For me, when it comes to TV-watching, few things beat jumping into a new foreign-language series.
First, I love that initial feeling of hitting play—the anticipation, the unknowing, the excitement. Typically, when I start a foreign-language show, it’s one I had never heard of prior to stumbling upon it. This means no friends, family, or colleagues have shared their opinions about it with me and, more importantly, I haven’t come across talk about it in the media—talk that reveals major plot lines, how people feel about the ending, etc. There is just something so satisfying about hitting play when you have no idea what you’re getting yourself into. (That said, I usually check the RT and/or IMDb ratings [and sometimes read a few comments] and read the show’s synopsis, so I’m rarely heading into a show completely unaware of what it’s about or how the audience generally felt about it.)
Once you hit play, there is the pure enjoyment of watching the show. Foreign shows often give you a glimpse into a world that is far different from your everyday world and certainly different from what is produced on a Hollywood soundstage. These differences aren’t what make the show, but they do add to the viewing experience—whether it’s catching glimpses of the Christmas-perfect village of Roros, Norway, where some scenes from Home for Christmas were shot or getting a peek into the Danish school system in Rita.
I also find that foreign shows tend to have a greater number of storylines and scenes that I haven’t seen before or that lack a familiarity. Many of these would work in American TV, but not all. The shows are catering to a different audience and coming from a different point of view, so you’re going to come across something that’s not typical of an American show. As a result, I find that foreign-language shows remove me a little bit more from my everyday life than American shows. (Like, have you ever watched a U.S. sitcom, but a particular scene, no matter how comical it might be, reminds you of something in your own life and actually makes you start stressing about that thing in your life? It happens to me quite a bit, but I don’t recall it ever happening to me when watching a foreign-language show.)
And, finally, the show is in a language other than your own, which helps to take the level of escapism up a notch. I should note that I watch all foreign-language shows and movies in their original language with English subtitles. I’m not a fan of the dubbed versions.
Check one out!
I highly recommend flipping through your favorite streaming service’s foreign-language collection and giving a random show a try. But if you want some suggestions, I’ve listed a few below. I didn’t check my Netflix viewing history to jog my memory of the foreign-language shows I’ve watched; these are just the ones that stood out as I tried to recall some of my favs (ratings are as of publishing date; they are listed in no particular order).
| Name of show | Rotten Tomatoes | IMDb |
| Home for Christmas (More info here.) | Audience score: 93% | 7.7 / 10 |
| Crash Landing on You (More info here.) | Audience score: 98% | 8.7 |
| Rita | Audience score: 94% | 8.1 |
| Love & Anarchy | Tomatometer: 100% Audience score: 88% | 7.3 |
| Quicksand | Audience score: 79% | 7.5 |
| The Time in Between | none | 8.3 |
| Gran Hotel (I watched the 2011-2013 series from Spain. It looks like Egypt also produced a show by the same name and with the same or similar plot. I have not seen that version.) | none | 8.4 |
Enjoy and feel free to share some recommendations of your own (it’s all good if you post anonymously). I didn’t add summaries of the shows in case you wanted to try watching one without knowing much at all about the plot.
(Apologies if the table doesn’t render well on your screen. This is my first time creating a table in WordPress and I am still playing around with it.)