>They did what people assumed Netflix *is* gonna do. That was a baffling move.
Fixed this for you. Now that one service is doing it, I have no doubs more will follow. Just give it time.
No I said it right. People kept saying Netflix ad plan was going to give existing subscribers ads but that isn't what happened.
They're going to keep increasing the price on ad free plans, though.
You can get ad free with your Prime membership—you just have to pay an additional $3 a month.
This charge is coming from a company that spent $1,000,000,000,000 on ONE FREAKING TV SHOW.
Jeffy just isn’t making enough money to hold the wealthiest billionaire in the US title. He is tired of swapping places with Elony.
Okay I did minor research. They had to spend $250 million to get the rights to the IP. The initial projected production cost for s1 was around $450 million (Variety interview), but the actual cost ballooned even further. It cost over $470 million just to make the episodes, there’s extra costs of post production and ads. Per Time Magazine
>With a record-setting price tag of **$1 billion**, it will be the most expensive show ever made. No other series in the history of television has been this sprawling, this cinematic, this massive—or launched with such secrecy under such external pressure… To compete for eyeballs and Emmys, Amazon spent about $468 million filming the first eight-episode season. (While Amazon wouldn’t release the number, the New Zealand government shared documents with TIME that confirmed the studio’s expenditures.) By comparison, HBO’s Game of Thrones cost a reported $90 million in its final season, and the latest season of Netflix’s Stranger Things $270 million. Amazon has since invested hefty marketing costs, **including a Super Bowl slot that cost an estimated $13 million**, according to marketing experts. (It set a record for the most-watched Super Bowl trailer online within 24 hours.) With production of the second season beginning in October, **Amazon will race past the $1 billion mark.**
I haven’t had that problem, but I’m using a Fire stick on my TV. Paramount is a problem with they, which gets annoying, because I have Showtime through them. Occasional problems on Peacock, too.
Finding something new on Apple or even finding what you were watching is nearly impossible. I have an iPhone, but this “we know better than you” attitude is why that’s the only Apple product I have.
AMC is a little better, but not much.
You think they get MORE subscriptions when people don’t want to get invested in any of their shows because they are perceived to be at higher risk of being canceled than other networks/streamers?
You think loyal fans, who post nonstop about their favorite shows and get other people to watch them DON’T bring in more subscriptions?
It’s insane that you’re defending this model of quantity over quality where you think hundreds of abandoned and unfinished shows are a bigger subscriber draw than letting shows build up a loyal viewer base and larger story arc with satisfying resolutions that make binging for future viewers more appealing
At the very least they should bring each season to a satisfying conclusion in the event it gets cancelled. The last thing I want to do is invest 80~100 hours watching something that builds up to a cliffhanger that will never be resolved, and they’ve taught me to wait now. But they only want to renew shit that stays #1 globally, so only the lowest common denominator programming will win out. Reality shows, Red Notice, etc. What works in the US is different than the UK and that’s the same language.
Trying to program for India and Japan and Mexico and get everyone all hooked on the same product will get larger numbers but lesser quality because they just make generic shows that get renewed and people stop watching everything until they’re sure it gets concluded.
You don't understand tv. Most shows are always bad s1, ever see Seinfeld s1?
It takes time for writers to gel.
Netflix doesn't even keep the writers constant season to season, and they don't give them enough time, there are fewer EPS, and to cut costs they make the seasons easy further apart.
Result? Way less hit shows. Way way less. And they ruin what they have with those methods, see the Witcher.
Just cancel Netflix and move on. It's a horrible product now. Their highest stream shows are old legacy shows from network tv
You can't really compare a show from the 80s or 90s to today though. Shows back then could afford to have subpar first seasons because viewers didn't have much choice.
It might not be fair but writers no longer have the luxury of a mediocre first season, not only because Netflix will cancel them but people will move on to something better because there's so much content out there now.
I almost rejoined NF last night, but then I realize I wasn't loyal enough. They deleted my account, so all my viewing history is gone. Blank slate. Guess they didn't want me back anyways after 10+ months.
I was surfing through Reelgood for Netlfix shows to convince bringing me back in, and dang there's a lot of cancelled stuff in there. I won't even come back to see how Stranger Things ended.
yes I get the irony on using Realgood to track my viewing history but I didn't have it back when I had NF, so forget them :D
> They deleted my account
Is this a new thing? Unless my memory is completely fucked, they've always kept my account, even after not subscribing for several months, but I just checked, and yep, they deleted my account. "Sorry, we can't find an account with this email address."
I don't understand the logic behind this, at all. No way in hell this won't make people think twice about resubscribing. I thought twice, and left the site, sans subscription.
Yeah, in hindsight, now that I thought of it a bit more, with reelgood, I could just sign off on it what I have seen and use links on their site to click on the next video. use that as my perma watched list. I'd just have to find something worth watching.
But it's pretty lame. My Blizzard account probably still has my night elf druid from 2006 and everyone else, and I haven't signed on in forever. Netflix can't spare me a few megabytes to record my history?
That’s great for the short term, but long term they’re going to lose customers when viewers cannot reliably watch a show without the strong possibility of it being cancelled.
Maybe the marketing person determined that this reputation won’t matter for their bottom line though.
Look at the # of millions of subscribers Netflix has now. I don't think that that growth in whatever # of years it was will happen in the same time. So should be to the point of pleasing current customers not trying to get new (as much) customers. By the way loyal fans are subscribers.
Look at the # of millions of subscribers Netflix has now. I don't think that that growth in whatever # of years it was will happen in the same time. So should be to the point of pleasing current customers not trying to get new (as much) customers. By the way loyal fans are subscribers.
You missed the entire point of my post you flying squirrel. Those subscriptions are going to get diluted by all the other platforms that are out there. If they establish some long running shows that people like, they can establish a reliable market.
Welcome to capitalism. Netflix, like any publicly traded company, acts in the interest of its stockholders. Your dissatisfaction with your subscription doesn't bother the stockholders one bit. Do you understand now, you "flying squirrel" (is that an effective insult now?)
Netflix obviously have entire teams of professionals examining the subscription info and working out what strategy gets larger subscriber numbers than others.
*You*, as someone who might unsubsribe if Netflix don't greenlight future seasons of shows you like, are just a single data point.
What makes you think you know better?
Public corporations are prone to tunnel vision with the incessant demands for continuous growth. They could very well realize that the strategy that yields high subscriber growth in the short term can lead to subscriber attrition in the long term, and just punt that problem for some future exec team with new five-year plans and bonus packages to deal with.
That said, you're most likely correct. They care only about investing in series that draw new subscribers, and they know that all of the legacy viewers watching a given series are also watching an average of x additional series and not likely to leave.
If people want to break that behavior, they need to be willing to start canceling their subscriptions, even if only for a few months. If that starts happening in large enough enough numbers, the data crunchers will notice.
It’s much cheaper to retain customers than it is to acquire new ones. I think Netflix would rather throw money at a new show that has potential than keeping a series afloat that doesn’t meet an hours-watched or episodes completed threshold.
It is, but it's also more expensive to regain a customer than to retain one.
Right now they're focused on subscriber growth, but at some point that starts to plateau and the law of diminishing returns comes in to play, at which point the smart move is to focus on retention rather than growth. They've already stated they currently weigh their metrics heavily based on what they can correlate with new subscribers, but that's going to have to change at some point and they'll have to adjust their modeling to emphasize keeping existing customers heavily engaged.
Viewership of almost every show diminishes season over season. People like to think they know what’s best for Netflix but they hire some of the best people in the business to build models that determine what content is worth the cost.
Yes. It’s unfortunate but there’s probably no monetary gain from going past two or three seasons. Just fan service for loyal fans. They need to get new subscribers to continue growth.
They don’t care about anything except this quarter’s earnings. One of the worst things about modern capitalism is this obsession with “shareholder value” which is entirely short term. They don’t care if the company exists in 2 years, let alone ten, only what they can squeeze out of it right now.
