Often films and TV shows have anachronisms in them (like the very first episode, IIRC, of Narcos with the clearly very modern touchscreen photocopier where the screen has been covered with a piece of paper, or the BMW that wasn't released until the mid/late 1990s), but every so often you'll see something that is instead a flash of the future.
Due to #reasons I watched the sentry gun scene in Aliens for the first time in decades the other day. This scene only appears in the director's cut of the film. Anyway, bearing in mind it was released in 1986, imagine my utter shock when Hicks busts out a couple of laptops to monitor and manage the guns. The machines in question are a pair of GRiD Compasses, originally released in, I think, 1984. Imagine that: a laptop computer from 1984. They're not even that big and cumbersome.
Of course, the specs are laughable by today's standards but actually pretty decent for the period, and especially for portables. In terms of memory and raw CPU power they'd certainly have wiped the floor with the average home computer of the day, although graphics capabilities might have been non-existent, and sound would have been PC speaker at best.
So, yeah, Nedry with a tablet? I can buy that. His whole den/lair is like a toy box of the coolest hardware and software from the early 1990s. But for all the times I've seen the film, I've never spotted this before.
Lol I wrote Avengers instead of Defenders, not sure why the downvote, but it was a really good series of shows, it was highly recommended on Netflix at the time any time a new season came out. Disney just wanted to pull it into Disney Plus that much is obvious considering they've only just started to do that, with the same cast.
Not only this, but there's also Stranger Things, which imho had too many long breaks between seasons. Black Mirror was another one that was really popular. Squid Game as well.
Narcos is another and one of my personal favorite shows of all time, really captures a lot of details that I had no idea about as known by the DEA agents who went after some of the biggest drug lords of our time.
They also fund and produce some of the best high quality documentary series.
The Crown, Stranger Things, Unbelievable, Russian Doll (wow, just wow), Orange Is The New Black, Narcos, Narcos: Mexico, GLOW, Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Ozark, Nobody Wants This, Altered Carbon, Dirk Gently, Mindhunters, The Queen's Gambit, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt.
And that's just what I can remember off the top of my head. And that's my taste, there's more not to my taste like Squid Game, Wednesday, Bridgerton, etc. And not including the films, documentaries, shorts, etc. they done like Love, Death and Robots.
Sad news. HBO has a veritable treasure trove of TV shows like The Sopranos, The Wire, Six Feet Under, Silicon Valley etc. Even their more recent ones like White Lotus, How to With John Wilson are leagues above Netflix. Only HBO can bet on artists’ vision like that.
I cancelled my Netflix subscription 7 years ago, 99% of their content is algorithmic drivel. Mindhunter, Dahmer, House of Cards were something I liked but nothing beyond that. I knew they were trash once I saw the sheer number of spinoffs they have just on Pablo Escobar. They had had one decent run of Narcos but then they just tried to extract every drop of juice out of that one persona. Most of Netflix dramas are just the equivalent of abhorrent and ugly graffiti. Their shows are Exhibit A in what happens if you give into algorithmic drivel and have no human touch to curate them.
HBO has some timeless TV classics that I keep rewatching every year even though I have watched them multiple times. Netflix can’t produce TV dramas like that, ain’t in their blood. Completely different DNAs.
Netflix does deserve all the plaudits wrt to their streaming experience though.
As usual the official story and some details don't match, and the plane engines misterously disappeared from the crash site, preventing further inspection.
I watch Pluto-TV for the exact same reason: it reminds me of old school cable-TV. I turn it on and "veg out", just like when I was a teenager. I tend to watch it before I go to sleep when I'm trying to shut down anyway.
The movie, The Big Short, was on heavy rotation about a year ago. Good movie. They have an entire channel dedicated to Narcos, so I'm basically fluent in Spanish now - well, "drug dealer Spanish", at least.
Narcos and Narcos: Mexico were both good. Dark, Katla, Frontera Verde. I guess those are all non-English speaking, or in Narcos' case, mixed language. As long as you don't hate subtitles, there's been good stuff. Russian Doll, Big Mouth, and Arcane were all pretty terrific among English speaking. Brand New Cherry Flavor wasn't mind-blowing, but more than worth watching. Same with Stranger Things. That's just content from the last couple years.
Netflix honestly has plenty of good content. You just have to not use the in-app recommendation system at all and find content through traditional sources, i.e. word of mouth, professional critics, and industry publications, then search directly. As long as they allow you to find a title by name when you already know the name, they're fine.
Netflix suggestions are not good. It takes a long time to find something decent to watch.
I have enjoyed Narcos, Tiger King, Stranger Things, Queen's Gambit and others.
But there are so many bad shows, that are formulaic, unoriginal and overall, lame.
Then, I have nothing against noble causes such as social justice and such. But compare a good movie, such as Men of honor, or the Green Book, with the unoriginal content on Netflix. It is just not watchable.
Let's reverse engineer what a PM will think with data:
1. 80/20 rule: Target best performing shows, replicate success to capitalize on fan loyalty/momentum (new seasons or spins): The Crown, Money Heist, Designated Survivor, Narcos...
2. Validation: Look at high movie ratings, copy those categories: Korean dramas, documentaries, telenovelas, reality TV...
3. Culture: Follow trending themes on social media - feminism, financial freedom, woke...incorporate them into the screenplay, regardless of bias, craft, or message
4. Engagement: As long as we capture user attention and addiction, reinforce this habit via recommendations with AI algorithms
Like Facebook, they are focused on creating an addiction machine for short term gain, and this strategy is reflected on their increasingly low quality shows - this affects the brand, leading to low trust and rising churn
> Just eat less man. It's pretty straight forward. Just eat one meal a day (lunch) and you'll see the weight fly off.
You're suggesting a diet that requires a discipline that, empirically, is obviously beyond the reach of most people.
Here's much, much simpler advice, that is also more enjoyable to do: Just eat better. Or just somewhat better, and do some exercise.
You'd be surprised how easy it is to purchase or cook a meal that is delicious and filling, but not all too heavy on calories. Vegetables are boring when you boil them. Properly seasoned and roasted, grilled, braised, or sauteed, they can be an absolutely amazing side dish. Hell, throw a bit of cheese on them, that little bit of Parmesan or Gruyère won't make a difference calorie-wise but will add a divine dimension of flavor. It's easy to make a delicious desert that doesn't contain >50g of fat.
Get some exercise. I enjoy lifting weights but you don't lose weight with that, you do it with endurance sport which I absolutely hate. Luckily, there's a solution for that: any halfway decent gym opened in the past decade has bikes, treadmills, cross-trainers etc. with built-in viewing screens and Netflix, Youtube, etc. An hour flies by when you're enjoying yourself, and with a heart rate of 130bpm or so, you're basically not even sweating, yet burning tons of calories. Imagine enjoying a full hour episode of House of Cards, Narcos, or whatever your thing is and getting healthy in the process. You're losing weight by watching TV.
I think most advice that requires a dramatic change in lifestyle (like limiting yourself to one meal a day) is extremely poor because it requires effort that most of us aren't willing to expend.
