John Landgraf, president of the FX channel, predicted years ago that series volume would peak as it was not sustainable for the business. He believed that the industry was generating too many series for all of them to have their share of attention. According to his analysis, an “entertainment bubble” was being created that at some point would reach its peak and begin to go down. But the media explosion streaming changed that prediction. Later he would end up acknowledging that this growth has proven to be more sustainable than he thought.
That bubble never burst. If not, he does not stop reaching new records.
The data. Specifically, this bubble is very clearly visible when seeing that between 2012 and 2018 the number of new series shot up from 300 to more than 500. In 2020, due to the pandemic and the cessation of many shoots, there was a slight drop. Until in 2021 we returned to the original channel. According to FX Research, which has been counting the number of series since he entered the field with his famous Shield in 2002, there were 559 original series on streaming and cable services. That is an increase of 66 from 2020 (13% more), when there were 493. In 2019 it was 532.
Since FX’s research only counts English-language programs, it does not include notable international series such as Squid Game and Money Heist, both of which drew sizeable audiences.
If it gives you the impression that there are many more series than you can see, it is not only that it is so, it is that in 2021 there was a maximum (559 premieres).
But this increase has been cooking for years, even before #Netflix be what it is today.
📺 Known as #PeakTV
Thread🧵 pic.twitter.com/onaa81NbMi
– Victor Millán (@victorcmn) February 2, 2022
More and more streaming media. In fact, in 2015, when Landgraf launched into that claim, he may not have known then that two years later Disney was going to buy the entertainment arm of FOX, and it would be swept up as one more by-product of an even bigger conglomerate than would prepare Disney Plus. The result also comes in part through other channels of streaming that have joined the fray since the decade began, including Peacock, HBO Max, and the rebranded Paramount Plus, which are now buzzing with ever-increasing volume.
After the pandemic. The recession in 2020 was partly due to the effects of the first few months of the pandemic, which caused production to shut down around the world and caused several series to “not be renewed”. However, as Covid vaccines became widely available and safety protocols became a routine part of the business, production increased again for much of 2021. Until what we have achieved now in 2022.
In Magnet
In its battle against the paradox of choice, streaming has ended up reinventing… TV
The evolution. To give you an idea of such a change: By comparison, on the eve of the streaming revolution in 2011, there were 266 original scripted series on television: 116 on rebroadcast, 33 on pay cable, 111 on basic cable, and 6 (have you read correctly, SIX) in streaming. And in 2002, there were 182 scripted series on television (135 on rebroadcast, 17 on pay cable, 30 on basic cable, and none on streaming, since it didn’t exist).
Benefits weekly releases. Free from the limits of time, and in many cases, of direct economic profitability, the services of streaming they can continuously generate new series. And with a huge arms race going on now in terms of how many billions each is allocating to original programming, that crank would just turn faster with more options. But the idea of starting a 12-hour series can seem more than intimidating. The possible beneficiaries? Weekly premieres and movies.
There are a lot of decisions to make and most likely a minor stressor if you fall behind in a series and their train passes. You start watching a series, but never find the time to finish it, resulting in all kinds of stress, guilt, and feelings of outrage every time you look at your TV remote. Weekly releases, on the other hand, don’t come with such stressors. We’ve talked about it at Magnet in this article. This system is scheduled for a specific day and time around which you can create your schedule. If you miss a day, two, or even a whole week, it’s pretty easy to catch up by doubling down on episodes. The return of linear TV is a reality.
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The news
If you have the impression that there are too many series, you are not alone: 559 have been released, a record
was originally published in
Magnet
by Albert Sanchis.