When you need a break from the beach this summer, there are plenty of fun ways — that don’t involve sun and sand — to spend your time. From a 93-year-old action star in Thelma, to exciting new seasons of House of the Dragon and The Boys, to the return of old favorites like Eddie Murphy in Beverly Hills Cop: Axel Foley and new installments in the Alien and Terminator franchises, there’s something for everyone. Check out EW’s 2024 Summer Preview to see which TV shows, movies, and albums need to be on your must list this season.
Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F
Melinda Sue Gordon/Netflix
Premieres July 3 on Netflix
In 1984, Beverly Hills Cop cemented a then-23-year-old Eddie Murphy as a superstar who could sell a movie on his own. Now, 40 years later, Murphy returns to his most iconic character in Netflix’s Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F. The fourth installment in the franchise reunites Murphy with original cast members Judge Reinhold (Lt. William “Billy” Rosewood), John Ashton (Sgt. John Taggart), Paul Reiser (Det. Jeffrey Friedman), and Bronson Pinchot (the scene-stealing Serge). There’s also some new blood with the addition of Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Axel’s partner, Det. Bobby Abbot, and Taylour Paige as Axel’s estranged daughter, Jane Saunders, who also happens to be Abbot’s ex-girlfriend. —Lester Fabian Brathwaite
Eric
Ludovic Robert/Netflix
Streaming now on Netflix
In Eric, Benedict Cumberbatch plays Vincent, a successful puppeteer and the creator of Good Day Sunshine, a Sesame Street-esque kids show. But when his son goes missing, Vincent’s addiction takes over and in his desperation to get his son back, he starts hallucinating Eric, the puppet his son had drawn. “We’ve always tried to see Eric as a manifestation of the inner workings of Vincent’s psychosis,” creator Abi Morgan says. “When I pitched it, I said it’s kind of a buddy movie of an obsessive puppeteer and his puppet who go looking for his son.” —Samantha Highfill
A Quiet Place: Day One
Gareth Gatrell/Paramount
In theaters June 28
We’ve seen what happens when the monsters of A Quiet Place prowl the rural grounds of upstate New York. Now we’ll find out what happens when these aliens that hunt through sound storm one of the noisiest locations on the planet: the Big Apple. A Quiet Place: Day One goes back to, duh, day one of the invasion. A woman named Sam (Lupita Nyong’o) just so happens to be on a day trip to the city with her cat when all hell breaks loose, and she’s forced to team up with a stranger named Eric (Joseph Quinn) in order to escape from New York, Snake Plissken style! “Yes, these are monster films, they’re horror-thriller movies that have these exciting, scary moments,” says director Michael Sarnoski, “but at their core, they’re stories about people dealing with something that they don’t know how to deal with. I wanted to focus on that, but in its own unique way.” —N.R.
The Umbrella Academy season 4
Christos Kalohoridis/Netflix
Premieres Aug. 8 on Netflix
Get ready for one last trip through time and space with the Hargreeves family, because The Umbrella Academy is ready to launch its fourth and final season on Netflix this summer. When we last saw these characters, they had been deprived of their strange superpowers, which means they’ll have to find a way to get them back before they can save the world one last time. Welcome to the final timeline. —Christian Holub
Normani’s Dopamine
Hugo Comte
Out June 14
Five years after teasing fans with her first solo single — an eternity on the internet — Normani is finally releasing her first solo album, Dopamine. “I think I’m just really excited because it’s been such a long journey, and not really an easy one,” the singer tells EW, explaining that the album’s title represents “me being the dopamine hit that everybody’s kind of been demanding.” She adds, “And it just sounds really good!” For Dopamine, Normani tapped into her pop, hip-hop, and R&B roots and also took inspiration from women in her own life and the things they’ve been through to weave together an album that is both personal and, she hopes, universal. —Lester Fabian Brathwaite
Bad Boys: Ride or Die
Frank Masi/Sony
In theaters now
Will Smith and Martin Lawrence are back for Bad Boys: Ride or Die, their third time reteaming since first starring together in Bad Boys nearly 30 years ago. Unfortunately, time (and age) has finally caught up to them, as Mike Lowrey (Smith) and Marcus Burnett (Lawrence) are both more aware of their mortality than ever and are concerned about the legacy they’re going to leave behind, especially when their late captain (Joe Pantoliano) is posthumously framed in a massive corruption conspiracy. The two must go on the run to clear his name — as well as their own reputations — while keeping their loved ones safe. —Sydney Bucksbaum
Read more about Bad Boys: Ride or Die.
