Hello and welcome to Appointment Television, a podcast about the TV you want to make time for I'm Margaret and with me are I'm Katherine and I'm Andrew and this week we have a special sort of structural shift for you we are doing a television versus television but instead of closing the episode with it we're gonna open it and for those of you who haven't listened to the podcast before it's probably isn't that many of you but who knows where I've been featured this week and what new years it's brought us. Hi, I'm Marty Lourty. This again. Just gonna take a quick sip from my VIP glass.
It's a thing where we pit disparate objects from television against one another in the ultimate battle to see which is best and Katherine and I will be arguing which is the best streaming service and then we're gonna go from that discussion into a larger discussion of streaming TV at the moment new platforms that are coming in they're baffling business models and how this whole weird ecosystem is going to work and what we make of it as semi professionals in this field as individuals with varying levels of professional relationship to this field. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So for TV versus TV it is me versus Katherine. Yeah, I'm gonna adjudicate.
I didn't send I didn't have time to send you the wig. No I got it. Yeah. I have my own wig.
I you know you have your own wig you just never know when you're gonna need one. Oh it's true. Yeah. Yeah.
You want to have that. What's what's in Jimmy said to be in your judges wig or have you gotten that all sorted out Andrew? None that I did not intend to be in there. Okay, so only the intended number of centipedes.
So you're appropriately centipeded wig is on. Yes, yes. And heart is ready. Always.
I think Katherine should go first. Okay. You think Katherine should go first? Hmm.
It's like you're trying to swipe the judges wig right off my head. I actually think I'm gonna do the classic coin flip. Oh yeah. Flip the coin and the coin probably goes on the floor.
Katherine, I'll let you call it. Okay, I call tails. Okay. Fine.
We lost. Andrew left the coin and we lost Andrew. Heads. Heads.
So Margaret you do get to decide who goes first and who goes second. Okay. I think Katherine goes first. Okay, so just as a little set up of what we're talking about here, the question is if you have, say, $15 a month, what streaming service, but only that.
And you can only get one streaming service. What one streaming service do you get? And for the purposes of this discussion, we will define streaming services as things like Netflix and Hulu and HBO now go, whichever one the streaming only one is. Yes.
Just like mass market streaming services that have a lot of different content from a lot of different providers. Right. So one of the things about this is that we're talking about is the time, or the time, or the stars, which also have their own stand-alone. This is one where it would have benefited from us having a fourth party come in and judge, that three of us could argue, because honestly one of the hardest things about this was looking at all of the options and figuring out which two are going to be the ones debated.
There are a lot of choices. There's a lot of choices. There are a lot of choices. We could go with the one that I got for my mother for Christmas Acorn.
Yeah. I bought that for my mother for Christmas two years ago. It's a great thing to buy for your moms for Christmas. Yes it is.
You're all prestige, all prestige, British television. You can just pretend that you live in the UK and you can turn on the TV and never have to hear an American accent unless they're purposely doing it and it's bad. Um, the dream. The game is the dream.
And then, um, services like, sling are generally not going to be inconsistent. No, services like sling are not included. Slings also would bust your 15 dollars. It's a little, it's like, it starts with $20 a month.
I just wanted to like, I want to clearly define the parameters of the debate. Yes, fair enough. Fair enough. Um, and oh, just by the way, for those of you who don't know what sling is, because it is kind of an interesting alternative model.
It's like a tiny cable package. I feel like we can talk about this more in the segment that you're dedicated to talking about all the different packages. Okay. I, I, I think the captain loves better than talking about packages.
There it is. Uh, yes. Um, I, okay. So you're thinking about this.
I also thought like, I could argue a bunch of these. And so the question comes down to what is going to give you the most breadth, what is going to give you the most value for your money. Um, and then what is going to give you the most exclusive content that you otherwise really cannot find elsewhere. Content makes a work around.
Sure does. Sure does hashtag content. So I will be arguing the old, hory grandfather of streaming services, Netflix. Now, uh, I, I think the current, I think the current, like, streaming only service costs $10 a month.
I don't know how much the DVD situation is that's let's let us. Like, I'm sorry, what year is it? Well, there are still things that you can get on there on DVD that you can't get on. But anyway, yeah, I mean, it's not, they never went through with their quick stir promise though.
