Poll of the Day > What happened to television?

(+) Yeah! (+)

I think that besides Star Trek and Doctor Who (the only space science fiction left) the only currently running television show I watch is Outlander and that's going to be in its 7th season, and is likely to be ending in the next couple of years because it's running out of material to cover.
I've been thinking this for years, but why do all of the shows look so bad? Things are awfully procedural. There's too much focus around the 10-episode season and a lot of good concepts (e.g. American Gods) get wasted and eventually cancelled.
It seems like the only things that are successful are IPs that are owned by Disney and HBO and that seems to also affect the film industry (in Disney's case too).

Are you talking about live TV or streaming?

shadowsword87 posted...

Are you talking about live TV or streaming?

Is there a difference anymore?

Whatever happened to Saturday night?

Judgmenl posted...

Is there a difference anymore?

Yes. Massive differences, since streaming-only can have any length seasons

Count_Drachma posted...

Whatever happened to Saturday night?

This might MAYBE be the real answer. Since people are working longer and in more atypical hours there's less of a TV 'event' that everyone can organize around and as such TV companies aren't competing for high demand timeslots... cuz they aren't high demand any more.

Most of the streaming shows are going for massive amounts of content, rather than quality. I guess they figure as long as they more interesting than staring at a wall, they are golden

For many years, I've felt there is not really anything good on TV.

fishy071 posted...

For many years, I've felt there is not really anything good on TV.

How about now?

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/8/5/9/AAPtSiAAD5uL.jpg

Count_Drachma posted...

Yes. Massive differences, since streaming-only can have any length seasons

Same with regular tv.

People like those singing competition shows like x factor and the voice

Also sports and crime drama

Nichtcrawler-X posted...

Same with regular tv.

Completely wrong. Unless a show gets canceled, a normal program lasts a set duration. Because a streaming show isn't intended to fill a block or time slot for a certain time-frame. It's probably more true of the US than other nations -- particularly since the BBC has 2-episode seasons of some shows -- but it's fairly consistent as a general rule. But the BBC also doesn't so much have "seasons" as what it calls "series," so there's far less consistency.

A normal tv show's seasons tend to be roughly the same length throughout the run unless they run into production troubles or ratings issues. However, a streaming show can have an 8-episode season, followed by a 2-episode season, followed by a 20-episode season... and the episode lengths can vary dramatically, without needing to compensate.

You grew up.