Streaming Queer: January 2025

It's January, which means new year, new you, new streaming shows to entertain and excite us!

We're thrilled to be back with Alan Cumming and new devious contestants on "The Traitors," and we are delighted to see that queer "Kitty XO" protagonist, Kitty, will be dating more girls at KISS this season. We look forward to seeing "White Lotus" actor Leo Woodall play a math genius under NSA surveillance in a conspiracy thriller, while Philemona Cunk goes out to explore the real meaning of life. This month, we'll meet a new cast of "Drag Race" queens, uncover behind-the-scenes scandals of "The Jerry Springer Show," and finally discover what happens with the gay "innie" workplace romance on "Severance." All this and so much more is available to watch this month – there's action, mystery, romance, and reality drama. Happy streaming!

"Cunk on Life"

"Is life's meaning a riddle that even can be answered? And if so, should we listen, or cover our ears to avoid spoilers?" With the follow-up to her Netflix series, "Cunk on Earth," quirky "documentarian" Philomena Cunk delves into life's profound questions, exploring topics ranging from art history to AI, meeting academics and "professional mammals," all while making her trademark deadpan observations about "the point of it all." She'll introduce her audience to "some of history's foremost thinkers and ground-breaking creatives, from Dostoyevsky to Van Gogh, from Nietzsche to whoever came up with those signs in kitchens that say, 'Live Laugh Love.'" We can't wait to learn from this educational, enlightening experience.

"Cunk on Life" premieres January 2 on Netflix.

"RuPaul's Drag Race" Season 17

"This year's lineup of queens promises a little bit of everything, from razor-sharp comedy to jaw-dropping runway looks, all competing for the $200,000 grand prize." The "Rate-A-Queen" system that was introduced last season is back, "now with an all-new twist that's sure to keep viewers guessing." So the Season 17 queens must be ready to slay, while taking on Rate-A-Queen and a dunk tank called the "badonka-donk." They've gotta be ready for backstage drama and shade to be thrown, while preparing to perform for a cast of celebrity guest judges that includes Adam Lambert, Hunter Schafer, Doechii, and living legend fashion icon Betsey Johnson.

"RuPaul's Drag Race" Season 17 premieres January 3 on MTV.

The 2025 Golden Globe Awards

The "Golden Globes" are a landmark occasion for the entertainment world, serving as a symbolic signifier of what is to come in the awards season it opens. This year's show will be hosted by Nikki Glaser. Buzzy trans film "Emilia Pérez" leads with 10 Golden Globe nominations, while other highly nominated films include "Conclave" with six nominations, and "Anora," "Challengers," "A Real Pain," and "The Substance" who all tie with four. It's the first big awards night of the year, and between the red carpet and awards speeches, we can't wait.

The 2025 "Golden Globe Awards" streams live January 5 on CBS and Paramount+.

"Jerry Springer: Fights, Camera, Action" Season 1

This two-part documentary takes us behind the scenes of "The Jerry Springer Show," America's most controversial daytime talk show, which ran for 27 seasons. Exposing its biggest scandals, both on- and off-camera, this documentary talks to people who worked on the show, those who appeared on the show, and everyone in between to paint a more accurate picture of what kind of environment made for the melodrama we saw on screen. From the physical fights on stage to secret siblings and love affairs shockingly revealed, insiders share the dark truths and regretful actions they took "in the name of entertainment" that shaped this show into the cultural beast that it was.

"Jerry Springer: Fights, Camera, Action" premieres January 7 on Netflix.

"The Traitors" Season 3

Hosted by the legendary Alan Cumming, this Emmy Award-winning competition series returns to the Scottish Highlands, bringing reality TV icons and celebrities together for the "psychological adventure in which treachery and deceit are the name of the game." Contestants who are selected to be Traitors must hide in plain sight, "killing off" their peers in the least suspicious way possible, and those left to be Faithfuls must stop accusing each other of secretly being Traitors long enough to banish all the Traitors and earn their share of the $250,000 prize. We're so looking forward to watching queer reality stars Bob the Drag Queen, Chrishell Stause, and Gabby Windey fight for their lives by building and breaking alliances all season long.

"The Traitors" Season 3 premieres January 9 on Peacock.

