Next week is a lighter week for Netflix as far as new releases go, with only a little more than a dozen new series and movies to enjoy from the streaming giant. Moreover, most of the new releases are international titles like Elite Season 8 that I’m not sure will interest the vast majority of American Netflix subscribers — that is, outside of one giant exception that I can’t recommend highly enough, especially if you love stylish, taut-as-a-wire espionage dramas.
That title I’m referring to is the highly anticipated second season of Kleo, which hits Netflix on July 25. I’ve described it before as sort of like a cross between The Americans and Killing Eve, with a mix of drama and black comedy, and I’d even go so far as to say it’s the only must-watch Netflix title coming next week. But you don’t have to take my word for it:
“What a breath of fresh air!” raved Stephen King on X/Twitter back in 2022, after he checked out the first season. “Suspenseful and also very funny.” From The Guardian, Kleo is “an entertaining, highly stylised and cinematic adventure,” while Decider very astutely opines that the Netflix series “isn’t trying to be anything more than a fast-paced spy thriller.”
I’ve written more about the series here, but by way of a brief summation let me state one important thing right off the bat: Kleo, a Cold War-era drama about an ex-Stasi killer with a vendetta, is one of the few really good spy series available on Netflix.
East German spy Kleo Straub spent Season 1 mainly trying to figure out who or what was responsible for sending her to prison after a mission in which she killed a man inside a nightclub. By the end of the season, she’s figured out why she was arrested — but her problems have only multiplied.
In Season 2, Kleo is on the hunt for a red suitcase — the contents of which will play a role in the reunification of Germany as well as the post-Cold War reorganization of Germany and Europe, which is why Kleo is racing to find the suitcase before the KGB and CIA get their hands on it. The result is a six-episode season of spies and killers racing from Belgrade to Moscow, with Kleo once again dodging the predations of other spooks as the fast-paced story gets kicked up a notch.
\