I was thinking the exact same thing a couple of days ago, when I heard about 1899 being cancelled. The thing is, I totally wanted to watch that, and it was on the "short list" of things I'd planned to start watching soon. But now that I know that it's cancelled, and especially knowing that it ends with a cliffhanger, there's no reason for me to <i>ever</i> bother starting it.<p>Look, I know there are financial considerations at play for production companies and all. But at some point you gotta be willing to either commit and do something all the way, or not do it at all. This half-assing isn't helping anybody.<p>This isn't just Netflix either. My big fear now is that the "Wheel of Time" series will be cancelled before the entire story is told. Which makes me very reluctant to start watching it. And if other people are also reluctant to start it for the same reason, that's going to hurt the viewership... which makes it all the more likely to be cancelled! You can't win.
The 1899 cancellation is when I realized that Netflix has no competent strategy to rolling out shows. It was #1 and #2 on their charts for weeks, only dethroned by Wednesday, yet they cancelled it. I fear that Netflix is eventually going to just make "Fast and the Furious" quality of original content, or they will go with franchises with known names that are licensed. They created the Witcher, are pushing out another season of it (despite the lead leaving, bad reviews and backlash on direction) and have a spin off that is universally panned.<p>Cinema is suffering from the same thing, which is why superhero films and franchises rule the silver screen. It's not a good direction for the artform or any semblance of quality. So many great franchises were rough (or had poor TV ratings) in their first seasons that are now considered classics. From Seinfeld to Parks and Rec to X-Files to Star Trek TNG, there are countless examples.
A month or so ago I saw a great set of tweets guessing at what’s going on.<p>Residuals.<p>(EDIT: <a href="https://mobile.twitter.com/PeterClines/status/1610408579940646913" rel="nofollow">https://mobile.twitter.com/PeterClines/status/16104085799406...</a>)<p>After the initial window they have to pay residuals every time people watch the episodes. As a series goes on, more people might start watching if it’s popular. The people who are already watching may re-watch it to get ready for the new season. All of that means paying for residuals.<p>But if your shows are flash in the pan, that’s not as much of an issue. When Netflix cancels a show what are the odds a bunch of people are going to start watching it four years from now?<p>And what happens if you constantly drop new shows and heavily promote them, hiding what a person was already watching? They may go to that new show and stop watching the old one? The window is new on the new show.<p>Why release all episodes at once? So people watch it fast, not over enough time for residuals to be big.<p>It seems like they are incentivized to keep people from re-watching existing things.<p>This may not actually be what’s going on. But it seems to fit weirdly well.
Let's not pretend that network television didn't have its fair share of shows being cancelled mid-stream.<p>It feels like the big difference is that Netflix is culturally bound to having very short seasons, which get pushed out at once but rarely (like, not even once per year). This has a bunch of effects, that make the cancelations more painful.<p>One is that the creators can't iterate and learn based on audience reactions. The classic network TV show pattern is a bunch of shaky episodes early on, until things click. If the first try didn't work well enough, too bad. You had your shot.<p>Another is that the creators get no warning for when the show will be over. The only thing they can do is plan for success. While a network TV show that's not doing well enough would often know "these are the numbers we need to hit in the early part of the season, or it's over". And then they can plan for wrapping things up. Sometimes this goes wrong, the ending gets rushed for a show that then miraculously finds another round of funding. But it is still better than the alternative.<p>The third is that shows have no time to build up word of mouth. When a new Netflix show drops, it is likely dead in the discourse two weeks later unless it was a once-per-year megahit like Stranger Things or Squid Game. When a once per week show drops, it'll get talked about weekly and (if the vibe is positive) pick up viewers. The most obvious case of this I remember recently is the utterly mediocre The Nevers. On the forum where I do my TV and movie discussion on, a Netflix show of similar quality dropping six episodes at once would warrant 5 messages in an omnibus thread, and then be forgotten. This got hundreds of messages of very engaged chat.
