Netflix’s (Instagram) Catalog arrives not with spectacle, but with soul, a gentle, emotionally charged drama rooted in the everyday, where the familiar chaos of parenting, the quiet ache of loss, and the unexpected beauty of human connection are placed at the heart of the story.
Set in contemporary Cairo, Catalog follows Yousef (Mohamed Farrag), a man suddenly forced into single fatherhood after the untimely death of his wife, Amina (Riham Abdel Ghafour). Left to raise two children, teenage daughter Karima (Retall Abdulaziz) and her younger brother Mansour (Ali El Beialy), Yousef is unmoored, emotionally unequipped, and desperate to find a way forward. That path emerges unexpectedly when he discovers a collection of parenting videos Amina had quietly uploaded to her YouTube channel, a kind of posthumous guidebook to parenting, recorded in moments of quiet foresight.
Yet this is not a story of one man’s struggle. It is about the community that surrounds grief: the firm but loving nanny Om Hashem (Samah Anwar), the gruff-yet-deeply-caring uncle Osama (Ahmed Essam), the children’s perceptive teacher Miss Howaida (Tara Emad), the warm-hearted neighbour George (Bayoumi Fouad), and Yousef’s elder brother Hanafy (Khaled Kamal), who steps into the emotional void when Yousef falters.
“In our region,” Mohamed Farrag tells YUNG, “we don’t always know how to talk about our feelings, especially as men. There’s a gap between how we feel and how we express it. Catalog tries to fill that space. It’s about understanding your kids, their worries and joys, their pain, and being present for it. That’s what creates a healthy environment for them to grow up in.”
The power of Catalog lies in its quietness. There are no grand plot twists. Instead, it tells the story of love in the margins, missed school plays, burnt breakfasts, bedtime rituals, and late-night confessions. Through this, Catalog becomes a mirror for Arab families, reflecting what’s often left unsaid.
“A lot of Arab fathers focus more on work than their children,” notes 15-year-old Retall Abdulaziz, who plays Karima, a teenager struggling to process her mother’s absence. “This happens in real life. Through this show, we want to remind parents to talk to their kids—to stay close to them, help solve their problems, ask them how they really feel.”
Ali El Beialy, who plays Mansour, agrees: “If a father watches this and sees himself in Yousef, he might start paying more attention. Even just knowing what his kids eat or when they have football practice… those little things make a big difference. That’s what Yousef had to learn.”
Off screen, the bond between Retall and Ali mirrored that of their characters, one that grew gradually and naturally, shaped by shared scenes and emotional storytelling.
“At first, we weren’t close,” Retall says of her relationship with Ali. “Karima and Mansour were in their own worlds, just like us. But after their mother dies in the show, they become closer. And that happened with us too. We grew into it.”
Farrag, a veteran of complex roles, believes Catalog will resonate because of its emotional realism, its resistance to stereotype, and its message of community.
“The beauty of this show,” he says, “is that the family isn’t just the nuclear one. It’s everyone. The teacher, the neighbor, the nanny, the brother. Even Amina, who’s gone, is still there in spirit—guiding them. That’s the Arab family we don’t always see on screen. One that includes everyone who shows up, who loves, who listens.”
And that’s what Catalog ultimately asks of us: to show up. To parent not with perfection, but with presence. To grieve together, not in silence. To build homes not only with bricks, but with empathy.
As Farrag puts it: “We live in a time where many of us are collapsing inside, quietly. Catalog opens the door to talk about that collapse—to say it’s okay to feel, to cry, to ask for help. Healing starts there. Not with grand gestures, but with the decision to keep going. Together.”
Directed by Waleed El Halafawy, written by Ayman Wattar and produced by Ahmed El Ganainy, Catalog is streaming globally on Netflix. The cast includes Mohamed Farrag (Yousef), Riham Abdel Ghafour (Amina), Tara Emad (Howaida), Khaled Kamal (Hanafy), Bayoumi Fouad (George), Samah Anwar (Om Hashem), Ahmed Essam Elsayed (Osama), Sedky Sakhr, Donia Sami, Ali El Beialy (Mansour), and Retall Abdulaziz (Karima).
It’s more than a series. It’s an invitation to talk, to feel, and to remember that family is a verb.
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