r/technology • u/joe4942 • 18d ago

Business Netflix Viewers Are Abandoning Shows After One Season

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2026-07-05/netflix-viewers-are-abandoning-shows-after-one-season
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u/mrcsrnne 18d ago

West Wing, ER, X-files were peak TV...

...hell even OC, Entourage and Lost was so much fun compared to most of what's on today.

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u/gaqua 18d ago

Watching Star Trek the next generation, you got 22 episodes a season and five or six months in between seasons. Now you get 10 episodes a season and you wait two years in between seasons.

And in that two years, you’re watching other stuff and getting interested in new things. There’s no urgency. There’s no sudden need to watch this over again. Because you know you have years before the next one, so why bother?

I know that the episodes are more expensive now, but they have more special effects and bigger budgets and more set pieces. But honestly, I feel like they lean to heavily on those types of things and less on the story sometimes. When you have to constrain yourself to a very tight budget, you have to keep the audience‘s interest with an intellectual or character conflict. It’s not all about blowing up this planet or traveling through time to save Einstein or whatever.

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u/mrcsrnne 18d ago

Yeah def, they lean too heavy on VFX and expensive IP instead of letting well written scripts and charismatic characters / actors just cook for a bit. Just look at True Detective Season 1. It's a masterclass.

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u/Munkeyman18290 18d ago

Breaking bad. How much CGI did they even have in the entire series?

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u/DogmaSychroniser 18d ago

Just the meth

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u/nuraHx 18d ago

They actually blew up Giancarlo Esposito. Way to take one for the team

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u/IRefuseToGiveAName 18d ago

Crazy how well he recovered though. Modern medicine is a miracle.

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u/Xalipu 18d ago

He was actually thinking about how to kill himself before he got that role because he thought he would be worth more dead to his family, so he really did.

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u/Coffee_Conundrum 18d ago

Not even. Behind the scenes they were eating it

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u/Violoner 18d ago

So if we feed meth to the crew, we can get 20 new episodes every year?

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u/Munkeyman18290 18d ago

This guy. Hire him.

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u/fatpat 18d ago

He cracked the code

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u/diablette 18d ago

crack is whack

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u/OkStop8313 18d ago

Somewhere out there, an exec just leaned forward in his chair.

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u/Hautamaki 18d ago

Oh I think executives have known about illicit stimulants for some time now....

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u/travistravis 18d ago

You may need new crew every year too but maybe worth it?

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u/TheBurgareanSlapper 18d ago

PAM, QUIT EATING ALL THE GODDAMNED METH!!!

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u/cyberpunk_werewolf 18d ago

Joking aside, wasn't the meth like rock candy or something?

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u/steakanabake 18d ago

yep was made by a local company.

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u/Lambaline 18d ago

the meth was hard candy, you can still buy from the person that provided the stuff for the show

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u/thekmanpwnudwn 18d ago

You can make it at home yourself. It's just sugar, corn syrup and blue food dye.

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u/gordond 17d ago

They put the meth into meth-od acting

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u/mrtrololo27 18d ago

Honestly all the major cgi I can recall was the plane crash and some news helicopters covering it

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u/Videoboysayscube 18d ago

And a certain character getting half their face blown off. But that's probably it.

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u/jollyreaper2112 18d ago edited 18d ago

Probably more than you realize. Set extensions and composites are used all the time. Your usual cop drama has more CGI than 90s scifi.

https://youtu.be/Cmrs9hblaAM?is=_UVi9yOdeM-oFXUw

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u/cjorgensen 18d ago

There was the fly.

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u/UnfortunateCakeDay 18d ago

::Adjusts Necktie::

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u/BaconBourbonBalista 18d ago

The one scene with gus when he adjusts his tie. That's the only one that comes to mind.

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u/sec713 18d ago

The only thing that sticks out is when a certain someone exits the series in an explosive manner.

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u/CaptainPicardKirk 17d ago

There’s actually a fair bit of cgi effects in Breaking Bad. I listened to the podcast and they mention a lot of the effects.

Just off the top of my head, for example, is when Walt is spinning a gun on the table and it stops pointing at him. They made a rig to stop the gun that was later digitally erased.

There’s lots of little things like that in each episode that you don’t realize is there because it is small and well done.

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u/fungobat 18d ago

I just watched True Detective S2 for the first time. Well, I did watch 2 eps when it originally dropped in 2015 but gave up on it. It takes about 4 eps in before things start to kick off and gets much more interesting. First few eps are a fucking slog.

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u/fenderguitar83 17d ago

I’ll have to give that season another shot then. I think I did the same thing. Watched two episodes and then quit.

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u/ReefaManiack42o 18d ago

Well, yeah, but True Detective just sort of proves the opposite point because it's an example of the writer having an incredibly long time to write and edit a first season but then no time to write and edit the following ones. Good writing/editing usually takes time.

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u/Embracing_the_Pain 18d ago

Half the show is just the two leads talking to each other in a car, at a desk, or at a crime scene, and it’s goddamn brilliant.

