>”Damn. I never did get around to watching The Boys Season 4. It isn’t that I’m not bothered – I love The Boys. But I missed it on the weekly episode rollout. My free time was already going to House Of The Dragon Season 2 (way better than the detractors said) and The Acolyte (RIP, gone too soon); which also meant I didn’t manage to binge The Rings Of Power Season 1 in time for Season 2 starting. I really need to start The Penguin, too, but I’ve already begun Agatha All Along and Only Murders In The Building Season 4, so I’ll just try and keep up with those for now. And I’d heard good word about KAOS – the Greek God drama with Jeff Goldblum as a paranoid, tracksuit-wearing Zeus. Except, that show just hit the Netflix scrapheap a mere six weeks (six weeks!) after it launched. Film and TV is basically my job, and even I can’t keep up.”
One assumption here is that every single person would be naturally interested in watching all of those shows. Out of all of them I am only interested in watching House of the Dragons.
I get that maybe he has too, but this isn’t true for a normal watcher.
>There’s something undeniably broken about the streaming model. The early promise of the streaming era – unlimited, quality series and movies beamed directly to your home, for a negligible monthly fee! – has soured. It’s not just the rising subscription costs, the variable quality of output and the unexpected disappearing acts (where are you, Willow?) that are killing the dream. It’s the pressure, the rush, the whack-a-mole game of trying to watch something before it’s unceremoniously yanked, amid a deluge of never-ending ‘content’. With so many high-profile shows culled after a single season (KAOS, The Acolyte, Lockwood & Co., The Midnight Club, to name but a few) it feels clearer than ever: you need to be an instant mega-smash to avoid the axe. Across multiple platforms, streaming services are expecting audiences to watch everything now to prove their interest. Even for series with critical acclaim, the omnipresent executioner looms.
The Acolyte was considered appalling from the start really.
I do agree though that it is possible streaming services expectations, or at least *Netflixs* expectations are completely unrealistic.
kamloopsycho on
Everyone is drunk or hungover.
ItsOnlyaFewBucks on
WTF. These are streaming services… watch what you want when you want. You did not miss a thing.
IrritablePanda on
The best thing we can do to battle this trend is not watch a season 1 show until there’s a season 2 order. After getting burned by this many times on shows in years past, I made it a rule I rarely break. Of course I did get burned on willow, the acolyte and kaos so I’m back to resolving to make a lot less exceptions to the rule again for a few years
MasqureMan on
How about stop canceling shows until at least a season 2? People literally do not have time to watch everything they’re interested in the span of a month
Shejidan on
This is exactly how I feel. There are a bunch of shows I want to watch but with limited time I can only watch a few if I still want to do other things. On one streaming service alone there are about five other shows I want to watch in addition to the two I’m currently watching. Not to mention other services and what I watch on cable. And I have to fit tv in between other things like gaming.
hotstepper77777 on
I stopped paying for streaming after Falcon and the Winter Solider.
PixelatedDie on
I just don’t watch Netflix. I rather watch streaming services with a low cancellation rate like Apple. This year I only got disappointed with the cancellation of time bandits. I got burned so many times with Netflix I just avoid it.
MisterB78 on
Hot take: while I’m super disappointed that Kaos won’t get a second season, I’m glad I watched season 1.
Honestly streaming shows go so long between seasons that half the time I forget about them anyway
jotunblod92 on
I completely stopped watching Netflix shows. For other TV shows I don’t start before their at least third season. 3 season means at least they will have some conclusion. I suggest you do the same thing.
Dear-Yellow-5479 on
I loved Kaos but this whole business is making me think that it’s best to watch shows that have already completed . Thank goodness Andor’s second season had already started shooting before the viewing numbers came in or it would have suffered the same fate.
Decipher on
In the glory days of network and cable TV, the vast majority of shows aired during the fall to spring stretch and released weekly with a few breaks. Many people watched many shows as they were released. Some even aired in the same time slot, so you had to tape at least one of them. There are not “too many shows now”. There always have been. There are more “prestige” shows now, sure, but that doesn’t change how you’d have to make time on your schedule to watch each episode as they were released back then just as you do now.