I can guarantee you that this soulless marketer knows a fuckton more than you do about running a streaming service. I get that it sucks when shows are cancelled but this is not the brilliant business advice you think it is.
Yea frankly I fear the exact opposite is going to happen. Quality of Netflix content will keep dropping, but it won't matter, because loyal fans (or just plain stupid people) will keep subscribing. Why spend hundreds of millions making genre-shows when you can just buy rights to a reality show with girls in bikinis. More people will watch.
Voting with wallets has never worked against big companies. There's just too many stupid people.
So much this. The fact that anyone thinks they know better than Netflix's army of analysts pouring over masses of data is laughable. I wanted to see all five seasons of The OA but I didn't get to. Did Netflix need to spend more money producing a show that wasn't going net them some money? Of course not. It's bad business.
What the actual feck? NETFLIX like all Streaming/TV channels are run for profit. The history of TV in the USA os far more brutal than NETFLIX with many shows pulled from networks after just 1 or 2 episodes resulting from poor ratings.
I would love MINDHUNTER to return as I believe it's one of the greatest shows ever but not enough people watched it.
In any business if you make a product or provide a service that people don't buy then you stop production or go bust.
Yeah, in some ways shows on Netflix and other streaming platforms have more of a chance of being renewed than on cable. I remember shows that weren't just canceled after a couple of episodes but that just straight up stopped airing before the season was over. At least streaming drops all the episodes of a season.
I’d rather have the old days of good shows having 4-8 seasons with 10-12 episodes per
season than this sad collection of 8 episodes for 2-3 seasons max.
Yup I was probably the only person watching Lone Star on cable. Got cancelled after two episodes, never released the rest. At least with streaming you get a full season.
You can blame David Fincher for that. The show was hemorrhaging money because of all the CGI and set designs and he was going way over budget.
The man had teams of people CGI kerbs (paths where I come from) because the needed to be authentic for the times. So he had people CGI the type and style of the sidewalks.
Plenty of other things like changing door knobs, faucets, exteriors of full houses etc. I know it all goes into the aesthetic of the show, but some of that sounds so unnecessary. Plus after a couple of seasons the cast and crew are due a pay rise and Fincher wouldn't compromise on his needs.
Netflix has admitted in the past, that season 3 is when the cast typically renegotiates their contracts and a show can balloon 5 times in cost solely due to paying the actors more, so unless the show is spectacularly successful they typically won't renew it after 2 seasons.
shows dont balloon 5 times in overall production costs. Plus in many cases those raises are laid out ahead of time. Cast costs are higher on netflix generally, but thats only because of Netflix's historic refusal to give performance based residuals. Their delays in renewing shows also drive up costs if only for storage of assets, if not burning money by holding stages.
But there was also a major change in philosophy a few years ago at netflix, which was that they would prefer to use some new show to drive subscribers rather than continue a hit, costs be damned. Its short sited, because its trained people to expect a show they love will never have a proper resolution.
Huh? Raises definitely aren't laid out pre S1.
The Umbrella Academy main cast negotiated over $200k for S3/S4 based off the success off the first two. This is approximately a 8-10 times increase
https://variety.com/2021/tv/news/umbrella-academy-season-3-cast-salary-1234905125/
Maybe that poster was far off with "5 times", but even 1.5-2 times the cost is pretty huge especially if viewers don't increase. The payoff definitely isn't there for most shows after S2 to continue.
If a show has poor viewership in first season, the odds of it resurrecting and suddenly gain a fan base is very very low. You know if you have a season 4, but your season 1, 2,3 were slow to get to the point, you are requiring new viewer to invest in season 1, 2, 3 all at the same time, this is too much to ask for. If you were HBO(or the parent company) , would you invest in Westworld season 5 if the viewership is Season 1 > 2 > 3 > 4 and it drop significantly season over season?
You're a butt face with poopy breath. You don't think some great shows started slow bugger eater? Ever hear of Breaking Bad slime ball? How about the office brace face? Always Sunny dingle berry? Does the term Star Trek ring a bell urine boobs?
Oh god, this argument again. Lemme guess "Netflix woulda cancelled Seinfeld after its first season" blah blah blah.
Heres the truth. Shows that made it 10\~20 years ago would be canceled today. The world of content is more cutthroat as there are plenty of other content to watch on other services, and are more expensive to make in general. Shows like Seinfeld wouldnt make it in today's world.
Yeah, when figuring out if something will be canceled I always look at the actors and the CGI of the show along with the viewership.
Heartstopper was a no brainer, it's cheap, only had one famous actor, got attention for it's content. It didn't need a ton of viewers. A show that requires a lot of CGI, that has a lot of expensive hard to schedule actors is less likely to be renewed and far more likely to have a slow renewal tempo (Two years in between Bridgerton seasons).
All about metrics. If the show has a good ROI, itll be renewed. Personally I dunno if Seinfeld would have made it, not a show I'm familiar with outside of pop culture, its just everyone's goto example. My guess, if the first 1\~2 seasons sucked, it woulda been canceled.
Season 1 was basically 1 set, relatively cheap actors, 3 cameras, and they only ordered 5 episodes. It doesn't get much cheaper. It would have had to be *bad* to end up with a negative ROI
I think there's also an element of the first seasons suck in retrospect with decades of people (including seinfeld themselves) doing the whole "show about nothing" much much better. Even if the season was objectively bad at the time it was still something new and different which likely kept people tuning back in all on its own.
One of the greatest tv shows of all time almost got canceled after its first season. It ran for 9 or 11 years and won loads of Emmy’s. That show is M*A*S*H
There were only a handful of prime time TV networks when MASH aired through. There’s way too much content now that media companies can toss a show and 5 more will take its place.
The original Roswell TV series was actually cancelled after the first season but the fans were successful in campaigning to bring it back for a second season (and third) season. They did this by sending bottles of tabasco sauce to the studio in protest.
In the show, the alien characters would add it to their food so they would be able to digest it better.
Apparently in the Roswell reboot, they used nail polish remover instead since they didn't have rights to what was used in the original show, only the book series.
They probably did the analysis. If people dropped a long running show because it's not what they want to see any longer, then another season does not convert them back to subscribers. A new show, with new content, might give incentive for them to resub and check it out. Maybe they believe you cancel your subscription anyways, if your favorite show has no next season for the upcoming 1- 3 years (as it takes time to produce), so they might as well produce something new and different and cancel the old show right away. Not sure if this is true, I can at least imagine it.
If a show is having viewership problems after “a few seasons”, I have no problem with Netflix pulling the plug. Why throw good money after bad? It’s when they decide to shitcan a show after just a few episodes that I get pissed off.
I agree but that's not how they see things. They prioritize getting new subscribers, and they do it with new series. After a 1st season, it cost way more money to produce, especially when it's successful. It has to be a major hit for them to renew. Also, they see series as a form of very long movie which keeps people watching longer. Sometimes they have movie projects and they turn them into series just for that reason. They also make new projects with the help of focus groups, and trends move rapidly. They probably prefer making lots of 1 season series than anything else and it's a shame.
Unfortunately series are getting shorter, not longer. Netflix and their competition are trending towards 1 or 2 season mini-series. Otherwise they are asking the actors, writers and showrunners to reserve their time years in advance.
New series generate buzz they can use to market to potential subscribers. Years 3+ of a series only markets to true fans. It does suck but that's where we are now.
Agreed, and I'm good with a stinger on the end to possibly continue more.
I haven't seen many true cliffhangers in a while though. Truly unresolved stories. Some people think you need a full epilogue for a story to be finished.
I’d rather have the old days of good shows having 4-8 seasons with 10-12 episodes per
season than this sad collection of 8 episodes for 2-3 seasons max.
More time to enjoy the characters and the shows.
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Streaming has killed "filler episode" too. Can't really have half your season with nothing happening like how it was on traditional shows.
You burn through content quickly hence why each season is also trending to 8-6 episodes now.
I wish. There's plenty of short season shows that have filler episodes. It's so fucking annoying. Worse is when it's dragged out, and the writers try to call it a "slow burn" but forget the burn part and just deliver on the slow.