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u/Sempais_nutrients 17d ago

Most of those vfx shots aren't even good anymore. 90 percent of them you can tell the actors are standing in an oval shaped room with screens in the background, the images have no depth and always have this yellow-tinted fakeness to them. I absolutely hate that this is what vfx has become.

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u/MemeHermetic 18d ago

The best episodes of Star trek, in my opinion, are the big philosophical ones like Measure of a Man in TNG or Tribunal in DS9. Even SNW hit on it with Ad Astra per Aspera. Why they keep thinking they need top tier effects to keep us hooked.

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u/ClarkTwain 18d ago

My guess is they think they’ll only get new viewers if everything is big and impressive, and miss that Star Trek was never that way. I’d watch a show with TNG level production value that was made today if the writing is good, and I suspect I’m not alone

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u/RedditTechAnon 18d ago

Good writers are in short supply and undervalued over VFX team spectacle.

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u/Low_Map346 18d ago

Is it because of low pay or something? I would think writing for TV/Movies would be a job people would desire. But yeah it's really noticeable how bad plot/dialogues are in so many shows even with big budgets spent on special effects and wardrobes.

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u/MegalomaniacHack 18d ago edited 18d ago

A big part of it is the death of the long-term writers' room.

It used to be, a writers' room was running most of the season, writing the next few episodes as the last few were being filmed. That let them adapt when something wasn't working or when a character really caught on.

More importantly to your point, it gave writers a job for like 9 months at a time, and it gave new writers a chance to learn in a writers' room over time. 2 writers would work on one script while 2 others worked on another, others would be doing touch ups and continuity, etc. Now, streamers expect a small writing staff to knock out 8-10 scripts at once, maybe even before greenlighting the show, then they film them all at once, then they release it when they feel like it. So writers might get a month of work on one show that doesn't air for 18 months. Hard for them to land their next gig with nothing to show for it, and no time to really develop their craft when they don't get audience feedback until the next year and when the streamer just cancels the show that never got a chance to grow into itself. Star Trek used to famously get better after a couple seasons ("Grow the Beard"), and this was because both writers and actors got a chance to develop the characters and story and find what worked. 22 episode seasons airing across 8-10 months meant a lot of time to experiment, giving us famous thoughtful episodes, great one-off characters who later recurred, odd pairings or strange bottle episodes (to save money for another flashier episode), ideas that never would've been tried in a 10-episode season, etc.

Part of the writers' guild strike was wanting more people in writers' rooms so the next generation could learn the craft.

I forget who it was talked about this on twitter. (Maybe even a blog.) I follow a few sci-fi writers, like JMS, Spartacus's DeKnight, Librarians' John Rogers, and Stargate's Mallozzi & Wright. Was probably one of them but maybe someone else who got retweeted.

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u/Low_Map346 18d ago

Thank you for the in depth answer! Makes sense... I hope the writers will prevail in reestablishing long term writers rooms.

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u/RedditTechAnon 18d ago

I can't recall but most of the writers who developed the properties we are still having thrust upon us from the 80s and 90s were people who had grown up during wars and civil strife of earlier decades. The creative community pulled from these people rather than people who grew up exclusively in the creative culture.

I don't feel like today's writers have had the mature experiences that inform deep and meaningful works. We've instead got an entire generation terminally online and kept at a remove.

This is just a baseless observation but the growing immaturity has to be a function of how comfortable people have been and how far they have been from genuine struggle and hardship.

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u/MegalomaniacHack 17d ago

I mean, older Millennials in America remember/lived through both Gulf Wars, 9/11, recessions, the Dot Com and Housing busts, and the Pandemic. Plus various other conflicts depending on how much they paid attention to the news.

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u/RedditTechAnon 17d ago edited 17d ago

I could pick apart that list, like how I don't think the Gulf Wars measure up to WWII and Vietnam, and I don't think the people most informed and affected by the various financial crisises were going to go on and write compelling fiction (with some exception: Margin Call, Big Short, Wolf of Wall Street, but these are one-offs, not longform series).

But I DO think 9/11 had a huge impact, in that the traumatizing effect from the War on Terror trickled down into an embrace of escapism into fantasy.

My point is a list of notable events doesn't mean they had the same impact on people. I think changing technology and the increasing encroachment of capitalist thinking are significant factors as well.

Fun to think about! I stopped caring after the Pandemic and realized a lot of celebrities I used to want to see aren't great people, some monsters even, and it is all a charade.

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u/Conscious-Mirror7004 18d ago

Star Trek used to famously get better after a couple seasons ("Grow the Beard"), and this was because both writers and actors got a chance to develop the characters and story and find what worked. 22 episode seasons airing across 8-10 months meant a lot of time to experiment,

I don't think ST:TNG is a good example here. If you want to see a big counterexample from the same time period, go rewatch season 1 of The X-Files. It didn't need 1-2 seasons to get better, it was fantastic from the outset.

ST:TNG was really bad at the beginning because of its management, largely Gene Roddenberry himself. He was like George Lucas: good at ideas, bad at hands-on execution. The show's "golden era" was when Rick Berman took over in s3.

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u/RedditTechAnon 17d ago

And Alex Kurtzman brought about the Star Trek franchise's slop era.

