We are five months into 2025, and it has been an excellent year for television.The Last of UsSeason 2,SeveranceSeason 2,AndorSeason 2,White LotusSeason 3,The Righteous Gemstones' final season,The StudioSeason 1, andAdolescenceare all vying for the title of best series of the year. Yet with all due respect, with how great those series are, the best show of 2025 isThe RehearsalSeason 2.
Debuting in July 2022 on HBO,The Rehearsalis a docu-series starringNathan Fielder. It uses sets and actors hired to recreate real situations to help ordinary people rehearse for upcoming difficult conversations or life events. Yet that simple plot summary barely scratches the surface of whatThe Rehearsalis actually about, and feels like a bit of a lie, since in Season 1, the show quickly goes off the rails into an entirely different subject.
Season 2 takes this a step further, as what initially starts as Fielder trying to fix aviation safety quickly morphs into something far greater, and nearly impossible to describe. It truly is a show that needs to be seen to be believed, and after the third episode of Season 2, it is in the conversation for the best show on television.
The Rehearsal
‘The Rehearsal’ Is an Absurdist Masterpiece You Aren’t Ready For
Tuning intoThe Rehearsalevery week is like the greatest mystery, because the audience never knows what they will get. This is the series that, in Season 2’s second episode, featured Fielder depicting the offices of the Paramount Germany division as a Nazi military base, including SS uniforms wearing the Paramount+ logo on their armbands following the reveal that the streaming platformremoved an episode ofNathan For Youfrom its platform due to being seen as “potentially anti-Semetic” when the episode removed was about raising awareness about the holocaust. After that, there’s no telling where the next episode will go. Who would have imagined that 10 minutes into the third episode of Season 2, a couple who cloned their deceased dog would be the least weird thing about the episode?
In the third episode, titled “Pilot’s Code,“Fielder uses himself as a test subject of an experiment to replicate the personality of heroic pilot Sully Sullenberger, reliving his life from infancy to the 2009 emergency landing in the Hudson River. Fielder shaves his whole body and dresses up in a diaper, is swaddled and changed by a giant terrifying marionette puppet meant to be his mother, before an equally hysterical and disturbing scene of Fielder choking on milk while being breastfed by the puppet. If one hasn’t seen this episode, this probably sounds ridiculous and exaggerated, but this all happens, and it only gets stranger (and better).
How To With John Wilson: One of the Most Innovative Shows on TV Today
HBO’s How To With John Wilson recently wrapped up its three-season run and was unlike anything else on TV.
The episode culminates with Fielder, as the adult Sully, going through a point in his life where he was very into music following the release of the iPod. Fielder hypothesizes that Sully might have been listening to the hit song “Bring Me to Life” by one of his favorite bands, Evanescence, when he landed in the Hudson, given that Sully’s 23 seconds of silence on the recording also matches up with the chorus of “Bring Me to Life” which happens to be 23 seconds long.
It is an absurd conclusion, and one that, when Fielder postulates in the episode, one can’t help but laugh at… yet the framing of it feels entirely believable. Even if it isn’t true, you want it to be. While one might laugh at the idea, it’s hard not to lean forward when the realization comes over Fielder. When the chorus starts blasting, it is a fist-pumping moment that somehow makesClint Eastwood’s 2016 filmSullyfeel incomplete without it and also usurps 2003’sDaredevilas the definitive piece of media to use “Bring Me to Life.” Evanescence and “Bring Me to Life” will never be the same afterThe Rehearsal, which is how viewers feel after watching the series.
‘The Rehearsal’ Is a Show About Anxiety
The Rehearsal’s initial pitch to the audience was a similar format to Fielder’s past series,Nathan For You, which would be a comedic series of Fielder trying to “help” others in absurd ways, with the idea of rehearsing for life’s big moments seeming ripe for comedy. However, as Season 1 progressed, it became clear this was something more, as it had a slightly darker edge. Season 2 steps the premise up more, with the seeming desire to “rehearse life” being anexploration into living with anxiety.The starting point of Season 2, airline safety, quickly becomes about teaching co-pilots to confront uncomfortable situations with fellow pilots and speak up, as well as the fear that comes with it.
In Season 2, Episode 2, “Star Potential,” as Fielder is looking at the Nazi-coded Paramount+ employees (again cannot stress enough how strange and gutsy this visual is), Fielder narrates about what are seemingly his struggles with connecting to people on a sincere emotional level, one that can speak to many individuals living with anxiety, or any other type of neurodivergence. Fielder says:
“I’ve always felt sincerity was overrated. It just ends up punishing those who can’t perform it as well as others. Some people are born great performers. They have the talent to effortlessly convince others that they are more than just a number. But for the rest of us, no matter how sincere we are inside, it will always be a struggle.”
Explained: Is Nathan Fielder Acting?
Nathan Fielder’s roles in Nathan For You and The Rehearsal are so convincing that many have wondered if this is all an act or actually real.
The Rehearsalis, first and foremost, a comedy series. But as Fielder mentions inthe Season 2 premiere, he wants to do more than make people laugh, and sometimes it is hard to get people to take you seriously when all they ever see is a clown making jokes. Fielder visualizes this perfectly as a literal clown who is trapped underneath a car, crying out for help, and people laughing at him until they realize it isn’t a bit… but in reality, it was all a bit, as everyone from the clown to the pedestrians were part of Fielder’s rehearsal.
Yet throughThe Rehearsal, Fielder is doing what he set out to do, which changes and saves lives, even if the final episodes don’t see him solving the pilot safety crisis. Spoiler alert: One look at the news and all the plane crashes since Trump fired the heads of the Transportation Security Administration suggests Fielder will fail in that endeavor, and the series itself is a tool to change lives. Underneath all the absurd visuals, elaborate costumes, and awkward moments is a series about understanding oneself and others.
Why ‘The Rehearsal’ Flies Under the Radar
Given thatThe Rehearsalairs on HBO and followsThe Last of Us, one would imagine it would be a bigger series. For those who do watch it, it is undoubtedly a top viewing experience, and taking aquick look atThe Rehearsalon Twitter and BlueSky reveals various reactions of people seemingly responding in real time to the madness they are seeing unfold.Yet it doesn’t seem to have the same hold on the cultural zeitgeist thatThe Last of Us or other popular series have had so far this year.
One might say that becauseThe Rehearsalis a docu-series, it is more difficult to capture audience engagement than a straightforward dramatic narrative likeThe Last of UsorWhite Lotus. However, that didn’t stop series likeTiger Kingor Discovery’sQuiet on Setdocumentary from garnering significant attention from audiences and the larger media.
It might be thatThe Rehearsalisn’t for everyone, which is okay.It is a very uncomfortable series to watchat times, and for many viewers, it might just be too much. It is an acquired taste that one expects from a creative mind like Fielder, who has delivered a series that only he could make. Fielder has somehow gotten HBO and David Zaslav, one of Hollywood’s most notable penny pinchers, to spend millions of dollars for Fielder to construct elaborate sets to recreate absurd scenarios that make for great comedy and seemingly partial immersive therapy.
There is nothing likeThe Rehearsalon television right now. Hopefully, HBO will keep giving Fielder money to create the series because it is both laugh-out-loud funny and transcendentally moving.The Last of Usmight be HBO’s big Sunday series right now, but for my money, it is the opening act forThe Rehearsal.StreamThe RehearsalonMax.