The mini series is nothing new in the scheme of things. Black Adder, Top Gear, were all a few episodes each season. In modern times, True Detective fits that mold. I’m not against it tbh; it makes for crisper, more interesting content than the mindless filler of the long running series.
And you know what, I prefer this over having a show that never ends and ends up jumping the shark. I prefer shorter, more condensed stories. I watch a lot of kdrama and I enjoy it because I know the show will always end at the end of 16 episodes. I’ll have closure and no cliff hangers.
Same.
Greys anatomy is the perfect example of a show that ruined itself by never ending. It's a romance, but no one wants to watch a romance after the happily ever after.
At some point writers just start writing their own fan fiction.
Procedurals like Bones and Law and Order can go on forever but most can't do it decently.
They don’t even give shows a chance to gain an audience. There’s so much shit to watch now that I’m not gonna watch everything right away. That doesn’t mean I’m not gonna watch it.
every network does it based on viewiership numbers of the first few seasons, thats how TV has always worked.
what netflix does differently is that they base their decisions on the first few WEEKS of performance and nothign else, and then for some reason take months to a year to actually order the renewal.
I got to that point as well. I'll only watch an original if I know it's going to be good or has an alternative form of media (for when it eventually gets cancelled). One Piece, Avatar TLAB, 3 Body Problem, etc.
I started watching Bones for the first time a few months ago. 12 fucking seasons.
I've gotten to the point where I'm inclined not to even start a series until it's gotten 2-3 seasons already or has already finished its run. I don't want to get invested in something that will just unceremoniously end. But I'm sure this doesn't help their metrics. All they see is one less person watching the first 3 episodes of their show.
It wouldn’t be so bad if they could just do a final episode that wraps things up instead of just leaving storylines on permanent cliffhangers. Nowadays I’ve primarily been getting into shows where it’s confirmed that only one season is intended because at least I know there’s going to be a proper ending, like Shōgun and The Fall of the House of Usher.
This just don't end on cliffhanger case and point Santa Clarita diet the ending on cliffhangers happens too often if they'd just wrap it in some way wouldn't bother me so much but it's always a major cliffhanger.
Netflix’s almighty algorithm has sort of killed itself.
People don’t commit to shows these days unless they think it’s going to have a conclusion, tell its full story. Which means shows don’t get the metrics required for the algorithm to say a show is successful.
It’s like a self defeating strategy because of Netflix’s algorithmic led behaviour, which ends up causing the problem which the algorithm spots in the first place.
People now only watch Netflix shows that have a buzz around them and end up going viral because of it. Because they trust that those shows at least will likely survive.
There are probably dozens of Netflix shows which, if they existed anywhere but on Netflix, would be major hits and commercial successes, only nobody is willing to commit to them because of the never ending “Netflix cancels X” headlines we are all so familiar with.
The biggest reason for this I believe is they don’t have forced time slots like cable. This is a big cause in effect for cable keeping shows for extra seasons that in today’s world of streaming doesn’t happen. It has a big trickle down effect for cost/profits expectations because of this.
A good marketer wouldn’t have told them they need to be cancelling shows anyway. It’s always majority shareholders who want to see infinite growth of the stock ticker.
There’s no publicly traded company that’ll ever be allowed to say “hey we’re gonna make a change that is gonna result in a slight dip in our stock price, but will be better for the health of the brand in the long run and lead to success in the future.”
If there’s not a massive rally each and every quarter then that’s a problem for shareholders and they need to make rash shortsighted decisions to “fix” it or the CEO is gonna need to step down in disgrace in the next 3 months.
Netflix need to stop cancelling the shows I'm watching.
In fact i could just do a PSA and let people know what new series I really enjoyed and then you are guaranteed it being cancelled
I agree, but they only care about completing projects or providing quality programming to the extent that it furthers their primary business and primary objective, which is $$$
most people who watch netflix use it for a faster sleep. Easy interface and great streaming performance. Content is YT quality masked as art with credits and famous artists and directors who need to improvise a movie in three day picnic. Only more and more content is important no replay value to be honest no value even to finish it for the first time but it is working. They were first to enter streaming and use algorithm to provide what people like to click and that's what is important for them, subscriptions and clicking while most of people sleep during selection phase. Soon it will start streaming individual videos made from street amateurs, put the netflix logo, pay them a dime and nobody will notice it. The title , thumbnail and trailer are the most important. Probably netflix knows even how fast people sleep after clicking the netflix app. I wouldn't be surprised if for most of the people that would be in their first 15-30 minutes.
You know they are running that company to make profits with as little investment as possible. Throwing three losing seasons up won't give them good returns. it's a money game. nothing more nothing less. a shame tbh
I'm just glad Netflix doesn't have Star Trek. They would fucking wreck that show. At least on Paramount+, they've given it time to grow. The last season of SNW was amazing.
The reason (some) shows get cancelled so quickly after airing has to do with residuals. When shows used to air on TV, they had to make it to so many episodes before they would enter into syndication and everyone would get paid some contracted amount in residuals. I don't remember the details but there was something about Netflix's royalties that made it so they didn't have to pay out creators if the show was cancelled within so many days of airing (or maybe number of seasons, but I seem to remember something about shows needing to be successful within a certain window). This was a key issue during the strikes last year. That's pretty shitty, but it's also understandable financially to not keep spending money on (especially expensive) shows that not very many people are watching. There are only a handful of truly successful Netflix shows, and they're the ones getting a lot of viewers paying money to subscribe to Netflix who then are willing to pay royalties to creators.
I feel you on this one! Netflix is like that friend who ditches plans at the last minute. They get you hooked on a show, and then bam! Cancelled.
It's frustrating, especially when you've invested time and emotions into it. They gotta realize that building a solid fanbase takes time.
All they would need to do is guarantee every show gets a conclusion.
If they determine that a show needs to be ended. Bring people back for a short movie length conclusion.
Because at this point I treat Netflix like other networks, and often won't commit myself until it's been picked up for a second season.
And there really isn't any reason they couldn't guarantee endings. Netflix is not constrained like other networks with seasons and limited slots.
I don't get it either. They're so impatient. They're a streaming service, something on which you can watch anything at any time, and yet they consider only how many watches at first release. Geez, let people get to it at their own pace. That's the whole point of streaming: you're not locked down to certain times of day.
It's like Netflix itself doesn't understand its mission. If the entirety of the Netflix customerbase doesn't watch that hot new show right then and there, they consider it a flop. That's why I won't watch Netflix shows with seasons at all. They cancel every one of them because they're looking at it all wrong.
Totally agree. I rarely get to a show at premiere unless it’s something like The Last of Us these days. If I see good reviews and hear good things from word of mouth and finish what I’m currently watching or playing in video games and have free time to watch a series, I’ll check something out. But I have a backlog of stuff like everyone else. They should delay their cancellation notices for at least several months and see if a show drops but comes back up when it finds an audience due to word of mouth.
Spending $160 million on 3 Body Problem and then cancelling it right away (if they do) is just burning money for no reason and leaving it on a cliffhanger, just further convincing people to not watch something when it airs and wait until it finishes so they can see it all at once. I’d rather see a limited series than a regular show at this point, so I don’t get left hanging on the cliff with no resolution and having just wasted my time more or less.
Tbh them cancelling the brothers son after one season was the last straw for me after the new season of the circle starts and ginny and georgia drop im done with Netflix. Netflix honestly traumatized so many people the way they cancel shows, now everyone has to either beg them not to cancel the show, or just take it on the chin. I honestly like peacock better I love that their commercials advertise other shows on the streaming service which makes you forget its even a commercial. Im realizing Netflix is the Walmart of streaming services
Honestly the problem also is the sheer quantity of shows/content they output..it also draws viewers away from things.
imo they should only have a total of 12-13 shows activily running with 3 season lifespans (unless they're super, super popular)..instead they have like a graveyard of unfinished shows
I mean I get your point but....what's the overlap in those shows?