They never did. Quick stir. Remember when they didn't even get the Twitter handle for quick stir and it was just like some teen who loved blazin joints all the time? Yes, good thoughts.
If you're not listening audience in the year of our Lord 2017 and you still get those DVDs delivered to you in envelopes, please step forward and identify yourselves. I want to talk to you before someone writes a book about you. And you're like, we were antiquated in race of old technologies. Yes.
Okay. Um, so I'm arguing Netflix. There are several reasons why I will go ahead and put my weakest, uh, the weak point up first, which is that the movie selection. Not great.
Not a great movie selection. That is true. But if what you're looking for is TV, I think it's hard to find a stronger and broader selection of stuff. It's certainly hard to find something that is as broad and as continually renewing as Netflix is.
They have more new content coming out every flip in month than any other streaming service. And it truly is like, it's like a, it's the blunderbuss of streaming services. Like you are going to get hit by something if you are standing anywhere in the radius of that thing. There will be something that you're like, Oh, yeah.
Okay. That's, that's kind of my thing. Um, I, it is the oldest, um, that sort of really made it happen. And so it also has sort of the most prestigious, well known, like, Oh, that show that actually like became a really giant thing shows.
I'm talking about shows like House of Cards, which is, which is terrible, but has entertaining moments. Um, and, uh, I think legitimately great. Um, I'm talking about shows also like, uh, well, if you wanted to watch the Gilmore Girls Revival, if you wanted for some reason to watch the rest of the development revival. There are gems.
Yes, I know. There are like real gems, like one day at a time, Stranger Things was really amazing. Um, and there just will continually be like, because their business model is, let's make a TV show for every single kind of person we can think of. There will be something for you.
There will. Um, the other thing that I want to say, I mean, I could talk about about this. I will happily talk about this more. But by the way, that's true for kids programming as well.
They actually have more original kids programming than you might know about if you don't look at a lot of kids programming. Um, but the last thing I want to say is that unlike any of the other streaming services right now, Netflix is heavily, heavily invested in international programming, both creating television for international audiences and in making that programming available to you as an American in spite of the fact that you may have no idea what to do with it. So this is shows like, you can get some Norwegian slow TV, right? Yeah, Norwegian slow TV.
This is also shows like The Crown, which is, you know, a very like American type of show. Um, but it is also shows like the show. But it is also shows that you probably really have never heard of like this, like the tiny Japanese show called Atelier, which is about like a young Anjanu who gets her first job in Tokyo. And she, all she wants to do is make fancy lingerie.
And it's really, really great and strange and. I've also heard really great things about Terrace House. Yeah, Terrace House. Yep.
I need to watch at some point. I haven't. Terrace House is a very weird Japanese reality TV dating program. Yeah.
Yeah. That was featured on a McElroy Brothers podcast. McElroy. But you can say, McElroy, if that's how the Margaret pronunciation needs to go.
Thank you. I feel like they ever like that's a word that you they say out loud a lot. Like it's not like it's not like it's not like a word that you only read. Okay.
Oh, and oh, I'm gonna need you this to be your last. Yeah, I'm just saying they have the most stuff and I think it's gonna it is just always going to be the broadest way of getting lots and lots of TV in front of your eyeballs. Alright, so Netflix in summary, a lot of content. Yes.
Yes. Margaret. What's your what's your what's your thing? So approach the bench.
As we were talking about this, I was saying that like it's almost hard to argue in favor of Netflix because it's like who doesn't have Netflix already. It's like arguing you should have electricity, which obviously it isn't these are all luxuries and there are lots of people in this world who don't even have internet. But at the same time, you know, Catherine really gave me full choice over what I would argue in this. She was confident in her ability to argue anything and based on what I know of Catherine, that's story checks out.
Catherine can argue anything. And it has and well and probably will win arguing anything. And it's funny because I watch more Netflix than any other streaming platform. I watch more Netflix original program than any other streaming platform, but I couldn't bring myself to argue for it because it doesn't feel like where I watch the best of anything I watch and where I feel like I watch the best things is prime.
This is really Amazon prime Amazon prime. This is a pure quality argument in the realm of streaming television originals. I don't think anything is as good as transparent. I think transparent is the best streaming original program currently offered that I've seen, which is admittedly a limited palette.
