Too Much TV: Your TV Talking Points For Wednesday, October 4th, 2023
Nearly every aspect of the streaming video world is layers of grey
Here's everything you need to know about the world of television for Wednesday, October 4th, 2023.
PROGRAMMING NOTES
Day five and the web site is still offline. Not much else to do but scream….
THE MYTH OF PEAK TV
I have been a journalist most of my life and if there is one lesson I have drawn from the experience is that journalists aren’t all that different than that stereotypical retired guy watching Fox News on his couch 12 hours a day. Everyone loves a good story.
There is no better example of that than the ubiquitous use of the phrase “Peak TV,” which is thrown around in the television industry with the same level of acceptance that people give to phrases such as “beautiful sunset” or “cranky convenience store clerk.” Everyone is familiar with the terms and generally accepts what we believe they mean.
But when you spend some time digging into it, what we think of as “Peak TV” isn’t an easily quantifiable thing. It’s a marketing term, a way to frame changes in the television industry in the most positive way for the person using it. So the fact that I am now seeing major publications posting pieces arguing we are in the “post-peak TV” era is a bit disheartening.
Peak TV is a term first used by FX's John Landgraf in 2015 in front of a gathering of critics at the semi-annual Television Critics Association gathering. He used the phrase to describe what he saw as one of the core problems facing the industry: too many TV shows.
Landgraf could not have chosen a more receptive audience for this message. With the growth of streaming, TV critics were already feeling overwhelmed just trying to keep up with the best new programming. So arguing there was already too much television resonated with critics in the same way that proclaiming there are too many fried foods to a group of cardiologists at a Midwestern State Fair.
And each year, Landgraf returned to update the critics with an even larger number of new shows that had been released that year. Which always prompted a predictable series of think pieces about the glut of the new television.
But Landgraf also had an ulterior motive when he discussed the ever-increasing number of new shows. His subtle framing was “There are too many random new things. Look at FX, we have some new stuff, but it’s carefully curated.” And it’s a message many critics ate up because Landgraf is a likable guy and he is always willing to talk about the industry with critics. And, to be fair, FX also had a generally impressive level of new programs.
The problem is that “Peak TV” was always an extremely mushy term. So arguing there is less of a loosely defined thing can make for some misleading headlines. And it's especially dangerous given that some industry decisions are being based in part on this flawed television narrative.
Landgraf’s “Peak TV” numbers were put together by some undefined FX research department and it tracked the total number of new scripted TV shows that had premiered during that specific calendar year. That included broadcast television, cable and premium channels as well as a variety of large and small streaming services. The list doesn’t include one-off specials, kids programming, or any show that is subtitled and/or where the show’s original language is not English.
There are a couple of problems with just counting the number of new shows and using that total as the metric. Firstly, focusing on the raw number gives a six-episode series the same weight as a new 23-episode broadcast TV show. A new 8-episode Disney+ Star Wars series that costs $250 million for the season counts the same as a single-camera comedy shot for $100,000 an episode. So given those variables, it’s difficult to draw much of a trend simply from the raw number of new programs.
And then there is the more complex problem of determining what you’re trying to measure. I assume that “Peak TV” is really seen as a stand-in for the “number of American TV shows.” This is likely why the list is limited to programs produced in English. But if that’s the case, then what trend do you draw if the number of shows produced primarily in the U.S. goes down, but the number of programs produced in English overseas goes way up year-on-year?
That scratches the surface of all of the factual problems with the phrase “Peak TV,” and yet I continue to see experienced industry people use that phrase as if it is some data-driven metric that is capable of tracking television trends.
Peak TV is not a thing. And post-peak TV is even less of a thing. It’s a glib, easy descriptor that stands in for “a lot more shows than I can comfortably watch.” Which is an interesting thing to point out. But it shouldn’t mean anything more than it does when someone looks up at the sky and mentions “Wow, there’s not a cloud in the sky.”
And don’t even get me started on the phrase “Netflix spending correction.”
TWEET OF THE DAY
ODDS AND SODS
* The Australian import series The Artful Dodger premieres Wednesday, November 29th on Hulu.
* Starz has given an eight-episode order to The Hunting Wives, a thriller based on May Cobb’s novel. Rebecca Cutter (Hightown) will write and serve as showrunner.
* The 77th Annual Tony Awards will air live on Sunday, June 16th, 2024 on CBS from a new venue, the David H. Koch Theater at Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in New York City.
* The Drew Barrymore Show is coming back October 16th, but the show's three WGA writers have declined to return.
SEE YOU THURSDAY!
If you have any feedback, send it along to Rick@AllYourScreens.com and follow me on Twitter @aysrick.