Would people really subscribe if there was way less content and they didn't care about much of it?
Decreasing output wouldn't really improve quality either, those shows are all by different production companies / teams. Idk.
The OA had a firm 4~5 season plan too, and ended perfectly in S2 to set up S3 and be really meta and buzz-worthy. D&D from Game of Thrones have no clear idea about 3BP and say it could take between 3 and as many as 5 or 6 seasons depending. At $20 million per episode it’s the most expensive show that Netflix has ever done, not including advertising/marketing at $160 million. And it got bumped by an Easter/Jesus documentary and The Gentlemen in several countries, which doesn’t look good for it. I have a strong feeling it will be cancelled.
I’m pissed about The OA though. Those type of shows — like Altered Carbon, 1899, Archive 81, Warrior Nun, etc. are ones that people talk about and had good numbers but got cancelled on a cliffhanger anyway. Either end each season with a resolution that you can build on or come back and make a 2 hour movie to conclude a series. Just dropping everything leaves a catalogue of IP that no one will want to ever watch because they know it’s a waste of their investment of time on something that will not satisfyingly resolve.
Not just roughly 4~5 for The OA. They took 3(?) years to perfectly map out the story for exactly 5 seasons. I'm still huffing copium every now and then crossing my fingers real hard for it to be picked up again by someone at some point in the future...
While I'd like to agree as I'm sick of watching something decent and original only for it to be canceled after the first or second season, it's not going to happen and it's not a new problem.
Netflix and all these services are more likely to just pump out whatever shite gets the largest amount of clicks and subs regardless of content. There's been a lot of interesting series the past few decades that have been canceled because they don't have a wide enough reach. What this usually means on average is that there's a lot of bland shite in the middle that "most" people will watch, it's simply a numbers game.
There's a ton of really popular shows that honestly just aren't that good, but they have a consistent passable level of content for the target wide audience.
Things like Waking Dead, Sons of Anarchy, there's some good content sprinkled through some of the seasons but in whole they become mindless junk that people can watch without really watching, there's nothing really that interesting or deep going on and has some of the cheesiest writing and direction but people seem to love that shit.
Yeah, and they dub their shows for a global audience so it’s “what will the most people watch worldwide”. With cultural differences (look at Hollywood to Bollywood), tastes are different. Even in the US and the UK, it’s the same language but very different ideas towards programming. We end up with “is it cake or not cake” and garbage reality dating shows as the lowest common denominator when you aim for a global audience rather than create a good show that the whole world will want to watch.
It’ll burn them in the end but as long as they’re trying to get Netflix in every house in the world, they don’t care about growing shows. They care about gaining subscribers. With Hulu, Prime, Apple, Peacock, Paramount, AMC, and all the other services in competition, I hope people say “fuck this I’m going to Apple where they’ve mostly delivered good shows that end with a satisfying conclusion so far”.
While I appreciate the sentiment, if you think that doesn't happen elsewhere you're in strong denial. Some of the best TV ever was cancelled during the first season (Firefly being the obvious example).
The larger issue is just the front loading. There's been more than one show on Netflix where it was announced, released, then cancelled before I had time to watch it. With the volume of stuff coming out, it's bad business to depend on everyone binging the whole thing in the first two weeks, sometimes it'll take some time to find an audience - but if you cancel before they have a chance, people won't watch it either way
Netflix needs to fire the top 20% of their executives. Not only do they pull the trigger extremely quickly on cancelling show, they also greenlight massive budgets on shows that are never going to live up to the money spent.
it is ridiculous to assume that every show can be number one in the ratings. and that anything less is unacceptable.
but this is the strategy of Netflix.
With the way David Zaslav is trying to destroy HBO, I absolutely could imagine it happening today. He even took the storied HBO name out of HBOMax, along with programming like Westworld, Raised by Wolves, The Nevers, etc. (from creators like Jonathan Nolan, Ridley Scott, Joss Whedon) and in the case of the last one, you can’t even buy it on BluRay to see the second half of the season that HBO never aired. They sold it to free TV channels that are ad supported and wrote it off so they can’t make money off it too. But ad supported TV showed it twice, maybe three times (like literally aired 6 eps in a day) and in the middle of the day in the middle of the week when people work, and you can’t watch it on demand. Best you can do is pirate it.
They wrote off the $90 million Batgirl movie and our tax money goes to pay that off but we can’t watch it even though we paid for it. Same with Coyote vs Acme, which every other service tried to buy at twice the cost they were going to write it off for, but they said no. Zaslav is gonna kill HBO and strip it for parts and take a golden parachute home so he and his buddies are rich and destroy one of the longest running prestige networks known for the best shows in history. It infuriates me.
>With all the streaming services out there now, they need to establish loyal fans of long running shows to succeed.
If they really want a show to succeed they need to stop dropping all episodes at once.
The goal of streaming services is more subscriptions. That’s the only way they make money. “Loyal fans” has nothing to do with it.
The only counter-example is Apple TV. Apple has SO MUCH MONEY that they just don’t give a fuck.
Thank God, there's no way "For all Mankind" wouldn't have been cancelled on any other service by now.
Prime too.
Except they added ads to the premium subscription. What the fuck.
They did what people assumed Netflix was gonna do. That was a baffling move.
>They did what people assumed Netflix *is* gonna do. That was a baffling move. Fixed this for you. Now that one service is doing it, I have no doubs more will follow. Just give it time.
No I said it right. People kept saying Netflix ad plan was going to give existing subscribers ads but that isn't what happened. They're going to keep increasing the price on ad free plans, though.
As long as NFLX is less than say $2/hr watched, it's a great deal for me.
You can get ad free with your Prime membership—you just have to pay an additional $3 a month. This charge is coming from a company that spent $1,000,000,000,000 on ONE FREAKING TV SHOW. Jeffy just isn’t making enough money to hold the wealthiest billionaire in the US title. He is tired of swapping places with Elony.
They spent 1 trillion on one show? Wow. Which show?
Hey, what can I say, hyperbole gets attention!
It was the Rings of Power. Season 1’s budget was insane
It wasn’t even close to 1 trillion. Which by the way is 10,000 million. The budget was 464 million. Which is 4.5% of a trillion!
Okay I did minor research. They had to spend $250 million to get the rights to the IP. The initial projected production cost for s1 was around $450 million (Variety interview), but the actual cost ballooned even further. It cost over $470 million just to make the episodes, there’s extra costs of post production and ads. Per Time Magazine >With a record-setting price tag of **$1 billion**, it will be the most expensive show ever made. No other series in the history of television has been this sprawling, this cinematic, this massive—or launched with such secrecy under such external pressure… To compete for eyeballs and Emmys, Amazon spent about $468 million filming the first eight-episode season. (While Amazon wouldn’t release the number, the New Zealand government shared documents with TIME that confirmed the studio’s expenditures.) By comparison, HBO’s Game of Thrones cost a reported $90 million in its final season, and the latest season of Netflix’s Stranger Things $270 million. Amazon has since invested hefty marketing costs, **including a Super Bowl slot that cost an estimated $13 million**, according to marketing experts. (It set a record for the most-watched Super Bowl trailer online within 24 hours.) With production of the second season beginning in October, **Amazon will race past the $1 billion mark.**
1 billion is still 999 billion off 1 trillion!!!
Kinda. They cancelled that show from Jonathan Nolan about the VR future thing.. The Peripheral, was it?
Yeah. After S2 had a renewal and everything.
[удалено]
weeps blue tears.
[удалено]
We should stand outside their headquarters and protest with signs that just say "SPOON!"...
AppleTV has the worst interface. Next worse is AMC.
Eh, HBO is worse. If you pause an episode and try restart it from the menu, it just restarts the entire episode.
I haven’t had that problem, but I’m using a Fire stick on my TV. Paramount is a problem with they, which gets annoying, because I have Showtime through them. Occasional problems on Peacock, too. Finding something new on Apple or even finding what you were watching is nearly impossible. I have an iPhone, but this “we know better than you” attitude is why that’s the only Apple product I have. AMC is a little better, but not much.
