What to watch on Showmax in Kenya in October 2023

There are some scarily good series hitting Showmax in the month of Halloween, like the third season of hit show Chucky and brand-new British crime series Six Four, plus loads of laughter to look forward to in American Auto.

Of course, reality TV addicts will already be glued to the new season of The Real Housewives of Lagos, exclusive to Showmax. New episodes weekly.

And, of course, there are still new episodes of Kenyan telenovela Second Family dropping every Thursday and Friday. There truly is never a dull moment when you’re a Showmax subscriber.

Showmax Originals

Boetie Boer | Showmax Original | Wednesdays from 18 October 

The most disturbing Showmax Original true-crime series to date, Boetie Boer: Inside The Mind Of A Monster takes us back in time to 1990: as the African National Congress is unbanned and Nelson Mandela is released after 27 years in prison, Stewart ‘Boetie Boer’ Wilken starts his killing spree in Port Elizabeth, now Gqeberha. As journalist Brett Adkins says in the trailer, “When he was arrested, it sounded like something out of a movie. Suddenly, we had a serial killer.”  

“Wilken was a highly unusual serial killer,” says director Jasyn Howes, who won Best SA Short Documentary at Jozi Film Festival for Dula. “Unlike most serial killers, he killed two distinct victim types: female sex workers and young boys, usually street children. He also claimed to engage in necrophilia and  cannibalism with his victims.”

The five-part documentary is a co-production between Stage 5 Films and Howes’ Fifth Floor Films. It’s the third documentary, and first true-crime docuseries, from Stage 5 Films, building on the success of Unearthed, which won the Green Award at the Sheffield International Documentary Festival and the Audience Award at Encounters, and The Journeymen, which took home Best SA Documentary at Durban.

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International series

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Chucky S3 | First on Showmax | 2 episodes on Mondays from 23 October

Chucky is headed for the White House in the third season of the cult horror franchise. It’s up to Jake, Devon, and Lexy to figure out how to stop Chucky when he’s cosied up to America’s First Family, in the most secure house in the US. Meanwhile, Chucky’s ex and now sworn enemy, Tiffany (Jennifer Tilly), faces a looming crisis of her own this season as the police close in on her. 

The series has a 91% critics’ rating on Rotten Tomatoes, where the critics’ consensus praises its “absurd humour and creative horror.” 

1923 | Binge from 16 October 

The Yellowstone prequel 1923 stars Helen Mirren and Harrison Ford as Cara and Jacob Dutton, who head a new generation of the Dutton family in Montana during the time of western expansion, Prohibition, and the Great Depression.

Continuing the saga from the first Yellowstone prequel 1883, 1923 was conceived as a two-season series. It has a 90% critics’ rating on Rotten Tomatoes, with Variety saying, “Mirren and Ford make for such a potent pairing; their chemistry alone is enough to make 1923 feel like an elevated version of Sheridan’s neo-Western fare.”

1923 was partly shot in Kenya, South Africa and Tanzania, so look out for SAFTA winner Nick Boraine (The Mating Game) as safari operator Richard Holland and Colin Moss (Warrior) as Tanganyika railroad construction supervisor Charles Hardin.

The Rookie: Feds S1 | Binge from 22 October

Five-time Emmy nominee Niecy Nash (Dahmer, When They See Us) stars in The Rookie: Feds as Special Agent Simone Clark, the oldest rookie in the FBI Academy, who is assigned to support the Los Angeles field office.

A spin-off from Showmax favourite The Rookie, Feds was nominated as Outstanding New TV Series at the 2023 GLAAD Media Awards and has an 86% critics’ rating on Rotten Tomatoes. 

Rain Dogs S1 | Binge from 19 October

Rain Dogs stars double-BAFTA winner Daisy May Cooper (Avenue 5) as Costello Jones, a devoted mother who wants more for her precocious young daughter, Iris (Fleur Tashjian). 

As she hustles to survive, Costello leans on Selby (Jack Farthing from Poldark), Iris’s pseudo father and Costello’s pseudo soulmate, and Gloria (Ronkẹ Adékoluẹjo from Alex Rider), the duo’s loyal yet chaotic godmother/best friend. Together they form a dysfunctional family on the fringes of society, trying to defy a system built against them to go straight in a crooked world. 

Rain Dogs has a 93% critics’ score on Rotten Tomatoes, where it’s #37 among the Best TV Shows of 2023 (So Far). Time calls Costello and Selby “easily the most compelling characters I’ve encountered this year”, hailing Rain Dogs as “magnificently dark… like no other family comedy on TV…” 

Son of a Critch S2 | Binge from 11 October

In Season 2 of Son of a Critch, a new school year brings new challenges for 1980s junior high-schooler Mark Critch, including his first fight, first beer, and even his first pair of jeans. But the bigger Mark’s world gets, the more complicated things become.

Benjamin Evan Ainsworth (Zemeckis’ Pinocchio) stars as the young Mark, with Hollywood Walk-of-Famer Malcolm McDowell (A Clockwork Orange) as his grandfather, and the real Mark Critch as his dad. An award-winning Canadian actor and writer, Critch co-writes the show, which is based on his memoir.

Season 1 scooped a 100% critics’ rating on Rotten Tomatoes and was nominated for seven Canadian awards this year. Son of a Critch has already been renewed for a third season. Common Sense Media gives the family friendly show 4/5-stars, recommending the show for ages 10+. 

