Screenshot: Peacock
Peacock launched just last July, largely on the promise of The Office reruns, but it also brought the power and checkbook of NBCUniversal to bear in creating some solid original content (“creating” being, in some cases, a euphemism for “importing”). Even though the library of originals is relatively small, there’s an impressive amount of diversity in what’s there: not just in terms of style and genre, but in the representation on screen and off. It’s possible to be a little cynical about Peacock’s positioning of shows about, say, an all-Muslim punk band or an Indigenous cultural center in a small town, on an upstart streaming service rather than its TV-network sibling; but, on the other hand, streaming is clearly the future, and the fact that the network expects these shows to lure people to pay for their new streamer is promising.
Peacock, by the way, currently has free and paid tiers. All of these shows are at least available to sample at the free level, but for a few, you’ll need to upgrade if you want to watch more recent episodes. Here’s some of the best stuff from Peacock’s first year.
