The Circle has entered the chat once again! After almost a year and a half on idle, Netflix’s premier reality competition series is back for Season 6 — and the show’s gone through a bit of a makeover. After producing the first five seasons in the UK, The Circle is now repping for the ATL. That means the show has brand new apartments for brand new players — and The Circle has a bunch of brand new twists to throw at them, too. But is this software update as frustrating as the latest iOS, or does The Circle remain on the cutting edge of reality TV?
Opening Shot: We’re in Atlanta, y’all! After five seasons of trying to hide the fact that The Circle was filmed across the pond, Season 6 is finally able to embrace its truth and show the actual city where it is filmed. And if you don’t recognize the Atlanta skyline, narrator Michelle Buteau tells you exactly what is up.
The Gist: Welcome back to The Circle, the social media strategy game where players are not always who they seem. And despite the fact that a lot has changed for The Circle onscreen (new apartments) and behind-the-scenes (new showrunner), the show still feels like itself. That’s partly because the new crew has taken a not broke/don’t fix approach to the show. Everything feels in line with what’s come before, even the usage of deep cut ’80s synth pop hits that charted way higher in the UK than they ever did in the US (this season’s opener: “Situation” by Yaz!).
As for the gameplay, The Circle is gonna Circle. We start with seven players sequestered in seven quirky apartments, only able to communicate via a “voice-activated” fictional social media platform called The Circle. Some players are exactly who they say they are — like Lauren, a self-described nerd who loves anime and gaming and is also very, very hot — and some have told little lies — like Kyle, a married pro basketball player who is playing as himself but single and a basketball trainer.
And then some players, like Brandon and Caress, have made up their profiles completely and are hoping to win the game by pairing their personalties with completely different people. Chats happen, snap judgments are made, grudges are formed, and flirts start flirting — and then everyone has to rate each other in order of favorite to least favorite player.
There has, however, been one significant update made to the show, and that speaks more to The Circle’s need to stay up-to-date with technology than anything else. This time around, one player is actually an AI chatbot, hilariously represented by what looks like an old PC tower sitting on a coffee table in an empty apartment. Can a bot running off of the chats of every Circle player ever win the money?
What Shows Will It Remind You Of? This is through and through The Circle, and there’s still no other show like it on TV right now. And the addition of an AI component, as existentially terrifying as AI is, makes the show feel fresh four years into its run.
Sex and Skin: Obviously the players all have thirst trap photos that they either deploy as their default pics or hold onto for mid-game DM sliding. So yeah, you’ve got Kyle showing off his eight-pack in a pic, and you have Lauren playing the game while wearing a bustier and denim cutoffs. Hey — flirting is part of the game!
Parting Shot: Unbeknownst to one of the top-rated players, they’ve just allowed an AI chatbot named Max to slide into the game unnoticed.
Sleeper Star: This season boasts an admirable lineup of big personalities, from proud fuckboy Myles (a.k.a. Yung Papi Fuego) to Steffi, a medium who’s rooming with her “emotional support skeleton.” But the immediate fave, the player who is absolutely going to win hearts, has to be Brandon.
He admits he looks like a Cabbage Patch adult, which is why he’s playing as his friend Olivia. And when Brandon bombs the first few chats, you will feel his frustration and you will want him to send him all the heart emojis.
Memorable Dialogue: Michelle Buteau remains the master of lovingly dragging all of the contestants. When Steffi starts dancing on top of Herb, her life-size plastic skeleton (at least I hope it’s plastic???), Buteau says, “Girl, how you gonna give a lap dance to something that’s got no lap?”
Our Take: It’s been 15 months since we heard the klaxon and resulting panic of an ALERT, and wow, is it good to be back. It’s also good to know that The Circle still has that undeniable, unidentifiable “it” that made it such an immediate phenomenon back in early 2020. If anything, the relocation to Atlanta has provided the show with the freedom to change anything that wasn’t working and to add in new features. Yeah, I’m only reviewing the first episode, but I know from a set visit last year that the players now have more places to chat from, including a gorgeous rooftop getaway. It’s a small change, but it makes the show — now in its sixth season, remind you! — feel a little more prestigious.
That’s one major vibe shift that separates Season 6 from the previous five. Maybe absence made the hearts grow fonder, but this feels like the first season where the players really, truly know and love the game. Like, The Circle has now been around long enough for it to be treated with some gravitas, y’know? It’s not like players getting on Survivor and geeking out about it, but you can see the mix of shock and joy as players say “Circle, take me to my ratings” for the first time. It’s surreal for the players, and that endears them more to me as an audience member.
And that’s what makes The Circle so special. More so than probably any other reality show, The Circle is really able to explore people’s personalities and portray them as complex individuals. Kyle is super macho, super smooth, and super confident — but he’s also super married and feels uneasy about having to flirt. Myles delivers every single sentence with a chill cockiness, like he’s greeting followers on an Instagram live — but he’s also an AI engineer and went to Carnegie Mellon??? Cassie is a Kentucky firecracker who looks like Barbie’s little (re: short) sister — but she was also sly enough to catfish her now ex-husband and catch him cheating on her! Yes, The Circle has dozens of cameras on these people at any given moment, but it remains the only reality show that shows how people act when no one is watching.
Our Call: STREAM IT! Hashtag Binge it, live it, love it. Circle emoji, TV emoji, blue heart emoji, SEND.