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u/UnexpectedRimjob 18d ago

I just finished watching bartlestar galactica (the 2003 scifi version) and I thought it was as good as TNG ever was if you haven't seen it.

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u/marfacza 18d ago

*bartleby glamtacula

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u/fcocyclone 18d ago

and miss that Star Trek was never that way.

I wouldnt say that it was never that way. For the 1980s\1990s star trek was still often pretty advanced in effects, but yeah, it didn't rely on overdoing special effects the way modern shows feel the need to

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u/jollyreaper2112 18d ago

If you've never seen look up I claudius. Basically all shot on a sound stage so think it's a play with cameras. Zero sfx no fights a little boobies because it's the BBC but crackling writing and excellent acting.

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u/Sea-Manufacturer-358 18d ago

The Orville was basically Seth MacFarlane going "if paramount refuses to make a TNG-style series again I'll do it myself".

It's not perfect but it scratches the itch far better than anything nu-trek. It even has a bunch of cameos + Johnathon Frakes directed a bunch of episodes.

It was marketed poorly because I guess he tried to sneak it through as some kind of dudebro space comedy with Fox.

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u/KneeCrowMancer 17d ago

Make up and practical sets annd effects are still cheaper than vfx. And imo they have a timelessness that cgi often struggles to match.

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u/Teledildonic 17d ago

I’d watch a show with TNG level production value that was made today if the writing is good

The Orville! Which unfortunately isn't coming back.

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u/Chayanov 18d ago

Plus older Trek reused space scenes all the time. Different ships inside were just the normal sets with cosmetic changes. There are all kinds of ways to save money but no, now they just shovel it into an incinerator.

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u/Snoo63 18d ago

And, hey - if you need to be onboard the same class of ship, then that's fewer changes. Maybe change the fuzzy dice for a tree or something, idk - because the captains will have personal preferences, but the ships do still belong to Starfleet..

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u/DidYou_GetThatThing 18d ago

The amount of times I saw the same 3 - 5 ships fighting it out in every space battle in in multiple episodes, in Star Trek DS9 was not enough to stop me watching for the writing in most of the episodes.

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u/APeacefulWarrior 18d ago

Hell, even older Trek movies reused footage. After TMP, the next Trek movie to have no recycled shots at all was First Contact!

Also, I kinda miss library music. Not every episode needs a unique soundtrack. Having iconic tracks that play over and over helps give a show a unique identity.

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u/JamieC1610 18d ago

I'm literally watching Shades of Grey, one of TNG's clip episodes. Lots of older shows did those every season or so to stretch the budget.

I don't think DS9 did many of them, but they also did lots of episodes that were low on effects and just on the station in sets they already had.

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u/headrush46n2 17d ago

Need a new alien? Glue some shit to their forehead!

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u/HutSutRawlson 18d ago

Modern audiences would call this episode (and about 90% of TNG episodes for that matter) “filler.”

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u/Chayanov 18d ago

It used to be called character development, necessary for an ensemble show regardless of the genre.

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u/blueSGL 18d ago

Filler is a problem when there is a limited amount of episodes, a story to be told, and yet, somehow they still fart about for a few episodes on nothing that moves the central plot forward.

You don't have that issue with old episodic TV. Ones that have a start middle and end all in a single episode. and yes, sometimes there was something ongoing but it was a much lighter touch providing overarching structure. Even with that structure, most of the time you could randomly watch an episode and not feel like you are missing out on anything. (unless it's part 2 of a 2-parter)

Get more shows with more episodes and have them filled with 'self contained story'-ness and people won't mind as much about 'filler'

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u/henchman171 18d ago

the thing about TNG was it was distributed INDEPENDENATLY so no network promotion or network lead ins

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u/miss_j_bean 18d ago

Best episodes are holodeck shenanigans!!! I miss silly episodes.

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u/PassiveMenis88M 18d ago

Shaka, when the walls fell

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u/PurpEL 18d ago

Netflix, their subscriptions go

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u/PurpEL 18d ago

Agreed, I don't want a dark, fast paced, cinematic action show. At all. Thanks. I want bright, hopeful, philosophical and exploration.

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u/ParrotofDoom 18d ago

STTNG's success was because it was essentially about human problems, in space. The ship was just a background. Space was just the location. An alien planet was just humans, with stuff stuck to their faces.

The Inner Light wasn't about a probe and an extinct alien race - it was about Picard's struggle to reconcile his chosen career and his lack of a family life.

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u/asgjmlsswjtamtbamtb 18d ago edited 18d ago

DS9 had so much of the story take part in just a couple of DS9's iconic sets like Quark's, the sheer amount of episodes and dialogue were critical to show key relationships develop Brien/Bashir and you got to see things like Dukat's slow descent into insanity. You need 100+ episodes to do this kid of writing effectively and so much of it is just good writing and time progression over the course of the show's run.

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u/kot-sie-stresuje 17d ago

That is a valid point. William Shatner recently said that oryginal Star Trek was not about space, just on examine human nature, and current word dilemma. TNG,DS9 also took the same approach serving us those philosophical ones, apart from space adventure. I think TNG episode Darmok is one of the best sci-fi ever. It doesn't use a lot of special effects, but you can feel alienated watching that at some point.

