Netflix Canada made its point in five words: “Something is in the water…” The streamer’s Canadian account attached that warning to a reminder that Below, its six-episode Newfoundland creature thriller, premieres October 8.
The timing is no accident. Oct. 8 plants the series squarely at the front of Halloween-season viewing, and Netflix is releasing all six episodes at once rather than metering them out weekly — a binge-sized bet on a show the company has been teasing since its first-look announcement in July.
Josh Hartnett leads as Calvin Penney, a big-hearted but stubborn fisherman in a small Newfoundland town still haunted by his father’s death decades earlier. When an unidentified sea creature starts terrorizing the community, Calvin teams up with a visiting marine researcher, Fonda Howander (Mackenzie Davis), to protect his son Wade (Charlie Heaton) and unearth whatever the island has kept buried.
Six episodes. One night, if you want them.
The series comes from creator and showrunner Jesse McKeown, whose credits include The Umbrella Academy, The Sinner and 19-2. Directors are Jamie Childs (The Sandman), Helen Shaver (The Penguin) and Stephen Dunn (Closet Monster); the writing room includes Karen Walton, who wrote Ginger Snaps, and Perry Chafe of Republic of Doyle. Hartnett executive produces alongside Jessica Rhoades, Chris Hatcher, Louise Sutton and Sharon Hall.
Netflix shot the show entirely on location in Newfoundland — St. John’s and coastal sites including Conception Harbour, Brigus South and Bacon Cove — between June and October 2025. Practical effects did the heavy lifting: crews pumped artificial fog across the bays, and a full-size prop house was submerged for a month to get the right decayed look. Hartnett spent months with a dialect coach on the local accent.
Before the streaming debut, Below served as the Primetime Opening Night selection at the Toronto International Film Festival on Sept. 10, where the full trailer arrived with a warning about a drifting iceberg that may not be an iceberg at all.
Netflix Canada’s post is the only spoon-fed spoiler so far: whatever is down there stays down there until Oct. 8.