Unlike Catherine, I do not get paid to do this for a living. But it has a coherency of vision and a true tourist stamp that is completely distinct from the things that I think Netflix is most famous for, which is things tied to properties elsewhere or even with House of Cards. There's a very established creation myth for House of Cards, which is Netflix was watching you watch it and it saw what you liked and it said, let me give you more of that and it made House of Cards. And even in the little House of Cards that I've seen, I can feel that sort of clinging commercial machinery shaping the decisions more than I feel any one coherent artistic vision shaping it.
And so, when you're watching House of Cards and Frank Underwood, it feels like a perfect recreation of what I think Jill Soloway wanted that show to be and a really strong piece of art, the equivalent of which I can't find elsewhere in the streaming universe. So, like, when you're watching House of Cards and Frank Underwood asks literally everyone he meets if they want to play PlayStation with him, you feel like that's not, you feel like that's an advertising choice and maybe not an artistic choice. Does anybody want to play my Sony PlayStation with me? He says, I have Doritos, France, Courant's chips at my house.
I should be doing a better Frank Underwood voice like, Clay, Clay, Clay, Clay, Clay, you mean, fetch me my Mountain Dew, Clay, I'm too busy playing my Sony brand PlayStation products. And in addition to that, when I think about the TV that I most want to have in the bunker with me, it is a lot of stuff that is only available streaming on Prime and it's a lot of old HBO programming that either I've seen a million times and want to wrap around me like a warm insulation blanket, hello, section of the city, or it's stuff that I've been promising myself to watch for years and I want on the desert island with me, like, all of Deadwood and all of the wire and the rest are six feet under, all of the Sopranos, all of HBO's, any part of HBO's programming that's streaming is streaming on Prime. And then that's setting aside all of the additional perks that you can get for Prime. It's equivalent in cost, if not cheaper, then Netflix, depending on whether you subscribe on a monthly basis or you've subscribed for the year.
But it also gives you access to a huge music library and to free digital access to the Washington Post, which in these political times is no small bonus feature. That's true. It would sell the free two day shipping from Amazon as a plus. I will be honest with you that that is a thing that comes against it because you will spend so much money on so many ten dollar face masks you do not need.
Because you don't also have to pay to have them shipped to you and two days still counts like instant gratification. Interesting. It's a small thing against it in terms of what it's going to do when you're fine and have access to this. Too many face masks.
Too many face masks. Too many face masks seems like a fair cost to pay for better and more coherent original programming and a level of quality in its offerings that I don't see equaled elsewhere. And that's not to say that everything that they make is a success or that everything that they make is tonight's taste, but it is to say that the things that they make are among the best examples of those things. And I think that is an argument.
Alright, so argument for Amazon Prime is quality over quantity both in original content and in syndicated, I guess, content for lack of a better word. I have follow up questions. Sure. Catherine, what would you say in response to Margaret's argument that some time?
I feel like with Netflix shows there are a few really good ones, but there are more just like fine ones. Yeah. And I think it does speak to that sort of TV by algorithm thing that they do for some of their shows. What are your thoughts on that?
I have many thoughts on that. I know how many Netflix shows you've gone through for the sake of your job. I have. You might know about this even more than I do.
Yeah. There is no doubt that there are many medium to mediocre shows on Netflix. No doubt. And I think a lot of that has to do.
I mean, some of that certainly does have to do with the sense of algorithmic programming where they're trying to say like, well, we don't really have one of X kinds of shows yet. So like, let's just make one and who cares if it's super shitty like the show between. But stuck in between. Seriously though, it is so bad that show.
But I think there is another problem with their shows, which is that they tend to give their creators way too much control over the things that they make. Hello, Amy Sherman. Palladino. It's nice to see you again.
Honestly, let's say hello, Mitch Hurwitz here. Yeah. In terms of the revivals. But here's okay.
So that's true. Amazon has that same problem. There is nothing that prevents that from being the same with Amazon. There are equal number of super shitty Amazon shows.
You just don't know about them because literally you don't know about them because no one ever talks about them. I'm looking at you, Bosch and the last tycoon and like, yeah, yes. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. Catherine's right. There are no doubt there are some amazing Amazon shows, but there are some amazing Netflix shows too. I'm thinking specifically of Bojack Horseman and Orange is the New Black.