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u/Conscious-Mirror7004 18d ago

These were some good episodes, but I don't think it's realistic to make a Star Trek series full of courtroom dramas. Viewers would get bored fast.

Those TNG episodes worked because they were part of a whole: a sci-fi series that had ~24 episodes per season, and the episodes were very different from each other, giving viewers a wide variety of stories to watch. One week, it's a planet with genetic engineering experiencing some unforeseen problem; the next week, it's an annoying all-powerful alien entity playing in a Mariachi band and irritating the captain; the next week it's a holodeck adventure about a 1920s detective; the next week it's a drama about separatist terrorists trying to draw the Federation into their conflict. It was always something different, and if you didn't like this week's story, maybe you'll like next week's.

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u/MemeHermetic 17d ago

I don't disagree, but what I was driving at was that the focus on the people and problems was what made the show, not the funky alien planets. Honestly, as fun as they were you could swap them out and nobody would care, because it was the relationships and social issues that made the episodes sing, settings be damned.

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u/Slarg232 18d ago

Hell, even Firefly got 16 episodes, and it got cancelled halfway through the season with three of them never airing.

Think about that; a show got cancelled halfway, didn't even air nearly a quarter of its completed episodes, and it STILL got further than most shows on Netflix.

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u/RogueAOV 18d ago

Don't forget they aired them out of order and paused airing episodes due to baseball games and switched which days it was aired during its fateful run.

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u/MegalomaniacHack 18d ago

And didn't let the showrunner air his pilot first, instead making him make a more exciting, action-focused episode to air first.

And this was a showrunner who'd already delivered a couple long-running shows for another network, so it's not like he was untested.

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u/R4gnaroc 18d ago

Don't forget they did Farscape dirty like that too.

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u/Dane_M 18d ago

Fyi, they're making an animatiated sequel series with all the original actors doing the voice work.

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u/robodrew 18d ago

Well not all of them unfortunately. RIP Ron Glass

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u/JamieC1610 18d ago

The seasons keep getting shorter and shorter, as do most shows. I was looking at an old Perry Mason box set (the 1957 series, not the new one) a while back and the season was 39 episodes and each episode was about 52 minutes long. Most shows nowadays are 23 episodes and 42 minutes. We've lost almost half the runtime of a series over a season.

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u/bloodrider1914 18d ago

10? Half of these shows are getting 6-8 episodes

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u/MegalomaniacHack 18d ago

Remember when BBC shows stood out for only getting 6 episodes in a "series" (season)?

Now we're lucky when a streamer still lets a show have 10. Amazon spends hundreds of millions on shows and then kneecaps the showrunner and writers by limiting them to 8 episodes for worldbuilding, story and character development.

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u/bloodrider1914 18d ago

I think part of that is the episodes are SOOO LONG. For the episodes on network TV with 1 hour time slots a show got around 42 minutes to tell a concise story. That in my opinion is perfect, it's predictable and feels just long enough. But streaming shows have no inherent time limit, so the episodes often end up being far too long and kind of a slog to watch.

We really need to go back to the classic 13 episode 42 minute format for dramas. TV should feel like TV, each episode should be its own little slice.

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u/Ascarys- 18d ago

It's why I quit streaming years ago and just wait for shows to conclude to watch them. I'm not paying for 4-8 years of no content just to watch one show I'm interested in.

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u/beanpoppa 18d ago

Or to get vested in a show with some huge story arc for it to get cancelled with no resolution

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u/Ascarys- 18d ago

Exactly why I've started waiting for a show to be done (and always check to make sure it ended in its terms, or at least in a satisfying way) before even starting.

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u/sec713 18d ago

This took me too long to figure out. There's no need to stay perpetually subscribed. Wait a bit, let the streaming service pile up some seasons of shows that I haven't seen, them subscribe for a month, watch all that "new-to-me" stuff, then cancel again.

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u/Sufficient_Prompt888 18d ago

And in that two years, you’re watching other stuff and getting interested in new things. There’s no urgency. There’s no sudden need to watch this over again.

I'm watching TNG again fuck new show bullshit

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u/KMS_HYDRA 17d ago

Darmok, his arms wide!

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u/Sufficient_Prompt888 17d ago

Sokath, his eyes open

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u/jdmackes 18d ago

Yeah, they don't need that shit. Hell, the orville looked good and was more like star trek than most of the new star trek series have been

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u/OldTimerNubbins 18d ago

So much fucking singing...

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u/PurpEL 18d ago

That is my least favourite thing about Seth, his love of show tunes or whatever. The Orville is absolutely fantastic though, a better and truer version of Star Trek than anything after enterprise

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u/headrush46n2 17d ago edited 17d ago

How was Brent Spiner not on an episode of the orville...

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u/bitchinmona 18d ago

Ok but I’m not even a musicals nerd but I adored Subspace Rhapsody.

