As of late, TV production and streaming services have been drastically lacking in their abilities to perform well for their audiences.
An idea that isn’t new but is becoming more frequent within these services, is the creation of a “split” in between seasons and/or episodes. This has been especially seen to be done by Netflix and Disney +.
Disney + is generally known for splitting their new releases into weekly episodes. This honestly isn’t a terrible idea. It gives time for their audiences to recuperate from the previous episodes and it also builds suspense and allows for them to advertise the next episode all within a week. Weekly episodes also keep the show running smoothly and within a timely 9-week manner or so.
Though weekly episodes are not the worst ideas streaming services have come up with, Netflix might have taken that title deciding to split seasons into parts. They’d release a couple of episodes to the original release date and then release the remaining episodes on a later date.
The big idea behind these “marketing tactics” seem to be that they want to retain viewers’ suspense and interest in their shows. It’s also supposed to keep the audience renewing their membership for several months until the next part comes out.
A prime example of this would be the finale season of Cobra Kai. Season six of Cobra Kai is being split into three separate parts with five episodes each.
The original release date would have been July 18, 2024. While the first five episodes did end up releasing on this date, viewers now have to wait until November 15 to watch the next five episodes. And then wait another few months, into the next year, to watch the final few episodes. A release in this manner is completely outrageous.
Although the idea is to leave space for viewers’ thoughts and other promotions, it shouldn’t be dragged on that long. While the show is still talked about since its release, implying the idea is working in a way, it isn’t the actual show that fans are talking about. They’re only complaining about how long they have to wait until they can continue watching it, giving Netflix as a streaming service a worse name than it already has.
Personally, they shouldn’t have done splits at all. Cobra Kai has a large enough fan base that the show’s finale would be talked about for just about the same amount of time it would take to release all three parts. If they really wanted to separate the season into parts, then three of them was most definitely not the way to go. The logical thing to do would be having two parts of the season that were relatively close to each other rather than having three that lead into the next year. Another option would be taking Disney as an example and producing weekly episodes.
Besides all of the splits, it would be way easier to keep viewer’s attention and keep suspension rates up if they hadn’t decided to transform 20 episode long seasons with 40 minute episodes into seasons with eight 30 minute episodes, including the beginning and end credits.
It is becoming more crystal clear day by the day that Netflix, Disney, Max, and all of the other popular streaming services are not the prime entertainment beings they once were.