I think they're two strongest shows, but you know, stuff like Jessica Jones is also really great and interesting and doing important stuff. If you like stand up or if you like comedy in general, they have a huge comedy offering and are one of the premier places to get sort of new places. And I think the reason that Netflix has this quantity over quality thing is because there just is undeniably an intense amount of quantity. But I think if you actually looked at the breakdown, the quantity to quality ratio is not that much different than prime.
I would also like to remind you that Amazon made that Woody Allen show that nobody watched or tried to ever think of again. That is a major, major blow against Amazon as a business. Okay. So, so Margaret, my follow up for you.
I'm tempted to ask you about the stinkos because I know Amazon's got some stinkos and some just mediocre, like high castle stuff. But what I really want to ask you about is that, all right, imagine this. Close your eyes and visualize. I'm closing my eyes.
You're hopping on Amazon.com, the website. And you're like, what's television? Can I watch? Let's see.
And you search around and you find a television show you'd like to watch. And you're like, oh, yeah, I got my Amazon Prime subscription. I'm all ready to go. This is great.
And then you click on the thing and you get to the page and it's like, hey, pay $3 an episode for me instead of getting me for free. How do you deal with that feeling of disappointment when Amazon has the show you want to watch, but they won't just stream it to you? I mean, you're presenting that as a disappointment, Andrew, but I think an actual more accurate way to present that is as a, that's a feature, not a bug, right? Because if you're in Netflix and you want to watch the people versus OJ Simpson and it's December, you're plumb out of luck.
It's going to show you where you're fine because it does have this argument would be stronger if off the top of my head. I could come up with something I'd wanted to watch that wasn't currently on Netflix. I realized that. Just kind of.
But I'm just saying, I can my notes here failed. Prepare. Yeah, I mean, no, but honestly, if you want to watch a thing and it's not on Netflix, Netflix has no options for you. But if you want to watch a thing on Prime and Prime doesn't have it yet for free, Prime can get it for you within the same platform for some money.
And it can get it for you for some money the day after it's aired, which is, as I'm saying, a feature, not a bug. And that's to say that the big player that's left out of this entire picture is Hulu, which is where currently airing television lives in general. So you may not be able to afford a subscription to FX independent. It doesn't have an independent subscription.
Exactly. But you can get a season passed to the Americans through Amazon Prime and watch it all in that one platform. It's additional money. But since Amazon Prime only cost you $8.25 a month, you would have the money.
Maybe. Well, well, it's not going to get you very far because Netflix only costs you $10 a month. But if you spent more money, you could get more TV than I could also say, but if you spent more money, you could also get it. But you spent more money, you can get TV within the platform that I've tried for you, which you cannot do with Netflix, which is something.
Okay. I'm just going to order in the court order in this court. I'm glad to hold you both in contempt. But I think Netflix wants to replace cable.
And I think Prime wants to replace HBO, which is a cable channel. I don't really see that. I do. Okay.
I know you see it because you said it. HBO is a cable channel just don't like whatever. But I do like Margaret's prestige argument. And sometimes it's a extreme cause even though I think it's specious.
No, we're all dying from too much choice. And that's why Donald Trump is president. I know interesting, interesting thought. I do think that your argument will be stronger if you could name a non-transparent Amazon original series that you're thinking of.
I mean, the other two that are big for me are Amazon partnerships, but Fleabag and catastrophe are, I think, remarkable TV shows. They're among the best TV I've watched in the last 10 years, and they're both prime-exclusive in America. All right, good. You've passed my test.
And I really want to watch Mozart and the Jungle. I just haven't yet. You don't. Okay.
I disagree. But I do. It's, it's, I feel like I can't not give it to Netflix because there's just like so much there. And it's also where, like AMC and Kevin does, I know FX put some stuff on Hulu.
I don't know if they have like a standing partnership with anybody. They don't have a standing partnership. Fargo is on Hulu. People versus Ojibs and Netflix and the Americans is prime.
Yeah. Okay. So it's all over the place. They've got their fingers in all the pies.
I do. Yes. But yeah, like Netflix just, it has so much. Like if you wake up, like if you're like sleepy hollow, wake up on Crane, sexy, wake up on Crane from the sleepy hollow show on Fox.
Sure. Only good for some. And you, and you wake up and you've never seen an TV before. Then like, it's just hard to, it's hard to argue with that quantity.