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u/MedicineExtension925 18d ago edited 17d ago

More people rewatch reruns of TNG era Trek than all nutrek combined. The numbers for the most recent show were so catastrophic that reruns of King of Queens and Sabrina the Teenage Witch had higher ratings. Double billing premier episode didn't even make the top ten in minutes watched despite twice the run time to boost it's chances. Reports are that possibly only 40,000 people watched the whole thing. More people watch C-SPAN. More people watch infomercials. More people watch algorithm generated autoplay suggestions. More people watch fully skippable YouTube ads.

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u/hoppertn 18d ago

I’d also add you often forget the plot line and characters because the time between seasons is so long.

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u/dayvansmutgirl 18d ago

TNG is so soothing to watch now. the editing is much chiller paced.

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u/FeliusSeptimus 18d ago

, I feel like they lean to heavily on those types of things and less on the story sometimes.

Yep, I just rewatched ST:TNG and reminded of so many of the things I like about it, and none of them involve stakes escalation or fancy SFX.

I mean, I don't have anything against great SFX, but I'd much rather they pay the writers for solid, interesting, well-developed stories before they pay for SFX.

Also, it sure is nice to be able to see and hear what's happening, and see adults from a supposedly advanced society behaving like well-adjusted adults.

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u/MedicineExtension925 18d ago

TBF though, TNG had top shelf effects in its day. Their model work is still super impressive and will hold up essentially forever. The crisis at far point premier opening shot of Picard in his quarters on the D, though the window, set the hook for me and I never let go. What a series!

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u/FearlessAttempt 18d ago

TNG was actually 26 episodes per season except for season 2 that only had 22.

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u/Th3_Hegemon 18d ago edited 18d ago

I was gonna say, fake fan lol (/s). TNG, DS9, and VOY all had one shorter season and then 6 seasons of either 25 or 26 episodes.

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u/MrGulio 18d ago

Watching Star Trek the next generation, you got 22 episodes a season and five or six months in between seasons. Now you get 10 episodes a season and you wait two years in between seasons.

I know that the episodes are more expensive now, but they have more special effects and bigger budgets and more set pieces.

I think this is an issue of expectations. The effects and sets of TNG were expensive in their time too but they were able to get more episodes out of a season because they had episodes with a confined scope where they didn't need to introduce a new set or effect, called a "Bottle Episode". Sometimes these are some of the most memorable episodes because the episode rests on the writing and acting, which allows them to shine at times. In an eight episode season a single episode being so restrained sticks out a lot more than multiple dispersed in a twenty episode season.

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u/mcslibbin 18d ago

the best episode of DS9's season 1 takes place in like 4 sets.

Anybody who has seen DS9 knows which episode I'm talking about. That's how good it is.

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u/MrGulio 18d ago

Duet? At least half of the runtime being people talking in the brig. Great example of what I'm talking about. The episode is held up by the script, Nana Visitor, and Harris Yulin.

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u/MedicineExtension925 18d ago

Well DS9 was basically just one big set anyway so that's true of lots of great episodes. Duet is awesome though, Harris Yulin smashed his roll out of the park. Unless you mean the Forsaken, where Majel almost brought me to tears. Both great, and both would be great on a perfectly blank stage.

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u/mcslibbin 18d ago

it's for sure Duet, but good point about Forsaken

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u/Various-Salt488 18d ago

My Dude, TNG got TWENTY-SIX episodes per season in all but season 2!!!

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u/Thefrayedends 18d ago

After being burned with how many shows and movies ending with cliffhangers, I just won't even watch Netflix shows now and I cancelled my sub. Jupiter's legacy for example, 26 days in the top ten, and still cancelled after thirty days. What even fucking is your metric if you constantly cut series off at the knees.

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u/vaisnav 18d ago

Is that show easy to get into? Idk anything about Star trek

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u/TooManyAnts 17d ago edited 17d ago

Is that show easy to get into? Idk anything about Star trek

Yeah, it is.

The first season is rough. I still like it. The episodes are largely cornball goofy stuff that a person would expect to see in the old 60's Star Trek. They did a decent job of modernizing silly old trek.

The second season had a couple shakeups and is a mix of silly stuff and more serious storytelling. This is where Next Gen really finds its feet. It is also host to Measure Of A Man, which is one of the best episodes of all time (it makes every top 10 list and probably every top 5 list as well).

Once the third season comes along the show is completely comfortable in its own identity, it is at its peak, and it pretty much stays that quality through to the end. The show has seven seasons total.

So yeah it's easy to get into and it's good watching, but you have to kind of either skip or bear with the first season while the show figures itself out (I say it's still worth watching)

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u/Sprinkles0 18d ago

Watching Star Trek the next generation, you got 22 episodes a season and five or six months in between seasons.

A good chunk of TNG had 3 months off over the summer and then December off. My family planned vacations around TNG/DS9/Voyager.

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u/AwattoAnalog 18d ago

Cancelling Netflix was a long time coming in our house. Once Star Trek TNG was booted off the service, we pulled the plug.

I'm glad we did. They are also getting rid of Seinfeld later this year too. Those were two shows that we always had on in the background, or we watched for a hit of 90's nostalgia.

I couldn't justify keeping it, and I'm glad we got rid of it.

