelter. The team behind the movie claims that it's inspired by true events, a fact that is endlessly terrifying, but if any actress can do such a role justice, it's Bhumi. She is believable when she questions people's apathy towards others' misfortune and impactful when she goes after the rich and corrupt. To my surprise, Inspector Abhijeet (Aditya Srivastava) playing the bad guy in the movie, which is difficult to digest but makes things more interesting.

Premieres Friday, Feb. 9 on Netflix

Listen, I'm still not over the fact that Phoebe Waller-Bridge was supposed to be the Mrs. Smith in this series before something happened and she dropped out. My celeb gossip-obsessed brain will never stop thinking about what her 'creative differences' with Donald Glover were, but Maya Erskine is as worthy a spy as any. You'd agree if you've seen the achingly touching yet hilarious Pen15. The 2005 Mr. & Mrs. Smith has an incredible legacy, with Brad and Angie not only giving us a superhit but also falling in love on the sets in a Hollywood-defining, let-the-world-burn sort of way. I'm excited to see what Donald and Maya do with this series, especially because it has a fake marriage plot, which is a staple of Hindi/Korean shows and fertile ground for slow burn romantic hijinks.

Streaming on Prime Video

Friends turned lovers, fake marriage, and now enemies turned lovers. I'm exposing myself as a sucker for romantic clichés but I'm ready to live my truth. Anyone who watches Korean dramas knows that Park Hyung-sik is the ultimate TV boyfriend — a green flag, nay a green forest, if there ever was one. If he has a new show out in the month of February, no matter how much you want to resist the commodified idea of love, you have to watch it. In Doctor Slump, he and Park Shin-hye star as two burnt out doctors who reunite at their rock bottom after being academic rivals in high school. It's a story as old as time, but I trust PHS to add his own charm to it.

Streaming on Netflix