Kaleidoscope is a new crime thriller series on Netflix, which revolves around a heist. Netflix has had great success with movies and TV shows which revolve around heists, such as the Spanish series Money Heist (which ran for five seasons) and Zach Snyder’s zombie twists on the heist genre – Army of the Dead and Army of Thieves.
The unique selling point of Kaleidoscope is that the episodes are designed to be watched in any order. They jump around in time – from decades before the heist, to six months after it takes place. This has obviously led to much debate about what is the best Kaleidoscope watch order.
And now, the master of writing novels which are turned into the best horror movies, Stephen King, has weighed-in on the debate. With one short and simple tweet, King calls Kaleidoscope; “Grade A entertainment.” But he adds; “I suggest watching chronologically.” Obviously, it’s up the audience how ‘random’ and scattershot they want the experience, and the showrunners clearly intend for this to be a disorientating experience.
If you do want to take the advice of Stephen King – and that generally seems like a good idea – we can help you out by advising you on the chronological order. Each episode has been assigned a colour. The episode order is randomised for each Netflix user, but for everyone – Black comes first and White comes last. White is not the final episode if you watch in chronological order, however.
Here is the chronological order:
- Black: intended to explain the premise
- Violet: takes place 24 years before the heist
- Green: takes place seven years before the heist
- Yellow: takes place six weeks before the heist
- Orange: takes place three weeks before the heist
- Blue: takes place five days before the heist
- White: takes place during the heist
- Red: takes place the morning after the heist
- Pink: takes place six months after the heist
Be warned, some say that watching in chronological order goes against the entire point of the series, and takes the fun out of it. So, follow King’s advice at your own peril.
If you’re a fan of crime, mystery, and more twists than you shake a stick at – check out our guide to the best thriller movies. Hopefully there will be some good heist movies amongst 2023’s slate of new movies.