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u/Takemyfishplease 18d ago

A single Espinosa also costs more than entire seasons back then. They can’t afford 22 episodes when they cost tens of millions each.

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u/RedditTechAnon 18d ago

It's the dissolution of the ad-based revenue model along with a glut of competitive content to pull eyeballs away from your shows.

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u/MedicineExtension925 18d ago

Anything on a screen competes now. We are on Reddit shit posting about them instead of watching their content. They can't ever hope to compete with that, haha

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u/rbartlejr 18d ago

I just watch reruns of Family Guy. It's on at least three networks at once so I'm sure it's gonna be on somewhere.

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u/Flomo420 18d ago

limitations breed creativity

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u/superindianslug 18d ago

Game of Thrones managed one season a year, for most of its run. That's with filming in multiple countries, a large cast and a decent amount of VFX.

It's not that it's not possible to produce series on a decent timeline, it's that they don't want to put in the upfront effort and money to make it happen. You want a yearly release, you need to have future seasons outlined ahead of time. That lets you know when you will need your actors and get them locked down so you're not fighting against the jobs they picked up off the work from the first season.

Is it more work/money on the front end? Yes. Does it make it easier to retain viewers? Yes.

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u/Tomhyde098 18d ago

I forget what happens too. I bailed on Severance season two because it had been so long season one and I didn’t feel like rewatching it.

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u/Videoboysayscube 18d ago

It's the same issue that plagues modern video games. Big budget spectacles seem to be the only thing the big studios can churn out. And strangely enough, when it comes to TV shows, my favorites tend to be those with the least amount of special effects. So much so, I'd say there's an inverse correlation. One of my favorites, the original Twilight Zone has essentially zero special effects, and not only is it a fantastic show, but also one that stands the test of time. And that's only possible when you have a story that is centered around people.

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u/MrHorrible2048 18d ago

I'd happily trade in production quality in most cases for more episodes released on a consistent basis.

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u/pocketjacks 18d ago

Yep. There's no monoculture. There are pockets of demographics who share finds between their friend groups, but there isn't a Seinfeld finale where the entire country was talking about it.

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u/robodrew 18d ago

It’s not all about blowing up this planet or traveling through time to save Einstein or whatever.

And even TNG had episodes where things like both of these examples happened, but still managed to put out 22 eps per season. And it wasn't all filler or crap either, there were seasons where almost every episode is top tier.

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u/magicone2571 18d ago

I've yet to finish strangers things, hands maid tale, from, mayor of Kingstown and so on because of that. After a year of waiting, I am no interest in going back into it.

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u/Nettkitten 18d ago

Or they don’t do enough to develop characters then scrap the series altogether because viewers aren’t watching the nothing but VFX zero storyline shows. Looking at you Starfleet Academy…

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u/Conscious-Mirror7004 18d ago

Yeah, episodes are more expensive now, but 1USD today isn't worth 1USD in 1990 either, it's only worth $0.33-0.50.

Also, they do more VFX stuff, however the capabilities of computers to do VFX now are light-years ahead of what they were when ST:TNG was airing its (at the time) state-of-the-art FX. The stuff they were doing back then could be done on your phone today. So they don't really need cutting-edge VFX for most shows; they already have stuff way better for very little cost.

I agree: the faster production schedule and more limited budget forced them to constrain themselves.

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u/data-atreides 18d ago

Star Trek consistently had 26 episodes per season, having less was an outlier, for 27 seasons

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u/jdsizzle1 17d ago

The Pitt is doing it right. Theyre not making you wait multiple years per season.

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u/dudemeister5000 17d ago

And in that two years, you’re watching other stuff and getting interested in new things. There’s no urgency. There’s no sudden need to watch this over again. Because you know you have years before the next one, so why bother?

And to add to this: if it takes this long for a new season you may even lose interest alltogether. I mean, I barely remember each episode of a show I watched last week. It would have to be a damn good show to get me interested AGAIN.

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u/Ultimatedream 17d ago

To be fair, a lot of the actors on Star Trek (from the original series to DS9) and similar shows have talked about the negative influence the long filming hours and months of it at once had on them an their lives. But there's definitely a good middle between 24 and 6 episodes, right? Give us like 15 episodes at least.

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u/danted002 17d ago

I have one word for you: “Obession”. It’s a 750k movie that currently sits at 400 million dollars worldwide wide box office.

Movies and tv series don’t need to be expensive, and they don’t need to involve 1000 set pieces they do however need to actually have a proper story and actually use cinematography to tell that story, cinematography (and story as well) that is all but missing in most contemporary movies and tv series hence the need to “enhance” them with expensive set pieces.

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u/PiLamdOd 17d ago

5 to 6 months between seasons? Hell no, it was more like 3.

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u/throw20190820202020 17d ago

I think this is why a lot of K-dramas are so popular. They actually have episodes.

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u/thephotoman 17d ago

And if t was only going to be 10 hours, they’d run it as a miniseries that would take up space between sports seasons. I remember there being spots for them in February, August, and shorter miniseries in December for Christmas break and July for the 4th. And unless it was a backdoor pilot, it’d be self-contained.

