Too Much TV: Your TV Talking Points For Friday, October 29th, 2021

So what's new on your favorite streaming service today?

Here's everything you need to know about the world of television for Friday, October 29th, 2021. I'm writing this from the Twin Cities, where AllYourScreens HQ has been wading through the hours of interviews I still need to transcribe. Yes, technology helps.  But in the end, you still need a human to clean up the text.

WHAT'S NEW?
So what's new on your favorite streaming service today? That's a more difficult question than it should be.

It's easy to find the newest stuff on Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, etc. if you are only interested in the very top titles. The big budget movies, the television that is being prioritized for whatever reason. But as far as a I can tell, none of the major streaming services have a way to see EVERYTHING that was just added, no matter how obscure.

Back in the dinosaur days, the web interface of Hulu used to have a section that listed every single new television title, sorted by individual episodes or show titles. It was an incredibly useful feature for discovery and I frequently uncovered things I never would have found otherwise: international shows, obscure domestic programs that were just thrown into a bigger overall content deal and forgotten.

I suspect one reason services don't show every new title is that all of them add a certain percentage of shows and movies which aren't very impressive. It's just the nature of content deals in the streaming era. And the fear is that someone might look at the list of new titles and not be excited by what they see.

That certainly might happen. But it's more likely subscribers would find new and unexpected things to watch. And from my point of view, anything that increases engagement should be a good thing for streamers.

THE ART OF TALENT RELATIONS
I admire a lot of what Netflix does, but I have frequently been critical of their struggles to deal with the day-to-day coordination of so much new content. PR efforts are often an issue for less important titles and it's not uncommon for producers with less pull at Netflix to hire outside publicists to promote their titles.

That issue of smaller titles being lost in the whirlwind at Netflix also extends to talent relations, especially on the producer/creator level. This was recently tweeted out by Elizabeth Ito, creator and co-producer of City of Ghosts, the hybrid documentary and animated series in which a group of kids discover stories around their city by communicating directly with the ghosts who inhabit it.

The show won the L.A. Conservancy Preservation Award in Media last month and it's the latest in a series of local accolades about the unique and very entertaining series. It's not a huge title. It's not going to spawn a string of branded toys or other merchandise. But Ito is an Emmy-winning producer who is going to continue to create worthwhile productions. And Netflix is unlikely to be first on her list after this experience. So the streamer's inability to devote the small amount of attention needed to keep this creator happy will damage whatever future their relationship they might have had.

I highlight this because I have heard variations of this story multiple times in recent months. Creators who are thrilled to see Netflix invest in their vision. But once the deal is signed and the production completed, they feel as if the streamer's attention has moved on to the next dozen projects. 

COMING UP ON ALLYOURSCREENS.COM
I have lots of new stuff posting on the web site over the next couple of days and here is a rundown of some of what to expect:

* The new Apple TV+ drama Swagger premieres today and along with a review, I'll have a number of of interviews posting throughout Friday and Saturday. First up is this interview with O'Shea Jackson Jr. Also look for interviews with creator/showrunner Reggie Rock Bythewood, as well as individual interviews with actors Quvenzhané Wallis, Tristan Mack Wilds and Shinelle Azoroh.

* The History series The Curse Of Oak Island premieres next Tuesday and I'll have an interview with the show's executive producer posting on Sunday. It's worth remembering the show remains one of the highest-rated shows on television and that is in large part due to the fact that the series is in search for an actual treasure that does exist (at least, it did at one point). 

* On Friday, there will also be reviews of Netflix's Army Of Thieves, Hallmark's Coyote Creek Christmas (which premieres Saturday) and Discovery's Lost City Of The Monkey God (which premieres Sunday).

* On Sunday, there will be reviews of the season premiere of Dr. Who, IMDB's Judy Justice (which premieres Monday), Acorn TV's Dalgliesh (premieres Monday) and Discovery's Undercover Underage (premieres Tuesday)

THIS MOSTLY SOUNDS LIKE A WHOLE LOT OF BUZZWORDS
In yesterday's newsletter, I linked to a piece I had written about my qualms about the so-called Metaverse. I'm not sure if lots of people agree with my POV or they were just hating-reading. But the piece was shared by a number of people on social media and it's received more than 400,000 pageviews in the first 24 hours. Which is an impressive bit of traffic for a site my size.

The Metaverse was the center of a lot of talk on Thursday, in large part because Mark Zuckerberg used the upcoming Metaverse as the rationale for changing the name of Facebook to Meta. It's worth noting that Zuckerberg's explanation of the Metaverse is a bit different than the picture painted by some other Metaverse enthusiasts. Zuckerberg sees the Metaverse as a gamified social media and sales platform, where users can have this immersive experience that is in many ways better than real life.

Matthew Ball is arguably one of the biggest proponents of the Metaverse. He's written about the metaverse for years as managing director of Epyllion, an early stage venture fund, and proprietor of a metaverse-oriented E.T.F. He spoke with Puck's Matt Belloni on Thursday and Ball's take on the Metaverse appears to have become much less expansive. He seems to be arguing that it's a great way for entertainment companies to share their IP across competing platforms, although he admits it might require some less restrictive licensing than is currently the norm:

You’re saying that in order to compete in the metaverse, Hollywood needs to be more permissive with its assets in virtual and gaming environments.

Marvel, 12 years ago, had a model where 1.2 Marvel films came out per year. In 2019, that grew to three MCU films per year. Now we’re at the point where there are five films per year and six TV series. It’s effectively an always-on entertainment system. It’s very clear that the next frontier for integration is going to be video games. And that’s not going to be a tagalong story, it will be an ongoing, nonlinear story. You may watch a [Marvel movie], you will come home, Robert Downey, Jr.—or someone who isn’t Robert Downey Jr. but is live motion-capturing Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark—will run some sort of battle or conquest, and you and your friends will go along and save the day. And that will become integrated into the culture. It doesn’t mean that the frontier of Marvel is gaming. It will stay film and TV. What it means is: what is put on screen is translated into an environment, and the audience is brought directly along for the ride. And then you weave that into your story.

It's worth reading the entire interview, although Ball's description of his Metaverse is weirdly scaled down while simultaneously unlikely.  Aside from the less-restrictive IP proposals, I have trouble believing that even with a seamless virtual reality experience, people will be content to visit a theme park like Disney World digitally. 

TWEET OF THE DAY

OKAY, ONE LAST METAVERSE MOMENT
In an interview with Ben Thompson, Mark Zuckerberg described his vision of a possible Meta-powered Metaverse and it quite honestly sounds horrifying:

ODDS AND SODS
* The remarkable story of a man who found 162 bowling balls under his house. And as weird as the story is, it has one last twist.

* Returning to books after climbing peak TV.

SEE YOU FRIDAY! 

If you have any feedback, send it along to Rick@AllYourScreens.com and follow me on Twitter @aysrick.