The 11 Best Shows on Paramount+ Right Now (August 2022)

So you got sick of bingeing Love Is Blind Season 536 and decided to try out a new streaming service and picked Paramount+. Now you have to decide what to watch. The good news is that Paramount+ is the streaming home of many familiar networks, like CBS, Comedy Central, and Nickelodeon, but the better news is that its Paramount+ originals are some of its best new shows.

We've put together a starter list of the best TV shows to watch on Paramount+. We're focusing on originals and exclusives you can't watch anywhere else, personal favorites, and shows that are important to right now. Don't go too far; we'll continue to update this list as new shows come to Paramount+.

This list was last updated Aug. 17; newer additions are at the top.

Beavis and Butt-Head

For fans of: Fire, fire fire!
Number of seasons: 1

Mike Judge's crudely drawn animated series has been rebooted multiple times, and you know what? It always stands the test of time, because stupidity is a timeless diversion. This time, Beavis and Butt-Head waste their days watching TikTok and YouTube in addition to music videos during the interstitials between their exploits trying to score, and the humor continues to work because Beavis and Butt-Head never punch down. This is good-natured dumb-assery. [Trailer]        

Players

For fans of: American Vandal, guys who go by "CreamCheese," Axe body spray
Number of seasons: 1

The team behind the surprise Netflix hit American Vandal brings its serious-but-not-too-serious mockumentary feel to the world of esports in this funny and enthralling series about a professional League of Legends team. Players works because it both respects and mocks professional gamers as kings of their bubble and outcasts in real life, while also creating a compelling story about a team coming together through adversity and offering thoughtful analysis about young male toxicity and the trappings of social media. Micah Brooks isn't going to win an Emmy for his pitch-perfect performance as the narcissistic bro-hard "CreamCheese," but I will stump for him. [Trailer]        

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds

For fans of: The original Star Trek, hot Spock
Number of seasons: 1

Paramount+ has a lot of Star Trek shows, from Treks past (the original series, The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, and more) to new adventures (Picard, Discovery, Lower Decks). But our current favorite is Strange New Worlds, a throwback (and prequel!) to the original series following James T. Kirk's predecessor Captain Christopher Pike (Anson Mount) as he commands the Enterprise on miscellaneous standalone Starfleet adventures that span the terrifying to the comical (yes, you want to see Pike as a sniveling, cowardly storybook character). Pike's crew includes younger versions of Spock (Ethan Peck) and Uhura (Celia Rose Gooding), and long-time fans will be treated to plenty of Easter eggs. [Trailer]    

Joe Pickett

For fans of: New Westerns like Yellowstone, murder mysteries, emus
Number of seasons: 1

Paramount+ knows its brand, which is why it picked up this Spectrum original that's riding the success of neo-Westerns like Yellowstone and Longmire. For All Mankind's Michael Dorman stars as Joe Pickett, a game warden in Wyoming who gets caught up in a murder mystery that might be tied to corruption in town. It's both lighthearted as Joe tries to win over those who dismiss him because he's just a game warden, but also serious when it deals with grisly murders, and the combination works well in the lawless Wyoming wilderness. [Trailer]     

Halo

For fans of: Master Chief, butts, giant rings
Number of seasons: 1

Halo isn't Paramount+'s best original sci-fi series — that would be Star Trek: Strange New Worlds — but it is its second best. The long-in-development adaptation of the popular video game franchise follows the cyborg super soldier Master Chief (Pablo Schreiber) as he learns that being part of a military operation that kills a bunch of things isn't so good, while aliens try to harness the power of a doomsday weapon. It may not be the adaptation that the hardcore gamers wanted, but it's a decent Showtime-quality sci-fi series. [Trailer]    

The Good Fight

For fans of: Big takes on big topics, irreverance
Number of seasons: 5 (Season 6 coming Sept. 8)