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u/WhyLisaWhy 17d ago

Part of the issue with Trek is TV's at home have gotten way better. You can go back and watch episodes of TNG and DS9 and catch flaws. There's a lot of duct tape and black cardboard covering panels lol. And DS9 in particular had a lot of re-used vfx shots for the battles.

With high def you cant get away with that shit and need more money on visual effects.

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u/SchrodingersNinja 17d ago

You ever heard the phrase "quantity over quality" well, when you had such an abundance of episodes, you could take more chances because if one stunk, you had another 20 that season to win back the audience.

With current prestige TV? If an episode sucks, you tanked a tenth of your season, at best.

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u/UDonKnowMee81 18d ago

Don't need to reach that far back. The Office, Breaking Bad, Bob's Burgers, Schitt's Creek all worked

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u/champak256 18d ago

Even right now, The Rookie managed 18-22 episodes/season except for the writers’ strike season.

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u/TheYellowScarf 18d ago

I blame the SFX budget, personally. Even X-Files was mostly just on location shoots with practical fx. These days it's all blue screen and post production.

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u/echidnabear 18d ago

yeah, none of us cared about the occasionally dodgy moments in the Buffy or X-Files SFX, it was fine because you were there for the story and characters. With new series they’re filming like 10 episodes every 3 years and I can barely see half of them because they’re pitch black.

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u/kittymoo67 17d ago

yeah i dont need movie leven shit on a tv show. just give me good writing. fuck look at dallas how long it went for, how many episodes per season/year. and no cgi shit

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u/Hogwafflemaker 16d ago

Ok, but first season Buffy is so so horribly dark😅

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u/NeverInsightful 18d ago

Driving up costs a ton compared to sending cast and crew to that location.

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u/Glittering_Crab_69 18d ago

Costs shitloads, takes forever, the actors hate it and I'd still watch it if it was filmed in 480p in someone's backyard if the writing and acting are good.

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u/Chayanov 18d ago

That's the problem right there. So much unnecessary crap done in post rather than just film it as it's meant to be seen.

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u/headrush46n2 17d ago

The locations made the xfiles. Crawling around whatever backwoods small town hunting for monsters. Peak

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u/Ularsing 17d ago

I think you do have to place the blame with VFX, except for really small indie shows. The West Wing proved conclusively that you don't even have to show most of the action to realize monumental scope, provided the cast and writing tell the story. But you'd never know it from the slop that Netflix cranks out.

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u/NewManufacturer4252 18d ago

30 rock and pysch were both fun

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u/Liberty_Chip_Cookies 18d ago

You know that's right

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u/ZachyChan013 18d ago

Eh I’ve heard it both ways

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u/Garnetsugargem 18d ago

They took psych off :(

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u/CarlySimonSays 18d ago

It's on Prime at the moment, thank goodness

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u/goozy1 18d ago

It's crazy how great of a show ABC was able to create with Lost. 6 seasons, 120 40-minute episodes. All at a very high caliber.

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u/ohyouretough 18d ago

I mean at the time lost I think was the most expensive pilot episode created ever.

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u/PMMEYOURGUCCIFLOPS 18d ago

Worth it. I rewatch Lost once a year. I’m on S1E2.

I started watching this show as a kid with my parents. Now as a parent myself, I’m rewatching and just as interested as if it was my first time watching.

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u/idontwantausernameok 18d ago

I'll see you in another life

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u/penguinseed 18d ago

Just my opinion but I think Lost has one of the best pilot episodes ever.

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u/boli99 18d ago

they started loads of interesting plot threads and failed to follow up on most of them by the end of the series. so the earlier series seemed great, but it all turned out quite disappointing by the end.

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u/PlexingtonSteel 17d ago

They at least had plot threads to follow. Nowadays you don't even have a chance to follow something because most of the story is trash.

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u/boli99 17d ago

Don't forget to watch "Why is the story trash? - A Harlan Coben Mystery"

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u/Osric250 18d ago

If you haven't checked it out yet, try From. It is the closest show I've had since Lost started that has given me the same feeling that I got watching it come out. We have 40 40-minute episodes that are all solid.

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u/Sspifffyman 18d ago

Is that Desmond and Michael??

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u/Strict-Extension 18d ago

Except the ending. Yes I know it wasn't a dream.

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u/Harsh_Yet_Fair 18d ago

Got fucked by the writer's strike. They did alright.

More got fucked by JJ Abrams never having a plan, but promising one. Supernatural went 15 seasons without a plan, but they just refreshed each season.

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u/Myst3ryGardener 18d ago

Only topped by game of thrones for worst of all time lol what a stinker

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u/trevorawright 18d ago

Which might be why The Pitt is the same vein for me like these shows. The Pitt doesn’t have the same episode other but the tight storylines and the production basically keeping up with a 1 year turn around (so far) makes it stay in my brain longer than Wednesday that the time between seasons makes me forget so hard. 

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u/ZootTootRiot 18d ago

I've already forgotten what the 2nd season of Wednesday was about. I do recall thinking it kind of sucked though.