Netflix has fallen into the Google trap.<p>Google famously kills projects and half-asses things. This destroys user trust. Eventually people won't use your new thing because they don't want to become dependent on something that's just going to languish before being cancelled.<p>Larry Page's "more wood, fewer arrows" idea never really took hold.<p>Apple OTOH is very good (mostly) at focusing on fewer things and seeing them through. Apple Pay is a prime example of this. Every month there are more banks and financial institutions onboarded.<p>But this hurts Netflix on both sides. The obvious one is for viewers. It's becoming increasingly less likely that I become invested in some Netflix series knowing it's likely fate. Even the otherwise excellent Ozark's 4th season felt rushed, like they were trying to cram 2-3 seasons of storylines into one season.<p>HBO has generally been very good at seeing things through. There are notable exceptions (eg Rome, Deadwood, arguably even Westworld although that one is complicated).<p>But it hurts Netflix on the creator side. If you're an Aaron Sorkin type shopping around your series and you have a lot of suitors, why would you choose Netflix when you fear it'll get cancelled prematurely. Now you can write in commitments into contracts. This happened with House of Cards, initially two seasons guaranteed IIRC. But not everyone has that leverage.<p>It seems like Netflix has fallen into the trap of optimizing for the wrong metrics, specifically short-term new customer signups. Maybe they look at customer retention too? Maybe customers don't actually care about this? I honestly don't know.<p>I do think they're hurting their brand though.
> It’s now created a system where creators should be afraid to make a series that dares to end on a cliffhanger<p>I don’t see that as a bad thing personally. But I’ve 100% avoided watching some series that I know have been canceled.<p>I’m wondering what a better model might be? Maybe air the pilots and let the people decide?
While we're ripping on them, let's not forget that Netflix's strategy has left it with a vast library of half-complete series.<p>Imagine if they had finished, say, The OA, 1899, Glow, Sense8, and a couple of more of the series that had devoted fan bases. In the future, these shows would be a selling point for new Netflix subscribers. Instead, they're just junkyard scrap that almost nobody starts watching, since they know there's no satisfying ending.
This is ultimately why I stopped watching television. I want to experience the whole story, and I want to be know it ties everything up and has a satisfying ending.
Yup. This is actually why I just cancelled my netflix completely.<p>I thought it was pretty telling that in their little "tell us why you're cancelling" they didn't have "because we cancel too many shows mid run".<p>They didn't even have "just following your lead"!!
I don't understand why they don't now factor a TV movie or mini series to tie it all off, in the season's comissioning.<p>A Serenity to Firefly.<p>Even if one is shot every season that may be its last. Just left without post-production unless needed.<p>Everyone gets resolution, the show is presumably worth more in the catalogue and resale, and you've got people watching another couple of hours of content. No more "I'm not starting it, Netflix will kill it on a cliffhanger."<p>The shot footage can potentially be recycled for the next season anyway, or used to write out actors that don't return or whatever.<p>Would writing and shooting less than three hours of material, with no post-production, really cost that much more?
I still watch Netflix but yes after being burned so many times, I do not want to start a series until I know it's concluded satisfactorily. 1899 was something I thought I'd watch and was on my shortlist but I won't now that I know that it's been cancelled in the first season.
The worst part of this is the statement that 1899 was canceled. I just finished it and was looking forward to the second season. I guess there's no way in Netflix to know if a show is ever coming back.. Will there ever be another Black Mirror season.. who knows..
Sort of a tangent, but related: I read a lot of serialized fiction and it suffers from the same problem that there's an implied contract the creator will take the consumer through a complete story arc. But authors struggle with both writing new episodes and attracting readers, and unless they build enough viewership it's possible they'll lose motivation and just stop writing.<p>To protect yourself from this, it usually pays to either read stories from authors who've finished work in the past, or wait until they're done. Too long between episodes, or frankly lots of "slice of life" (cynically read: the author hasn't plotted anything out and doesn't have a plan to create and resolve conflict, so they just putter along) and most readers will lose interest.<p>Anecdotally this is why I stopped watching Rick and Morty even prior to the various revelations about the authors. They shed enough momentum that any interest in the characters or universe was lost. And R & M is a good example of what happens when there's no planned plot line: you end up with filler episodes like "Intergalactic Cable" where the authors just riff randomly.<p>For people who remember Babylon 5, there was a great deal of excitement in part because the arcs were all pre-planned which some viewed as a positive because there was no danger of the show just turning into episodic and formulaic exploitation of a known set of characters and places. We used to have TV shows just stagger on until cancelled, with showrunners hoping to be the next Simpsons, Star Trek or Stargate writer and now we're at the other extreme that if audiences don't show immediate and sustained engagement, the show (at least on Netflix, HBO MAX, etc) is doomed.
