Why I Can No Longer Get Excited About Netflix

Netflix streamed Tudum, their equivalent of network upfronts crossed with San Diego Comic Con, over the weekend. The priority was building as much hype as possible for both dominant hit series like Stranger Things and Bridgerton and introducing captive audiences to new wannabe smashes, most notably the expensive adaptations of The 3 Body Problem and One Piece. There was plenty of excitement online, especially from fans of these IPs. Yet the tedium of the spectacle was also evident. I was one of the cynics, watching trailers for things I was previously intrigued by and feeling little true pleasure. I can’t get excited by Netflix anymore, and frankly, I don’t think they deserve my enthusiasm.

How does one allow anticipation to simmer when the source for it is so wearily unreliable? No network or broadcasting platform is reliable, per se, but Netflix has taken that to preposterous levels. It’s a service designed with maximum opacity and that has turned the act of being a viewer into an interminable slog. I wrote before about how the failings of modern television have rendered what should be simple entertainment into an exhausting grind that punishes fans and creators alike. As the WGA strike continues, it’s clear that those well-tended errors are near and dear to Netflix executives’ hearts. They don’t want to change because they benefit so highly from the gamification of the system. Under these impossible circumstances, they cannot lose (or at least can’t do so publicly because we all know that house is built on shaky foundations.) So, with this being the default, why the hell should I care about anything Netflix makes now?

Take One Piece for example. It’s a true cultural phenomenon, one of the biggest-selling manga series of all-time and an anime adaptation with over 1000 episodes (?!) to its name so far. A lavish live-action adaptation should make me want to clap like a seal. Think of the potential! A vibrant slapstick pirate adventure comedy with real emotional stakes and a frenetic style all its own! It’s the kind of thing you dream of seeing on this scale. Of course, Netflix has not earned the goodwill required to make me fully care. Putting aside the general tonal mismatch of the trailer and its drab palate, all I could think while watching it was, ‘So, does this get cancelled after two seasons or three?’ I remember Cowboy Bebop. You think this show is getting more than one manga arc completed? Why bother investing when the end is in sight before it’s already begun?

Quality problems is also an evident shadow looming overhead with Netflix. Sure, they’ve made some legitimately great television, but the overload in quantity often overwhelms things. I’ve talked before about my issues with the streamer’s true crime assembly line, which replicates a slick aesthetic over and over for faux-prestige presentations of garden variety exploitation. The problem is wearily evident in their fictional programming, both TV and film. It’s content, algorithmically birthed to meet a series of questionable demands from a formula that seems impenetrable to all who aren’t Netflix executives. You feel this most heavily with things like the Extraction films starring Chris Hemsworth, of which there are inexplicably two installments in this so-called franchise. It’s anonymous storytelling, lifeless time fillers that seldom seem to aim for anything more praiseworthy than, ‘that was okay, I suppose.’

Of course, the problem isn’t just with Netflix but you can see the sickness spreading across multiple platforms. Apple TV+ hit a curious new low with its most recent original film, Ghosted, which The Guardian declared to be ‘a staggeringly, maddeningly atrocious heap of increasingly boneheaded decisions that will act as depressing documentation of just how rotten things got in the current oversaturated streaming landscape.’ Ouch. In a podcast interview, the film’s director, Dexter Fletcher, stated that his big plans for a splashy opening scene were nixed by Apple because if ‘something doesn’t happen in the first 30 seconds, people will just turn off.’ Not much separates a Ghosted from Netflix’s action original of the moment, all made with exorbitant budgets that still appear as though they were produced on the same Atlanta sound studio with the same overworked effects teams.

Netflix has certainly made enough exceptions that would usually earn a company the benefit of the doubt, but that luxury was long nixed when it comes to this streamer. Good series increasingly feel like happy accidents, tiny victories in the face of bureaucratic jackassery. And even the stuff I feel true attachment to comes with unbearable caveats. Oh, you like this show? Well, I hope you watched every episode multiple times in the first week of release or it doesn’t count. Did you tell all your friends to watch it too? Are you keeping it on repeat in the background just to up the numbers because who knows if Netflix will want to renew it because their magical system for deciding cancellations is more secretive than some countries’ nuclear codes! Sound too much like hard work? Too bad, because now it’s been cancelled. Sorry, we tried so hard not to cancel it but the algorithm rules all.

I’m sure a lot of this sounds repetitive to many of you, a cycle of arguments we’ve had before on this site. Indeed, when I looked up research for questions on Netflix’s quality problem, I found articles dating back almost five years. This is a constant, and it must be so for a reason. It’s working for Netflix, even in the face of mass industry-wide strikes and an increasingly dissatisfied viewership who feel smothered by these limitations. One can only hope that the writers’ strike and impending SAG battles force through some much-needed change. It’d be nice to feel something other than eye-rolling tedium over the biggest name in streaming. Aren’t we all sick of gruel?