"XO Kitty" Season 2

This second season of the "To All the Boys I've Loved Before" spin-off reunites us with bisexual lead Kitty Song Covey (Anna Cathcart) at KISS, the fictional international school in Seoul, South Korea. Last season, Kitty had both male and female love interests, which complicated her already messy (though entertaining) coming-of-age experience, and got her into some very stylish but scandalous situations. The sapphic spark in Kitty's life was fellow student Yuri Han, who already has a secret girlfriend at KISS (played by queer actor Regan Aliyah). This season, Kitty's "single and ready for a drama-free fresh start" and she wants to try dating girls, even though she's not over Yuri. "But," the synopsis reads, "she has more to worry about than her love life, as a letter from her mother's past sets her on a wild journey, and new faces at KISS bring change." The cast includes Anthony Keyvan ("Love, Victor") as Q, one of KISS' few openly gay students. Noah Centineo will cameo this season, reprising his role as "To All the Boys" dreamboat Peter Kavinsky, who is dating Kitty's sister, Lara Jean.

"XO Kitty" Season 2 premieres January 16 on Netflix.

"Severance Season 2

Anyone who watched the Season 1 "Severance" finale will know that we've been holding our collective breath from all the shocking reveals that dropped right at the end of the final episode for way too long now. "Major cliffhanger" does not even begin to describe the way everything we knew about the toxic, surreal Lumon Industries office unraveled before our eyes. This workplace thriller follows a group of employees who have (apparently willingly and knowingly) undergone "severance," a procedure that separates their work selves ("innies") from who they are in the real world at home ("outies"). There's so much we can't wait to get back to, but top of mind is learning more about both the innie and outie versions involved in the blossoming gay romance between Irving (John Turturro) and Burt Goodman (Christopher Walken). New cast members this season include bisexual "Search Party" actor Alia Shawkat, and Gwendoline Christie.

"Severance" Season 2 premieres January 17 on AppleTV+.

"Harlem" Season 3

"Harlem" returns with more plot twists, major life decisions, professional and romantic drama, and fierce fashionable looks on its four fabulous 30-something best friends: Queer women Quinn (Grace Byers) and Tye (queer actor Jerrie Johnson), academic Camille (Meagan Good) and born-to-be-a-superstar performer Angie (Shoniqua Shandai). Last season explored sapphic breakups, discussions about fertility and its impact on a relationship, and showed us examples of supportive parenting. This season promises everything we love about this sensational show that constantly surprises, as well as new cast members including "Dear White People" lead Logan Browning, and Gail Bean as Eva, "a flirty venture capitalist who begins working with Tye."

"Harlem" Season 23 premieres January 23 on Prime Video.

"Prime Target" Season 1

"White Lotus" breakout Leo Woodall and nonbinary "Trinkets" actor Quintessa Swindell (they/he) lead this eight-episode conspiracy thriller series about a math genius and the NSA agent who has been observing him. Woodall is the brilliant math postgraduate on the verge of a major breakthrough. "If he succeeds in finding a pattern in prime numbers," the synopsis tells us, "he will hold the key to every computer in the world. Soon he begins to realize an unseen enemy is trying to destroy his idea before it's even born, which throws him into the orbit of Taylah Sanders (Swindell)." Swindell's character has been tasked with monitoring and reporting on the mathematician's behavior, but "together they start to unravel the troubling conspiracy Edward is at the heart of."

"Prime Target" Season 1 premieres January 22 on AppleTV+.

"High Tides" Season 2

"High Tides" (or, in its native region, "Knokke Off,") follows the drunk and drug-fueled escapades of rich, privileged Belgian teenagers and the scandalous secrets of their parents in the wealthy coastal town of Knokke. There's Louise (played by Belgian pop star Pommelien Thijs), whose boyfriend Alex "doesn't mind" when she casually hooks up with her best friend, Margaux (who is clearly in love with her); Louise's father introduced her to his (secret, though not from his wife, who is supportive of his late-in-life gay awakening) boyfriend of five years last season. But it all began with Dutch outsider Daan, who moved to Knokke with his mother. Daan's mother strategized her way into a job as a nanny for the same family her sister, Claudia, worked for before she disappeared. We learn early on that Claudia disappeared after working as a nanny for Alex's younger sister, but (spoiler alert) it was revealed at the end of last season that she was having a passionate love affair with his mom. With so much to unpack from Season 1's mysteries and multi-dimensional cliffhanger ending, we cannot wait to dive back into the drama and deceit of the Knokke elite.

"High Tides" Season 2 premieres January 31 on Netflix.