Thelma
Magnolia Pictures
In theaters June 21
In her first leading film role, Oscar-nominated Nebraska actress June Squibb, 94, and the late Richard Roundtree (of Shaft fame) star in the heartwarming comedy Thelma. A fun twist on movies like Mission: Impossible, the film turns the eponymous 93-year-old granny into an action star, chronicling her intrepid quest to recover the money she lost to a scammer. It’s loosely based on a real-life incident that actor-turned-director Josh Margolin experienced with his grandma, whom he named the movie after. Even at 94, Squibb was eager to do many of her own stunts. “There’s a reason she was right for the part,” Margolin told EW. “She has that spirit; she has that tenacity.” —Mike Miller
The Boys season 4
Amazon Studios
Premieres June 13 on Prime Video
It’s not a shocker that the masterminds behind Amazon’s R-rated superhero satire continue channeling the zeitgeist in the upcoming fourth season. Perhaps the craziest aspect this year, however, is that the show isn’t all that crazy when you think of the current political climate. Homelander (Antony Starr) has embraced his MAGA era with an army of alt-right zealots at his disposal — only this time there’s a new special someone whispering sweet power plays in his ear. Sister Sage (Susan Heyward) arrives on the scene as a super-powered brainiac, and she has plans to bring this whole America experiment crumbling down. —Nick Romano
Babes
NEON
In theaters now
Ilana Glazer and Michelle Buteau have been friends for over 20 years — and that played to their advantage for the movie Babes, where Buteau’s Dawn has just had her second child with her husband (Hasan Minhaj), while Glazer’s Eden has decided to become a mother after a one-night stand. When they were shopping the script around town, Glazer says reactions were mixed — specifically to the film’s brand of comedy. “People in the industry either got it or they didn’t. They were like, ‘This is blue,’ and I was like, ‘Blue? This is my life,'” she recalls of the conversations. “Also, pregnancy and motherhood, it’s gory. We’re so used to gore being expressed through violence rather than humanity — humanity that we all come from, that we’re all experiencing in some degree. Off that initial experience with the script, it gave me peace in knowing that this story doesn’t have to reach everybody, and it won’t, but the people who are going to grab hold of it and never let go need this story the same way that me and Josh and Susie needed to tell it. And when Michelle and [director] Pamela [Adlon] came on board, we all needed to tell this story.” —Gerrad Hall
House of the Dragon
Theo Whitman/HBO
Premieres June 16 on HBO and Max
If season 1 of HBO’s Game of Thrones prequel established the main players of the great conflict that crumbled the Targaryen empire, then “season 2 is the march to war,” says co-creator Ryan Condal. It’s Team Rhaenyra vs. Team Aegon in a battle over, what else? The Iron Throne. But instead of each side sicking their dragons on each other outright, Condal explains this warfare is more about “plotting and backstabbing and assassination and spy games and all the things that you would see in a classic James Bond Cold War thriller.” —N.R.
Orphan Black: Echoes
Sophie Giraud/AMC
Premieres June 23 on AMC and BBC America/will stream on AMC+
Think of Orphan Black: Echoes as a clone of the original series in the way that Tatiana Maslaney‘s Alison Hendrix and Katja Obinger are clones. Both may have the same DNA, but their different environments gave way to distinct personalities. For one, Maslaney isn’t even in it, beyond a few stray Easter eggs here and there. This one is all about Krysten Ritter‘s Lucy, a woman with no memory of her past being chased by mysterious forces. Her biggest clue to what is going on lies in a teenager she bumps into one day, Jules (Amanda Fix), a much younger cloned version of herself. Says showrunner Anna Fishko, “They didn’t want to just repeat the original idea from the first show of having one actress play all of these different versions of herself, I think, in part, because Tatiana Maslany had obviously done such an incredible job and it would be very hard to recreate that. —N.R.
Bon Jovi’s Forever
Out now
After suffering health problems that threatened to literally and metaphorically take Jon Bon Jovi‘s voice away, the lead singer and his bandmates are back and better than ever with their 16th studio album, Forever, out June 7. The rocking 12-track album, which includes hits like “Legendary” and introspective “Hollow Man,” chronicles the recent triumphs and tribulations of Bon Jovi’s legendary life. “I’ve come through the surgery. I’ve come through Richie [Sambora] leaving the band. I’ve come through all these other obstacles,” he tells EW. “How do you write that next chapter?” With some unforgettable rock anthems, of course. —Emlyn Travis
MaXXXine
Dons Lens/A24
In theaters July 5
Maxine Minx is back, and she’s finally getting to live out her dream. Mia Goth‘s hit-making performance in Ti West’s 2022 horror film X has returned, only this time she’s making a name for herself in Hollywood. We’re in the year 1985, six years after the events of that first movie, and Maxine is trying to break into serious cinema after becoming a famous porn actress. She finally gets her chance when a buzzed-about director casts her in a sequel to a hit indie horror film, only now Maxine has to deal with her dark past coming back to haunt her. “Some people, in a very gruesome way, don’t make it to the end,” West teases. “If you’re expecting it to be part of this X movie and people will be killed, yeah, I’m going to deliver on all those things. But it’s going to zig instead of zag in a lot of places that people aren’t expecting. It’s a very decadent world that she lives in, and it’s a very aggressive world that she lives in, but the threat shows up in an unexpected way.” —N.R.
