… or somewhere in between, like in two halves released a few weeks apart?
One of my co-workers is watching a show that is dropping week-by-week and has been complaining about it for a few weeks. She wants to watch the whole thing at once and it drives her crazy that she has to wait. She likes to make the new season of a show she likes a sort of event- clears her schedule and spends a couple days immersed in it.
I feel the opposite. That is, I love having shows released week-by-week because it gives me some little thing to look forward to each week. It also means I get to enjoy them longer. And, any regular week-by-week cliffhangers have more impact when you have to wait a week than they do if you can just click “next episode.” Also, it makes it easier to discuss with your friends (or to have online discussions) about the show when everyone is more-or-less on the same episode.
Which do you prefer? Is is the same answer for different kinds of shows (like scripted shows vs. reality shows, comedy vs. drama) or does it depend on the show?
For streaming services, I far prefer to have them all released at once. My preferred watching speed is usually one or two per night. And even if I wanted to watch one a week, then I could easily do that with a season that dropped all at once anyways.
This is really the only reason to release episodes week-by-week (to build up buzz/discussion about the show), but I much prefer to discuss a TV season after the end of the season. I find speculation about what’s going to happen on the next episode to be kind of annoying.
The part of me that likes instant gratification wants whole seasons at once. But I’ve found that binge-watching just isn’t the same experience as week-by-week (or year-by-year, if you come in late on a ninge) watching. You absorb so much less in a binge. For instance, I came in fairly late to Buffy the Vampire Slayer but still spent about four years watching it all. I know/remember much more about the characters and plots than I do some show where I watched a season in a couple of days a month ago. (Season 2 of a show called Shadow and Bone recently dropped. I was a way into reading the description before I finally realized that I had actually watched Season 1.)
I don’t watch a ton of television but the weekly Mad Men threads here really helped me appreciate the show more. Spending a few days chewing each episode over, pointing out things that might have otherwise been missed, discussing the characters, etc added an extra layer to the experience that I don’t think would have been there by binging each season (even if there was a thread on the season later).
On the other hand, I can see where this would be less of a thing with 30min episodes of a comedy so I guess it depends a bit on the show and what value there is in digesting each episode.
Like @Darren_Garrison, I find that watching episodes of a show one by one rather than binge-watching leads to better recollection. I’ve started watching a second season of a show after seeing the first all at once and realized that I don’t really remember what happened in the first season.
For me, it’s like reading a book in physical form rather than on an e-reader. After years of reading library books on Kindle, I now often check out a book that Amazon tells me I’ve read but that I don’t clearly recall. I never have that experience if I’ve read the physical book.
We like to watch inoffensive sitcoms in the evenings - one or two half-hour episodes before bed to cleanse the mental palate, as it were - and I’ve noticed that I’m much less forgiving of mediocre writing and acting if I’m watching the shows in aggregate. I can overlook the standard “family misunderstanding leads to wacky behavior and loving denouement” plots if I’m not watching them end-to-end.
I’m curious how old she is. For me and perhaps many of us of a certain age, it seems a bit odd to complain about this because, for the majority of our lives, that’s just How Television Worked.
I notice that the question asks how you prefer shows to be released, not how you prefer to watch them. And I suppose it doesn’t ultimately matter: Just because the episodes are released all at once doesn’t mean you can’t watch one a week; and if they’re released one a week, you can wait until they’re all available and binge-watch them then.
So it doesn’t really matter to me. But if you forced me to choose, I’d choose week by week, for the perverse pleasure I derive from thwarting people’s demand for instant gratification.
My preference is all at once, by far. In fact, I generally don’t start watching a show until it has ended, so I can watch the whole thing at my pace. What I really hate is long inter-season gaps. I often find that when I come back to the show after a 6 month break, I need to rewatch the earlier episodes to refresh my memory and come up to speed again. I’m over 60 years old, so this isn’t because I’m unfamiliar with traditional TV scheduling, I just don’t like it any more.
We would prefer if all episodes were released at the same time and we can watch them at our pace. We find that series that have continuing story lines (often several) and just too difficult to keep track of if only watched once a week.
Of course, we could wait until all episodes have been released and then watch them however we want, but what’s the fun in that? Typically, when trying out a series, we watch the first episode, and if that’s promising, watch a second immediately to see where it goes.
I get more enjoyment and pay more attention when they are doled out one episode per week, but the instant gratification side of me wants the entire season released at once.
I’m hearing (possibly apocryphal) stories of people young enough to have grown up with Netflix enthusing about the exciting new model of releasing episodes once per week.
For those who claim to enjoy weekly episodes, how do you know you might not get even more enjoyment if you watched one every 8 days? Or 5 days? I find it hard to believe that TV scientists have determined that a 7 day cooling-off period is optimum for televisual enjoyment.
At least in ye olde broadcast television days, a TV network would provide a block of shows every evening. Does Amazon Prime have the equivalent of Must See TV Thursday nights? Not as far as I know.
On a similar note, for popular weekly show I feel the need to watch them as quickly as possible because of how easy it is to encounter spoilers. Even from, Google News which featured an article headline spoiling a plotline for this week’s The Mandalorian the day the episode came out.
I don’t, but then that’s never really been the question or an option. If a service stats releasing shows on a five day schedule then I guess people can opine on how they like it versus a seven day schedule.
I watch Asian dramas and wait until they’re done, usually 12-16 episodes, then download the complete set. There are a few weekly variety shows I watch, but not necessarily every week.
For the rare U.S. series I watch, like Law & Order SVU, I wait until I can watch it On Demand, so it has fewer commercials.
Yes and that suffices for those who forgot last week’s plot developments but I’m talking beyond that. The experience of a show is different when viewed weekly and when relatively binged. I’m commenting about writing with those divergent viewing experiences in mind.
Going back in time - there were many shows that had a weekly general formula that was repeated with variations each ep. That worked fine for shows as diverse as Columbo to iZombie. It would not work as well for binging. Longer arcs OTOH do well with binging without the “previously on” recaps …