The popular online television and movie streaming service Netflix produced its first ever original, web-only content with the successful television series House of Cards, starring Kevin Spacey, which it released the entire first season of on February 1, 2013. Shortly afterwards, Netflix released the fourth season of Arrested Development and the launch of Orange is the New Black in the same manner. To illustrate exactly how successful Netflix’s gambit to release entire television seasons on one day has been, when the student body shuffles into John Paul Jones Arena October 18 to hear Kevin Spacey’s Speaker for the Arts address, we aren’t going to be waiting for a reference to Se7en, American Beauty or The Usual Suspects. We’re going to be waiting for a House of Cards reference. We’re going to be waiting for a little of Spacey’s Underwood southern drawl. So yes, Netflix has done well for itself. The question is, is Netflix doing well for us?
In the excitement of the internet age we’ve forgotten what makes a television series so compelling to watch. We’re too hastily sacrificing television’s charm for the short-term convenience of immediately having an entire season of television for our viewing. Even though the weekly-release format of most television series is continued in the current day to maximize advertising revenue and incentivize continued cable and premium channel payments, this profit-minded convention is integral to what makes television exciting.
Weekly releases importantly give us time to appreciate the series. We have time to properly ponder each episode, and our excitement for the next one ferments over the week. We have time to excitedly discuss each development with friends or to form ridiculous theories for next week’s episode. Where is that experience with the one-day release television season? Where is the sense of time and place when you binge watch House of Cards over a day or week? I remember breezy, yellow October weeks watching Boardwalk Empire, each exploit and danger blooming in my memory over the weeks. I can’t say the same for House of Cards. I remember a basement and a couch. I remember saying “yes” every time Netflix asked if I’d like to watch another episode. But I can’t remember what I felt at each plot turn. I can’t remember what else was going on with my life at that time. Every subtlety of the show was ground down by the rapidity with which I consumed it, and I didn’t have the time to associate memories with the show. House of Cards stands by itself in my mind, a vague mass, unassociated with any of the trials, victories, and feelings of the season of my life that enrich every other television series.
The obvious solution to the problems of binge-watching the show is to watch one episode a week or every few days — a good idea, but one with numerous problems. First, it assumes I have a superhuman degree of self-control, and waiting to watch the episodes puts me at risk of having the plot spoiled. But most importantly, not watching episodes at release forfeits the thrill of bearing witness with thousands of others to the show’s first viewing. When you watch a newly airing episode, the excitement of the actual content is compounded by the knowledge that there are thousands of others seeing and hearing the same shots and sounds, feeling the same joys, dooms, and stabs of grief that you are. This is why the movie theaters are still in part making money. We are all social beings; we crave solidarity.
And so, while I definitely will keep watching House of Cards, a bit of me wishes they followed the cable television format. Cable providers are generally awful, and it’s tough keeping a commitment to watch a weekly show — so Netflix is making a step forward in one way. But the step back, I fear, is that because of the problems I outlined above, Netflix’s original programming will never enter the cultural fabric the way other shows have before. Lost and The Sopranos are so representative of their ages in part because we as a culture experienced them together. You can’t in earnest talk of late 1990s culture without giving a nod to The Sopranos. Whether House of Cards will reach that point remains dubious. But in my opinion, without the weekly release scheme, no matter how well Kevin Spacey acts, House of Cards will never be remembered as the show that defined our current age.
Brennan Edel is a Viewpoint Writer.
Read More
EDITORIAL: Scapegoating students will not stop hazing
By Editorial Board | 16 hours agoInstead of retroactively responding to extreme hazing allegations, we, and especially the University, must begin asking more probing questions about the role of fraternal organizations on Grounds.
EDITORIAL: Celebrating and reflecting on The Cavalier Daily’s independence
By Editorial Board | 6 days agoOur independence grants us the ability to ask the hard questions and to say what University representatives cannot.
ARRAS: U.Va. must revise the Sexual Assault Prevention Training module
By Aoife Arras | April 17, 2024In addition to its failures in interactivity, the module lacks details specific to the University and discusses key concepts in universal terms.