I enjoy food. A lot. I like to go out and try it, I like to cook it, I like to share it with others. For me, "eating one meal a day" is absolute punishment, I'm missing out on least two occasions to taste something enjoyable, maybe even remarkable. And it's easy to do that 3x a day when you just watch what you eat. Eat proper food for a while and you'll never crave a Big Mac again, because you can actually taste what crap it is.
> Why don’t any other characters have to explain what makes them unique from the rest
They do. Geralt has a huge back story that explains why he's ripped and has a bunch of scars and why every peasant is afraid of him. Yennefer has a huge back story that explains why she's beautiful. If they casted someone ugly as Yennefer then that backstory wouldn't exactly apply anymore would it?
> I would say Black Panther is a story about blackness
Let's use another example then. Narcos - if some Asian guy was the one who auditioned best as Pablo Escobar, would you think that's good casting? Narcos is clearly not about Colombian culture, it's about the War on Drugs. If all the random cartel members are casted as Latino but the leader is Asian you think that's good casting? Or if we look at House of Cards - what if you replaced Garret Walker with a Korean dude. You think that's good casting?
> why does race need to be explained
Because one character is different from all the other people in their supposed race (Nilfgaardian). If there was a character that was taller than everyone in their kingdom I'd expect that to be explained too. Or if the character was white and everyone else was not.
> Growing up my class was all white, except one black kid
That's great, but completely irrelevant in this case. You are trying to impose your own social justice values on a high fantasy TV show. Ironically I find it's always white dudes in their 20s and 30s that have this view of the world. I bet you're white, male, a millennial or Gen Z, you live in a big city, and you work in tech.
The one thing I could think of while reading the article, this guy Denard's story would make a great movie! Despite the obvious nastiness, he seems to have lived a colorful life.
I know it is wrong to popularize such characters by making movies about them, but damn, such stories are interesting. I guess there is a reason bad boy stories (like Netflix's Narcos show) are popular
Curious if there’s anyone here who doesn’t regard this as over-zealous selective prosecution of political enemies that makes the country look like a banana republic? Meanwhile MSM pundits running around talking about witnesses “flipping” as if it’s an episode of Narcos.
From my point of view the problem manifests in this way: I simply don't bother to invest the time to watch new shows until it's clear that they're going to get a proper run that allows them to finish well (Breaking Bad, Justified; even Sons of Anarchy, which was a real slog for the last 3 seasons, ended well).
I'm tired of investing time in shows that Netflix simply drops: The Expanse (though now thankfully picked up by Amazon), Designated Survivor, and Shooter (although that was total crap, especially after season 1) spring immediately to mind, but there have been plenty of others.
I also won't bother starting to watch shows that I know Netflix have cancelled before they've concluded (e.g., Glow), because what's the point? And this is starting to severely erode the value of Netflix's library to me.
Things that have worked incredibly well on Netflix are shows that tell self-contained stories within a single season, like Narcos or Fargo, or shows that tell have a self contained but are able to tell it in a longer form than feature film would allow. The canonical example of the latter for me is Godless, which is one of the best shows on TV, I think. Genuinely fantastic.
And this last point leads on to another, which others have made: US TV series are too long, typically 18 - 24 episodes per season, multiple seasons, often too bloated with filler episodes, and often suffer from ridiculous over-plotting after the first few seasons, which comes off as aimless thrashing around: Prison Break (season 3 onwards: just utter nonsense), 24 (SPOILER ALERT: I mean, seriously, WTF was that Tony Almeida betrayal storyline all about in, I think, the final season - multiple sharks were jumped and I'm still pissed off about it).
On the flipside UK TV series are often too short: 6 half-hour episodes is still quite typical, so you're only really getting into a show and then suddenly the season ends. With that said, for some shows this has been made to work really well: Line of Duty, or the earlier seasons of Luther.
I do feel like, for many shows, a happy medium would be 10 - 12 hour long episodes. You could then afford to make a much more polished product, whilst still probably investing quite a bit less.
Beg to differ. Netflix has made some great local content, narcos, Dark, Casa de papel, The dutch civil war resistance miniseries, some great French comedies, and the list goes on.
I think it's great to see stuff not all coming out of Hollywood.
Disney values their family friendly image too much. Which is why they'll only ever produce safe boring stuff that doesn't take any risks. So you get these kid-friendly superhero and Star Wars movies, which are popular right now, but surely at some point an adult audience would want more? Especially when they're watching it in the privacy of their own room. Looking at Netflix originals (even if they're not very good), I can't see Disney making something like Narcos, 13 reasons why, Devilman, Love Death & Robots, hell even something like Sabrina (Satanic imagery) or She-Ra (gay stuff). Seriously, what shows in [1] excluding "Children and family" section can you see being streamed on Disney+?
This article has incredible annoying spacing (one sentence per paragraph). Is this meant to read like an unrolled Twitter thread?
Content wise: I recently cancelled my Netflix again because despite a flood of new shows, all feel incredibly generic and formulaic. I like shows across genres, from teenage romance to sitcom to thriller, and I am looking forward to watching e.g. Narcos new season when it hits, there are also great one-offs like Maniac.
I just don't believe in the strategy of flooding their platform with their own content at this volume. Or rather, the type of content. If I remember correctly, plots and artistic decisions are made by committee, and it just shows very hard how plots are made to be subtly educational, not offend, just a lowest common denominator of what the data says.
Not sure it works. After finding myself browsing through too many evenings in a row, I always cancel until something I know I want returns for a new season, then resubscribe for a month.
Friends is my most watched show on Netflix, but that's because there are 10 seasons with 24 episodes each (i.e. a lot of content) and it's just something that plays in the background while I do other stuff. I wouldn't care too much if it was removed, but I would if they took away Stranger Things, Ozark, Our Earth, The Crown, Altered Carbon, Narcos, Santa Clarita Diet, BoJack Horseman, Queer Eye, all the comedy specials and lots more.
>WRT Netflix, their stated strategy was that their access to data was going to allow them to create superior content
I would argue that Netflix has and does do this except for a different definition of superior. They aren't really trying to make a single show with broad market appeal. An algorithm isn't going to help with that anyway. What an algorithm can do is find niches to serve. Netflix has done a good job of creating these smaller shows that have an intense appeal to a small number of people. Gather enough of those shows together and eventually you have everyone covered. It is basically just targeted advertising except with TV shows.
HBO might have GOT that everyone watches, but Netflix has Black Mirror, BoJack Horseman, GLOW, You, The Crown, Russian Doll, Narcos, Maniac, Ozark, One Day At A Time, Big Mouth, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, and numerous other shows that have received critical acclaim and everyone probably watches at least one of those.
What i find amusing is that he only asked for $100,000 to build the network. To risk his life and his entire family for 100K ... even in mexico this is not a lot of money it seems.
The number should have been closer to at least 5-10 million range depending on the size of the family - enough $ to get everyone out permanently to a safe place somewhere far far away on a short notice when things go bad. (similar to that breaking bad guy who makes people disappear when things go bad: permanent change of identity, relocation etc. even that movie guy charged 250K to make that happen.)
But perhaps this IT guy was made an offer he couldn't refuse...
