Dark Matter, the trippy Apple TV+ thriller adapted from Blake Crouch’s novel of the same name, is the latest addition to the streamer’s growing collection of high-quality sci-fi fare. With its reasonably strong Rotten Tomatoes scores, and the fact that it’s once again the most popular TV series across the entire streaming landscape this week, it’s helping to position the iPhone maker’s streaming service as the go-to place for mind-bending, provocative sci-fi storytelling — which the new show starring Joel Edgerton and Jennifer Connelly certainly delivers, and then some.
In the new Apple series, four episodes of which are currently available to stream as of this writing, Edgerton plays a physics professor who’s yanked into a multiverse. The “real” version of Edgerton’s character Jason, who teaches a physics class to bored undergraduates, is kidnapped and replaced by a Jason from another dimension. A Jason who, among other things, is a prize-winning scientist and has invented a mechanism that can connect people to parallel worlds.
The show plays with the same kinds of ideas, such as the principles of quantum mechanics, as other recent Apple TV+ dramas like Constellation — and if you were a fan of Apple’s existing sci-fi titles like Silo, Severance, and For All Mankind, Dark Matter should likewise be right up your alley.
Moreover, not only is the show currently the #1 series on Apple TV+ right now, but it’s also the top-streamed series this week according to the streaming search engine Reelgood, which tracks the most popular TV shows from all of the major streamers, including Netflix to Max, Apple TV+, Hulu, Paramount+, Prime Video, Peacock and more.
Reelgood monitors 20 million viewing decisions each month across every streaming platform in the US. For the 7-day period that ended on May 22, the 10 shows that topped Reelgood’s latest TV chart are as follows:
- Dark Matter (Apple TV+)
- Fallout (Prime Video)
- Bridgerton (Netflix)
- Bodkin (Netflix)
- Outer Range (Prime Video)
- Young Sheldon (Netflix)
- Baby Reindeer (Netflix)
- Hacks (Max)
- Sugar (Apple TV+)
- Under the Bridge (Hulu)
As for the rest of the TV shows that are among the most popular this week, we’ve covered many of the standouts on this ranking — from Apple’s Sugar, with its truly wild twist, to Netflix’s Bodkin that comes from the Obamas as well as Prime Video’s hit video game adaptation Fallout.
One I want to single out that I don’t think gets enough attention is Prime Video’s Outer Range, starring Josh Brolin as a gruff rancher in a story that’s sort of like a cross between Yellowstone and Stranger Things. Season 2 just hit Prime a few days ago and continues the story of the rancher discovering a mysterious hole at the edge of his property, and the show explores themes that range from family secrets to the supernatural and the complexities of rural life in Wyoming.
The talented cast and gorgeous cinematography are just some of what make Outer Range a must-watch for anyone who’s a fan of mystery and suspense.