I prefer to think of this as a double-cliffhanger, in which the buildup of suspense relies on creating an aura of angsty dread over 1) will the protagonist escape from those circling hammerheads? and 2) will the producers cancel Season 2???
Personally, I've just cooled off on the whole episodic format.<p>The emotional toll of the cliffhanger, the hours of pseudo-psychological filler (sorry, "character exploration") in-between bursts of narrative progression, continuously going from one macguffin to the other... It all takes so much time, and usually for little reward.
Mindhunter. I'm hoping they pick that one back up. The long thread in that series is BTK, which they teased throughout the existing episodes.<p>Apparently Netflix never "got the numbers" they wanted, which disappoints the hell out of me; it is some of the best work Netflix has ever done.
We could learn a thing or two from the British in the sense of making short run series, designed to not go beyond two or three seasons. Like the wrap-up is known from the start. It seems like Netflix wants every show to go on for infinity, and if it doesn't show promise for that by end of season, it gets axed. Far better to make several well-premised stories with limited seasons, than so many false starts that piss off viewers.<p>That said, God help the English and their insatiable appetite for procedurals to the exclusion of nearly everything else. The only thing more amazing than the quantity of repetitive detective shows is that the population hasn't risen up in revolt over it.
I know Hollywood has a lot of very smart contract lawyers and CPAs, hence the "Hollywood Accounting" meme, which has been around so long that even in a Travis McGee novel, one woman mentions that the really creative people work in finance, "net profits" should be "nyet profits," and so on, but ...<p>If I were to start any kind of television show, my contract would have a heavily-armored section about getting N number of episodes to wrap things up upon hearing of cancellation. Maybe N as a function of the number of seasons (and therefore loose ends) would be smart. But <i>something</i>, so that the work could feel finished, rather than terminated.
I told friends and family to wait for season 3 before watching 1899 and to start with Dark. I canceled my Netflix sub after they canceled 1899 and won't return to anything but torrents for Netflix content.
1899 cancelled? Another low for Netflix, that series was great.
I wonder if series producers could demand upfront to be given by contract enough episodes to wrap up and complete stories so that the whole series doesn't lose all its value in case of DVD adaptation or re-run?<p>Also, please stop ending seasons with cliffhangers. Doing that equals to treating your viewers as dumb idiots who need an incentive to start watching the next season, aside destroying the series value in case of cancellation.
In an on-demand model, what’s the point of “seasons” anyway? Tell a story, break it up into chapters for easier consumption, and move on. Not all stories need multi year story arcs. If there’s interest, make another mini-series with the same characters or universe or themes. why carry the legacy baggage of network production schedules?
I've taken a similar approach for reading sci-fi/fantasy, where authors/publishers seem obligated to make everything a trilogy. I'm tired of reading a great book and waiting years for the next, so now I just don't bother until they're all done. If they're expecting to use the first book to decide whether to do the remainder (which seems rare) I'm not helping the situation, but hopefully I'm voting with my dollars that writing standalone books is appealing.<p>There's enough good stuff out there, or series being completedthat even at 20-30 books per year I'm not lacking for anything to read.<p>I'm looking forward to reading The Kingkiller Chronicle, The Stormlight Archive, etc. ... someday.