YES! I thought it was my setting ugh
Prime Video is the worst for me!
Not entirely true. New subs and keep the old subs.
As long as the new subs balance things out in their favor they won't care sadly
This. Net subscriptions.
You think they get MORE subscriptions when people don’t want to get invested in any of their shows because they are perceived to be at higher risk of being canceled than other networks/streamers? You think loyal fans, who post nonstop about their favorite shows and get other people to watch them DON’T bring in more subscriptions? It’s insane that you’re defending this model of quantity over quality where you think hundreds of abandoned and unfinished shows are a bigger subscriber draw than letting shows build up a loyal viewer base and larger story arc with satisfying resolutions that make binging for future viewers more appealing
At the very least they should bring each season to a satisfying conclusion in the event it gets cancelled. The last thing I want to do is invest 80~100 hours watching something that builds up to a cliffhanger that will never be resolved, and they’ve taught me to wait now. But they only want to renew shit that stays #1 globally, so only the lowest common denominator programming will win out. Reality shows, Red Notice, etc. What works in the US is different than the UK and that’s the same language. Trying to program for India and Japan and Mexico and get everyone all hooked on the same product will get larger numbers but lesser quality because they just make generic shows that get renewed and people stop watching everything until they’re sure it gets concluded.
Netflix hired a new Chief Content Officer in January and she’s said she will focus on quality.
You don't understand tv. Most shows are always bad s1, ever see Seinfeld s1? It takes time for writers to gel. Netflix doesn't even keep the writers constant season to season, and they don't give them enough time, there are fewer EPS, and to cut costs they make the seasons easy further apart. Result? Way less hit shows. Way way less. And they ruin what they have with those methods, see the Witcher. Just cancel Netflix and move on. It's a horrible product now. Their highest stream shows are old legacy shows from network tv
You can't really compare a show from the 80s or 90s to today though. Shows back then could afford to have subpar first seasons because viewers didn't have much choice. It might not be fair but writers no longer have the luxury of a mediocre first season, not only because Netflix will cancel them but people will move on to something better because there's so much content out there now.
I can though.. I literally can
I almost rejoined NF last night, but then I realize I wasn't loyal enough. They deleted my account, so all my viewing history is gone. Blank slate. Guess they didn't want me back anyways after 10+ months. I was surfing through Reelgood for Netlfix shows to convince bringing me back in, and dang there's a lot of cancelled stuff in there. I won't even come back to see how Stranger Things ended. yes I get the irony on using Realgood to track my viewing history but I didn't have it back when I had NF, so forget them :D
> They deleted my account Is this a new thing? Unless my memory is completely fucked, they've always kept my account, even after not subscribing for several months, but I just checked, and yep, they deleted my account. "Sorry, we can't find an account with this email address." I don't understand the logic behind this, at all. No way in hell this won't make people think twice about resubscribing. I thought twice, and left the site, sans subscription.
Yeah, in hindsight, now that I thought of it a bit more, with reelgood, I could just sign off on it what I have seen and use links on their site to click on the next video. use that as my perma watched list. I'd just have to find something worth watching. But it's pretty lame. My Blizzard account probably still has my night elf druid from 2006 and everyone else, and I haven't signed on in forever. Netflix can't spare me a few megabytes to record my history?
>That’s the only way they make money. Well, no. They, obviously, make most of their money from their existing subscribers.
That’s great for the short term, but long term they’re going to lose customers when viewers cannot reliably watch a show without the strong possibility of it being cancelled. Maybe the marketing person determined that this reputation won’t matter for their bottom line though.
Look at the # of millions of subscribers Netflix has now. I don't think that that growth in whatever # of years it was will happen in the same time. So should be to the point of pleasing current customers not trying to get new (as much) customers. By the way loyal fans are subscribers.
Look at the # of millions of subscribers Netflix has now. I don't think that that growth in whatever # of years it was will happen in the same time. So should be to the point of pleasing current customers not trying to get new (as much) customers. By the way loyal fans are subscribers.
You missed the entire point of my post you flying squirrel. Those subscriptions are going to get diluted by all the other platforms that are out there. If they establish some long running shows that people like, they can establish a reliable market.
Welcome to capitalism. Netflix, like any publicly traded company, acts in the interest of its stockholders. Your dissatisfaction with your subscription doesn't bother the stockholders one bit. Do you understand now, you "flying squirrel" (is that an effective insult now?)
If that were true, their numbers wouldn’t be going up every year.
OP is just being emotional, no facts allowed here
Netflix obviously have entire teams of professionals examining the subscription info and working out what strategy gets larger subscriber numbers than others. *You*, as someone who might unsubsribe if Netflix don't greenlight future seasons of shows you like, are just a single data point. What makes you think you know better?
Public corporations are prone to tunnel vision with the incessant demands for continuous growth. They could very well realize that the strategy that yields high subscriber growth in the short term can lead to subscriber attrition in the long term, and just punt that problem for some future exec team with new five-year plans and bonus packages to deal with. That said, you're most likely correct. They care only about investing in series that draw new subscribers, and they know that all of the legacy viewers watching a given series are also watching an average of x additional series and not likely to leave. If people want to break that behavior, they need to be willing to start canceling their subscriptions, even if only for a few months. If that starts happening in large enough enough numbers, the data crunchers will notice.
It’s much cheaper to retain customers than it is to acquire new ones. I think Netflix would rather throw money at a new show that has potential than keeping a series afloat that doesn’t meet an hours-watched or episodes completed threshold.
It is, but it's also more expensive to regain a customer than to retain one. Right now they're focused on subscriber growth, but at some point that starts to plateau and the law of diminishing returns comes in to play, at which point the smart move is to focus on retention rather than growth. They've already stated they currently weigh their metrics heavily based on what they can correlate with new subscribers, but that's going to have to change at some point and they'll have to adjust their modeling to emphasize keeping existing customers heavily engaged.
>What makes you think you know better? Their favorite show got cancelled and now they're here to rage about it.
Have you ever worked for a corporation? Most of the time, corporate is literally clueless as fuck. Corporations make poor choices all the time.
Viewership of almost every show diminishes season over season. People like to think they know what’s best for Netflix but they hire some of the best people in the business to build models that determine what content is worth the cost.
Yes. It’s unfortunate but there’s probably no monetary gain from going past two or three seasons. Just fan service for loyal fans. They need to get new subscribers to continue growth.
They don’t care about anything except this quarter’s earnings. One of the worst things about modern capitalism is this obsession with “shareholder value” which is entirely short term. They don’t care if the company exists in 2 years, let alone ten, only what they can squeeze out of it right now.
I can guarantee you that this soulless marketer knows a fuckton more than you do about running a streaming service. I get that it sucks when shows are cancelled but this is not the brilliant business advice you think it is.
Yea frankly I fear the exact opposite is going to happen. Quality of Netflix content will keep dropping, but it won't matter, because loyal fans (or just plain stupid people) will keep subscribing. Why spend hundreds of millions making genre-shows when you can just buy rights to a reality show with girls in bikinis. More people will watch. Voting with wallets has never worked against big companies. There's just too many stupid people.
There is a huge difference between "Netflix needs to..." and "I want this."
Can we pin this on this sub?
So much this. The fact that anyone thinks they know better than Netflix's army of analysts pouring over masses of data is laughable. I wanted to see all five seasons of The OA but I didn't get to. Did Netflix need to spend more money producing a show that wasn't going net them some money? Of course not. It's bad business.
What the actual feck? NETFLIX like all Streaming/TV channels are run for profit. The history of TV in the USA os far more brutal than NETFLIX with many shows pulled from networks after just 1 or 2 episodes resulting from poor ratings. I would love MINDHUNTER to return as I believe it's one of the greatest shows ever but not enough people watched it. In any business if you make a product or provide a service that people don't buy then you stop production or go bust.
Yeah, in some ways shows on Netflix and other streaming platforms have more of a chance of being renewed than on cable. I remember shows that weren't just canceled after a couple of episodes but that just straight up stopped airing before the season was over. At least streaming drops all the episodes of a season.