Also, i cant believe that someone running multi-billion dollar empire was too cheap to pay for bullet proof security system. You get what you pay for.
p.s. clearly you can tell i watched too many narcos episodes and BB.
I really hope they are keeping his family safe. The cartels are pretty nasty. Just watch Narcos, Narcos: Mexico ("Season 2" of Narcos) and El Chapo on Netflix (both in mostly Spanish, especially El Chapo) and see all the crazy history.
My fear is that Netflix is trying to hit the level of content volume where they no longer have to license shows/movies belonging to other studios/networks. They can finally turn into their own silo.
While Netflix's original content initially yielded huge hits (House of Cards, Narcos, Stranger Things), it's purely a game of quantity over quality now.
There is also the risk of Netflix falling into the same trap that Spotify is in now, being pigeonholed as focusing only on a certain type of "chill" music because that's what listening data points to. Netflix's selection would be awful if they created long-term commitments for shows that reflect today's tastes, and not necessarily what tomorrow will bring.
Someone recently commented elsewhere that they were tired of paying for streaming access to a bunch of shows nobody wants to watch, and they wanted access to the most popular movies/network shows/whatever.
I didn't comment then, but FWIW: some of the best shows available are now streaming originals from Netflix, Prime, etc. If you haven't checked out specifically any of the Netflix originals, you're missing out. It's a complete replacement for the non-sports watcher.
As posted in response elsewhere below, here's a list of Netflix's best work:
- Stranger Things
- Narcos
- The OA
- The Haunting of Hill House
- Marvel series. All of them!
- GLOW
- Ozark
- Altered Carbon
- American Vandal
- 13 Reasons Why
Also good:
- Atypical
- Love
- Flaked
- Maniac
- Master of None
- Chef's Table
- Making a Murderer
This is by no means a complete list, you can find that here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_original_programs_distributed_by_Netflix
I tried to skim through it and provide my own short list of what I really liked, so this is just one person's opinion.
Netflix has created some of the best TV shows I have watched in the past few years.
Strangers things, Maniac, The End of the F*ing World, Narcos, On my block, Master of none, El Chapo, Ozark, Glow, Disenchanted, Black mirror, Dare Devil, 13 reasons why, Jessica Jones, The Punisher, A series of unfortunate events, The OA, Orange is the new black
Those are just some of the ones I can recall at the moment.
Only other shows that I use popcorn time to watch are Game of thrones and Homeland.
I think the market overreacted a bit. They have been growing for so many years, there is bound to be a quarter here and there where growth stalls.
Having said that, I feel Netflix's biggest problem is content discovery. They have the best multilingual content that can be consumed globally like Narcos and Sacred Games. Yet they make it really hard to find such content. Their categorization is weird and not easily understandable. But what really bothers me is that their content preview is just a short paragraph. So you are asking viewer to watch 10hrs of content based on a short paragraph ? I would prefer a lot more info about a particular show before I commit to it. Info such as critics reviews, rotten tomato and IMDB rating, popularity in native country, more detailed description of the show, similar shows, etc etc. Basically I have to go ask r/television about a particular series or movie on Netflix before I start watching. I am pretty sure this leads to a lot of user frustration and ultimately cancellation
Yes, I see this issue with Netflix very often. Watching Narcos doesn't mean I'm interested in every mediocre drug-related documentary. Instead I'm looking for high quality, detailed, in-depth productions covering a wide array of very different themes, topics, locations and periods.
Algorithms don't seem to be able to solve this problem yet. Certainly not those used at Netflix.
Netflix is improving in some locales, but remains a shitshow elsewhere (experimentally: countries with under 40M population). E.g. there are German and Polish subtitles for everything; there are almost none for Czech. They do things like providing them for only season 1, but not the rest, or don’t bother even with their own high-profile shows. Slovak viewers can choose between Slovak, Polish and Ukrainian subs, but not Czech - even though the entire country fluently understands Czech, an extremely closely related language. Netflix doesn’t care. Or have even nominally-useful support.
If the Netflix app allowed side loading my own subtitles, it’d be fine. But of course it doesn’t and won’t.
So guess what I do when I finish Narcos season 1 and discover lack of subtitles in season 2. Or when a show available on Netflix doesn’t have any (and I want to watch it with my spouse who can’t read English subs quickly enough).
Murder? Quite frankly, that's either akin to terrorism or it is terrorism. It destabilises entire regions of harmless civilians.
The CIA did this as well in Central and South America in the previous century. They got away with it as well, of course. The series Narcos and movies American Made and Che Part One and Che Part Two are albeit partly about these subjects. Not to mention more recently the collateral murder video.
I'm not entirely sure why? I guess if you got the military and economic high ground you get away with doing things like that?
Yes, in Germany left means Socialist, right means Fascist, and the differentiation between conservatism and progressiveness is actually something you can find in each of the corners. I also believe that Germany is not the only country like that. E.g. I have just finished watching season 3 of the tv show Narcos and it seems to me as if in Colombia this distinction also exists and it is enforced even stronger, with the liberal power being in government, and both left socialist and right fascist parties being military forces on the outskirts (considering the ability to kill as a political power as well).
I agree that there is a distinction between Islam and Islamism. However I wouldn't say one is political the other religious. In the same way we can't put German parties on a US spectrum, we can't put Islam on a Christian spectrum. For Islam politics and religion are not two separate topics. It's one topic. If there's a distinction for Muslims it is for other factors, which I sadly don't know however. (If a Muslim reads it feel free to educate me on that part. I'm certainly interested)
Never watched Bus 174, but my first experience with Padilha's work was "Elite Squad" [0], which coincidentally, I watched via Netflix's DVD rental service. And less coincidentally, had the same lead (Wagner Moura) as "Narcos".
I remember me and others, on HN years ago, complaining about how Netflix was investing too much money into TV and original TV while skimping on its streaming movie catalog (this was around the time its STARZ deal was ending). Turns out their strategy was exactly right. I like watching movies, but nothing gets my return visits like serial TV, such as "Breaking Bad" and "Walking Dead". Investing so much money into "House of Cards" seemed bizarre 5 years ago but now that Netflix has so much exclusive content, it's hard as a longtime subscriber to just quit it. even as someone who now subscribes to Amazon Prime and HBO. I actually like Amazon Prime's library, which can be augmented with content I buy from Amazon separately, enough to quit Netflix. But my parents really like the Netflix shows (and I'll admit to binge watching HoC, as shallow as it is), which is something Prime or HBO will never have.
edit: besides the Netflix-conceived shows, e.g. HoC and "Narcos", there are the Netflix-bought shows, such as Arrested Development and Black Mirror, and what seems like countless comedy specials, such as Louis CK 2017. Back when I thought HoC was a poor investment, I was thinking that one really great show a year wouldn't be enough to keep me subscribing year after year. But Netflix seems to be introducing exclusive content several times a month.
> Netflix streaming, in my opinion, has degraded significantly in terms of programming choices.
One exception I'd say is that Netflix Original Programming is getting quite good. Narcos, The Crown, and Stranger Things are all fantastic.