Yeah. Because they've got a lot of networking. Yeah, they've got a lot of, like if you really, if you want to tuck into like some really long, ass 90 shows like Star Trek or, or West Wing or like any of those ones that ran for like seven seasons of 25 episodes of piece like 90s and early 2000s. Netflix is kind of a place to go for that, which is like, I think you might be able to get it someplace else.
But I think Netflix has like exclusive deals with a lot of people. It does also now new CW shows, right? So after Jane the Virgin finished, it will be on Netflix and not other places. They're just like, it's, they're too big to argue with.
You can't, you can't fight Netflix. And I think it's, it's too bad that they seem to have a monopoly on, not a monopoly, but like they just, they have so many things on the planet. It's hard for services like Amazon and Hulu to stand out all the time. But I don't know.
I think I'm going to have to rule in Netflix's favor, but I don't like it's, it's not a thing where I feel great about it. I know I hear you. Like Netflix doesn't need my fucking charity. They don't need our fakey pretend podcast court to rule in their favor.
They don't care. But does Jeff Bezos need it either? I mean, prime. Jeff Bezos would come to my house and give me a trophy.
He would show up on my stoop in a box wrapped in like, fire phone tape and he would bust out and he'd be like, thanks. Thanks. That's the point of television. Yeah, but while he was there, he would install all kinds of surveillance into your home and drones would perpetually hover over it gathering all your data.
That's true. I mean, they're all gathering all of our data. At least I know when Netflix gathers my data, it's only so it can make solos, prestige, or political. That's right.
Whereas Jeff Bezos wants to know like every single object that you touch throughout the day. It's really, you think that Amazon collects all this data, they know all this stuff and they're like, hey, you bought a toaster. How about you look at that more fucking toaster? No.
That sounds good. It's still better than Hulu, which is collecting all kinds of data about you, but still shows you the same for goddamn ads. And they're all watching an hour of television on Hulu is one of the most painful experiences that a middle-class American person. Well, okay, let's look at it into the general screen.
So I have ruled in favor of Netflix. Yay. But you don't know the name. There are no appeals in the TV court, but I feel like Amazon might be able to win the civil trial.
Well, and also it's a sort of thing where in a couple of years there could be enough shows that are just undeniable on Prime. Right. Netflix still has a head start. It does.
Netflix is still in terms of quantity of stuff. And therefore also in terms of like aggregate quality, it's laughing competition. Yeah. But I didn't feel good arguing for it.
And so I didn't. And I'm okay losing to it, but I'm glad you don't feel good. Oh, we're doing it away. That's not one of my favorite rulings.
Fair enough. But I think we should pivot into the more general streaming discussion to talk a little bit about, first of all, the number of different streaming options that are available. Oh my God. There's so many.
And I have a PBS passport where you pay $5 a month to your local PBS station and you have first run of all their programming. I got I'm Hulu Netflix Amazon and HBO. Yes, that's currently what I have set up and I didn't have the caviar Americans. I don't know.
Hi, T Americans. Something I didn't even actually have full on HBO because I was able to like roll in on my screen or privilege for most of the years. But those bastards aren't giving out screeners for girls. And so I like actually needed to like buy real HBO.
And I got to tell you the first time I turned on my TV and I was like, look at all the HBO channels. My lifelong dream has finally come true. Like there was actually a little thrill for me. You finally made it.
I did. I finally made it. Y'all Catherine could see you now. I know.
I will also consider it depends on like screeners set up and various other things. I mean, I have a cable package in addition to those things. So that then also gets me online access to, you know, more like cable channels. Yeah, pretty much every cable channel actually does have a streaming service.
They just all need you to sign in through Verizon or Comcast or whoever the fuck. Which is fine. The one that I have a bigger problem with is broadcast TV people that have like a benefitless streaming platform that they still require. You have a cable subscription to login to.
Like if I can put if I can put bunny ears on my TV and get your fucking channel that I should need to pay for your streaming app. Come on. So bogus. Okay.
So what are the drawbacks? What are the pluses and drawbacks of something like Hulu? Can we real quick like just split the different streaming services? I think you can put them into like three or four different buckets.
Okay. Give me the buckets. I think the buckets are. So you got your one bucket that's just like here's the streaming stable.
So you got Netflix, Hulu, HBO, Amazon. I think there was one other one I wanted to put in there. I don't remember. But like these are your big standalone streaming services where like we all have most of them.