Terminator Zero
Netflix
Premieres Aug. 29 on Netflix
The new Terminator show has Zero f—s to give. You want anime instead of live-action? You got it. Bored of the Sarah and John Connor happy hour? Well, this Terminator takes place in Tokyo with a whole new cast of characters. On the cusp of Judgement Day in 1997 — the fateful moment the A.I. known as Skynet became self-aware, beginning a war between man and machine — a scientist named Malcolm Lee designs his own A.I. system to combat Skynet. And because this is Terminator, there’s an unrelenting assassin chasing him and his family, as well as a soldier from the future protecting them. Says showrunner Mattson Tomlin, “I knew that I wanted to tell a time-travel story, and I knew I wanted to tell an almost Godfather-like multi-generational saga that would ultimately follow this family with these kids. —N.R.
The Good Half
FalcoInk
Hits select theaters through Fathom Events screenings on July 23 and July 25
Ignoring your problems won’t make them go away, and that’s the hard lesson at the center of the indie comedic drama The Good Half. Nick Jonas stars as Renn Wheeland, a struggling writer living in L.A. who’s forced to face all the unresolved issues in his life when his mother (Elisabeth Shue) dies. On his flight home to Cleveland for the funeral, he strikes up a new connection with a fellow passenger, Zoey (Alexandra Shipp). But when he returns home to his family, he struggles to balance that new relationship while healing old ones with his overbearing sister, Leigh (Brittany Snow), his eager-to-connect father, Darren (Matt Walsh), and his frustrating stepfather (David Arquette), all while dealing with his own grief. —S.B.
Young Woman and the Sea
Disney
In theaters now
Daisy Ridley makes a splash in Young Woman and the Sea, Joachim Rønning‘s biographical film about American swimmer and Olympic medalist Gertrude “Trudy” Ederle. Adapted from Glenn Stout’s book of the same name, the drama dives into the uplifting true story of how the swimmer, at just the age of 20, became the first woman to swim across the English Channel in 1926, earning her the nickname “Queen of the Waves.” —Jessica Wang
Deadpool & Wolverine
Jay Maidment/20th Century Studios/2024 MARVEL
In theaters July 26
It’s been 15 years since Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman shared the screen together as Deadpool and Wolverine in 2009’s X-Men Origins: Wolverine. And ever since, fans hoped for a redo of that colossal bomb of a superhero movie. Well, those prayers have paid off. The two titans are colliding in gloriously debaucherous fashion as they enter — for the first time ever — Disney’s Marvel Cinematic Universe of the Avengers. Reynolds’ Wade Wilson is tapped by Mr. Paradox (Matthew Macfadyen) for a unique mission that puts him on the path of Jackman’s adamantium-clawed Logan… or, rather, an alternate-reality version of Logan than the one we met several times in all those past X-Men movies. “This is still Wade dealing with certain issues,” says director Shawn Levy, “but it’s very much two characters, two heroes, and two haunted men hoisted together in a shared journey.” —N.R.
Descendants: The Rise of Red
Disney/Quantrell Colbert
Premieres July 12 on Disney+
Nearly three decades after Rodgers & Hammerstein’s Cinderella premiered, Brandy and Paolo Montalban‘s iconic ’90s royalty are back for Disney+’s original movie Descendants: The Rise of Red. Cinderella and the now-King Charming’s perfectionist teen daughter Chloe (Malia Baker) must team up with the Queen of Hearts’ (Rita Ora) rebellious daughter Red (Kylie Cantrall) for a time-hopping adventure to save their kingdoms. —S.B.
Sing Sing
A24
In theaters July 12; expands wide Aug. 2.
Colman Domingo is headed to prison for his next film. In the drama Sing Sing, based on a true story, the Emmy winner and Oscar nominee plays Divine G, a wrongfully imprisoned man who finds a form of escape and therapy through the prison’s theater group. Domingo got to know the real Diving G, who he says has a hopefulness about the system despite it being “an institution that’s set to sort of break you down in a way.” He adds, “I thought that was an interesting perspective — someone who was using their intelligence while they were in the inside to advocate for others, using their skills, not only for themselves but for others.” —G.H.
