After a year of tumult at Warner Bros. Discovery, we can be thankful for at least one streaming blessing this holiday season: David Zaslav hasn’t kicked Doom Patrol to the curb…yet. Despite a raft of cancellation rumors this past summer, the weird-as-shit series following DC Comics’ weirdest band of anti-heroes will return for a fourth season on Dec. 8—and the door is still open for more zany adventures to come.
If Doom Patrol exists to you only as the show you keep mistaking for The Umbrella Academy, it really is worth watching. It’s crass, over-the-top, and surprisingly touching. If nothing else, it’s one of the best queer-positive, found-family stories on TV that also features Brendan Fraser as a bronzed cyborg. Watch it now before it gets canceled for real and shoved down the streaming memory hole alongside Batgirl.
And speaking of shows that were almost canceled, this month also sees the long-awaited return of His Dark Materials (Dec. 5), concluding the TV adaptation of the beloved Philip Pullman YA series. Though it’s a far better take on the books than the big-screen movie, the show never quite lived up to the initial hype. But I’m glad HBO and the BBC managed to scrape together one last batch of episodes, if only to see how they manage to wrestle one of the weirdest and most incendiary kids’ books ever written into something resembling an action-adventure show. (Spoiler alert: The endgame involves a literal attempt to murder God).
Elsewhere on the streamer, you can watch returning seasons of a few Max Originals that you’ve probably never heard of (because HBO is almost as bad at promoting its niche streaming shows as Netflix). December sees the launch of the second seasons of the Gossip Girl reboot (Dec. 1), the awkward comedy Sort of (Dec. 1), the Spanish-language thriller series Paradise (Dec. 1), the claustrophobic suspense anthology series The Head (Dec. 22), and the Billie Piper vehicle I Hate Suzie (Dec. 22).
Here’s everything else coming to (and leaving) HBO Max in December, including the streaming premieres of recent theatrical releases Amsterdam (Dec. 6) and The Banshees of Inisherin (Dec. 13). Titles with (HBO) next to them are available on HBO and HBO Max; everything else is exclusive to HBO Max.
What’s coming to HBO Max in December 2022
Table of Contents
Arriving Dec. 1
- 3:10 to Yuma, 1957
- 10,000 B.C., 2008
- Black Sheep, 1996
- Branson, HBO Original Docuseries Premiere (HBO)
- Burn After Reading, 2008
- Can’t Hardly Wait, 1998
- Cheech & Chong’s Nice Dreams, 1981 (HBO)
- Cheech & Chong’s The Corsican Brothers, 1984 (HBO)
- Cheech & Chong’s Things Are Tough All Over, 1982
- The Children Act, 2017 (HBO)
- De Palma, 2015 (HBO)
- First Reformed, 2017 (HBO)
- Friends with Benefits, 2011
- Gossip Girl, Max Original Season 2 Premiere
- Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa, 2008 (HBO)
- The Murdochs: Empire of Influence
- Gone Girl, 2014 (HBO)
- Green Room, 2015 (HBO)
- Hellraiser III: Hell on Earth, 1992 (HBO)
- Hellraiser IV: Bloodline, 1996 (HBO)
- Hellraiser V: Inferno, 2000 (HBO)
- Hellraiser VII: Deader, 2005 (HBO)
- Hellraiser: Hellseeker, 2002 (HBO)
- Hellraiser: Hellworld, 2005 (HBO)
- A Hollywood Christmas, 2022
- Hook, 1991
- Into the Forest, 2015 (HBO)
- Krisha, 2015 (HBO)
- The Maze Runner, 2014 (HBO)
- My Fellow Americans, 1996 (HBO)
- Paradise (Paraíso), Max Original Season 2 Premiere
- The Purge: Anarchy, 2014
- Redemption, 2013 (HBO)
- Reindeer Games, 2000 (Director’s Cut) (HBO)
- The Sea of Trees, 2015 (HBO)
- Sesame Street’s The Nutcracker, Max Original Special Premiere
- Small Town Crime, 2017 (HBO)
- Sort Of, Max Original Season 2 Premiere
- Step Up All In, 2014 (HBO)
- Step Up Revolution, 2012 (HBO)
- Stomp the Yard, 2007
- Stomp the Yard: Homecoming, 2010
- Street Kings, 2008 (HBO)
- The Tomorrow Man, 2019 (HBO)