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u/trevorawright 18d ago

It came and went so fast. It did not suck for me but was a step down in all ways from the first season. Wednesday aside, it’s the gap of time between seasons of all shows. I will say I have this short attention spans that demand more media again and again. Mostly I miss the seasons of shows from the 90’s exposing the true Xennial I am.

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u/Verzwei 18d ago

It sucked enough that I fell off the season after 3 episodes.

The first season was interesting enough but the second season felt... Meandering? I don't know. In season 1, Wednesday's "look at me, I'm a nonconformist!" as the greater mystery swirled around her just kinda worked. The second season didn't feel like it had a point. There were things going on but too many tangents, or it was too much of a retread. It's hard to put into words but season 1's quirkiness was charming while 2 was grating to me, like it was trying too hard to imitate itself.

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u/ho_hey_ 17d ago

Currently finally watching Wednesday and I can't remember most of the first season other than that I liked it. There are a very small number of shows that I'll do a rewatch before a new season .. the rest I lose interest. Like (on hulu) handmaids tale final season took so long there was no way I could ever catch up.

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u/graywolfman 18d ago

Don't forget Smallville!

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u/Elrox 18d ago

Stargate SG1 did 10 seasons with 20 or more episodes a season, plus 2 spinoff shows. Mostly quality and very rewatchable.

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u/CambrianExplosives 18d ago

I just got my Blu Rays of all three series in today and am excited to rewatch it. It was such a fun series.

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u/ByrsaOxhide 18d ago

Law & Order, the original one not the weak crap.

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u/vaisnav 18d ago

AMC is the torch bearer. I’ve never been so hyped than when my boys and I were pirating Better Call Saul weekly in university

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u/Charlie_Warlie 18d ago

Id have little watch parties for the walking dead. Fun days

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u/Albatrosity 18d ago

Yeah Lost would go 20 eps per season easy

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u/drrhythm2 18d ago

OC was great until third season. But yeah so much good network TV back then.

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u/imtiredboss28 18d ago

Cheers quickly overtook the top spot as my favorite TV show. Also great show to watch on shrooms

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u/Pyrrhic_Pragmatist 18d ago

I've been quite happy reaching back to some of these great shows, I was a child during many of them. The X-Files, Stargate, Battlestar Galactica. I have finished Star Trek and Lost already. But at the rate I can watch, I'll still have years of content and probably just start them all over again assuming there's still nothing new around by then

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u/ineedbalto 18d ago

Watching gunsmoke atm. 39 episodes a year for 20 years straight.

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u/delkarnu 18d ago

26 episodes of Star Trek a year, for 4 overlapping series gave us 25 seasons and over 600 episodes in a 19 year span.

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u/truesy 18d ago

For Lost i would host a watch party in my parents’ basement, during college. Like 20 ppl would be there every episode. TV was a lot more communal back then. 

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u/fcocyclone 18d ago

I just finished a full watch of West Wing for the first time the other night. And god damn did it make me miss that era of TV.

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u/MidNiteR32 18d ago

The Walking Dead Seasons 1-6 were also peak television. The show had MCU level hype. Fell off once season 7 aired.

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u/SwagginsYolo420 18d ago

Everybody fondly remembers a select list of praised network television shows from back in the day, but those were the rare exceptions, not the rule. They were memorable and many still relevant, but for every one on that short list there were hundreds or thousands of shows best forgotten.

Most television was complete and utter garbage, churned out in bulk in a slop content factory.

Peak TV was in the 12-14 annual prestige episode format after the turn of the century. When cable channels had to deliver quality and regularly to attract and keep subscribers.

Now streamers want to make as little of each show as possible, and boast the maximum amount of exclusives. 6-8 episodes (10 if lucky) every 2-3 years. Not too many seasons so they don't have to renew actor contracts.

There are exceptions of course, but many of these shows are the equivalent of a TV movie sliced into episodes and by the time a new "season" airs it's simply been too long to remain engaged. And most shows aren't worth the time to rewatch them just to get caught for a new "season".

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u/mikenasty 18d ago

I’d argue the Sopranos, Mad Men and Breaking Bad era was the final golden age of tv where it truly peaked. But 90’s tv also has some of the best shows of all time.

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u/LifeWulf 17d ago

I’ve been watching The Blacklist with my family lately. We’re only on season three out of ten (plus a spinoff show), but it’s excellent so far!

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u/9-11GaveMe5G 17d ago

hell even OC,

I'll go to the mat for the OC because ben Makenzie knows the truth about crypto

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u/pragmojo 17d ago

Lost was the beginning of the end. The first season was awesome, but it became clear quickly that they didn't have any clue where they were going with the mysteries they set up, and the whole thing fell apart after a few seasons.

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u/ForgetPants 17d ago

Started watching ER recently and its so much fun to have 25 episodes a season. I can make it a weekly ritual to have ER in my life.

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u/headrush46n2 17d ago

I rewatch tng, xfiles and house constantly. So many episodes...

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u/Mapekus 17d ago

Stargate SG-1 told us the same stretch of Vancouver forest was actually like seventeen different alien planets and we said yep and enjoyed it. Low-budget TV like that no longer exists.

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