It's not easy for someone who hasn't seen The Good Fight to understand that it's one of the weirdest (compliment!) shows on television. "That show? The one that's a spinoff of a CBS legal procedural?" Yep. Outside of the confines of CBS, Robert and Michelle King were essentially granted permission to go wild with the streaming exclusive spinoff that follows Christine Baranski's Diane Lockhart as she joins a predominantly Black law firm during the most tumultuous political era of our lives. Alternate timelines, mushroom microdosing, and animated shorts are typical in episodes, creating a smart satire that isn't afraid to take big swings. [Trailer]    

Ghosts

For fans of: The British Ghosts, oddball humor 
Number of seasons: 1

Rose McIver stars as a woman who inherits a fixer-upper mansion in the countryside, so she decides to turn it into a bed and breakfast. The only problem? It's lousy with ghosts! Ghosts who are funny! This CBS remake of the BBC original (streaming on HBO Max) probably wasn't necessary, but thankfully it retains much of the charm of the source material, making it one of the better new broadcast comedies of the last decade. [Trailer]       

1883

For fans of: Yellowstone but even older, mustaches
Number of seasons: 1

1883 is a prequel to Yellowstone that tells the story of how John Dutton's ancestors got to Montana. James Dutton (Tim McGraw) is leading his family on a perilous journey across the Great Plains alongside trail boss Shea Brennan (Sam Elliott), a tough old cowboy with a heart of gold. It's an old-fashioned Western with beautiful cinematography. It's an on-the-road show that's more like Lonesome Dove than Yellowstone, but Taylor Sheridan hallmarks like artfully macho dialogue and an impressive sense of authenticity in its cowboy-life details will make fans of the flagship show feel at home in the earlier time period. -Liam Mathews [Trailer]       

Evil

For fans of: The X-Files, demonology, laughing then getting scared then laughing again
Number of seasons: 3

Evil, which started on CBS before moving to Paramount+, is a show made by and for people who love television. This isn't a "seven-hour movie" broken up into bits; it's a horror procedural with serious range, created by Robert and Michelle King, the boundary-pushing husband-and-wife duo behind The Good Fight. The show follows a trio of investigators, played by Katja Herbers, Mike Colter, and Aasif Mandvi, who work for the Catholic Church investigating freaky cases. Exorcisms, cannibalism, elevators to Hell, online chat rooms, racist hospitals, demonic AR goggles — nothing is off the table, and nothing ever resolves cleanly. Each episode is a clever parable about what ails modern society, with a tone that's impossible to pin down, dancing from winking playfulness to the creeping sense that we're all already doomed. It's funny until it's terrifying. -Kelly Connolly [Trailer]      

Nathan for You

For fans of: The Rehearsal, ideas from a guy who got good grades in business school
Number of seasons: 4

Those of you mesmerized by Nathan Fielder's HBO show The Rehearsal are probably scrambling to find his first series Nathan for You. Well, it's on Paramount+! (And Hulu and HBO Max.) The reality/prank/social experiment series follows Nathan as he helps struggling small businesses by giving them ideas to drum up profit that are so absurd they just might work. But the show is at its best when it goes meta into Nathan's life, becoming something entirely unexpected. Paramount+ is also home to many other great Comedy Central shows, including Detroiters, Review, and Corporate.  [Trailer]         

 
SpongeBob SquarePants

For fans of: Crabby Patties, blissful idiocy
Number of seasons: 12

Paramount owns Nickelodeon, so Paramount+ is going to be the place to stream SpongeBob SquarePants. For some parents, that's enough reason to have a subscription, as SpongeBob is still one of the best kids programs out there (it's also good for grown-ups). Paramount+ is also the home to SpongeBob spin-off Kamp Koral, the SpongeBob films, the SpongeBob live musical (which is a total trip), and probably whatever else Nickelodeon eventually squeezes out of the franchise. And as the place to stream Nickelodeon shows, Paramount+ is also home to Paw Patrol, Rugrats, Peppa Pig, and more.