Amazon and PBS have struck a deal to bring episodes of the new PBS original series Mercy Street to Prime members seven days after they air on PBS stations. Amazon says Prime members have valued having in-season access to shows like Extant and Under the Dome. In-season deals like this which provide access to shows mere days after episodes air for the first time seem to be a new trend for Amazon. They signed a similar deal with CBS which will bring in-season episodes of three new shows, premiering this summer on CBS, to Prime Video just four days after they air. All Amazon customers can stream the first episode of Mercy Street right now, three days before it’s set to premiere on PBS, for free without the need to be a Prime member. Read on for a description of the show.

Executive produced by Ridley Scott (The Martian, The Man in the High Castle), David W. Zucker (The Good Wife, The Man in the High Castle), Lisa Q. Wolfinger (Desperate Crossing, The Untold Story of the Mayflower) and David Zabel (ER), Mercy Street, set on the Civil War home front of Virginia in the spring of 1862, follows the lives of two volunteer nurses on opposite sides of the conflict; Mary Phinney (Mary Elizabeth Winstead of The Returned and The Spectacular Now), a staunch New England abolitionist, and Emma Green (Hannah James of Winding Lane), a naive young Confederate belle. Political persuasions open a window into a world where the unprecedented medical demands create a chaotic atmosphere and challenge doctors, nurses and patients in unimaginable ways, while the pressure of Union occupation threatens to tear apart the Confederate family.