I think when we are doing decisions about TV book club, if they're in one of those four services, we're like, okay, this is fine. Most people can probably get this. We don't even include HBO in that though. No, we certainly don't.
We didn't know we watched VEEP. But I guess that was one of them. We watched on Prime. Yeah.
I watched on HBO. I couldn't. Maybe I'm not like slightly a slightly better version. I would move HBO into the other category.
Yeah, maybe. Sure. I can see that. And then you've got a bucket of stuff like sling, which is like, okay, here's what we're going to do is we're going to try and replace your actual cable subscription.
And I don't know like it like I know what like Ariel was in it once before they got shut down. I'm not sure who else is displaying around. All right. We love you.
And then the third bucket is I guess you could put HBO in here too. It's like channel specific streaming stuff. And if you're going to split that in a sub buckets, you could say like it does have a standalone option like CBS all access and does not have a standalone option like FX or I think AMC maybe as well. Yeah.
So yeah, show time and stars. Yes, sure, sure. The nice thing about stuff like HBO show time and stars right now is that if you have Prime you can buy channels or if you have like a Roku box or something, you can add it onto those rather than having to like have your baseline $50, $60, $70 cable package and then add something else on top of it. Yes.
So I guess like my big question going into it is like how so the established like Netflix who knew like the cord powder bucket is there, but then I don't know like at what point would you consider getting like a sling subscription or or CBS all access subscription like like can these services make it like what's there? What's their deal? I am probably going to get a CBS all access platform and I'm going to get it for the same reason you're going to get it Andrew, but for a different franchise. They are holding a continuation of my favorite franchise hostage and reluctantly I'm going to give them money.
Even though I can't imagine there are enough of me making this choice that they're making as much as they would if they just sold an ad to Metamucil like one ad to that. And they're the good fight on normal broadcast television, but I really love the good wife that is a PS prime exclusive show now. I hope he'll do the D.V. court.
Not an appeal just noting for the record for our. I would love if we could I would love if we could stop relitigating this argument. Can we please move on? I would like to be removed from this narrative which you never asked to be included in.
I understand Andrew's Swift unsubscribe. But the good fight is a sequel to the good wife following the best character from the good wife. I bad ass lady corporate lawyer Diane Lockhart played by the incredible Broadway actress Christine Baranski. Like joining like the big time like mostly African American legal firm in Chicago and like shit going down and I'm so here for that.
I think it's like me and like a small cadre of women between the ages of 27 and 37 who aspire to be nothing more than 67. And then like a lot of actual 67 year olds. Yeah. Yeah.
So so none of you have seen the good fight have you? I've seen the title sequence. Yes. Because it's so awkward isn't weird.
It's fucking weird. Please go on YouTube right now and watch the title sequence for. If you've ever watched one of those YouTube videos where they like pop a water balloon in slow motion and you found it relaxing or whatever just. So so I think you know the re one of the reasons that we thought about having this conversation at all was that we were all coming at this from like how bullshit is CBS all acts.
You're mostly mad about the yes all acts. It's really mostly because the so if you go on the page like the main CBS all acts as pages like hey try a picture like try our you know sign up or whatever it itself is its own worst advertisement right there in a like splash page for a website. You can get all of this stuff and it's bull Kevin can wait and Jim Parsons smirking at you from Big Bang Theory Jeff fucking props. Yeah.
And I don't even know who this guy is with who this sweet swab guy is with the hat and Taylor Leone from Madam Secretary which is a decent show that like maybe you would like to watch but man do you not want to give him the way that she's like aggressively with her hair is weird anyhow. Literally it is a bunch of CBS shows that you only ever watched when you put on in the background like because you're folding laundry or like you're you're low key depressed and you need to feel like other humans exist in the world. But you don't actually want to have any like engagement emotionally or like or like is limited because you're 78 and like this is the channel that you have your like young niece put on before she like goes out to hang out with her friends. Yes.
The conversation we were having in our slack like we could not think of a better argument against CBS all access than their like marquee header image. And then he's like I did not scroll down before I scroll down and one like in all of their screenshots are outside fucking Star Trek Discovery which is not like one not even out yet and to the production has been so troubled that they don't even have really say for it. I know I know use it to advertise your stupid service when you came and tell me why I can watch it. I know.