Someone more TV-knowledgeable can answer this for me or provide further clarification for me, but are there parallels between the Netflix show methodology and Anime?<p>From my small amount of experience absorbing the anime world, it seems like a lot of studios find a manga/source material, then cram all the storyline into one season as the funding might not be there, etc. etc.<p>I wonder if the motivations in the Anime world to put out one season are the same or similar to the Netflix show motivations - find a source material or writer who has a decent story, crank out a 1-season concept and if it takes off, you have a money-maker that will likely last a few years with more seasons/spinoffs.
Multi-season series rarely work these days. They will be either cancelled too early (e.g. 1899), or closed/cancelled too late (e.g. Walking Dead). Both are disrespectful to the time the viewer spent on the series.<p>Limited series is the future.
This article is really begging the question: Why do tv shows need multiple seasons ?<p>What's wrong with telling a single story in 8-10 episodes and calling it a day ?
Doesn't british television often work this way ?
HBO's Barry has a fantastic bit on this.<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ktAbh39aoU8">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ktAbh39aoU8</a><p>Hilarious and watching I felt it was targeted directly at Netflix.
The flip side of this for Netflix is that frequent cancellation helps keep cast and crew costs far lower.<p>The cast typically want a big pay bump when it has become clear the show is successful...
Why doesn't Netflix create shows that are more episodic? Like each episode is a self-contained story, like Star Trek (not the recent ones, they are barely Trek). And produce 20-30 episodes each season. Even if a few stories are not great, it still doesn't hurt the show much. People will continue to watch, and re-watch. It is also easier to start. I have been avoiding 1899, just because it feels so tedious to follow one over-arching story over 8 hours.
Why begin watching a program that I know has already been cancelled?<p>Why watch a show in its infancy, when I know Netflix cancels shows early and sometimes with cliff hangers?<p>Why watch Netflix at this point?
Maybe these shows are being cancelled because they're not good enough and people don't watch them.<p>"Netflix adaptation" is already a meme these days for a reason.
I actually prefer tight self contained single season shows.<p>Multiple seasons make me nervous, it feels like there’s an opportunity every new season for things to go bad and sour my opinion on a show. When writers are able to top the previous season it’s great, but increasingly it seems like the exception rather than the norm.
That's a stretch. Do people really anticipate cancellation and use it as an excuse? I doubt the loop is real.<p>Now, it is a real thing that NetFlix has abandoned all pretense of building a catalog. They're now just ratings-whores like most content providers.
>some sort of record-breaking fluke megahit (Wednesday)<p>I watched it and liked it, but huh, I didn't realize that it was a record-breaking fluke megahit. Good to hear it'll get a second season, though!
We were just screwed by this last week. After weeks of rationing out a detective series we came to the last episode just to have a cliff-hanger added in the last 20 seconds. And the show long-cancelled.<p>Sigh.
Here is a crazy thought:<p>Could streaming providers put this into the hands of the customers? What if they put the idea of "cancel or continue?" in their faces and made them vote with their feet (screens)?
Am I the only one who does not like episodes and prefers movies?<p>One the one hand there is time for development that a movie would not have, on the other hand it often feels drawn out.
netflix shows are so predictably boring. seemingly fake suspenses. suddenly ending on a turn. ofcourse we are used to certain patterns in tv. but keeping it so monotonous makes me avoid watching anything that is a "N" in its logo.
Someone maybe read too much mysticism and think they get a hard on (power?) by trashing their previous works, watching as no matter what they do with it, an established franchise with a strong fan base will sell no matter the content.<p>Same patterns emerge in gaming. Strong, very good gaming studios with established franchises suddenly come up with terrible sequels with mind boggling narrative, borderline idiotic, superficial characters and plot. And all of these took 5+ years to be made :DDD.
A lot of people seem to assume a network-TV economic model applies to netflix, where ‘ratings’ are inherently good, and high rated shows beget renewals, and so on…<p>But, Netflix subscriptions are much more in the ‘gym membership’ economic model.<p>People watching shows on Netflix costs Netflix money. They would much rather take your money and have you <i>not</i> watch anything.<p>The ideal Netflix subscriber is someone who won’t cancel because they think they might want to watch something some time, but who whenever they browse the shows decides not to bother starting a show right now.<p>This strategy seems optimized for maximizing that audience.