- Trumbo, 2015 (HBO)
- Two Can Play That Game, 2001
- Urban Cowboy, 1980
- ¡Viva Maestro!, 2022
- Win Win, 2011 (HBO)
Arriving Dec. 2
- Blippi Wonders, Season 2B
- Hank Zipzer’s Christmas Catastrophe, 2016
- Lellobee City Farm, Season 2
Arriving Dec. 4
- Under The Stars (Sous les étoiles), Max Original Premiere
Arriving Dec. 5
- His Dark Materials, Season 3 Premiere (HBO)
Arriving Dec. 6
- Amsterdam, 2022 (HBO)
- Batwheels Holiday Special: Holidays on Ice
- Bugs Bunny Builders Holiday Special: Looneyburg Lights
- Sesame Street Mecha Builders Holiday Special: Yip Yip Tree Tree / The Snowman Scarecrow, Season 1
- Unveiled: Surviving La Luz del Mundo, HBO Original Docuseries Premiere (HBO)
Arriving Dec. 8
- Doom Patrol, Max Original Season 4 Premiere
- South Side, Max Original Season 3 Premiere
Arriving Dec. 9
- Silos Baking Competition: Holiday Edition, Special
- Teen Titans Go! To The Movies, 2018 (HBO)
Arriving Dec. 10
- Atsuko Okatsuka: The Intruder, HBO Original Premiere (HBO)
Arriving Dec. 12
Arriving Dec. 13
- The Banshees Of Inisherin, 2022 (HBO)
- Meet the Batwheels: The Best Present in the World, Season 1
Arriving Dec. 14
- Selling the Hamptons
- Serving the Hamptons
- Queen of Versailles Reigns Again
- Trixie Motel
Arriving Dec. 15
- Jugada Peligrosa (El Patrón del Balón, Goles Limpios Dinero Sucio), Max Original Premiere
Arriving Dec. 16
- Martin: The Reunion Special, 2022
- Ranch to Table, Season 3
Arriving Dec. 22
- I Hate Suzie, Max Original Season 2 Premiere
- The Head, Max Original Season 2 Premiere
Arriving Dec. 23
Arriving Dec. 27
- The Man From U.N.C.L.E., 2015 (HBO)
Arriving Dec. 30
- The Established Home, Season 2
- This Place Rules, Original (HBO)
What’s leaving HBO Max in December 2022
Leaving Dec. 8
- Mortal Kombat, 2021 (HBO)
Leaving Dec. 13
- Spark: A Space Tail, 2016 (HBO)
Leaving Dec. 29
- Those Who Wish Me Dead, 2021 (HBO)
Leaving Dec. 31
- 12 Rounds, 2009 (Unrated) (HBO)
- 12 Rounds 2 Reloaded, 2013 (HBO)
- 2 Guns, 2013 (HBO)
- Africa, 1999
- A Kind Of Murder, 2016 (HBO)
- A Perfect Planet, 2021
- A Simple Plan, 1998 (HBO)
- Against The Ropes, 2004 (HBO)
- Arbitrage, 2012 (HBO)
- Babylon A.D., 2008 (HBO)
- Baggage Claim, 2013 (HBO)
- Bend It Like Beckham, 2002 (HBO)
- Blue Planet II
- Blue Planet: Seas of Life
- Bringing Out The Dead, 1999 (HBO)
- Chaplin, 1992
- Collision Course, 1989 (HBO)
- Damien Omen II, 1978 (HBO)
- Damsel, 2018 (HBO)
- Down Periscope, 1996 (HBO)
- Down With Love, 2003 (HBO)
- Dr. Dolittle: Tail To The Chief, 2008 (HBO)
- Dynasties
- Extraction, 2015 (HBO)
- Frozen Planet
- Fast & Furious 6, 2013 (HBO)
- Harlem Nights, 1989
- Head Office, 1985 (HBO)
- Highlander, 1986 (HBO)
- Joyful Noise, 2012
- Life,1999
- Life Story, 1987
- Little Monsters, 1989 (HBO)
- Losing Isaiah, 1995 (HBO)
- Monster’s Ball, 2001 (Unrated)
- Nature’s Great Events
- Odd Jobs, 1986 (HBO)
- Omen IV: The Awakening, 1991 (HBO)
- Ouija, 2014
- Planet Earth
- Planet Earth II
- Real Steel, 2011
- Ricochet, 1991 (HBO)
- Rocket Science, 2007 (HBO)
- Romancing The Stone, 1984
- Sabotage, 2014 (HBO)
- Serengeti
- Serengeti II
- Seven Worlds, One Planet
- Space Chimps, 2010 (HBO)
- Space Chimps 2: Zartog Strikes Back, 2010 (HBO)
- Starter For 10, 2006 (HBO)
- Sweet Dreams, 1985 (HBO)
- Switch, 1991 (HBO)
- That Awkward Moment, 2014 (HBO)
- The Chosen, 1981 (HBO)
- The Clearing, 2004 (HBO)
- The Counselor, 2013 (Extended Version) (HBO)
- The Final Conflict, 1981 (HBO)
- The Flight Of The Phoenix, 1965
- The Hitcher, 1986 (HBO)
- The Hunt, 2020
- The Jewel Of The Nile, 1985
- The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen, 2003 HBO
- The Mating Game
- The Omen, 2006 (HBO)
- The Order, 2003 (HBO)
- The World’s End, 2013 (HBO)
- The X-Files: I Want To Believe, 2008 (Director’s Cut) (HBO)
- Thor: Tales Of Asgard, 2011 (HBO)
- Thoroughbreds, 2017 (HBO)
- Voyagers, 2021