But yes, in general their selection of quality 3rd party titles is horrible. It's rare to browse Netflix hoping to find a specific movie and not be disappointed.
My mother tongue is Dutch, as that is the language my family spoke growing up. My parents decided to give me a French education (we lived in Belgium then, which made that easier).
I learned English through TV (Flemish TV channels, and some Walloon ones are subtitled instead of dubbed), BBC radio and Linux documentation. I would say I was proficient around age 8. Around age 14-15 I decided to switch my American accent to a more British one.
I lived in southern France for some time, which exposed me to Spanish and Catalan. I'm not able to have a conversation, but I can follow a movie (I watched most of Narcos without subtitles). I took German classes in high school. I had a fair leg up thanks to my Dutch background. I wouldn't say I know the language in any shape or form, but I'm able to understand the rough lines of most written German.
I moved to Denmark about a year ago, took some (paid for by the government) classes to learn the basics. Pronunciation is horrible, but I have a fairly firm grip on the basic grammar, sentence structure (fairly close to Dutch, in the end) and vocab. I still do a fair amount of Duolingo and often ask my colleagues to keep conversations in Danish instead of switching to English. Due to the amount of English loan words in technical conversation, it's fairly easy to follow that. It's the casual conversation that is a lot more difficult to understand.
All of this to say: jump in. Move to another country, and don't rely on any kind of lingua franca to help you out. Watching TV in the language you're trying to learn, with either subtitles in a language you master, or once you've started getting a basic grip, subtitles in the same language as the spoken one.
Another thing you can do is watch English shows with subtitles in your target language. Force yourself to read the subtitles (this can be hard to do if you're not used to it). This helps with common idioms, sentence structure, and everyday vocab.
And read. Read a lot. Every country has a wealth of youth books, that, although not the most fascinating of reads, can be both challenging enough yet easy enough for beginners. Books also have the added advantage that they're asynchronous, meaning you can take time to reflect and research before hitting the next word.
In addition to film being entertainment, it's one of the most effective mediums for communication we have right now. Case in point: way more folks are aware of the Narcos subject matter than previously.
Now whether or not we can transition communication to action is another question entirely...
You should watch the TV show Narcos [0], which is about Pablo Escobar and Columbia. He has all the money and power that he could ever need, but still tries to amass more & more. It's intoxicating viewing and provides some insight into the mind of people who feel the need to rule absolutely.
[0] http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2707408/
If this is indeed forced by content creators, I think it is counter productive. They will just give more incentive to Netflix (and Amazon and others) to create they own content, as third part content lose them money.
Perssonal view: the "Original Netflix Content" sign already give me a more value perception. Between a recycled TV show and a new one by Netflix, I always chose the new on by Netflix. So far I watched all of: Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Making a Murderer, House of Cards, Narcos, Sense8, Bloodline, Orange is the new black, Master of None, Better Call Saul.
And I'll probably keep watching the next seasons of all of them.
Outside of Netflix, I only follow the very best ones (IMO): Game of Thrones, Breaking Bad (that's over) and Walking Dead.
What this means? I consume only the very best hits that these other content creators produce. For casual, day-to-day entertainment, that covers 90% of the time, I stay with Netflix.
"For one monthly price, members around the world will be able to enjoy Netflix original series including Marvel’s Daredevil and Marvel’s Jessica Jones, Narcos, Sense8, Grace and Frankie, and Marco Polo, as well as a catalog of licensed TV shows and movies. In 2016, the company plans to release 31 new and returning original series, two dozen original feature films and documentaries, a wide range of stand-up comedy specials and 30 original kids series -- available at the same time to members everywhere."
This implies to me that their original content is globally available, while licensed content will still be regionally restricted (and I don't see a way they could do anything else). Unless I'm missing something in the announcement?
Marco Polo — 92% (Fun Fact: Critics rated it 24%. How’s that for incongruity?)
Narcos — 94% (Another crazy disconnect as critics only rated it 78%)
The author preaches shows produced by data driven companies, then when a rating data driven company has results he judges abnormal to his taste he insinuates something is wrong.
Personally, I found Marco Polo okay, the visuals are good, but the plot got boring after a while. I would not give it more than 50%. As for Narcos, 78% seems legit, I found the whole traditional drama show mixed with documentary interventions awkward. And would not give it more than 75%.
As for the article, of course linear TV is going to get disrupt. But I doubt Amazon or Netflix will get a monopoly. AMC and HBO will simply put their content online, and TV providers will make their revenue loss from linear TV on higher internet consumption.
Not long ago I found a quiz which purported to measure how much of a "millenial" the test taker was, ultimately it boiled down to three main characteristics of "millenials", one of which was whether or not they watch TV. Younger people just don't watch TV conventionally much any longer. They may watch TV shows, but they do so using computing devices and the internet, not cable or broadcasts. The internet will only get better for that, and people will increasingly be abandoning conventional TV service.
More so when you consider that more and more of the highest quality and most popular video content has shifted away from the traditional model of regularly aired shows and schedule based content consumption to more plot driven content that is designed more for on-demand viewing. The shows people are watching the most and talking about the most are increasingly of the type that have fewer episodes per "season" and are more story driven. And many of the most popular shows today are only available online (House of Cards, Daredevil, House of Cards, Narcos, Sense8, etc.)
A lot of teens and younger folks aren't even watching traditional television style content. They're watching "streamers" and other video content on youtube. As they get older they may start watching more episodic content but I doubt they'll magically morph into traditional couch potatoes. That era is, I think, firmly in the past.
Hacker Cinema
51 comments on Hacker News
I love stuff like this.
Often films and TV shows have anachronisms in them (like the very first episode, IIRC, of Narcos with the clearly very modern touchscreen photocopier where the screen has been covered with a piece of paper, or the BMW that wasn't released until the mid/late 1990s), but every so often you'll see something that is instead a flash of the future.
Due to #reasons I watched the sentry gun scene in Aliens for the first time in decades the other day. This scene only appears in the director's cut of the film. Anyway, bearing in mind it was released in 1986, imagine my utter shock when Hicks busts out a couple of laptops to monitor and manage the guns. The machines in question are a pair of GRiD Compasses, originally released in, I think, 1984. Imagine that: a laptop computer from 1984. They're not even that big and cumbersome.
Of course, the specs are laughable by today's standards but actually pretty decent for the period, and especially for portables. In terms of memory and raw CPU power they'd certainly have wiped the floor with the average home computer of the day, although graphics capabilities might have been non-existent, and sound would have been PC speaker at best.
So, yeah, Nedry with a tablet? I can buy that. His whole den/lair is like a toy box of the coolest hardware and software from the early 1990s. But for all the times I've seen the film, I've never spotted this before.
Lol I wrote Avengers instead of Defenders, not sure why the downvote, but it was a really good series of shows, it was highly recommended on Netflix at the time any time a new season came out. Disney just wanted to pull it into Disney Plus that much is obvious considering they've only just started to do that, with the same cast.
Not only this, but there's also Stranger Things, which imho had too many long breaks between seasons. Black Mirror was another one that was really popular. Squid Game as well.