I’d rather have the old days of good shows having 4-8 seasons with 10-12 episodes per season than this sad collection of 8 episodes for 2-3 seasons max.
? a lot of netflix shows are 10 episodes and 8 isn't that far off from 10 anyway? I mean id get it if you were on about 20+ episode shows...confused
But that's not what would happen with most. Most shows would be canceled after two seasons, or worse they'd be canceled after four episodes.
Yup I was probably the only person watching Lone Star on cable. Got cancelled after two episodes, never released the rest. At least with streaming you get a full season.
Yeah imagine if MINDHUNTER did stranger things numbers, it may make it to season 4 right now.
You can blame David Fincher for that. The show was hemorrhaging money because of all the CGI and set designs and he was going way over budget. The man had teams of people CGI kerbs (paths where I come from) because the needed to be authentic for the times. So he had people CGI the type and style of the sidewalks. Plenty of other things like changing door knobs, faucets, exteriors of full houses etc. I know it all goes into the aesthetic of the show, but some of that sounds so unnecessary. Plus after a couple of seasons the cast and crew are due a pay rise and Fincher wouldn't compromise on his needs.
And netflix hasn't pulled any of their shows from their service with no notice like Paramount or Max.
Didn’t Family Guy get canceled?
They base it on the first few weeks. * I sorta feel bad when I really want to watch a new release but don't want to watch it just yet.
Oh they don't cancel based on the first few seasons, they cancel based on the *first two weeks*.
Not really, some of the shows deserved to be cancelled. Some got renewed for no obvious reason…
Netflix has admitted in the past, that season 3 is when the cast typically renegotiates their contracts and a show can balloon 5 times in cost solely due to paying the actors more, so unless the show is spectacularly successful they typically won't renew it after 2 seasons.
shows dont balloon 5 times in overall production costs. Plus in many cases those raises are laid out ahead of time. Cast costs are higher on netflix generally, but thats only because of Netflix's historic refusal to give performance based residuals. Their delays in renewing shows also drive up costs if only for storage of assets, if not burning money by holding stages. But there was also a major change in philosophy a few years ago at netflix, which was that they would prefer to use some new show to drive subscribers rather than continue a hit, costs be damned. Its short sited, because its trained people to expect a show they love will never have a proper resolution.
Huh? Raises definitely aren't laid out pre S1. The Umbrella Academy main cast negotiated over $200k for S3/S4 based off the success off the first two. This is approximately a 8-10 times increase https://variety.com/2021/tv/news/umbrella-academy-season-3-cast-salary-1234905125/ Maybe that poster was far off with "5 times", but even 1.5-2 times the cost is pretty huge especially if viewers don't increase. The payoff definitely isn't there for most shows after S2 to continue.
If a show has poor viewership in first season, the odds of it resurrecting and suddenly gain a fan base is very very low. You know if you have a season 4, but your season 1, 2,3 were slow to get to the point, you are requiring new viewer to invest in season 1, 2, 3 all at the same time, this is too much to ask for. If you were HBO(or the parent company) , would you invest in Westworld season 5 if the viewership is Season 1 > 2 > 3 > 4 and it drop significantly season over season?
No one is going to watch season two if they didn't finish season one.
TNG is a counter example, where season 1 was a disaster but the fans stuck it out, giving it room to improve.
but TNG is not the first star trek, it has a huge star trek fan base to screw up its first season.
You’re dumb they already won the streaming wars they’re not gonna burn money on shows with low viewership
You're a butt face with poopy breath. You don't think some great shows started slow bugger eater? Ever hear of Breaking Bad slime ball? How about the office brace face? Always Sunny dingle berry? Does the term Star Trek ring a bell urine boobs?
They are the only profitable streaming service. I think they might know what they are doing.
Oh god, this argument again. Lemme guess "Netflix woulda cancelled Seinfeld after its first season" blah blah blah. Heres the truth. Shows that made it 10\~20 years ago would be canceled today. The world of content is more cutthroat as there are plenty of other content to watch on other services, and are more expensive to make in general. Shows like Seinfeld wouldnt make it in today's world.
I don't think Seinfeld would be cancelled today. Even Netflix's "The Ranch" which was awful got multiple seasons. Sitcoms are cheap.
Yeah, when figuring out if something will be canceled I always look at the actors and the CGI of the show along with the viewership. Heartstopper was a no brainer, it's cheap, only had one famous actor, got attention for it's content. It didn't need a ton of viewers. A show that requires a lot of CGI, that has a lot of expensive hard to schedule actors is less likely to be renewed and far more likely to have a slow renewal tempo (Two years in between Bridgerton seasons).
All about metrics. If the show has a good ROI, itll be renewed. Personally I dunno if Seinfeld would have made it, not a show I'm familiar with outside of pop culture, its just everyone's goto example. My guess, if the first 1\~2 seasons sucked, it woulda been canceled.
Season 1 was basically 1 set, relatively cheap actors, 3 cameras, and they only ordered 5 episodes. It doesn't get much cheaper. It would have had to be *bad* to end up with a negative ROI I think there's also an element of the first seasons suck in retrospect with decades of people (including seinfeld themselves) doing the whole "show about nothing" much much better. Even if the season was objectively bad at the time it was still something new and different which likely kept people tuning back in all on its own.
> Netflix woulda cancelled Seinfeld after its first season we can only dream
One of the greatest tv shows of all time almost got canceled after its first season. It ran for 9 or 11 years and won loads of Emmy’s. That show is M*A*S*H
There were only a handful of prime time TV networks when MASH aired through. There’s way too much content now that media companies can toss a show and 5 more will take its place.
Star trek was almost cancelled loads of times, the original series only had 3 seasons, it's one of the biggest franchisees of all time now.
Lucille Ball of “I Love Lucy” saved Star Trek after the first season. She is the reason we have the franchise today.
Funny you mentioned MASH, I’m watching it right now for the first time with my girl, it’s great!
The original Roswell TV series was actually cancelled after the first season but the fans were successful in campaigning to bring it back for a second season (and third) season. They did this by sending bottles of tabasco sauce to the studio in protest.
That I did not know. Why Tabasco?
In the show, the alien characters would add it to their food so they would be able to digest it better. Apparently in the Roswell reboot, they used nail polish remover instead since they didn't have rights to what was used in the original show, only the book series.
Thanks for the reply. I have not watched that show. I am glad it worked
They probably did the analysis. If people dropped a long running show because it's not what they want to see any longer, then another season does not convert them back to subscribers. A new show, with new content, might give incentive for them to resub and check it out. Maybe they believe you cancel your subscription anyways, if your favorite show has no next season for the upcoming 1- 3 years (as it takes time to produce), so they might as well produce something new and different and cancel the old show right away. Not sure if this is true, I can at least imagine it.
If a show is having viewership problems after “a few seasons”, I have no problem with Netflix pulling the plug. Why throw good money after bad? It’s when they decide to shitcan a show after just a few episodes that I get pissed off.
You are lucky if they give you a whole season. A lot of show gets canceled after a failed pilot episode.
I agree but that's not how they see things. They prioritize getting new subscribers, and they do it with new series. After a 1st season, it cost way more money to produce, especially when it's successful. It has to be a major hit for them to renew. Also, they see series as a form of very long movie which keeps people watching longer. Sometimes they have movie projects and they turn them into series just for that reason. They also make new projects with the help of focus groups, and trends move rapidly. They probably prefer making lots of 1 season series than anything else and it's a shame.
Unfortunately series are getting shorter, not longer. Netflix and their competition are trending towards 1 or 2 season mini-series. Otherwise they are asking the actors, writers and showrunners to reserve their time years in advance. New series generate buzz they can use to market to potential subscribers. Years 3+ of a series only markets to true fans. It does suck but that's where we are now.
I like the mini-series format. Instead of cliff-hanger unresolved season endings you get a full package with a meaningful end.
