Paramount+ is having a loud start to the summer. The Taylor Sheridan machine is still purring along with Dutton Ranch, The Madison, and Marshals, Michael Fassbender’s The Agency is back for a second season, and, whether you like it or not, the whole streaming platform is bracing for June 14, when the UFC descends on the White House lawn.
But if you happen to have a few free moments this weekend to liven up your mind, three new documentaries have quietly landed on P+ to offer some enlightening distraction. One is a warm-up to that big White House spectacle, with a profile on one of its main event fighters. Another busts open a hidden religious community in New Zealand. The third is epic concert film about Elvis from Baz Luhrmann.
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Topuria Matador
From a war-torn childhood to UFC champion
If you’re a fan of UFC MMA fighting, then you undoubtedly know that Spanish-Georgian fighter Ilia Topura is set to fight for the undisputed Lightweight championship against interim champ Justin Gaethje on June 14, as the main event in President Trump’s spectacle UFC Freedom 250 card on the White House lawn. Just in time for that polarizing event is Topuria Matador, a feature-length sports documentary that traces Topuria’s rapid rise to the top of the UFC.
Kicking things off with his 2023 win over Josh Emmett, the doc builds towards Topuria’s decisive knockout of then featherweight champ Alexander Volkanovski in 2024 to take the belt. While it doesn’t cover Topuria’s rise to the Lightweight division, where he fights now, the movie acts as a great origin story, and delivers some pretty impressive access to Topuria’s often brutal training camps, showing what it takes to prepare for fights at this level.
But one of the best parts of the doc is that it doesn’t depend fully on on-camera interviews with his team and those close to him (who weight in on just how dangerous he is), but instead it lets Topuria tell his own story—from his early days growing up in war-torn Georgia, his bond with his brother, and his relocation to Spain where he began his career. UFC fans will love this inside-baseball look at one of the sport’s most explosive fighters.
QuizName that hit Paramount+ series
Trivia challenge
From the frontier to the final frontier — can you identify Paramount+’s biggest shows from just a clue?
DramaSci-FiComedyWesternStreaming
This Taylor Sheridan drama follows the Dutton family as they fight to protect their Montana ranch — the largest in the United States — from developers, politicians, and rival landowners. What is it called?
Correct! Yellowstone debuted in 2018 and became one of the most-watched cable dramas in American history before moving to Paramount+. Kevin Costner stars as patriarch John Dutton, and the show sparked an entire universe of Taylor Sheridan spin-offs.
Not quite — the answer is Yellowstone. While 1883 is also a Taylor Sheridan show set on a ranch, it’s a prequel following the Dutton ancestors heading west. Yellowstone is the flagship series centered on the modern-day Dutton family in Montana.
This Paramount+ Star Trek series stars Patrick Stewart reprising his iconic role as a retired admiral who is drawn back into action to protect a mysterious young woman. What is the show called?
Correct! Star Trek: Picard ran for three seasons from 2020 to 2023 and concluded with a beloved final season that reunited the full cast of Star Trek: The Next Generation. It was widely praised as a fitting send-off for one of Trek’s most beloved characters.
Not quite — the answer is Star Trek: Picard. Strange New Worlds features Captain Pike and a young Spock, while Discovery follows the USS Discovery through different eras of Trek history. Lower Decks is an animated comedy set on a lesser starship.
This long-running animated comedy series, now exclusive to Paramount+, is set in the fictional Colorado mountain town of the same name and follows four foul-mouthed fourth-grade boys. Name it.
Correct! South Park has been on the air since 1997, making it one of the longest-running animated series in television history. Creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone signed a massive deal with Paramount+ and Comedy Central through 2027, including exclusive streaming specials called ‘Paramount+ Events.’
Not quite — the answer is South Park. Beavis and Butt-Head does have a Paramount+ revival, but South Park is the flagship animated franchise for the streamer. The show’s exclusive streaming home is Paramount+, where all 26-plus seasons are available.
This Taylor Sheridan prequel series follows the Dutton family’s treacherous 1800s wagon train journey from Texas to Montana, and stars Tim McGraw and Faith Hill as James and Margaret Dutton. What is the title?
Correct! 1883 premiered on Paramount+ in December 2021 and stars real-life country music couple Tim McGraw and Faith Hill alongside Isabel May as their daughter Elsa, whose narration drives the story. The show was a massive hit and helped establish Paramount+’s reputation for prestige drama.
Not quite — the answer is 1883. While 1923 is also a Yellowstone prequel set in the early 20th century starring Harrison Ford and Helen Mirren, 1883 specifically covers the original westward journey of the Dutton family in the late 1800s.
Originally airing on Syfy and later moving to streaming, this critically acclaimed sci-fi drama reimagined a 1970s series about humanity’s android-like enemies hunting down survivors of a nearly destroyed human fleet. What is it?
Correct! The reimagined Battlestar Galactica, developed by Ronald D. Moore, aired from 2004 to 2009 and is widely considered one of the greatest sci-fi dramas ever made. It’s available on Paramount+ and used its Cylon-versus-human premise to explore themes of politics, religion, and what it means to be human.
Not quite — the answer is Battlestar Galactica. Caprica is actually a prequel spin-off set before the Cylon war, while The Expanse is a celebrated sci-fi series that aired on Amazon Prime. Battlestar Galactica is the flagship reimagined series available on Paramount+.