Narcos is another and one of my personal favorite shows of all time, really captures a lot of details that I had no idea about as known by the DEA agents who went after some of the biggest drug lords of our time.
They also fund and produce some of the best high quality documentary series.
https://screenrant.com/marvel-netflix-tv-show-cancellations-response/
Seriously?
The Crown, Stranger Things, Unbelievable, Russian Doll (wow, just wow), Orange Is The New Black, Narcos, Narcos: Mexico, GLOW, Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Ozark, Nobody Wants This, Altered Carbon, Dirk Gently, Mindhunters, The Queen's Gambit, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt.
And that's just what I can remember off the top of my head. And that's my taste, there's more not to my taste like Squid Game, Wednesday, Bridgerton, etc. And not including the films, documentaries, shorts, etc. they done like Love, Death and Robots.
Sad news. HBO has a veritable treasure trove of TV shows like The Sopranos, The Wire, Six Feet Under, Silicon Valley etc. Even their more recent ones like White Lotus, How to With John Wilson are leagues above Netflix. Only HBO can bet on artists’ vision like that.
I cancelled my Netflix subscription 7 years ago, 99% of their content is algorithmic drivel. Mindhunter, Dahmer, House of Cards were something I liked but nothing beyond that. I knew they were trash once I saw the sheer number of spinoffs they have just on Pablo Escobar. They had had one decent run of Narcos but then they just tried to extract every drop of juice out of that one persona. Most of Netflix dramas are just the equivalent of abhorrent and ugly graffiti. Their shows are Exhibit A in what happens if you give into algorithmic drivel and have no human touch to curate them.
HBO has some timeless TV classics that I keep rewatching every year even though I have watched them multiple times. Netflix can’t produce TV dramas like that, ain’t in their blood. Completely different DNAs.
Netflix does deserve all the plaudits wrt to their streaming experience though.
It's toward the end of season one of Narcos, but the subjects are cops and criminals.
Avianca Flight 203, the one Pablo Escobar blows up in the TV show Narcos, was probably an engine failure.
https://reportajes.elespectador.com/avianca-203/?outputType=amp
As usual the official story and some details don't match, and the plane engines misterously disappeared from the crash site, preventing further inspection.
The FBI was involved.
I watch Pluto-TV for the exact same reason: it reminds me of old school cable-TV. I turn it on and "veg out", just like when I was a teenager. I tend to watch it before I go to sleep when I'm trying to shut down anyway.
The movie, The Big Short, was on heavy rotation about a year ago. Good movie. They have an entire channel dedicated to Narcos, so I'm basically fluent in Spanish now - well, "drug dealer Spanish", at least.
Narcos and Narcos: Mexico were both good. Dark, Katla, Frontera Verde. I guess those are all non-English speaking, or in Narcos' case, mixed language. As long as you don't hate subtitles, there's been good stuff. Russian Doll, Big Mouth, and Arcane were all pretty terrific among English speaking. Brand New Cherry Flavor wasn't mind-blowing, but more than worth watching. Same with Stranger Things. That's just content from the last couple years.
Netflix honestly has plenty of good content. You just have to not use the in-app recommendation system at all and find content through traditional sources, i.e. word of mouth, professional critics, and industry publications, then search directly. As long as they allow you to find a title by name when you already know the name, they're fine.
A brief, incomplete list of Netflix series that would be horribly diminished by being movies:
Stranger Things, The Queens Gambit, Narcos, The Crown, basically all of the rest of them.
A complete list of movies that would be worse as series:
Anything by Michael Bay
Taste is not subjective. The critics (cc Metacritic, >>> Rotten Tomatoes) are usually right about TV/film.
Decent Netflix TV: Maid, Unbelievable, Ozark, Narcos, Bloodline, Mindhunter, Black Mirror, Sweet Tooth.
They average like one decent TV show every 18 months. It's an absolute disaster.
Netflix suggestions are not good. It takes a long time to find something decent to watch.
I have enjoyed Narcos, Tiger King, Stranger Things, Queen's Gambit and others.
But there are so many bad shows, that are formulaic, unoriginal and overall, lame.
Then, I have nothing against noble causes such as social justice and such. But compare a good movie, such as Men of honor, or the Green Book, with the unoriginal content on Netflix. It is just not watchable.
I've never heard of crash and burn I'll check it out!
Waiting on stranger things to end
I enjoyed Breaking Bad, Narcos, Battlestar, and some of the game of thrones seasons.
If you liked Narcos you might also like ZeroZeroZero. It's a miniseries on Amazon with really high production value.
Let's reverse engineer what a PM will think with data:
1. 80/20 rule: Target best performing shows, replicate success to capitalize on fan loyalty/momentum (new seasons or spins): The Crown, Money Heist, Designated Survivor, Narcos...
2. Validation: Look at high movie ratings, copy those categories: Korean dramas, documentaries, telenovelas, reality TV...
3. Culture: Follow trending themes on social media - feminism, financial freedom, woke...incorporate them into the screenplay, regardless of bias, craft, or message
4. Engagement: As long as we capture user attention and addiction, reinforce this habit via recommendations with AI algorithms
Like Facebook, they are focused on creating an addiction machine for short term gain, and this strategy is reflected on their increasingly low quality shows - this affects the brand, leading to low trust and rising churn
> Just eat less man. It's pretty straight forward. Just eat one meal a day (lunch) and you'll see the weight fly off.
You're suggesting a diet that requires a discipline that, empirically, is obviously beyond the reach of most people.
Here's much, much simpler advice, that is also more enjoyable to do: Just eat better. Or just somewhat better, and do some exercise.
You'd be surprised how easy it is to purchase or cook a meal that is delicious and filling, but not all too heavy on calories. Vegetables are boring when you boil them. Properly seasoned and roasted, grilled, braised, or sauteed, they can be an absolutely amazing side dish. Hell, throw a bit of cheese on them, that little bit of Parmesan or Gruyère won't make a difference calorie-wise but will add a divine dimension of flavor. It's easy to make a delicious desert that doesn't contain >50g of fat.
Get some exercise. I enjoy lifting weights but you don't lose weight with that, you do it with endurance sport which I absolutely hate. Luckily, there's a solution for that: any halfway decent gym opened in the past decade has bikes, treadmills, cross-trainers etc. with built-in viewing screens and Netflix, Youtube, etc. An hour flies by when you're enjoying yourself, and with a heart rate of 130bpm or so, you're basically not even sweating, yet burning tons of calories. Imagine enjoying a full hour episode of House of Cards, Narcos, or whatever your thing is and getting healthy in the process. You're losing weight by watching TV.
I think most advice that requires a dramatic change in lifestyle (like limiting yourself to one meal a day) is extremely poor because it requires effort that most of us aren't willing to expend.
I enjoy food. A lot. I like to go out and try it, I like to cook it, I like to share it with others. For me, "eating one meal a day" is absolute punishment, I'm missing out on least two occasions to taste something enjoyable, maybe even remarkable. And it's easy to do that 3x a day when you just watch what you eat. Eat proper food for a while and you'll never crave a Big Mac again, because you can actually taste what crap it is.
