What we want, and why we aren't getting it.

Tim Schildberger - Script Magazine - April 16th, 2024

We, the global film and TV audience are making it very clear what we want to watch, yet the people creating the content don’t seem to be listening. What’s going on?

Tubi released a survey last month – it’s the ad-supported 'free’ streamer owned by FOX - that revealed interesting tidbits our content overlords seem to be entirely ignoring.

96% of people surveyed liked ‘nostalgia watching’ – movies and TV that are more than ten years old. And 67% of millennials and Gen Z’ers said they like it because…”the style and quality is good.”

These same youngsters and not so youngsters also said when it came to new content, they want to support more independent/smaller creators (in financial size, not stature) and diverse voices.

Seems pretty clear – if nuanced. They’re saying they’re into the old stuff, they’re open to new stuff, but they’d prefer the new stuff come from smaller creators. And they like the old stuff because it’s well made. Makes them feel safe I would argue. Which implies they think most of the content created during the recent streaming “boom” is not as good as the older stuff.

Which explains why desperate streaming eyeballs decided Suits was high-quality entertainment. Can we all now agree the boom, where streamers decided quantity was the same as quality delivered almost nothing we’ll want to watch in ten years?

But what are the studios and giant streamers hearing when given this information? OH…YOU WANT REMAKES! So we get Roadhouse – a perfect example of a movie no sensible person thought “this needs to be rebooted.”

Have you seen Disney’s upcoming slate? I swear I’m not making this up. Between now and the end of the decade – they’ve lined up – Frozen 3, Toy Story 5, Mandalorian and Grogu, Inside Out 2, Moana 2, Moana live-action, Snow White live-action, another Tron and another Zootopia. And some Marvel movies. Please don’t show anyone working at Disney their own shadow – it would probably kill them.

We are officially in a period where gigantic corporations are clinging desperately to past glories hoping to recapture magic that cannot be recaptured, and blaming us for growing tired of a relationship that stopped feeling fresh before the global pandemic.

To read the full article head to scriptmag.com