You assholes. This was a suspect idea when we thought that it's landmark program would at least be later focused on a population of viewers that are not regular CBS watchers who are prime court cutters. Right. But when you're choosing to launch it with something that was a stalwart of the age and audience you already serve the age and audience that is so strong that you have already been able to completely score and Hulu unlike every other major broadcast channel.
Why would you launch it with the good fight? Why would you do that to service to the good fight and why does that make sense for your streaming platform? Yeah. So so neither have seen the show and I did just want to say I have seen it.
I really love it. It is the weirdest possible choice to be like like you must now watch our premier prestige separate standalone service. Like the thing that defines this bucket that makes me mad is like so you got this you got Yahoo screen. I think I probably think of a couple other examples if I tried.
But it's like you you launch a streaming service with like one or two. Yeah, there you go with like one or two flagship. Yeah. See so yeah, that's a great one with one or two flagship shows and then you expect people to stick around.
If you build it, they will come. Yeah, right. Like like I'm going to get on CBS all access. I'm going to watch the Starship Enterprise or Discovery or whatever the hell it's called fly through the space and I'm going to finish it and I'm going to be like what's what's fucking Kevin James up to.
I wonder like what how do you pitch that and make it make sense in a room full of executives. I just don't get it. I feel like see so is the best example of this in that they have gotten a lot of very they've acquired a lot of affordable but. Super affordable.
Yeah, super affordable but also miniature established brands. You know, so their flagship program is take my wife and that is Cameron Esposito who's a successful enough standup comedian that if you've heard of a standup comedian who isn't Louis C K there's a very good chance you've heard of her. Yeah. Like that's a that's a narrow slice of the American population.
Well, like time my parents might have heard of her because she's on a PR bunch like that. Yeah, like maybe you heard her read something on his second life. It's like she has hustle. She's been on this American life.
She has her own podcast. She appears on other people's podcast regularly. She's part of this like miniature new media ecosystem in that miniature new media ecosystem. She's kind of a big fish, right?
So it makes sense to give her this platform and then be like sell the shit out of it, right? Give her a shoestring budget and that show has made at least a minor cultural indent in our social sphere. Like you wouldn't show about a party and be astonished to know that somebody has a passionate feeling about take my wife. Yeah.
Yes. And you know, the most recent iteration of the CISO brand is the. McElroy. McElroy brothers shows.
What is wrong with you? My brother. Yeah, they picked up the podcast. The podcast.
My brother, my brother, I made a six episode series about it, which I have watched and I loved, but it's very deeply weird and I'm not sure how it would come off to anybody who was not already a fan of the podcast. But yeah, they've got like that and they've got like Dan Harmon does a it's like a show where they play D&D and they're just like they were films playing the game and then there are animated cutscenes that are like super imposed over their dialogue. It's called. I think it's got a couple other things.
It's mostly it's like very little runs. Yeah, it costs very little. They give their programs very, very small budgets, but it's got a very defined brand. Like you come in because you want to see Travis, Nick, Roy, Matt, Roy, got it.
Right. Right. McElroy. Oh my God.
I love you guys so much. Thank you for having me on this show. I'm going to try to try. If you want to see a Travis.
And you finish that. There's a very good chance that you'll be like, yeah, let me see what Cameron Esposito and her wife are up to on their show, take my wife and vice versa. And so it has a cohesive brand. I think that the trouble with it right now is you could watch every show worth watching on it in the space of your three week free trials.
Yes. But I think it's doing a good job of pushing past that and it's becoming a home for things that might have aired on Adult Swim, but twice as long. That's sure. That's not a bad comparison.
I don't think. Yeah. I think you're a star track and then a bunch of old people shows. And cost is cost is a factor too.
Right. So it's $4 a month. Right. Which is not much.
Which is not a star track discovery money. But we added on to your prime subscription. Yeah. You know, throw it out there with commercial CBS all access is $6 a month.
If you cannot bear to watch NCIS with commercials, which I don't know why because how can you even tell the difference between the commercial and the show? I just feel like NCIS and commercials go together. They are. You can't have the big.
You can't have one without the other. It's like you're not getting that full gives experience. If I don't see a life alert, then I'm just not watching NCIS. If you're part of the target audience for CBS, the chance that you do not need frequent bathroom breaks are slim.
Yeah. Don't have young bowels anymore. Yeah. I just keep coming back to Kevin James.