> Why don’t any other characters have to explain what makes them unique from the rest
They do. Geralt has a huge back story that explains why he's ripped and has a bunch of scars and why every peasant is afraid of him. Yennefer has a huge back story that explains why she's beautiful. If they casted someone ugly as Yennefer then that backstory wouldn't exactly apply anymore would it?
> I would say Black Panther is a story about blackness
Let's use another example then. Narcos - if some Asian guy was the one who auditioned best as Pablo Escobar, would you think that's good casting? Narcos is clearly not about Colombian culture, it's about the War on Drugs. If all the random cartel members are casted as Latino but the leader is Asian you think that's good casting? Or if we look at House of Cards - what if you replaced Garret Walker with a Korean dude. You think that's good casting?
> why does race need to be explained
Because one character is different from all the other people in their supposed race (Nilfgaardian). If there was a character that was taller than everyone in their kingdom I'd expect that to be explained too. Or if the character was white and everyone else was not.
> Growing up my class was all white, except one black kid
That's great, but completely irrelevant in this case. You are trying to impose your own social justice values on a high fantasy TV show. Ironically I find it's always white dudes in their 20s and 30s that have this view of the world. I bet you're white, male, a millennial or Gen Z, you live in a big city, and you work in tech.
The one thing I could think of while reading the article, this guy Denard's story would make a great movie! Despite the obvious nastiness, he seems to have lived a colorful life.
I know it is wrong to popularize such characters by making movies about them, but damn, such stories are interesting. I guess there is a reason bad boy stories (like Netflix's Narcos show) are popular
Curious if there’s anyone here who doesn’t regard this as over-zealous selective prosecution of political enemies that makes the country look like a banana republic? Meanwhile MSM pundits running around talking about witnesses “flipping” as if it’s an episode of Narcos.
I don't think it was a movie, but Narcos the series.
A few? Off the top of my head:
- The Queen's Gambit
- Narcos
- House of Cards
- Russian Doll
- Ozark
- Stranger Things
- Tiger King
- Dear White People
- The Witcher
- The Umbrella Academy
- The Crown
- Space Force
And that's just TV shows. There are a lot of films they've put out that are very good as well.
From my point of view the problem manifests in this way: I simply don't bother to invest the time to watch new shows until it's clear that they're going to get a proper run that allows them to finish well (Breaking Bad, Justified; even Sons of Anarchy, which was a real slog for the last 3 seasons, ended well).
I'm tired of investing time in shows that Netflix simply drops: The Expanse (though now thankfully picked up by Amazon), Designated Survivor, and Shooter (although that was total crap, especially after season 1) spring immediately to mind, but there have been plenty of others.
I also won't bother starting to watch shows that I know Netflix have cancelled before they've concluded (e.g., Glow), because what's the point? And this is starting to severely erode the value of Netflix's library to me.
Things that have worked incredibly well on Netflix are shows that tell self-contained stories within a single season, like Narcos or Fargo, or shows that tell have a self contained but are able to tell it in a longer form than feature film would allow. The canonical example of the latter for me is Godless, which is one of the best shows on TV, I think. Genuinely fantastic.
And this last point leads on to another, which others have made: US TV series are too long, typically 18 - 24 episodes per season, multiple seasons, often too bloated with filler episodes, and often suffer from ridiculous over-plotting after the first few seasons, which comes off as aimless thrashing around: Prison Break (season 3 onwards: just utter nonsense), 24 (SPOILER ALERT: I mean, seriously, WTF was that Tony Almeida betrayal storyline all about in, I think, the final season - multiple sharks were jumped and I'm still pissed off about it).
On the flipside UK TV series are often too short: 6 half-hour episodes is still quite typical, so you're only really getting into a show and then suddenly the season ends. With that said, for some shows this has been made to work really well: Line of Duty, or the earlier seasons of Luther.
I do feel like, for many shows, a happy medium would be 10 - 12 hour long episodes. You could then afford to make a much more polished product, whilst still probably investing quite a bit less.
Beg to differ. Netflix has made some great local content, narcos, Dark, Casa de papel, The dutch civil war resistance miniseries, some great French comedies, and the list goes on.
I think it's great to see stuff not all coming out of Hollywood.
Disney values their family friendly image too much. Which is why they'll only ever produce safe boring stuff that doesn't take any risks. So you get these kid-friendly superhero and Star Wars movies, which are popular right now, but surely at some point an adult audience would want more? Especially when they're watching it in the privacy of their own room. Looking at Netflix originals (even if they're not very good), I can't see Disney making something like Narcos, 13 reasons why, Devilman, Love Death & Robots, hell even something like Sabrina (Satanic imagery) or She-Ra (gay stuff). Seriously, what shows in [1] excluding "Children and family" section can you see being streamed on Disney+?
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_original_programs_distributed_by_Netflix
This article has incredible annoying spacing (one sentence per paragraph). Is this meant to read like an unrolled Twitter thread?
Content wise: I recently cancelled my Netflix again because despite a flood of new shows, all feel incredibly generic and formulaic. I like shows across genres, from teenage romance to sitcom to thriller, and I am looking forward to watching e.g. Narcos new season when it hits, there are also great one-offs like Maniac.
I just don't believe in the strategy of flooding their platform with their own content at this volume. Or rather, the type of content. If I remember correctly, plots and artistic decisions are made by committee, and it just shows very hard how plots are made to be subtly educational, not offend, just a lowest common denominator of what the data says.
Not sure it works. After finding myself browsing through too many evenings in a row, I always cancel until something I know I want returns for a new season, then resubscribe for a month.
Friends is my most watched show on Netflix, but that's because there are 10 seasons with 24 episodes each (i.e. a lot of content) and it's just something that plays in the background while I do other stuff. I wouldn't care too much if it was removed, but I would if they took away Stranger Things, Ozark, Our Earth, The Crown, Altered Carbon, Narcos, Santa Clarita Diet, BoJack Horseman, Queer Eye, all the comedy specials and lots more.
>WRT Netflix, their stated strategy was that their access to data was going to allow them to create superior content
I would argue that Netflix has and does do this except for a different definition of superior. They aren't really trying to make a single show with broad market appeal. An algorithm isn't going to help with that anyway. What an algorithm can do is find niches to serve. Netflix has done a good job of creating these smaller shows that have an intense appeal to a small number of people. Gather enough of those shows together and eventually you have everyone covered. It is basically just targeted advertising except with TV shows.
HBO might have GOT that everyone watches, but Netflix has Black Mirror, BoJack Horseman, GLOW, You, The Crown, Russian Doll, Narcos, Maniac, Ozark, One Day At A Time, Big Mouth, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, and numerous other shows that have received critical acclaim and everyone probably watches at least one of those.
What i find amusing is that he only asked for $100,000 to build the network. To risk his life and his entire family for 100K ... even in mexico this is not a lot of money it seems.
The number should have been closer to at least 5-10 million range depending on the size of the family - enough $ to get everyone out permanently to a safe place somewhere far far away on a short notice when things go bad. (similar to that breaking bad guy who makes people disappear when things go bad: permanent change of identity, relocation etc. even that movie guy charged 250K to make that happen.)
