Too Many Shows, Too Little Time
Somebody tell Hulu to give it a rest please...
Stranger Things’ season 4’s final two episodes — released as a summer package one month after the season’s first seven episodes — are about to hit a billion streams since coming out on July 1st. They are bad. The entire season is bad. The show as a whole has been below its’ initial standard of mediocrity for some time. Did I watch it? Of course I did.
In fact, I watched it while I was also trying to find time to watch several other shows of much higher quality. I am one of the billion streams and I don’t like it. But I will not be left out of the discourse, goddamit!
No, instead I took a break from watching the following shows: Hulu’s The Bear, Hulu’s The Old Man, Netflix’s (but really BBC’s) Peaky Blinders, and Amazon Prime’s The Boys. I am in the midst of all of these shows, which all appeal to me in different ways. This is an issue, and I would like to explain why.
Streaming services, and the concept of the subscription based online television model, has exploded in popularity because of the means by which we now consume media. Netflix — the true pioneer of the modern streaming — found incredible initial success by taking shows from other networks, slapping their logo on it and placing them, in their entirety, on their platform. This led to the boom of “binge watching,” and incentivized Netflix to make entire season’s worth of content available instantly when it came time to release their own original content.
But once other services and networks caught word of the shifting tide, they stopped licensing to Netflix and bought up their old properties once again. Which is why we now have huge, hip, and sort-of-affordable new streaming services like… Paramount+ and… Peacock…
So what started as an easy alternative to cable has no fully *ouroboros’ed* itself and become a far more expensive and complicated system with lots of bugs. Want to watch the new episode of Ted Lasso? Oh it’s on… Apple TV. How about the Yellowstone spinoff, 1883? You have to get Paramount+. For $7.00 - $15.00 dollars a month surely there’s more quality content on these platforms than just those shows right? I’ll let you know when I get around to watching the Halo show or The Morning Show, I guess.
** An Ouroboros for reference**
My point is this: even if all these shows were readily available on one platform for one, two, or even god forbid three flat monthly subscription rates, some would still fail to reach their audience. I know this because I watch more television and movies than the average person, and I will probably barely put a dent in the wall of content looming over me by the year’s end.
The average couple coming home after a day’s work to sit on the couch and watch 2 episodes of TV before they go to bed, is not going to pay $17.00 dollars a month for the 12 days out of every year and a half they get to watch a new season of Ted Lasso. And for the sake of argument, let’s say they do — now they’re going to want to get their money’s worth and feel obligated to watch other Apple properties even if options on other networks appeal to them more.
They’ll scroll mindlessly, directed by the frightening algorithm their three streaming services of choice, (probably some combo of Netflix, Hulu, HBO, or Amazon) until they find a new agreeable 12 -episode snore-fest.
This makes me sad and confused. You know this is true, and I know this is true. So why is it that the executives behind these platforms seem determined to drown their shows in the wake of their other shows?
In the last sixth months, Hulu has released the following series: Pistol (biographical show about the Sex Pistols), Only Murders in the Building S. 2, Under the Banner of Heaven, The Dropout, The Old Man, The Girl From Plainville, and Mayans (a Sons of Anarchy spinoff). I have varying interest in all of those shows and those are just Hulu’s releases…
In short, I’m bummed. I’m bummed that we’ve fallen ass-backwards back into cable — but this time more expensive and less convenient. I’m bummed that I feel increasingly cynical about the state of quality television today. But mostly I’m bummed that there are some very, very good TV shows that won’t get watched by enough people. Or won’t even make it past their first season.
I just finished Hulu’s The Bear three days ago. I had to before I did my obligatory wrap up of Stranger Things. It was the best season of television I’ve watched since season 2 of Netflix’s masterpiece, Mindhunter. What happened to that show again? Oh, right… Netflix canceled it after two seasons… because it didn’t get enough viewers to justify its fairly large budget.
In unrelated news the Duffer Brothers were given an average of $30 Million Dollars PER EPISODE for season 4 of Stranger Things. The final episode of which, was 2 hours, and 22 minutes long.
Streaming cannibalism strikes again.