It’s almost the weekend, and that means you should book in another Gizmodo movie night. This week, suspend your disbelief, prepare to laugh, and check under your seat for some motherf**king snakes — these are the best comedy movies and TV shows streaming online right now.
We’ve re-jigged our existing Netflix Movie Night series, and brought in Australia’s other popular subscription video on demand services — Stan and Presto — to give you a broader selection of movies and TV shows to enjoy. On all three services, you can watch from your tablet or smartphone, on your PC or laptop, through your Smart TV, or through a media streaming dongle like the Google Chromecast, although specifics can vary.
Stan costs a flat $10 per month, Netflix can cost from $9 to $15 per month, and Presto is $10 to $15 depending which package you choose.
Not what you’re after? Check out some other Gizmodo Movie Night suggestions:
15 Of The Best Monster, Alien And Creature Features Streaming Right Now
Impress Your Friends With The Most Underrated And Underappreciated Movies And TV Shows
15 Date Night Movies And TV Series That Actually Aren’t Terrible
Stan
Snakes On A Plane
Snakes On A Plane is Samuel L Jackson at his snake-punching best. How do you kill a witness to a crime on a plane from Hawaii to the continental US? Do you crash the plane? Do you pay some guy to garrotte the witness? Do you smuggle a gun onboard? Oh, you fill the plane with snakes and rely on them to do your dirty work for you. That much is obvious. Why didn’t we think of this earlier? Watch this movie and try not to laugh out loud, I dare you. Watch it now on Stan.
Stan: An FBI agent must contend with a swarm of deadly serpents that have been released aboard an airliner to kill the witness he is escorting to trial.
Community
Community is a sitcom set in the Greendale Community College, where a suspended lawyer is forced to enrol to complete his aborted legal degree. There, he finds himself stuck with an eclectic group of students, a host of chaotic teachers and an especially weird dean. The Community cast are deadpan comedy masters, and the show is super-watchable — there’s a huge amount of variety between episodes, too, so you won’t get bored. Watch it now on Stan.
Stan: “Community” is a comedy that is ranked as one of the most inventive and original half-hours on television. It centers around friends who all met at what is possibly the world’s worst educational institution — Greendale Community College.
Zombeavers
Zombeavers follows that stereotypically American trope of the college vacation getaway, a lake trip. Sex and debauchery takes a back seat to being gruesomely attacked by zombie beavers. This not-really-horrific horror-comedy is one of those laugh-out loud ones; the only difference is you’re laughing as much at the ridiculousness of the situation as at the humour itself. Oh, and a whole bunch of totally subtle innuendo. Zombie beavers, guys. Watch it now on Stan.
Stan: WARNING: FEATURES HIGH IMPACT SEX SCENES AND VIOLENCE. An action packed horror-comedy about three college girls who go on a care-free vacation. Their frolicking fun comes to an abrupt end when toxic zombie beavers try to eat them.
Rake
Rake is great — Richard Roxburgh at his best as Cleaver Greene, the utterly antiheroic attorney at law apparently based loosely upon the real life of Charles Waterstreet, himself one of the series’ producers. It’s smart, funny, witty and gloriously irreverent. Rake gets points for just being straight-up ridiculous; it’s almost slapstick in its comedy, but just in its surreal and insane situations — and the creative profanity — it’s well worth a watch. Watch it now on Stan.
Stan: Criminal barrister Cleaver Greene, has a practice that somehow seems to be devoted to the most hopeless of hopeless cases — from cannibals to dog lovers. Even so, his professional affairs are still less chaotic than his personal ones.
In The Loop
In The Loop is a spin-off of The Thick Of It, that brilliant British comedy series about the machinations of the UK government. In the cinematic adaptation, an inept government minister accidentally precipitates an international incident and brings both the UK and US to the brink of war with an enraged Middle East, purely through a terrible choice of words. If you like The Office, then you’ll enjoy the humour here. Watch it now on Stan.
Stan: When the Britain’s bumbling Minister for International Development, Simon Foster, accidently causes a media splash by mentioning the possibility of an attack on the Middle East, the waves are felt on both sides of the pond.
Netflix
Utopia
Utopia is an Australian gem. Now in its second season, this utterly awkward and cringeworthy TV series follows the (thankfully fictional) staff of Nation Building Australia the Nation Building Authority, tasked with blue-sky thinking for projects of ever-increasing size and importance. How does the idea of a bridge to Tasmania sound? If you’ve ever stepped into a Centrelink office and dealt with bureaucracy, you’ll identify. Watch it now on Netflix.
Netflix: Tasked with rush infrastructure projects, employees of the Nation Building Authority walk a tightrope between big ambition and government bureaucracy.
Coming To America
Coming To America is a vehicle driven by comedic genius Eddy Murphy. Some people think it’s the funniest movie of all time. It’s certainly a little bit unbelievable, especially in the modern era. A 21-year-old African price decides that he needs a wife, and so travels to America to find the woman of his dreams — a woman who doesn’t know how fabulously wealthy he is. If you need some good simple humour, and a lot of it, then settle in with this one. Watch it now on Netflix.