But perhaps this IT guy was made an offer he couldn't refuse...
Also, i cant believe that someone running multi-billion dollar empire was too cheap to pay for bullet proof security system. You get what you pay for.
p.s. clearly you can tell i watched too many narcos episodes and BB.
I really hope they are keeping his family safe. The cartels are pretty nasty. Just watch Narcos, Narcos: Mexico ("Season 2" of Narcos) and El Chapo on Netflix (both in mostly Spanish, especially El Chapo) and see all the crazy history.
My fear is that Netflix is trying to hit the level of content volume where they no longer have to license shows/movies belonging to other studios/networks. They can finally turn into their own silo.
While Netflix's original content initially yielded huge hits (House of Cards, Narcos, Stranger Things), it's purely a game of quantity over quality now.
There is also the risk of Netflix falling into the same trap that Spotify is in now, being pigeonholed as focusing only on a certain type of "chill" music because that's what listening data points to. Netflix's selection would be awful if they created long-term commitments for shows that reflect today's tastes, and not necessarily what tomorrow will bring.
of
- Narcos - The OA - The Haunting of Hill House - Marvel series. All of them! - GLOW - Ozark - Altered Carbon - American Vandal - 13 Reasons Why
I've seen all of Altered Carbon, some of Ozark, some of Narcos, and 2 seasons of Marvel (Daredevil season 1 and 2).
None of them were particularly amazing.
Someone recently commented elsewhere that they were tired of paying for streaming access to a bunch of shows nobody wants to watch, and they wanted access to the most popular movies/network shows/whatever.
I didn't comment then, but FWIW: some of the best shows available are now streaming originals from Netflix, Prime, etc. If you haven't checked out specifically any of the Netflix originals, you're missing out. It's a complete replacement for the non-sports watcher.
As posted in response elsewhere below, here's a list of Netflix's best work:
- Stranger Things - Narcos - The OA - The Haunting of Hill House - Marvel series. All of them! - GLOW - Ozark - Altered Carbon - American Vandal - 13 Reasons Why
Also good:
- Atypical - Love - Flaked - Maniac - Master of None - Chef's Table - Making a Murderer
This is by no means a complete list, you can find that here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_original_programs_distributed_by_Netflix
I tried to skim through it and provide my own short list of what I really liked, so this is just one person's opinion.
> IF I want to watch scripted drama like NARCOS, I can't find anything close to that on Youtube
If you step outside of the narrow US/English speaking world this isn't the case.
Here's episode 92 of a popular hour-long scripted family show from Vietnam: https://youtu.be/rqdqn5Rfx6w
You can see that it has 5.7 million views within 5 days of release. That's more viewers than, say, Daredevil gets.
Netflix has created some of the best TV shows I have watched in the past few years.
Strangers things, Maniac, The End of the F*ing World, Narcos, On my block, Master of none, El Chapo, Ozark, Glow, Disenchanted, Black mirror, Dare Devil, 13 reasons why, Jessica Jones, The Punisher, A series of unfortunate events, The OA, Orange is the new black
Those are just some of the ones I can recall at the moment.
Only other shows that I use popcorn time to watch are Game of thrones and Homeland.
I'd certainly add City of God and City of Men to that list.
Along with Elite Squad, these movies are simply amazing.
Wagner Moura. the main character in Elite Squad, also stars as Pablo Escobar in Netflix's original series Narcos.
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0609944/?ref_=tt_cl_t1
I think the market overreacted a bit. They have been growing for so many years, there is bound to be a quarter here and there where growth stalls.
Having said that, I feel Netflix's biggest problem is content discovery. They have the best multilingual content that can be consumed globally like Narcos and Sacred Games. Yet they make it really hard to find such content. Their categorization is weird and not easily understandable. But what really bothers me is that their content preview is just a short paragraph. So you are asking viewer to watch 10hrs of content based on a short paragraph ? I would prefer a lot more info about a particular show before I commit to it. Info such as critics reviews, rotten tomato and IMDB rating, popularity in native country, more detailed description of the show, similar shows, etc etc. Basically I have to go ask r/television about a particular series or movie on Netflix before I start watching. I am pretty sure this leads to a lot of user frustration and ultimately cancellation
Yes, I see this issue with Netflix very often. Watching Narcos doesn't mean I'm interested in every mediocre drug-related documentary. Instead I'm looking for high quality, detailed, in-depth productions covering a wide array of very different themes, topics, locations and periods.
Algorithms don't seem to be able to solve this problem yet. Certainly not those used at Netflix.
Netflix is improving in some locales, but remains a shitshow elsewhere (experimentally: countries with under 40M population). E.g. there are German and Polish subtitles for everything; there are almost none for Czech. They do things like providing them for only season 1, but not the rest, or don’t bother even with their own high-profile shows. Slovak viewers can choose between Slovak, Polish and Ukrainian subs, but not Czech - even though the entire country fluently understands Czech, an extremely closely related language. Netflix doesn’t care. Or have even nominally-useful support.
If the Netflix app allowed side loading my own subtitles, it’d be fine. But of course it doesn’t and won’t.
So guess what I do when I finish Narcos season 1 and discover lack of subtitles in season 2. Or when a show available on Netflix doesn’t have any (and I want to watch it with my spouse who can’t read English subs quickly enough).
Baltimore police were stealing drugs from Baltimore dealers and selling the stolen drugs to dealers in Philadelphia.
Hard to believe actions like that were taking place in the U.S. Sounds like something straight out of a Narcos episode.
Murder? Quite frankly, that's either akin to terrorism or it is terrorism. It destabilises entire regions of harmless civilians.
The CIA did this as well in Central and South America in the previous century. They got away with it as well, of course. The series Narcos and movies American Made and Che Part One and Che Part Two are albeit partly about these subjects. Not to mention more recently the collateral murder video.
I'm not entirely sure why? I guess if you got the military and economic high ground you get away with doing things like that?
Yes, in Germany left means Socialist, right means Fascist, and the differentiation between conservatism and progressiveness is actually something you can find in each of the corners. I also believe that Germany is not the only country like that. E.g. I have just finished watching season 3 of the tv show Narcos and it seems to me as if in Colombia this distinction also exists and it is enforced even stronger, with the liberal power being in government, and both left socialist and right fascist parties being military forces on the outskirts (considering the ability to kill as a political power as well).
I agree that there is a distinction between Islam and Islamism. However I wouldn't say one is political the other religious. In the same way we can't put German parties on a US spectrum, we can't put Islam on a Christian spectrum. For Islam politics and religion are not two separate topics. It's one topic. If there's a distinction for Muslims it is for other factors, which I sadly don't know however. (If a Muslim reads it feel free to educate me on that part. I'm certainly interested)
Never watched Bus 174, but my first experience with Padilha's work was "Elite Squad" [0], which coincidentally, I watched via Netflix's DVD rental service. And less coincidentally, had the same lead (Wagner Moura) as "Narcos".