This Taylor Sheridan crime drama stars Sylvester Stallone as a New York mob boss who is exiled to Tulsa, Oklahoma, and forced to build a new criminal empire from scratch in unfamiliar territory. What is it called?
Correct! Tulsa King premiered in 2022 and marked Sylvester Stallone’s first lead role in a television series. The show blends crime drama with fish-out-of-water comedy as Stallone’s character Dwight Manfredi navigates an unfamiliar city with no existing criminal connections.
Not quite — the answer is Tulsa King. Mayor of Kingstown is another Taylor Sheridan show, but it stars Jeremy Renner as a power broker in a Michigan prison town. Tulsa King is the one that brought Sylvester Stallone to television for the first time in a lead role.
This Star Trek series on Paramount+ is set aboard the USS Enterprise before the events of the original series, featuring Captain Christopher Pike and a young Spock on episodic adventures. Name the show.
Correct! Star Trek: Strange New Worlds debuted in 2022 to widespread critical acclaim, praised for returning to the episodic storytelling format of classic Trek rather than the serialized approach of Discovery. Anson Mount plays Captain Pike with charm and gravitas, and the show quickly became a fan favorite.
Not quite — the answer is Star Trek: Strange New Worlds. Star Trek: Discovery is set in various time periods and follows a more serialized story arc. Prodigy is an animated Trek series aimed at younger audiences, and Enterprise is an older prequel series from the early 2000s.
This Paramount+ series stars Jeremy Renner as a powerful fixer and power broker in a Michigan city where the local economy revolves entirely around a massive prison complex. What is the show called?
Correct! Mayor of Kingstown premiered in 2021 and was created by Taylor Sheridan alongside Hugh Dillon. Jeremy Renner plays Mike McLusky, a man who brokers deals between criminals, prison officials, and law enforcement in a city defined by incarceration — a gritty and intense examination of the American prison system.
Not quite — the answer is Mayor of Kingstown. Tulsa King is the Taylor Sheridan show starring Sylvester Stallone, not Jeremy Renner. Mayor of Kingstown features Renner in one of his most dramatic and physically demanding roles, filmed largely before his serious snowplow accident in 2023.
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Devotion: Obedience or Betrayal
A peek inside New Zealand’s most secretive religious community
In the same vein as such chilling and acclaimed documentaries as Netflix’s Keep Sweet: Pray and Obey and Prime Video’s Shiny Happy People: Duggar Family Secrets, Devotion: Obedience or Betrayal is a three-part Paramount+ offering that heads across the world to expose Gloriavale, a fundamentalist Christian community on New Zealand’s South Island that has lived by its own rules for more than 50 years.
The contentious documentary offers up two distinct viewpoints surrounding the controversial community, combining present-day interviews from those “leavers” who have since gotten out of what they describe as an abusive, Handmaid’s Tale-like cult, and the remaining faithful who staunchly defend their faith and way of life. The doc’s main voice is that of Phil Cooper (the son of Gloriavale’s late founder, Neville Cooper), who left the group in 1991 and later testified against his father amid mounting sexual abuse allegations.
Director Nicole Rittenmeyer somehow secured unprecedented access to community members, as well as decades worth of archival footage from within to tell the story, which moves chronologically through the community’s origins, the allegations and police raids, and whether it can adapt or reform its ways under public scrutiny.
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EPiC: Elvis Presley in Concert
Baz Luhrmann resurrects the King’s Vegas magic
Australian Writer-director Baz Luhrmann (Moulin Rouge!, Romeo + Juliet) has already wowed audiences with his film 2022 Elvis, which was an Oscar darling that made a household name out of its star, Austin Butler. With his stunning documentary EPiC: Elvis Presley in Concert, new on Paramount+ this month, Luhrmann bridges the gap between the iconic “image” of Elvis Presley and the actual man that he was. But, of course, it also delivers some never-before seen concert footage fans will adore.
When researching for his film Elvis, Luhrmann and editor John Redmond uncovered a treasure trove of long-lost concert footage, audio, and archival material. Using Peter Jackson’s Park Road Post Production restoration technology that was used for his incredible Disney+ Beatles series Get Back, Let It Be, and Anthology, EPiC: Elvis Presley in Concert delivers an insane concert experience, built around restorations of unused footage from two Elvis concert films, 1970’s Elvis: That’s the Way It Is, and 1972’s Elvis on Tour.
The results are gobsmacking—crisp footage with vivid colors fitting of the King, and sonically-clean and AI-separated audio, re-engineered and mixed by audio designers for big audiences (the movie ran in IMAX theaters, too). But to bring forward the man behind the image, there are no “talking head” interviews. Instead, The King himself narrates the film in his own voice, taken from audio recordings Luhrmann found in the archives. EPiC is just that, epic, and its Rotten Tomatoes score reflects that, with the reviews aggregator giving it 97% from critics and 98% from audiences.
Three kinds of obsession
From the cage to the commune to the Vegas stage, this weekend’s documentaries will surely give you something fascinating to get into this weekend. If you burn through them fast, though, How-To Geek keeps a steady, er, stream of streaming guides for whatever you’re looking for next.
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Stephan is the sports journalist for the Maple Grove Report.
