Kaleidoscope is about to change everything you know about storytelling. Spanning 25 years, the compelling anthology series follows a crew of masterful thieves attempting to break into a vault filled with $7 billion in bonds. Viewers will get the chance to fully immerse themselves into the heist by entering the crime at different moments in time. Before the mission begins on the show’s release date Jan. 1, the cast, creator and executive producers sat down with Tudum to answer all our questions on how to watch Kaleidoscope.

Bob (Jai Courtney) and Judy Goodwin (Rosaline Elbay) understand that couples who do crime together, stay together… or do they?

How do you watch Kaleidoscope?

The crime anthology consists of eight episodes named after different colors, but you won’t be watching them in chronological order. Viewers will watch the first seven episodes in a different order, but everyone will arrive at the same finale to witness the heist go down.

“There are five episodes that take place before the heist, two episodes that take place after the heist, and then you get the “White” episode (finale),” creator, showrunner, and executive producer Eric Garcia tells Tudum. “The idea is that when you watch the “White” episode, you’re learning true answers to things that have been hinted about beforehand and afterward. You really find out everybody’s true motivations. It’s almost like a skeleton key.”

How will you experience the episodes?

Like the sneaky bandits in the show, viewers will have to crack open the full story from hidden clues and plot points throughout each episode. Some might start with the “Pink” episode, while others begin with “Yellow.” No matter how your journey kicks off, you’ll have a unique experience that dictates how you view the full story.

“Being able to move around and watch different orders gives you a different viewpoint on the characters,” Garcia explains.

Tati Gabrielle, who plays Hannah Kim, shares, “When you have to think a little bit harder about the story, about how it all connects, that it’s not just handed to you, that was very exciting for me.”

Giancarlo Esposito, who plays heist mastermind Leo Pap, adds, “Here we had all the different colors [of episodes], which resemble a tapestry of Leo Pap’s and the other characters’ lives.”

It’s just an ordinary day for this crew of thieves.

Why is each episode named after a different color?

Each episode is titled after colors you’d see in a kaleidoscope, but there are also other reasons for this creative choice. “If you take each episode as a color, when they combine together, all those colors make white,” executive producer Russell Fine explains. 

Color coding each episode also helped Garcia and the writers intertwine different storylines. “Each of the colored episodes would also then have colors within them, so I wanted to make sure that every episode had at least seven questions in it that were answered by at least one of the other episodes.”

Was the series filmed in chronological order?

Staying true to the story, Kaleidoscope wasn’t shot in chronological order. “There are challenges in playing something that presents itself out of chronology. But for me, I would argue that it wasn’t that much more challenging to take on because you just have further to go and there’s more details in between,” explains Jai Courtney, who portrays the brawny and comedic criminal Bob Goodwin. “There were days definitely in the way that we shot it that I had moments of total confusion into where the fuck we were in the story,” he jokes.

Ava Mercer (Paz Vega) and Leo Pap (Giancarlo Esposito) examine the vault.

How was Kaleidoscope written?

If you’re having trouble finding index cards at the store, Garcia might be responsible for the shortage. He came up with the idea for Kaleidoscope back in 2014, but it would take years to develop the complexity of the story.

“It was a lot of time with a lot of index cards on my kitchen counter,” he shares. After shuffling the cards around as a starting point, he eventually graduated to whiteboards. “We had charts, we had graphs, we had lines between things, so it was a little Beautiful Mind by the time we were done with everything.”

For Fine, working on Kaleidoscope confounded his expectations as a filmmaker. “We had to creatively be explaining things about the characters and the relationships without starting from the beginning in every episode,” he says. “The challenge is making sure that when you watch Kaleidoscope, that all the information is there to be able to connect the dots and know the story.”

Garcia’s strategy was simple. “One of the ways that we approached it was by making sure that we treated every episode like a pilot,” he adds. “Think about all the tricks you know as a writer. You set things up, you pay them off. You can’t do that [here] because the payoff could come before the setup, so it changes the way you think — and I think it’ll change the way people view things.”

Are there any alternate viewing orders?

Some viewers prefer a little structure before diving into a series, and we get it. While you’ll still watch all the same episodes, here are five alternate viewing orders to help guide your experience. Forget about horoscopes — here’s what your viewing order says about you.

1. Classic Detective Story
Just finished Glass Onion and feel like sleuthing some more? Make Kaleidoscope your next mystery. (Unfortunately, Benoit Blanc is unavailable to help with this case.)

“Orange: 3 Weeks Before”
“Green: 7 Years Before”
“Violet: 24 Years Before”
“Red: The Morning After”
“Yellow: 6 Weeks Before”
“Blue: 5 Days Before”
“White: The Heist”
“Pink: 6 Months After”

2. The Rainbow Order
Taste the rainbow — not with candy — but with a kick of revenge and crime. You’ll start with the aftermath of the operation and finish off with the heist itself.

“Red: The Morning After”
“Orange: 3 Weeks Before”
“Yellow: 6 Weeks Before”
“Green: 7 Years Before”
“Blue: 5 Days Before”
“Violet: 24 Years Before”
“Pink: 6 Months After”
“White: The Heist”

3. Orange Is the New Black
Start your journey with an adrenaline-filled prison break. Like Piper in Orange Is the New Black, you’ll begin behind bars before you can enter the actual heist.

“Green: 7 Years Before”
“Violet: 24 Years Before”
“Red: The Morning After”
“Orange: 3 Weeks Before”
“Yellow: 6 Weeks Before”
“Blue: 5 Days Before”
“White: The Heist”
“Pink: 6 Months After”

4. The Usual Suspects
If you don’t care about spoilers, then this order is for you. Starting at the end can make for a thrilling viewing experience. 

“Pink: 6 Months After”
“Violet: 24 Years Before”
“Green: 7 Years Before”
“Yellow: 6 Weeks Before”
“Orange: 3 Weeks Before”
“Blue: 5 Days Before”
“White: The Heist”
“Red: The Morning After”

5. “What I Think Is the Correct Order”
You love a challenge. Embark on your crime spree in whatever order you think is correct.

Thrilling Heist Movies and Shows To Stream NowFrom Lupin to Red Notice, these movies have high stakes and swanky outfits.

Have all the information you need before the mission begins? Stream Kaleidoscope now.