Series replacing Movies??

[bmoney]

Wife made a comment yesterday..."there are no good new movies to watch!"

made me reply thinking studios are really leaning towards Series.  All big name actors are in most series these days (save a few blockbuster movie actors) ....everything is a series

to which she replied I like a movie cause its short and has an ending.  unlike the commitment a series takes

thoughts?  Are series overtaking movies?

[SRW1000]

I hear similar comments from lots and lots of people.  Part of this is due to streaming requiring more and more content each year.  Series are generally cheaper, and provide more hours of content, so very prevalent as a result.

I'm firmly in your wife's camp, though.  Not only do they require a commitment, it's tough enough to land an ending with a movie, the stakes are only higher for a much, much longer series.  I'm afraid Lost completely broke my trust in sinking that many hours into something.  We watched the show religiously, getting completely absorbed in the story, spending at least as much time speculating on different theories, only to end up being beyond disappointed with where it ended.  We never started watching Game of Thrones, but it prompted similar cries of outrage when it ended.

I'm sure there are all kinds of great series out there that might be worth watching, but I will wait until they've wrapped up before watching them just to know it's worth the investment.

On the other hand, we can watch roughly 8-20 movies in the same amount of time and be content with roughly half of them, while experiencing a vastly wider variety of themes and stories.

[bmoney]

Oh I’m that call as well. I have onky started watching Netflix series cause I can watch them while running on the pelaton treadmill   Otherwise I feel like a slave to them lol. 

In all for movies. 

[Paul Heroy]

At first I wasn't sure if you meant "TV series" or movie franchises that end up being a series of movies.

But yes, with the last several years of streaming taking over that kind of swung things toward the platforms with that in place. Obviously the pandemic helped push that forward as people had more time at home to make the commitment to a series over a singular movie. But series have also pulled back, in that the traditional TV show that used to be 22-26 episodes per year, and on a regular yearly basis, has morphed into 6-10 episode seasons that frequently take well over a year between seasons, sometimes more than 2 years. The much anticipated S5 of Stranger Things, for instance, is a good example. The season premieres for it have been these dates:

Jul 15, 2016
Oct 27, 2017
Jul 4, 2019
May 27, 2022
Oct ?? , 2025 (Buzz of Oct but not confirmed?)

The nearly 3 year gap from S3 to S4 can be partly explained by the pandemic but it appears there will be an even longer gap from S4 to S5, with no such excuse.

I don't know with certainty what the take is from the business and talent side on this, but the impressions I have are that the TV series have a lower investment and a lot of people enjoy sticking with characters they get to "know" and relate to. So that maybe gives a longer and better run and return. Some of the streaming services, particularly Apple, have followed the old HBO model of shooting for a bit more "prestige" shows and bringing in big names. But they're really all over the place, which kind of means there's something for everyone.

[David Vaughn]

At first I wasn't sure if you meant "TV series" or movie franchises that end up being a series of movies.

But yes, with the last several years of streaming taking over that kind of swung things toward the platforms with that in place. Obviously the pandemic helped push that forward as people had more time at home to make the commitment to a series over a singular movie. But series have also pulled back, in that the traditional TV show that used to be 22-26 episodes per year, and on a regular yearly basis, has morphed into 6-10 episode seasons that frequently take well over a year between seasons, sometimes more than 2 years. The much anticipated S5 of Stranger Things, for instance, is a good example. The season premieres for it have been these dates:

Jul 15, 2016
Oct 27, 2017
Jul 4, 2019
May 27, 2022
Oct ?? , 2025 (Buzz of Oct but not confirmed?)

The nearly 3 year gap from S3 to S4 can be partly explained by the pandemic but it appears there will be an even longer gap from S4 to S5, with no such excuse.

I don't know with certainty what the take is from the business and talent side on this, but the impressions I have are that the TV series have a lower investment and a lot of people enjoy sticking with characters they get to "know" and relate to. So that maybe gives a longer and better run and return. Some of the streaming services, particularly Apple, have followed the old HBO model of shooting for a bit more "prestige" shows and bringing in big names. But they're really all over the place, which kind of means there's something for everyone.

