Stephen King’s The Institute Is the Sci-Fi Sensation Supercharging MGM+

2025 was a banner year for anyone obsessed with Stephen King adaptations (so, basically, half the internet). Not only did we get three major movies—The Running Man, The Monkey, and The Long Walk—but there were two splashy new TV projects, too. HBO's It: Welcome to Derry grabbed most of the headlines, but the other one quietly became a streaming juggernaut over on MGM+.

That other series? The Institute. If you haven't heard about it, well, you're probably not hanging out on MGM+. But apparently, plenty of people are, since the show's been camped out in the service's Top 10 chart for over 200 days. And yes, in streamer-land, that's basically an eternity.

Superkids, Secret Bunkers, and King Bingo

Here's the setup: The Institute is adapted from King's 2019 novel. The premise ticks off about half the boxes on the King-trope bingo card—there's a group of kids with psychic or otherwise "special" abilities, a creepy government agency, and a sinister facility where nobody gets out unscathed. If that gives you déjà vu, you're not alone.

The difference this time is numbers. Instead of following one gifted child (Carrie, Firestarter, The Shining—the list goes on), The Institute brings us an ensemble of supernatural kids all trying to outwit the bad guys together. Think "Stranger Things," but with a bit more bureaucracy and a lot less nostalgia.

• Title: The Institute
• Developed by: Benjamin Cavell
• Directed by: Jack Bender
• Lead: Joe Freeman as Luke Ellis (teen psychic with telekinesis)
• Episodes: 8 (Season 1)
• Rotten Tomatoes: 64% (critics), 69% (audience)

A Streaming Power Player (Even If You Missed It)

The Institute landed on MGM+ with a two-episode premiere on July 13, 2025, then dropped new episodes weekly until August 24. The impact was immediate—it shot to the number one spot on the streamer and has been hanging around the Top 10 essentially ever since.

According to numbers from Flix Patrol, the show has spent a ridiculous 219 days in MGM+'s Top 10. For context, the streamer‘s horror hit From couldn’t match that, only popping back up after its Season 4 premiere. The only other MGM+ series close to that kind of staying power is the British thriller Nine Bodies in a Mexican Morgue, with 137 days in the Top 10. So, no matter how you slice the metrics, The Institute is one of MGM+'s biggest winners.

'Is There Gonna Be a Season 2?'

It didn’t take a psychic to predict that with numbers like those, MGM+ would pony up for another round. Sure enough, renewal news broke in August 2025, and by February of this year, Season 2 was already filming.

'While there's still no locked-in release date, we could see Season 2 as soon as late 2026. Details are pretty tight-lipped, but word is the story is moving beyond King's original novel this time, exploring what’s next for the survivors and pulling back to show a bigger conspiracy involving other secret facilities worldwide.'

So, for anyone worried they'd burned through King's source material too quickly, rest easy—they're officially off the map now.

The Final Word

If you're a King completist or just a fan of stories about teens with weird powers fighting shadowy suits, The Institute is worth a look. It's comfortably outlasted some much-hyped genre shows on streaming, even if the critics didn't go wild for it. With another batch of episodes in the works, MGM+ has every reason to keep the psychic drama rolling.

If MGM+ isn't on your radar... well, maybe now it should be.