Six Four S1 | Binge from 23 October

Based on the best-selling novel by award-winning Japanese mystery writer Hideo Yokoyama, Six Four follows Glasgow police detective Chris and his wife, former undercover officer Michelle, who discover that the disappearance of their teenage daughter may be connected to a cold case.

Kevin McKidd (Grey’s Anatomy) and Vinette Robinson star alongside the likes of Richard Coyle (Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore). 

In their four-star review, the London Evening Standard praised Six Four as “tight, thrilling and full of twists and turns.”

American Auto S1 | Binge from 2 October

From Justin Spitzer (the creator of Superstore and producer of The Office), American Auto is set at the Detroit offices of Payne Motors, where the floundering corporate execs are at a crossroads: adapt to the changing times or be sent to the junkyard. Luckily, they have a bold new CEO, whose leadership, experience, and savvy are only slightly offset by her total lack of knowledge about cars. 

American Auto holds a 100% critics’ rating on Rotten Tomatoes, with Globe and Mail calling it, “A mad satire of corporate life… mainly set in the boardroom, where executives prove daily that they know nothing.”

The hilarious ensemble cast includes Ana Gasteyer (Saturday Night Live), Jon Barinholtz (Superstore’s Marcus), Harriet Dyer (Colin From Accounts), and X Mayo, an Emmy nominee for her writing on The Daily Show. 

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International movies

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Cocaine Bear | 19 October

Inspired by the true story of a drug runner’s plane crash, missing cocaine, and the black bear that ate it, Cocaine Bear finds an oddball group of cops, criminals, tourists and teens converging on a Georgia forest where a 230-kilogram apex predator has ingested a staggering amount of cocaine and gone on a coke-fueled rampage for blow … and blood. 

Directed by Elizabeth Banks (Pitch Perfect 2), Cocaine Bear was nominated for two 2023 MTV Movie Awards – Most Frightened Performance for Jesse Tyler Ferguson (Mitchell in Modern Family) and Best Villain … for The Bear. Chicago Sun-Times calls it a “wildly entertaining and darkly hilarious B-movie blood-fest.”

Honk For Jesus. Save Your Soul. | 26 October

Regina Hall (The Best Man: The Final Chapters) and Sterling K Brown (This Is Us) star as Trinitie and Lee-Curtis Childs, a mega-church power couple determined to rebuild their congregation in the aftermath of a huge scandal.

The mockumentary-style satirical comedy co-stars Nicole Beharie (Breaking), along with Nigerian actor Conphidance (Little America). 

IndieWire praises Hall and Brown for “doing predictably divine work (do these two performers know any other way?)”, calling the film “a biting send-up straight from heaven.. a winning combination of the divine and the horrific… equal parts hilarious and painful.”

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Documentaries

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Love to Love You, Donna Summer | Stream from 4 October

Love to Love You, Donna Summer is a deeply personal portrait of the Queen of Disco. The singer and songwriter of a string of anthemic hits like “Hot Stuff”, “I Feel Love”, and “She Works Hard For the Money”, Donna Summer was an Oscar and five-time Grammy Award winner whose voice legendary producer Quincy Jones has called, “the heartbeat and soundtrack of a generation”. She was also the first Black woman to be nominated for an MTV Video Music Award. 

Directed by Oscar and Emmy-winning filmmaker Roger Ross Williams (God Loves Uganda, Life, Animated) and Donna Summer’s daughter Brooklyn Sudano, the HBO documentary film explores the highs and lows of fame, offering an intimate glimpse into the artist’s life, both on and off stage. 

The film has an 81% critics’ rating on Rotten Tomatoes, where the critics’ consensus says: “An enigmatic documentary about an equally enigmatic singer, Love to Love You, Donna Summer’s got you covered from disco to soul.”

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Kids

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Tad, the Lost Explorer and the Emerald Tablet | 5 October

Get ready to journey across the world with the most ambitious (and clumsy) adventurer of all time in the award-winning Spanish-made animated movie Tad, the Lost Explorer and the Emerald Tablet. 

When a slight blunder destroys a rare sarcophagus, an ancient spell is unleashed. Now, Chicago bricklayer-turned-archeologist Tad Jones must team up with his friends Sara and his “oldest pal” Mummy to race across the far corners of the Earth and stop the curse of the Emerald Tablet before things get really out of hand.

The movie has an 89% critics’ rating on Rotten Tomatoes and is the second sequel to Tad, the Lost Explorer, which was nominated for Best Feature at the Annecy International Animated Film Festival.

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More to watch 

2 October 

Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy | Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues | Dora and the Lost City of Gold | Downsizing

5 October 

Crossword Mysteries: Abracadaver | Hostile Territory | Lake Placid | Rocketman | Tabaluga | XXX: Return of Xander Cage

9 October 

Chocolate City | Daddy’s Home 1 and 2 | Shutter Island

12 October 

Angry Neighbours | Game of Love | Gemini Man | Hostel | The Hotwives of Las Vegas | The Visitor

16 October 

A Quiet Place | Black Cat | Coach Carter | Forrest Gump | S.W.A.T | Tiger Cage 3 | Zu: Warriors from the Magic Mountain

19 October

Bumblebee | Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation | Transformers | Transformers: Age of Extinction | Transformers: Dark of the Moon | Transformers: The Last Knight | Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen | When A Stranger Calls | Witness To Murder: A Darrow Mystery

23 October 

Crawl | Disciples of Shaolin Temple | Haunted Trail | Legacy of Rage | Monster House

26 October

Don’t Look Deeper | I Know What You Did Last Summer | Overlord | Slender Man

30 October 

Curse of Rosalie