[0] http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0861739/
I remember me and others, on HN years ago, complaining about how Netflix was investing too much money into TV and original TV while skimping on its streaming movie catalog (this was around the time its STARZ deal was ending). Turns out their strategy was exactly right. I like watching movies, but nothing gets my return visits like serial TV, such as "Breaking Bad" and "Walking Dead". Investing so much money into "House of Cards" seemed bizarre 5 years ago but now that Netflix has so much exclusive content, it's hard as a longtime subscriber to just quit it. even as someone who now subscribes to Amazon Prime and HBO. I actually like Amazon Prime's library, which can be augmented with content I buy from Amazon separately, enough to quit Netflix. But my parents really like the Netflix shows (and I'll admit to binge watching HoC, as shallow as it is), which is something Prime or HBO will never have.
edit: besides the Netflix-conceived shows, e.g. HoC and "Narcos", there are the Netflix-bought shows, such as Arrested Development and Black Mirror, and what seems like countless comedy specials, such as Louis CK 2017. Back when I thought HoC was a poor investment, I was thinking that one really great show a year wouldn't be enough to keep me subscribing year after year. But Netflix seems to be introducing exclusive content several times a month.
> Netflix streaming, in my opinion, has degraded significantly in terms of programming choices.
One exception I'd say is that Netflix Original Programming is getting quite good. Narcos, The Crown, and Stranger Things are all fantastic.
But yes, in general their selection of quality 3rd party titles is horrible. It's rare to browse Netflix hoping to find a specific movie and not be disappointed.
My mother tongue is Dutch, as that is the language my family spoke growing up. My parents decided to give me a French education (we lived in Belgium then, which made that easier).
I learned English through TV (Flemish TV channels, and some Walloon ones are subtitled instead of dubbed), BBC radio and Linux documentation. I would say I was proficient around age 8. Around age 14-15 I decided to switch my American accent to a more British one.
I lived in southern France for some time, which exposed me to Spanish and Catalan. I'm not able to have a conversation, but I can follow a movie (I watched most of Narcos without subtitles). I took German classes in high school. I had a fair leg up thanks to my Dutch background. I wouldn't say I know the language in any shape or form, but I'm able to understand the rough lines of most written German.
I moved to Denmark about a year ago, took some (paid for by the government) classes to learn the basics. Pronunciation is horrible, but I have a fairly firm grip on the basic grammar, sentence structure (fairly close to Dutch, in the end) and vocab. I still do a fair amount of Duolingo and often ask my colleagues to keep conversations in Danish instead of switching to English. Due to the amount of English loan words in technical conversation, it's fairly easy to follow that. It's the casual conversation that is a lot more difficult to understand.
All of this to say: jump in. Move to another country, and don't rely on any kind of lingua franca to help you out. Watching TV in the language you're trying to learn, with either subtitles in a language you master, or once you've started getting a basic grip, subtitles in the same language as the spoken one.
Another thing you can do is watch English shows with subtitles in your target language. Force yourself to read the subtitles (this can be hard to do if you're not used to it). This helps with common idioms, sentence structure, and everyday vocab.
And read. Read a lot. Every country has a wealth of youth books, that, although not the most fascinating of reads, can be both challenging enough yet easy enough for beginners. Books also have the added advantage that they're asynchronous, meaning you can take time to reflect and research before hitting the next word.
Edit: typo.
In addition to film being entertainment, it's one of the most effective mediums for communication we have right now. Case in point: way more folks are aware of the Narcos subject matter than previously.
Now whether or not we can transition communication to action is another question entirely...
You should watch the TV show Narcos [0], which is about Pablo Escobar and Columbia. He has all the money and power that he could ever need, but still tries to amass more & more. It's intoxicating viewing and provides some insight into the mind of people who feel the need to rule absolutely. [0] http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2707408/
If this is indeed forced by content creators, I think it is counter productive. They will just give more incentive to Netflix (and Amazon and others) to create they own content, as third part content lose them money.
Perssonal view: the "Original Netflix Content" sign already give me a more value perception. Between a recycled TV show and a new one by Netflix, I always chose the new on by Netflix. So far I watched all of: Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Making a Murderer, House of Cards, Narcos, Sense8, Bloodline, Orange is the new black, Master of None, Better Call Saul.
And I'll probably keep watching the next seasons of all of them.
Outside of Netflix, I only follow the very best ones (IMO): Game of Thrones, Breaking Bad (that's over) and Walking Dead.
What this means? I consume only the very best hits that these other content creators produce. For casual, day-to-day entertainment, that covers 90% of the time, I stay with Netflix.
"For one monthly price, members around the world will be able to enjoy Netflix original series including Marvel’s Daredevil and Marvel’s Jessica Jones, Narcos, Sense8, Grace and Frankie, and Marco Polo, as well as a catalog of licensed TV shows and movies. In 2016, the company plans to release 31 new and returning original series, two dozen original feature films and documentaries, a wide range of stand-up comedy specials and 30 original kids series -- available at the same time to members everywhere."
This implies to me that their original content is globally available, while licensed content will still be regionally restricted (and I don't see a way they could do anything else). Unless I'm missing something in the announcement?
Marco Polo — 92% (Fun Fact: Critics rated it 24%. How’s that for incongruity?)
Narcos — 94% (Another crazy disconnect as critics only rated it 78%)
The author preaches shows produced by data driven companies, then when a rating data driven company has results he judges abnormal to his taste he insinuates something is wrong.
Personally, I found Marco Polo okay, the visuals are good, but the plot got boring after a while. I would not give it more than 50%. As for Narcos, 78% seems legit, I found the whole traditional drama show mixed with documentary interventions awkward. And would not give it more than 75%.
As for the article, of course linear TV is going to get disrupt. But I doubt Amazon or Netflix will get a monopoly. AMC and HBO will simply put their content online, and TV providers will make their revenue loss from linear TV on higher internet consumption.
Netflix content is indeed amazing, Narcos is my favourite show by far, house of cards and others are also top notch.
In the beginning I was always wishing that Netflix would get famous TV shows/ new movies to the platform ASAP.
Now a days I really want to see more of their own content in the platform instead.
On that topic I strongly recommend the TV show "Narcos". If that degree of violence is the price for prohibition then prohibition has to go.
It is pointless to vote laws that are unenforceable.
Not long ago I found a quiz which purported to measure how much of a "millenial" the test taker was, ultimately it boiled down to three main characteristics of "millenials", one of which was whether or not they watch TV. Younger people just don't watch TV conventionally much any longer. They may watch TV shows, but they do so using computing devices and the internet, not cable or broadcasts. The internet will only get better for that, and people will increasingly be abandoning conventional TV service.
More so when you consider that more and more of the highest quality and most popular video content has shifted away from the traditional model of regularly aired shows and schedule based content consumption to more plot driven content that is designed more for on-demand viewing. The shows people are watching the most and talking about the most are increasingly of the type that have fewer episodes per "season" and are more story driven. And many of the most popular shows today are only available online (House of Cards, Daredevil, House of Cards, Narcos, Sense8, etc.)
A lot of teens and younger folks aren't even watching traditional television style content. They're watching "streamers" and other video content on youtube. As they get older they may start watching more episodic content but I doubt they'll magically morph into traditional couch potatoes. That era is, I think, firmly in the past.