Netflix: Discontented with his pampered life, an African prince heads to America as a working-class man to find someone who will fall for him, not his riches.
Danger 5
Danger 5 is weird. It’s quite weird. It’s weird enough that you won’t be surprised when I tell you that it’s also showing on SBS. It’s super lame, and super campy, but it does those things so well — it’s exactly what a series like Danger 5 should be like. If you like your comedy absurd, you like your agents secret, and you like your Hitlers alive and living in 1980, then you should sit down in front of this show with a bowl of popcorn. Watch it now on Netflix.
Netflix: A trio of experienced spies joins forces with a pair of newbies to form the Danger 5, a squad tasked with the formidable task of offing Adolf Hitler.
Rubber
Rubber is a movie about a homicidal car tire. It’s called Robert, it has psychic powers, and an obsession with a mysterious woman. Look, if you’re trying to find a movie that will confuse the hell out of you even while you’re snorting at just how odd it is, then Rubber is that movie. It’s an extremely B movie, and I don’t want to spoil it by talking about its plot, but suffice to say that you will be surprised at what happens. You just can’t pick it. Watch it now on Netflix.
Netflix: A car tire named Robert rolls through the desert Southwest using its strange psychic powers to blow up birds, bunnies, human beings and more.
The Thick Of It
The Thick Of It is a four-series TV show about how ridiculous government is — it’s a bit like Utopia in that way. At the Department of Social Affairs, which is lumped with all the political dead weight and deadbeats, slightly useless public servants and no clear governing agenda, the man in the top job — and his staff — are trying to find something to do. Watching these people bumble around and, in the end, make fools of themselves, is great TV. Watch it now on Netflix.
Netflix: The newly appointed Minister for Social Affairs, Hugh Abbot is on his way to a secondary school in Wiltshire to announce the setting up of a Snooper Squad.
Presto
The Trip
The Trip is aptly named; Steve Coogan is asked to review restaurants for the UK’s Observer, and is joined on a working road trip by his friend Rob Brydon who fills in at the last minute when Coogan’s romantic relationship falls apart. If you like British humour, The Trip is an absolute must-watch. It’s awkward, it’s full of constant movie and actor references, and it’s what you get when two brilliant comedic minds decide they can’t stand each other. Watch it now on Presto.
Presto: Steve Coogan has been asked by The Observer to tour the country’s finest restaurants, but after his girlfriend dumps him he must take his best friend and source of eternal aggravation, Rob Brydon.
Flight Of The Conchords
Flight Of The Conchords is sort of a musical, it’s sort of a documentary, it’s sort of a comedy series. When New Zealand’s top folk-rock band hit New York City to seek their fame and win big, they… don’t exactly succeed. Things aren’t really helped along by Murray, their hapless band manager, or the fact that they can only book a gig at an aquarium. At least their fan is nice enough. This is one for the oddball comedy fans. Watch it now on Presto.
Presto: Transplanted New Zealanders Bret and Jemaine — a.k.a. Flight of the Conchords – search for romance and gigs in NYC.
Office Space
Office Space is a comedic masterpiece. Three company workers who really, really hate their jobs decide to rebel against their boss, and to steal some money from the company’s computer systems on the way out. Predictably, things go a little bit wrong and comedy ensues. If you have ever worked in an office, you’ll understand why. Especially if your job ever involved printing something off from the office copy machine. Watch it now on Presto.
Presto: A cubicle slave in a mind-numbing job conspires to plant a computer virus in the company’s system that will embezzle corporate funds into a secret account.
Louie
Louie is, for the most part, quite a bleak TV show. It’s about the day-to-day, somewhat fictionalised life of comedian Louie C.K, and that level of minutiae will never be constantly interesting — I know my life certainly isn’t that fascinating for every single second. But in the monotony, and in the middle of the tough and real life he leads, there’s a great deal of levity and of genuine comedy. Louie is a funny show that doesn’t try to be funny in the first place. Watch it now on Presto.
Presto: Louie puts a spotlight on Louis C.K.’s everyday ordeals, his quest to find love and his pursuit of humor.
Escape From LA
Escape From LA is not meant to be a funny movie. In 1996, I’m sure it was gritty and real and a high-concept edge-of-your-seat action triller. But in 2015, on re-watching, it’s just ridiculous. Kurt Russell is ridiculous. (Kurt Russell is still ridiculous today, actually.) The fact that it’s actually a sequel to Escape To New York is ridiculous. The entire concept is ridiculous. And that’s why you should watch it, and snicker along, the entire way. Watch it now on Presto.
Presto: Snake Plissken is back in John Carpenter’s long-awaited sequel to Escape From New York, injected with a virus that will kill him in 10 hours flat unless he is successful in his latest quest.
Disclosure: Stan is a 50/50 joint venture between Nine Entertainment and Fairfax Media. Allure Media, the company which publishes Gizmodo Australia, is also owned by Fairfax.