What's interesting for my watching habits is that Paramount+ seems to get watched the most because of its TV shows, not because of its movies. We've been watching the original UK version of Ghosts (which is much better than the US version) as well as Landman (excellent), Tulsa King, and of course, S2 of 1923. 

[Craig Peer]

Oh I’m that call as well. I have onky started watching Netflix series cause I can watch them while running on the pelaton treadmill  Otherwise I feel like a slave to them lol.

In all for movies.

Same - I have no time for series. Ironically the few series we've watched I've bought on disc, so we can watch them on our time frame and on our terms. Besides, I don't really need many new movies when we have so many great old movies to rewatch that I haven't seen in years. Just got Amadeus in 4K, Jackie Brown in 4K, and have a pile of favorites that I re-bought in 4K but haven't had time to watch - Rush, Hugo, The Departed, all the Star Trek movies, the original Hunger Games films ( and the prequel ). Considering we are just wrapping up soon around 30 days of xc skiing staying in our camper van, and have around 100 days of camping in it planned this year, when I am home, I just want to sit down in the theater and watch a good movie - old or new. I am looking forward to the next Mission Impossible film - loved the last one. I might do Tom a solid and go watch it at a  theater and buy the disc. 

[Barry]

Your point about series are just now taking over from movies is not quite correct, but it’s not wrong.

We are part of an evolution that is made up of art, commerce and technology .

You see, series had taken over for movies since 1950 when people began getting their televisions. My parents would go to the movies and spend the whole evening there watching the double feature but then they got TV.

And TV started putting on series after series. Zorro stop being a movie and started being a TV show. So did Lassie, Dr. Kildare, and 1000 others…movies lost 50% of their viewers from 1950 to 1960.  And a lot of the famous older stars, Henry Fonda, Bob Hope, Jimmy Stewart, Loretta Young, Robert Young could only find work in TV. Now that level of star can only find it in streaming

It turns out that many people, especially older ones,would rather stay home . I remember when VCR tapes came out and people would have family nights of choosing a movie and watching it on TV. It’s only gotten easier.

We are part of that evolution. Series for adults went on cable in the 90s and 2000s. No one complained about the Sopranos being on HBO.

But people, forget that for the most part, on its beginning, most of what was on cable was commercial free. I used to watch the Yankee games when they were first on cable and there were no commercials. But the network learned they can charge you for watching and sell commercial time too.

With streaming, I’ve noticed that they’re slowly adding commercials on many things, but they have always had them on sporting events. Or they charge you a lot more monthly. Production will go with the money leads them. It always has and always will.

So broadcast TV is declining just like radio did. It’s not gone, but it’s not what it was.

And movie theater attendance has been declining now for decades.

PS: I am guessing on this. Broadcast TV ratings or dramatically down. This means advertisers are not paying as much as they used to. It also means instead of four minutes every half hour of commercials when now getting eight minutes every half hour. So TV shows are so expensive to make, and the union doesn’t seem to realize this, and we are getting fewer new TV series on broadcast TV

[bmoney]

Yes that makes sense. The new series are all on subscription based services. Netflix. HBO max etc. and they seem to release the whole series at once. To allow for binge watching. (Except HBO and Apple TV they still like to release one a week)

[Paul Heroy]

Barry, they don't drop the whole series at once any more, or at least it's very rare now. They realized they could string people along and retain them more by going back to the old school TV practice of 1 per week. They do frequently drop 2 or 3 the first week though.

Another aspect of streaming is, of course, a lot of data and control. They can get a very fine level of info about not only what people watch but how long, what gets replayed, paused, stopped etc. Netflix has done things to encourage more watching on phones and tablets where they can get even more data about you. 

[bmoney]

Barry, they don't drop the whole series at once any more, or at least it's very rare now. They realized they could string people along and retain them more by going back to the old school TV practice of 1 per week. They do frequently drop 2 or 3 the first week though.

Another aspect of streaming is, of course, a lot of data and control. They can get a very fine level of info about not only what people watch but how long, what gets replayed, paused, stopped etc. Netflix has done things to encourage more watching on phones and tablets where they can get even more data about you.

This is studio/platform dependent.