News From This Week
Although this is a roundup of television shows, it must be mentioned at least one more time that Netflix created a new way to release a blockbuster movie this week. Netflix apparently paid over $50 million to acquire J.J. Abrams’ “The Cloverfield Paradox” and then an estimated $5 million just for its surprise announcement during the Super Bowl.
The unexpected release was kind of a cross between two music album releases of recent years ― Beyoncé’s self-titled album from 2013 that debuted without warning and her husband, Jay-Z, announcing his album “Magna Carta Holy Grail” via an ad during the 2013 NBA Finals.
“The Cloverfield Paradox” ended up being a terrible movie, but maybe Netflix will be able to successfully use this strategy again with a more worthy project.
Netflix released data about user bingeing habits Wednesday.
“It takes a new member 12 days to start their first show binge, with the majority of users finishing a season in just 3 days,” read a company press release. “With no shortage of TV shows to stream, more than 90% of members have had a ‘First Netflix Binge’ within a year of joining.”
The top five shows users have binged first over the last five years are “Orange Is the New Black,” “Breaking Bad,” “The Walking Dead,” “Stranger Things” and “House of Cards,” according to the platform. Sounds about right. You can find out the first show you binged by heading to your account page, clicking “Viewing Activity” and then scrolling all the way down.
I remember signing up for Netflix when I learned “Party Down” was leaving the service, so I watched that show many hours into the morning past midnight. It was worth it.
Travel company Champion Traveler pulled data to learn that Japan now has more streamable titles on Netflix than the United States. As of January, Japan now has the most in the world, with 6,340 titles available to stream. The United States has a measly 5,600 titles. Now try watching them all.
And in especially fun news, Fantastico Studio has created a video game based on Netflix. The premise is that the playable character gets sucked into the Netflix streaming site and has to battle villains from parodies of popular shows such as “Breaking Bad” and “Stranger Things.” You can donate to their Kickstarter to help make that a reality, download a demo or at least watch their teaser.
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