The arguments about shows being cancelled quickly, however, I totally agree with.
12 Comments
>”Damn. I never did get around to watching The Boys Season 4. It isn’t that I’m not bothered – I love The Boys. But I missed it on the weekly episode rollout. My free time was already going to House Of The Dragon Season 2 (way better than the detractors said) and The Acolyte (RIP, gone too soon); which also meant I didn’t manage to binge The Rings Of Power Season 1 in time for Season 2 starting. I really need to start The Penguin, too, but I’ve already begun Agatha All Along and Only Murders In The Building Season 4, so I’ll just try and keep up with those for now. And I’d heard good word about KAOS – the Greek God drama with Jeff Goldblum as a paranoid, tracksuit-wearing Zeus. Except, that show just hit the Netflix scrapheap a mere six weeks (six weeks!) after it launched. Film and TV is basically my job, and even I can’t keep up.”
One assumption here is that every single person would be naturally interested in watching all of those shows. Out of all of them I am only interested in watching House of the Dragons.
I get that maybe he has too, but this isn’t true for a normal watcher.
>There’s something undeniably broken about the streaming model. The early promise of the streaming era – unlimited, quality series and movies beamed directly to your home, for a negligible monthly fee! – has soured. It’s not just the rising subscription costs, the variable quality of output and the unexpected disappearing acts (where are you, Willow?) that are killing the dream. It’s the pressure, the rush, the whack-a-mole game of trying to watch something before it’s unceremoniously yanked, amid a deluge of never-ending ‘content’. With so many high-profile shows culled after a single season (KAOS, The Acolyte, Lockwood & Co., The Midnight Club, to name but a few) it feels clearer than ever: you need to be an instant mega-smash to avoid the axe. Across multiple platforms, streaming services are expecting audiences to watch everything now to prove their interest. Even for series with critical acclaim, the omnipresent executioner looms.
The Acolyte was considered appalling from the start really.
I do agree though that it is possible streaming services expectations, or at least *Netflixs* expectations are completely unrealistic.
Everyone is drunk or hungover.
WTF. These are streaming services… watch what you want when you want. You did not miss a thing.
The best thing we can do to battle this trend is not watch a season 1 show until there’s a season 2 order. After getting burned by this many times on shows in years past, I made it a rule I rarely break. Of course I did get burned on willow, the acolyte and kaos so I’m back to resolving to make a lot less exceptions to the rule again for a few years
How about stop canceling shows until at least a season 2? People literally do not have time to watch everything they’re interested in the span of a month
This is exactly how I feel. There are a bunch of shows I want to watch but with limited time I can only watch a few if I still want to do other things. On one streaming service alone there are about five other shows I want to watch in addition to the two I’m currently watching. Not to mention other services and what I watch on cable. And I have to fit tv in between other things like gaming.
I stopped paying for streaming after Falcon and the Winter Solider.
I just don’t watch Netflix. I rather watch streaming services with a low cancellation rate like Apple. This year I only got disappointed with the cancellation of time bandits. I got burned so many times with Netflix I just avoid it.
Hot take: while I’m super disappointed that Kaos won’t get a second season, I’m glad I watched season 1.
Honestly streaming shows go so long between seasons that half the time I forget about them anyway
I completely stopped watching Netflix shows. For other TV shows I don’t start before their at least third season. 3 season means at least they will have some conclusion. I suggest you do the same thing.
I loved Kaos but this whole business is making me think that it’s best to watch shows that have already completed . Thank goodness Andor’s second season had already started shooting before the viewing numbers came in or it would have suffered the same fate.
In the glory days of network and cable TV, the vast majority of shows aired during the fall to spring stretch and released weekly with a few breaks. Many people watched many shows as they were released. Some even aired in the same time slot, so you had to tape at least one of them. There are not “too many shows now”. There always have been. There are more “prestige” shows now, sure, but that doesn’t change how you’d have to make time on your schedule to watch each episode as they were released back then just as you do now.
The arguments about shows being cancelled quickly, however, I totally agree with.