By Jamil Oakford/managing editor
The DVR is full.
Netflix, Hulu and Amazon Prime Video queues are inundated with shows we’ll probably never get around to watching, but the premise sounded cool. But most importantly, patience is running on empty.
Please, stop telling people they have to watch this show or that show. Stop saying we haven’t experienced television’s episodic masterpiece until we’ve bingewatched an entire 16-season show. As if anyone will ever finish 16 seasons in their lifetime.
I want to preface this by saying how happy I am that so many people want to share what they love. It’s the reason we all, at some point, have thrown our friends at movies, artists or television shows that we hold dear, because that’s what we do.
But it’s getting to a point where it’s becoming difficult to sift through the hype. What’s a good show versus what people hype to be a good show that’s, in reality, complete rubbish?
Time is valuable for everyone, so investing in a show that’s several seasons in with 20-something episodes per season and about an hour allotted for each episode is a lot of time to dedicate to just one thing.
For someone who is already episodes behind — sometimes, whole seasons — on shows they already like and feel are episodic masterpieces, it becomes overwhelming. It’s come to a point that I would rather be contrarian just for the sake of being contrarian. Oh, Breaking Bad is the best television show of the 21st century? Cute. I won’t watch it even if it’s true. Orange is the New Black is a socially conscious look at the prison system and women’s roles in society and in film and TV? Sounds like something I can pass on.
Instead, I’ll just get comfy and watch an episode of Golden Girls I’ve probably seen a hundred times before. What about Pam and Jim? Will they ever confess their feelings to each other? It doesn’t matter that I’ve seen The Office in its entirety a least four times.
Maybe I’ll catch up on those episodes I missed when I’m not fawning over all the Sabrina the Teenage Witch episodes now streaming on Hulu. Wait! Living Single is now streaming on Hulu, too. I guess I can rearrange this and pencil in starting The Handmaid’s Tale for another few centuries.