Gracie Abrams’ The Secret of Us
Out June 21
Gracie Abrams’ semi-charmed sophomore album eschews sad girl bedroom pop for more amped-up, self-deprecating summer anthems meant for screaming out the car window. It’s a notable pivot for the 24-year-old singer, who’s already toured with Taylor Swift and Olivia Rodrigo, and whose music has mostly been melancholy up until now. “I already got the greatest gift with this album,” she says, “which was… realizing that it’s possible to have this good of a time when you’re making stuff, versus needing to feel anxious or tortured over someone to write a song that matters to you.” —Allaire Nuss
Ezra
Bleeker Street
In theaters now
In Tony Goldwyn‘s Ezra, Bobby Cannavale stars as Max Bernal, a stand-up comedian struggling to co-parent his autistic son, Ezra (Willian Fitzgerald), with his ex-wife, Jenn (Rose Byrne). When faced with a challenging decision about his son’s future, Max flees with Ezra, taking him on a transformative cross-country road trip that tests the bonds of their relationship. Also starring Robert De Niro, Vera Farmiga, Whoopi Goldberg, and Rainn Wilson, Ezra was written by Goldwyn’s longtime friend Tony Spiridakis, who based the script on his relationship with his autistic son, Dimitri. —M.M.
The Blue Angels
Prime Video
Now streaming on Amazon Prime
Fresh off playing a fighter pilot in Top Gun: Maverick, Glen Powell is once again taking to the skies — though this time, he’s letting the experts take the controls. Alongside J.J. Abrams, the Hit Man star produced the documentary The Blue Angels, which takes audiences behind the scenes of the Navy’s elite Flight Demonstration Squadron. The Blue Angels have been captivating audiences for over 75 years with their gravity-defying aerial maneuvers, but, as Abrams says, the new IMAX documentary is “the closest I think any of us will come to being in the cockpit with these pilots. It’s a remarkable thing to see.” —M.M.
Alien: Romulus
20th Century Studios
In theaters Aug. 16
The Alien franchise has gone in a couple of different directions over the decades, but the latest installment promises a return to the visceral thrills of the 1979 original; it’s even set before the events of 1986’s Aliens. This time, though, the spaceship crew is much younger than we’re used to. For director Fede Alvarez (Don’t Breathe), this makes the characters more relatable because they barely know any more about their situation than viewers do. This movie has siblings on its mind, which is why it’s named after one of the mythical brothers who supposedly founded Rome. —C.H.
Shaboozey’s Where I’ve Been, Isn’t Where I’m Going
Daniel Prakopcyk
With his meld of country music and rap, Shaboozey is carving out his own lane — one that drives his new album Where I’ve Been, Isn’t Where I’m Going. The record, which includes his hit single “A Bar Song (Tipsy),” comes after a career-defining moment when he collaborated on Beyoncé’s Cowboy Carter. Now, he’s reminded fans, both new and old, what he’s capable of. The collection of tracks includes collaborations with Noah Cyrus, Paul Cauthen, and BigXthaPlug — and it’s clear the Virginia-born singer-songwriter is just getting started. “I wanted to put together a great album that people would listen to and feel connected to, to feel like this is the new artist we want to listen to for the next 20, 30, 50 years,” he tells EW. —Alamin Yohannes
The Bachelorette
Disney/John Fleenor
Premieres July 8 on ABC
The 25 men who will compete for Jenn Tran’s heart have the unenviable task of following in the footsteps of Joey Graziadei — our sweet angel baby former Bachelor and the last man Jenn fell for. At least the 26-year-old physician assistant student from New Jersey has a lot of interesting new guys to choose from, including Moze, a strapping, 25-year-old algebra teacher; Aaron, the 29-year-old twin brother of Bachelor in Paradise alum Noah Erb; and Brett, a 28-year-old health and safety officer who looks like the world’s biggest teddy bear. Only one of them will “win” — the rest can just hope they don’t get a villain edit. —Kristen Baldwin
Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes
Owen Teague/20th Century Studios
In theaters now
Can humans and apes actually co-exist? That’s the question at the center of Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes, the continuation of Andy Serkis‘ trilogy that jumps ahead 300 years after 2017’s War for the Planet of the Apes. In this distant future, apes have taken over but live in isolated colonies, while humans have regressed into feral creatures. When an ape king named Proximus Caesar (Kevin Durand) begins attacking and enslaving other ape clans, twisting the legendary Caesar’s teachings for his own gain, a young chimp named Noa (Owen Teague) goes on a harrowing journey with mysterious human Nova (Freya Allen) to fight for a future where they can all live peacefully. —S.B.
Read more about Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes.
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