General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20266 min read

Creamerie

Creamerie is a New Zealand dystopian black comedy television series in which three women running a dairy farm in a post-plague world discover a man who appears to be the last male survivor on Earth. It was created by director Roseanne Liang with actors JJ Fong, Perlina Lau, and Ally Xue, premiered on TVNZ 2 and TVNZ OnDemand on 19 April 2021, and ran for two seasons of six 30-minute episodes each before ending in 2023.¹^•²

Key fact	Detail
Format	New Zealand dark comedy blending dystopian science fiction, satire, and mystery; 6 × 30 minutes per season¹
Creators	Roseanne Liang, JJ Fong, Perlina Lau, and Ally Xue³
Premiere	19 April 2021 on TVNZ 2 and TVNZ OnDemand⁴
Lead cast	Ally Xue as Alex, JJ Fong as Jamie, Perlina Lau as Pip, Jay Ryan as Bobby, Tandi Wright as Lane⁵
Seasons	Season 1 (6 episodes, April 2021); Season 2 (6 episodes, 14 July 2023); 12 episodes total, canceled/ended²
International release	Hulu (United States) from 9 December 2021; SBS On Demand (Australia)³^•⁶
Award	NZ On Air Best Drama Series, New Zealand Television Awards 2021¹

Spoilers

Premise

The series is set eight years after a viral plague has swept the Earth and killed the male population. Sources describe the toll slightly differently: several summaries say the plague killed all men,⁵ while others, including the episode guide and several streaming synopses, specify that it killed 99% of men, with the surviving 1% sent to a Facility in New Zealand where they did not survive, or perhaps did.²^•⁷ The surviving women have rebuilt society under the Wellness Committee, which provides healthcare, education, and mandatory menstrual leave, and manages repopulation through a sperm lottery.⁸^•⁴

The story follows three dairy farmers in the rural Hiro Valley: the rebellious Alex (Ally Xue), the rule-following Pip (Perlina Lau), and Jamie (JJ Fong), who wants to become a mother. They accidentally run over a pedestrian who turns out to be Bobby (Jay Ryan), apparently the last surviving man. Each woman sees a different possibility in him: Jamie hopes he could let her conceive without the sperm lottery's bureaucracy, Pip considers turning him in to curry favor with the authorities, and Alex sees his existence, and his claim that other men survive, as proof that something is rotten in the Wellness regime.⁹

Wellness and satire

The show's central antagonist is Lane (Tandi Wright), the charismatic leader of Wellness, a fascist matriarchy that filled the power vacuum after the pandemic.¹⁰ Reviewers read the regime as a satire of wellness culture: society runs on menstruation festivals, the greeting "oh my goddess," and pink anatomical iconography, while punishments in Hiro Valley range from five-day doses of subdermal Bliss medication to lobotomisation.¹¹^•¹² Season one reveals that Wellness secretly operates a facility in which captive men are farmed for semen so the organization can control human reproduction.¹³

The opening sequence establishes the tone: a rugby changing room of men coughing blood gives way to a pile of male bodies being burned, scored to a rendition of "What a Wonderful World," before cutting to the female-only society eight years later, on Day 2920 after the outbreak.¹²^•⁴

Production

The idea was developed around a dining table in 2018 by Liang, Fong, Lau, and Xue, the team behind the web series Flat 3 and Friday Night Bites. Liang has said the show began as a reaction to The Handmaid's Tale: after watching its second season, the group asked what a funnier version of that story would look like, and switched the power structure so that it lies with the women.¹⁴^•¹⁵

Filming took place in New Zealand during the COVID-19 pandemic, with pre-production underway when the country entered level four lockdown in 2020; the cast and crew learned lines in self-isolation and held production meetings over Zoom before resuming filming.¹⁴ The series was produced by Bronwynn Bakker for Flat3 Productions and Kevin & Co for TVNZ, with executive producer Tony Ayres, and principal funding from NZ On Air. It was written by Liang, Kirsty Fisher, Dan Musgrove, and Shoshana McCallum, with Liang directing, and is distributed by NBCUniversal Global Distribution.³

The three leads are Asian-New Zealand women, and Lau has noted that three Chinese-Kiwi women leading a comedy on New Zealand television was a first.¹⁴

Release and reception

Season one premiered on TVNZ 2 on 19 April 2021, with all six episodes streaming on TVNZ OnDemand.⁴ After its debut in New Zealand and on SBS On Demand in Australia, Hulu released the full first season in the United States on 9 December 2021.³ Season two was released on TVNZ+ on 14 July 2023, on Hulu on 15 July 2023, and on SBS on 28 August 2023.⁶ The series is also available on Disney+ in some regions.¹⁶

At the New Zealand Television Awards in 2021, the series won NZ On Air Best Drama Series, with nominations for Best Director: Drama (Roseanne Liang), Best Script: Comedy (Shoshana McCallum and Roseanne Liang), and Best Cinematography: Drama (Marty Smith).¹ Jay Ryan received a Best Supporting Actor nomination at the 2024 awards for season two.⁶

Reviewers responded to the show's tonal mix. The Spinoff's Linda Burgess called it a gender-flipped Handmaid's Tale that is "actually darkly funny," praising the writing and acting.⁴ Season two was described as darker and more action-driven, picking up directly from the first season's cliffhanger as Alex, Jamie, Pip, and Bobby flee Hiro Valley on a road trip to bring Lane to justice.¹¹^•¹⁶ On IMDb the series holds a score of 6.8.¹⁷

The series ended after two seasons.²

Context and comparisons

Creamerie arrived on screens alongside the American series Y: The Last Man, another pandemic-era drama about a plague that kills the male population; both were well into production before COVID-19 hit and both were led and entirely directed by women. Critics placed Creamerie in a lineage of all-female-society fiction that includes Charlotte Perkins Gilman's 1915 novel Herland and The Handmaid's Tale, while noting that its satire of wellness culture and biological essentialism gives it a distinct angle.¹⁸^•¹⁹^•²⁰

References

Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Series and fictional screen worlds › Scripted television and comedy series › Sitcom and comedy series › Comedy series outside the US and UK › Premiered 1964 to 2021

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026

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