Binge-watch.
A few years ago, it meant nothing. Now, for many, it’s a way of life: streaming television shows — episode after episode. Last weekend, by lunch time, Christopher had watched all 13 episodes of Netflix’s Daredevil. Shawn has watched time pass by in episodes of House of Cards. We both go back to different Star Trek series.
Technology has changed the way people watch television, and with that, television itself has changed…and even changed us. Ongoing storylines hook people, bringing them back and keeping them talking about TV more than ever. That’s what we’re talking about this week.
We begin by talking about the first series television shows we remember seeing, and then we jump to the biggest draw of ongoing storylines. After that, we talk about what kinds of stories seem more suited for series TV than others.
Sometimes, shows move along great and then…fall apart. We talk about some of the problems series shows can face, and then we talk not only about our all-time favorite (and current favorite) series shows, but why we like them so much. After that, we discuss how cable TV and Netflix/Amazon have changed series television.
Salman Rushdie has praised series TV. Other big writers are just as hooked. Some of these writers have stated that if they were starting out writing now, they’ve go straight to series television. We talk about how series television has affected novels, and then talk about the effect series TV has had on other media.
Being the geeks that we are, we devote some time to talking about things we’d love to see turned into ongoing television shows — and then we talk about things we’ve written that we’d like to see as a series. (We even share loglines and the dreaded “It’s Weekend at Bernies meets On Golden Pond” mash-up line we’d use to describe our show.)
We close out the episode talking about the future of series television…and how we’ll view shows in the coming years.
As always, feel free to share your feelings about this week’s topic in the comments below…
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