Light & Magic is the story of George Lucas' special effects studio with a big focus on the making of Star Wars. Photo / Supplied
Watch, listen and be inspired by Calum Henderson's definitive list of what's hot right now and gems from the vault.
Light & Magic (Disney+)
Be honest: would you rather watch another new Star Wars series that colours in the backstory of one of the supporting characters or a behind-the-scenes documentary about how the original movies were made?
The good news is that either way, Disney+ has you covered.
Technically Light & Magic is the story of George Lucas' special effects studio, Industrial Light & Magic (ILM), but for all intents and purposes, it's about the making of Star Wars – with some of the 80s biggest blockbusters and Jurassic Park thrown in later in the series.
Lucas set up the company in 1975 when he found there was no special effects studio in Hollywood equipped to do the things he wanted to do with Star Wars. He enlisted the help of effects whiz John Dykstra, who just happened to know a guy, who just happened to know a guy.
This rag-tag team of misfits, each more scraggly-bearded than the last, set up in a warehouse in Los Angeles and got to work designing X-Wings and lightsabers and all our other favourite toys.
Fair to say ILM got all the fun parts of making Star Wars.
While George Lucas was in England filming the movie itself, under increasing amounts of pressure to get his ambitious project over the line, the team in the warehouse were literally making it up as they went along. One designer found inspiration for the Millennium Falcon by looking at a pile of dirty dishes, another bought an aircraft escape chute from the military surplus store across the road and turned it into a slip 'n' slide in the parking lot.
A dramatic cliffhanger arrives at the end of episode one, when Lucas comes back to discover almost none of the special effects are completed with the studio deadline fast approaching. But really, like Peter Jackson's Beatles documentary, the thrill of Light & Magic is simply being in the room, catching a glimpse of how the dream was made.
The Sandman (Netflix)
Attempts to produce a film adaptation of Neil Gaiman's cult comic book series began more than 30 years ago, so to call this 10-part Netflix series long-awaited is something of an understatement.
It's easy to see why many thought a screen adaptation would never be possible – it's equally difficult to summarise, but basically it's an epic supernatural fantasy drama with an incredibly long list of characters played by a cast of familiar faces.
With a Game of Thrones prequel and a mega-budget Lord of the Rings adaptation coming soon, this could still end up being the fantasy series of the year.
Five Days at Memorial (Apple TV+)
A lot of the best TV shows this year have featured people under immense workplace stress, but Five Days at Memorial is on another level entirely.
Based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning book by Sheri Fink, the harrowing new Apple TV+ series is set in the intensive care unit of Memorial Medical Center in New Orleans during and after Hurricane Katrina in 2005.
Not your usual hospital drama, by any stretch.
Between the rising floodwaters, the power going out and the wards overflowing with patients that doctors have no way of treating, this is a disaster story.
All Or Nothing: Arsenal (Prime Video)
Another edition of the sports documentary series that follows different elite sports teams behind the scenes over the course of a season. You might remember the one about the All Blacks as one of the most boring sports documentaries ever made – but imagine how much better it would have been if they'd filmed it this season.
That's what makes spending a season with Arsenal so promising. They certainly don't win every game, in fact they lose their first three, and they're constantly under pressure, always only a couple of bad games away from the coach getting the sack.
Bad working conditions but great documentary conditions.
Movie of the Week: Scream (Neon)
The opening scene of the original 1996 Scream marked a generational shift of attitudes toward telecommunications – is it any wonder millennials are so scared of answering the phone after what happened to Drew Barrymore?
That scene probably doesn't make sense to modern teens who've never seen a landline telephone before in their lives, but it's okay because here comes the reboot. A handful of survivors from the original cast star as elders who offer today's teens wise counsel when they start being tormented by a familiar masked slasher.
From the Vault: Julie & Julia (2009) (Netflix)
File under 'Movies that can cheer you up no matter how many times you watch them' - one of the most under-rated categories of film. And if the reason you need cheering up in the first place is because you've run out of episodes of Julia to watch, 'two birds one stone'. Nora Ephron's last film stars Meryl Streep as Julia Child in the now familiar story of how she wrote and published her seminal French cookbook, and Amy Adams as Julie Powell, a first-wave blogger who set herself the challenge of cooking every recipe in the book decades after it was published. Perfect every time.
Podcast of the Week: Love and Radio
Dating back as far as 2005, Love and Radio belongs to the first wave of podcasts – a throwback to the form's dorky public radio roots, pre-true crime and pre-Joe Rogan.
It's been off most listeners' radars since 2019 due to an exclusive deal with subscription service Luminary, but now those episodes are being brought out from behind the paywall and made available on all platforms.
And whether you're new to the podcast or just forgot it existed, they're worth checking out. Take the recent episode 'Gotcha!' as an example of why Love and Radio is still one of the best. Without giving too much away, it's a weird and winding tale of a South Australian morning radio prank that took a turn nobody saw coming, then several other turns after that, each wilder than the last.
These days, as podcasting becomes a more commercial enterprise, the inclination would be to turn this story into (at least) a six-part series. But as other Pod1.0 mainstays like This American Life and Radiolab have been proving for years, almost all these types of stories are better served by a single 45-minute episode. That's certainly the case here, as it has been all through the eclectic Love and Radio back catalogue.