2 "Seasons" of a netflix show is not even 1 season of broadcast... Most Broadcast shows run 20-24 Episodes per Season. Netflix is 10 at the most, some 6 episodes. per "season"
That is part of their problem, and why the cancellations feel even more abrupt and why people do not want to invest time in them. it is hard to tell a compelling story in 6 episodes of TV. So if a netflix series get 2 seasons, 12 Episode. it is just starting... even though to netflix thinks it should have a captive audience. that would just be the midseason of a Broadcast show
Most of the popular shows on broadcast would never had made it to be popular under the netflix model of 1000 shows @ 6 episodes...
I think the "hard to tell a compelling story in 6 episodes" thing just depends on the type of story. Previous replies mention several excellent shorter-run series.
Often, if I find out a show is a miniseries (or I guess they call them "limited series" nowadays) I am much more likely to watch it. Too many shows go the route of "how many seasons can we get this to run" instead of "how long will it take to tell this story with good pacing to conclusion?"
I get tired of watching shows that seem designed to run indefinitely. They all have the same sort of pacing that stretches things out unnecessarily just to pad seasons. Shows like that feel like basic cable to me when I watch them. I'll take a good 6 or 8 episode arc over indefinite seasons any day.
Amen. Knowing that the show runners had the ending in mind when they started making the show gives it a much better chance of being a cohesive package than a vehicle for somebody's desire to build a franchise.
Depends on the country, it is totally ok for some british detective/crime series to have 6 episode seasons, because each episode is an hour or 1,5 long, they are not filled with pointless stuff to make them longer, etc.
The short series format works if you write a story that is suited to it. When done right it feels like the middle ground between movies and a full TV series, not as starved for time as a movie and moves much faster than a 12-24 episode TV series. Of course the issue with Netflix is they tend to take what would traditionally be a 24 episode TV series, break it down into small parts, then cancel it at a inconvenient point in the story.
A friend who's written Netflix original shows says that Netflix has a lot of data regarding user watch behavior, and provide specific directions for how shows should be structured to maximize viewer retention. As a theoretical example, they know people tend to lose interest around 60% mark in episode 2, so that's where you have to insert a plot twist.
That wasn't the point at all. The nominal point was a hand-wavy claim that you can barely get started with a small number of episodes, which is clearly not true.
> 2 "Seasons" of a netflix show is not even 1 season of broadcast
I'd say most of their episodes are longer, on average. But that's not entirely relevant anyway, the main cost is in setting up the production as a whole.
> it is hard to tell a compelling story in 6 episodes of TV.
It's even harder to do it in one episode - the pilot.
In the past, a lot of pilots would be produced and never seen by anyone but execs. Then something like 5% of projects would be picked to air, and typically be given two seasons to iron out any problems - because it would look bad on execs who had fought to use a scarce slot for it, so there was a level of continued support for a while. Episodes were very short in length, and being effectively just containers for ads, it was alright to schedule tried-and-tested material, even if performing in a relatively mediocre manner.
Pilots are now less necessary, Netflix will invest on screenplays; but that means that a lot of the selection previously made by execs is now made by viewers. NF execs have less skin in the game, because there isn't a real limit to the amount of picks they can have. Netflix needs subscriber numbers to grow, so it needs big hits more than tv channels did. They have no incentive to continue pushing nonperforming series.
> Most of the popular shows on broadcast would never had made it to be popular under the netflix model
I'd argue that most of the series produced under the NF model would never even have existed on broadcast.
Yeah, I think that's the real issue. People complain about 6 episodes not being enough, but the truth is that a lot of those 6-8 episodes now feels like filler - probably because some constraints (ad cuts on scenes...) have disappeared, so writers feel emboldened. Not everything can be The Wire.
I have a friend who's written Netflix original shows, and I'll say it's the opposite - Netflix has very specific instructions for how scripts must be structured based on viewership data. Netflix knows where people tend to pause, and where viewership tends to fall off, and have formulated guidelines for scripts to counter it. They require scripts to conform to their requirements - add a plot twist in episode 2 at the 60% mark, for example. The primary character should occupy 60% of episode 1, and 40% of episode 2, and so on.
> 2 "Seasons" of a netflix show is not even 1 season of broadcast...
Yes, most streaming-first platforms use shorter seasons than is typical for US broadcast (but that was also often true of US cable, and is also true of, e.g., British broadcast.)
> That is part of their problem, and why the cancellations feel even more abrupt
Mid-season, especially first-season, cancellations on broadcast have always been a thing (as have soft-cancellations by moving—often multiple times in a season—to a less valued timeslot, especially when timeslots mattered more.)
> Mid-season, especially first-season, cancellations on broadcast have always been a thing
A TV or cable network canceling a show is very different from netflix doing it though. When a network cancels a show mid-season fans get pissed but the network removes that show from broadcast and replaces it with shows that do get full seasons and proper endings.
When netflix puts out an unfinished product by starting a show and then not finishing it, the fans get pissed, and it just sits like a giant turd in their library so that month after month and year after year more and more people will start the show, get to where it cuts off and also get angry that netflix wasted their time.
Even if a netflix show seems to under-perform, it's in netflix's best interest to make sure every story has some kind of conclusion because some percentage of subscribers will still be able to find value in it. A finished product is a win for their library.
Otherwise the unfinished show will just sit on their servers being forever unwatched by anyone aware that Netflix screwed the show's fans, or it becomes a trap that will only make anyone who does start it angry at netflix.
Netflix should either just commit to concluding any show they start, or remove any shows that get left without a conclusion from their library entirely (throwing away all of the money they invested)
That is part of their problem, and why the cancellations feel even more abrupt and why people do not want to invest time in them. it is hard to tell a compelling story in 6 episodes of TV. So if a netflix series get 2 seasons, 12 Episode. it is just starting... even though to netflix thinks it should have a captive audience. that would just be the midseason of a Broadcast show
Most of the popular shows on broadcast would never had made it to be popular under the netflix model of 1000 shows @ 6 episodes...