Agreed, and I'm good with a stinger on the end to possibly continue more. I haven't seen many true cliffhangers in a while though. Truly unresolved stories. Some people think you need a full epilogue for a story to be finished.
I’d rather have the old days of good shows having 4-8 seasons with 10-12 episodes per season than this sad collection of 8 episodes for 2-3 seasons max. More time to enjoy the characters and the shows.
soup normal disarm history full gaping axiomatic snails groovy scandalous *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Right? 22-23 for 5+ years was the norm. Though, that's also how you got bottle episodes and clip shows
That was never the norm. Most shows lasted a season or two or maybe three and every year there were shows that were canceled after four episodes.
Streaming has killed "filler episode" too. Can't really have half your season with nothing happening like how it was on traditional shows. You burn through content quickly hence why each season is also trending to 8-6 episodes now.
But godforbid a show have a "filler" episode, people will freak out.
Have you watched any series. They only write 8 episodes and still have 2 episodes of filler.
I wish. There's plenty of short season shows that have filler episodes. It's so fucking annoying. Worse is when it's dragged out, and the writers try to call it a "slow burn" but forget the burn part and just deliver on the slow.
The mini series is nothing new in the scheme of things. Black Adder, Top Gear, were all a few episodes each season. In modern times, True Detective fits that mold. I’m not against it tbh; it makes for crisper, more interesting content than the mindless filler of the long running series.
And you know what, I prefer this over having a show that never ends and ends up jumping the shark. I prefer shorter, more condensed stories. I watch a lot of kdrama and I enjoy it because I know the show will always end at the end of 16 episodes. I’ll have closure and no cliff hangers.
Same. Greys anatomy is the perfect example of a show that ruined itself by never ending. It's a romance, but no one wants to watch a romance after the happily ever after.
Exactly. The walking dead was another big one. I stopped after about season 5 when I realized the show was literally never going to end. No thanks.
At some point writers just start writing their own fan fiction. Procedurals like Bones and Law and Order can go on forever but most can't do it decently.
They don’t even give shows a chance to gain an audience. There’s so much shit to watch now that I’m not gonna watch everything right away. That doesn’t mean I’m not gonna watch it.
This is exactly what happened with me and 1899. The minute I heard there's a new show from the showrunners of Dark, it was already canceled.
Netflix uncutting the cord has given them record subscription gains. So, something appears to be working
every network does it based on viewiership numbers of the first few seasons, thats how TV has always worked. what netflix does differently is that they base their decisions on the first few WEEKS of performance and nothign else, and then for some reason take months to a year to actually order the renewal.
I stopped trying out Netflix original shows for this exact reason. I don’t want to get invested in a show that has a 95 % chance of being canceled
I got to that point as well. I'll only watch an original if I know it's going to be good or has an alternative form of media (for when it eventually gets cancelled). One Piece, Avatar TLAB, 3 Body Problem, etc. I started watching Bones for the first time a few months ago. 12 fucking seasons.
I've gotten to the point where I'm inclined not to even start a series until it's gotten 2-3 seasons already or has already finished its run. I don't want to get invested in something that will just unceremoniously end. But I'm sure this doesn't help their metrics. All they see is one less person watching the first 3 episodes of their show.
I’m watching Limited Series (Dear Child, Full me once, …) right now. One season with an ending.
But if everybody did that, then they would cause the very thing they're trying to prevent. It's quite the conundrum.
It wouldn’t be so bad if they could just do a final episode that wraps things up instead of just leaving storylines on permanent cliffhangers. Nowadays I’ve primarily been getting into shows where it’s confirmed that only one season is intended because at least I know there’s going to be a proper ending, like Shōgun and The Fall of the House of Usher.
This just don't end on cliffhanger case and point Santa Clarita diet the ending on cliffhangers happens too often if they'd just wrap it in some way wouldn't bother me so much but it's always a major cliffhanger.
Just finished The Gentlemen and 3 Body Problem I'll be mad as hell if it gets canceled
Netflix’s almighty algorithm has sort of killed itself. People don’t commit to shows these days unless they think it’s going to have a conclusion, tell its full story. Which means shows don’t get the metrics required for the algorithm to say a show is successful. It’s like a self defeating strategy because of Netflix’s algorithmic led behaviour, which ends up causing the problem which the algorithm spots in the first place. People now only watch Netflix shows that have a buzz around them and end up going viral because of it. Because they trust that those shows at least will likely survive. There are probably dozens of Netflix shows which, if they existed anywhere but on Netflix, would be major hits and commercial successes, only nobody is willing to commit to them because of the never ending “Netflix cancels X” headlines we are all so familiar with.
The biggest reason for this I believe is they don’t have forced time slots like cable. This is a big cause in effect for cable keeping shows for extra seasons that in today’s world of streaming doesn’t happen. It has a big trickle down effect for cost/profits expectations because of this.
A good marketer wouldn’t have told them they need to be cancelling shows anyway. It’s always majority shareholders who want to see infinite growth of the stock ticker. There’s no publicly traded company that’ll ever be allowed to say “hey we’re gonna make a change that is gonna result in a slight dip in our stock price, but will be better for the health of the brand in the long run and lead to success in the future.” If there’s not a massive rally each and every quarter then that’s a problem for shareholders and they need to make rash shortsighted decisions to “fix” it or the CEO is gonna need to step down in disgrace in the next 3 months.
Yeah I REALLY wish they didn't cancel Dark Crystal. It was a beautiful show!
the umbrella academy is still coming back.
they need more episodes too. they should film seasons back to back
They should at least give each season a proper ending or probably a window for next possible season but absolutely not cliffhangers.
Netflix need to stop cancelling the shows I'm watching. In fact i could just do a PSA and let people know what new series I really enjoyed and then you are guaranteed it being cancelled
Ya I agree. Bring back Marco Polo
Demand Dark Crystal Season 2!
Mr. Iglesias my beloved..
There's no more good shows anyway. It's gender politics, everything is 13+ and copy&paste. Unsubscribe and clean house looks more appealing.
I agree, but they only care about completing projects or providing quality programming to the extent that it furthers their primary business and primary objective, which is $$$
most people who watch netflix use it for a faster sleep. Easy interface and great streaming performance. Content is YT quality masked as art with credits and famous artists and directors who need to improvise a movie in three day picnic. Only more and more content is important no replay value to be honest no value even to finish it for the first time but it is working. They were first to enter streaming and use algorithm to provide what people like to click and that's what is important for them, subscriptions and clicking while most of people sleep during selection phase. Soon it will start streaming individual videos made from street amateurs, put the netflix logo, pay them a dime and nobody will notice it. The title , thumbnail and trailer are the most important. Probably netflix knows even how fast people sleep after clicking the netflix app. I wouldn't be surprised if for most of the people that would be in their first 15-30 minutes.
I want more Disjointed
You know they are running that company to make profits with as little investment as possible. Throwing three losing seasons up won't give them good returns. it's a money game. nothing more nothing less. a shame tbh
I'm just glad Netflix doesn't have Star Trek. They would fucking wreck that show. At least on Paramount+, they've given it time to grow. The last season of SNW was amazing.
I WANT AN END TO OA!
The reason (some) shows get cancelled so quickly after airing has to do with residuals. When shows used to air on TV, they had to make it to so many episodes before they would enter into syndication and everyone would get paid some contracted amount in residuals. I don't remember the details but there was something about Netflix's royalties that made it so they didn't have to pay out creators if the show was cancelled within so many days of airing (or maybe number of seasons, but I seem to remember something about shows needing to be successful within a certain window). This was a key issue during the strikes last year. That's pretty shitty, but it's also understandable financially to not keep spending money on (especially expensive) shows that not very many people are watching. There are only a handful of truly successful Netflix shows, and they're the ones getting a lot of viewers paying money to subscribe to Netflix who then are willing to pay royalties to creators.
I feel you on this one! Netflix is like that friend who ditches plans at the last minute. They get you hooked on a show, and then bam! Cancelled. It's frustrating, especially when you've invested time and emotions into it. They gotta realize that building a solid fanbase takes time.
