‘Beef’ Dethroned Again In Netflix’s Top 10 List By A New Show

We may be looking at a new breakout hit on Netflix as of this week, a strong debut at #1 for a show with high critic and audience scores, unseating the last show with high critic and audience scores, Beef. But that series took a little while to spool up through word of mouth. That’s not true for its #1 replacement, The Diplomat.

The Diplomat gives us a post-Americans project for one of its stars, Keri Russell, the titular diplomat who is an ambassador to the UK, and has a “turbulent” marriage to a political star, played by The Man in the High Castle’s Rufus Sewell. The series is eight, 50 minute episodes and it does not appear to be pitched as a one-off series, implying it will indeed try to perform well enough to be renewed for more.

The show is also reviewing quite well, which of course is never a sure thing for a Netflix series, even a highly viewed one. The Diplomat currently has a 91% on Rotten Tomatoes with a 90% audience score, though it’s still pretty early on both counts. That’s less than Beef’s 98%, but it could be argued that’s Netflix best series of the entire year so far.

What I’m wondering is if The Diplomat is going to be just a good, solid series for Netflix, or have some wild breakout performance like The Night Agent, which was a decently okay enough series, somehow rocketed to become the third best debut for a Netflix original ever, and has climbed to being the sixth most-watched show on the whole service. The Diplomat may not be quite as action-centric, but I’d argue Keri Russell and the base concept are both big draws. It seems like this one may end up doing really, really well, if I had to guess.

As for the rest of the list, Beef is still performing extremely well, despite controversies about one of its actors, David Choe, that I’m sure the general public has never heard about. Beef season 2 could happen with a new cast, according to its creator, but nothing has been announced on that front yet.

The Love is Blind train is leaving the station after its botched live finale, and will continue to slide down the list. Better Call Saul is now #4 after the final batch of episodes were added from AMC, one of Netflix’s few remaining lucrative licensing partnerships. The Night Agent and Florida Man are dropping lower in the list. I’ve never heard of The Marked Heart, but it’s apparently a Netflix original and apparently has a new season. It’s at #8.

So yes, it does seem like The Diplomat is one to check out and something I’m going to be keeping an eye on, based on this very strong debut performance. We’ll see where it goes from here.

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