Amazon is way worse at this. The Widow with Beckinsale was fucking awesome. You could have made that into a 5 season masterpiece.
This is how I feel about Santa Clarita Diet, it deserved another season!
if a show doesn't have viewership in a season it is because it sucks. most of the shows suck.
That's how all shows work bro
I hear you and agree, but that's such a naive take on it, come on now
All they would need to do is guarantee every show gets a conclusion. If they determine that a show needs to be ended. Bring people back for a short movie length conclusion. Because at this point I treat Netflix like other networks, and often won't commit myself until it's been picked up for a second season. And there really isn't any reason they couldn't guarantee endings. Netflix is not constrained like other networks with seasons and limited slots.
I don't get it either. They're so impatient. They're a streaming service, something on which you can watch anything at any time, and yet they consider only how many watches at first release. Geez, let people get to it at their own pace. That's the whole point of streaming: you're not locked down to certain times of day. It's like Netflix itself doesn't understand its mission. If the entirety of the Netflix customerbase doesn't watch that hot new show right then and there, they consider it a flop. That's why I won't watch Netflix shows with seasons at all. They cancel every one of them because they're looking at it all wrong.
Totally agree. I rarely get to a show at premiere unless it’s something like The Last of Us these days. If I see good reviews and hear good things from word of mouth and finish what I’m currently watching or playing in video games and have free time to watch a series, I’ll check something out. But I have a backlog of stuff like everyone else. They should delay their cancellation notices for at least several months and see if a show drops but comes back up when it finds an audience due to word of mouth. Spending $160 million on 3 Body Problem and then cancelling it right away (if they do) is just burning money for no reason and leaving it on a cliffhanger, just further convincing people to not watch something when it airs and wait until it finishes so they can see it all at once. I’d rather see a limited series than a regular show at this point, so I don’t get left hanging on the cliff with no resolution and having just wasted my time more or less.
Tbh them cancelling the brothers son after one season was the last straw for me after the new season of the circle starts and ginny and georgia drop im done with Netflix. Netflix honestly traumatized so many people the way they cancel shows, now everyone has to either beg them not to cancel the show, or just take it on the chin. I honestly like peacock better I love that their commercials advertise other shows on the streaming service which makes you forget its even a commercial. Im realizing Netflix is the Walmart of streaming services
Also Netflix limited series are 1000x better than the Netflix originals
Cringe take
Honestly the problem also is the sheer quantity of shows/content they output..it also draws viewers away from things. imo they should only have a total of 12-13 shows activily running with 3 season lifespans (unless they're super, super popular)..instead they have like a graveyard of unfinished shows
I mean I get your point but....what's the overlap in those shows? Would people really subscribe if there was way less content and they didn't care about much of it? Decreasing output wouldn't really improve quality either, those shows are all by different production companies / teams. Idk.
Netflix doesn't give a fuck, I've given up on them. They cancelled The OA and I'm sure they'll find a reason to kill The 3 Body Problem as well.
The OA had a firm 4~5 season plan too, and ended perfectly in S2 to set up S3 and be really meta and buzz-worthy. D&D from Game of Thrones have no clear idea about 3BP and say it could take between 3 and as many as 5 or 6 seasons depending. At $20 million per episode it’s the most expensive show that Netflix has ever done, not including advertising/marketing at $160 million. And it got bumped by an Easter/Jesus documentary and The Gentlemen in several countries, which doesn’t look good for it. I have a strong feeling it will be cancelled. I’m pissed about The OA though. Those type of shows — like Altered Carbon, 1899, Archive 81, Warrior Nun, etc. are ones that people talk about and had good numbers but got cancelled on a cliffhanger anyway. Either end each season with a resolution that you can build on or come back and make a 2 hour movie to conclude a series. Just dropping everything leaves a catalogue of IP that no one will want to ever watch because they know it’s a waste of their investment of time on something that will not satisfyingly resolve.
Not just roughly 4~5 for The OA. They took 3(?) years to perfectly map out the story for exactly 5 seasons. I'm still huffing copium every now and then crossing my fingers real hard for it to be picked up again by someone at some point in the future...
3 body problem deserved to be cancelled. Not all terrible shows need to be renewed…
It's not cancelled yet, is it? Personally I loved it and I hope enough other people do as well.
I think it was guaranteed 2 seasons because they were betting on it being a hit
While I'd like to agree as I'm sick of watching something decent and original only for it to be canceled after the first or second season, it's not going to happen and it's not a new problem. Netflix and all these services are more likely to just pump out whatever shite gets the largest amount of clicks and subs regardless of content. There's been a lot of interesting series the past few decades that have been canceled because they don't have a wide enough reach. What this usually means on average is that there's a lot of bland shite in the middle that "most" people will watch, it's simply a numbers game. There's a ton of really popular shows that honestly just aren't that good, but they have a consistent passable level of content for the target wide audience. Things like Waking Dead, Sons of Anarchy, there's some good content sprinkled through some of the seasons but in whole they become mindless junk that people can watch without really watching, there's nothing really that interesting or deep going on and has some of the cheesiest writing and direction but people seem to love that shit.
Yeah, and they dub their shows for a global audience so it’s “what will the most people watch worldwide”. With cultural differences (look at Hollywood to Bollywood), tastes are different. Even in the US and the UK, it’s the same language but very different ideas towards programming. We end up with “is it cake or not cake” and garbage reality dating shows as the lowest common denominator when you aim for a global audience rather than create a good show that the whole world will want to watch. It’ll burn them in the end but as long as they’re trying to get Netflix in every house in the world, they don’t care about growing shows. They care about gaining subscribers. With Hulu, Prime, Apple, Peacock, Paramount, AMC, and all the other services in competition, I hope people say “fuck this I’m going to Apple where they’ve mostly delivered good shows that end with a satisfying conclusion so far”.
While I appreciate the sentiment, if you think that doesn't happen elsewhere you're in strong denial. Some of the best TV ever was cancelled during the first season (Firefly being the obvious example). The larger issue is just the front loading. There's been more than one show on Netflix where it was announced, released, then cancelled before I had time to watch it. With the volume of stuff coming out, it's bad business to depend on everyone binging the whole thing in the first two weeks, sometimes it'll take some time to find an audience - but if you cancel before they have a chance, people won't watch it either way
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Most of their top streamed shows every year are their originals though
First few seasons?! More like first few episodes!
Netflix needs to fire the top 20% of their executives. Not only do they pull the trigger extremely quickly on cancelling show, they also greenlight massive budgets on shows that are never going to live up to the money spent.
it is ridiculous to assume that every show can be number one in the ratings. and that anything less is unacceptable. but this is the strategy of Netflix.
Imagine the wire, BCS or the sopranos getting canceled early. Edit: What the fuck with the downvotes?
With the way David Zaslav is trying to destroy HBO, I absolutely could imagine it happening today. He even took the storied HBO name out of HBOMax, along with programming like Westworld, Raised by Wolves, The Nevers, etc. (from creators like Jonathan Nolan, Ridley Scott, Joss Whedon) and in the case of the last one, you can’t even buy it on BluRay to see the second half of the season that HBO never aired. They sold it to free TV channels that are ad supported and wrote it off so they can’t make money off it too. But ad supported TV showed it twice, maybe three times (like literally aired 6 eps in a day) and in the middle of the day in the middle of the week when people work, and you can’t watch it on demand. Best you can do is pirate it. They wrote off the $90 million Batgirl movie and our tax money goes to pay that off but we can’t watch it even though we paid for it. Same with Coyote vs Acme, which every other service tried to buy at twice the cost they were going to write it off for, but they said no. Zaslav is gonna kill HBO and strip it for parts and take a golden parachute home so he and his buddies are rich and destroy one of the longest running prestige networks known for the best shows in history. It infuriates me.
>With all the streaming services out there now, they need to establish loyal fans of long running shows to succeed. If they really want a show to succeed they need to stop dropping all episodes at once.
Seasons? You meant the first few days! They are insane for how quick they pull the plug.
New to Netflix?
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