Like imagine like all the stuff, but with Kevin can't wait. Like I can't wait for the commercials to end. So I can watch more Kevin can't wait. Nobody's ever said that.
That's a different that's an inverse situation. Nobody's like, oh, it's a commercial break. Thank God. It's like a Super Bowl.
I just maximize my KJ, pH, my Kevin James is per hour and I just cannot have those commercials up in there. Really mess with his rhythm. Yeah. So that is so, yeah, CBS all access is is baffling and infuriating.
I think there's also a question about aggregation, right? Even beside the infuriation of attempting to get me to pay for CBS all access so that I can watch one single show. Which is all. Anyone is doing.
Can he wait or can't see? I don't remember. It feels it feels also like we're really. None of us can remember Andrew.
We're really to this place where we're like testing what the market can bear as far as all right. I've got my base Netflix subscription. I added on prime because I like the shipping or I don't like the shipping or whatever. I like the music.
I added on Hulu because I needed to be able to see the bachelor next morning because I couldn't stay up until 11 to watch after the final rose and I didn't want to pay for a DVR. And then I added on like one other thing because I really liked Showtime or HBO or whatever. Now I'm easily already paying the same as just a basic cable package. How many more dollars am I willing to add on to this for limited returns of programming?
It feels like this really feels sort of it is a tipping point I think while it was. And so that really becomes the question like at what point does a mass aggregator like Netflix always went out and is it possible now at all possible for any single small show? Remember at one point Netflix was well and now they've got orange and new blacks. You have to get Netflix.
Right. Is that is that at all possible to break through anymore? And then there's the additional question of have any of these streaming services ever been in that game for the companies and frankly no one knows for sure. That is so true and fascinating.
I think even even Hulu is kind of a weird experiment. Yeah. Yeah. Marty, you actually made a pretty compelling argument for Cecil for me.
Like they are they are a must you bad you couldn't do it in court? But they've got a they're building like a small weird lineup where when you when you think about Cecil like you can instantly think of some weird shows that they have. I think the the failure template is Yahoo screen would pick up community as it's flagship show like the sixth the season of community. Yeah.
And then they had a I'm looking at the list. I'm burning love Hollywood help a.k.a. we need help. Since it is saints and other space which actually other space I thought I heard was good because didn't have like Joel Hodgson from MST for K.
I don't know. But they just like their list of shows is like six shows long. Yes. And if you can't like I don't know how CBS is going to walk the line between figuring out okay here's what we're going to lock behind the CBS.
I'll access paywall and here's what we're going to produce an air on the TV network that we already have to run. I know. And like we're one of the only TV networks that seems like it makes money semi financially. Yeah.
But like gets to up front and is like it's okay to you don't care about its critics. We've got our audience and we're doing great. Yeah. Yeah.
I think like they took that model and they were like but what if we weren't to though. Yeah. It's very very very very. I do just want to complete a thought I had a dangling from earlier really fast which is one of us to complete a thought at some point.
Part of the reason the good fight every episodes one of us to complete a thought part of the reason the good fight is such a weird choice for this. And I think Star Trek Discovery maybe as well is that like CBS shows they are I like it because it is good to watch in one episode. And then although I will admit I'm in the mood for the good fight and would happily watch several of them. It is not a stranger thing situation where you're like I'll watch the next one what's happening what's happening like this is not a show that is designed to propel you forward through the narrative.
This is not a show. This is a show that says like hey you got an hour like maybe sit down maybe don't. Yeah. It makes no sense as a sort of driver of intense fandom in the same way.
It just is a content wise really bizarre choice and yet I do love it but it is so weird. Yeah it's great we're very glad that it's been renewed for a second season. I've seen this season and I'm so excited that there are going to be two seasons at the very least. I wanted to continue indefinitely and that is honestly why I am worried it's on this platform that is sure to collapse.
Yes. I think somebody like Hulu I think save that Yahoo season of community I think if somebody will buy it after the platform it's really still on inevitably fails. If you build the platform they will come if you make the show someone will buy it. If you have a baby on the type of somebody will take it and say that.
If they're going to die is that what we're all saying? Yeah. Sheldon's going to make it out no matter where they put it so they might as well throw it into this weird experiment they seem deeply indifferent to existing. Yes.
Oh, but it's in. Okay. So yeah. So streaming streaming TV.
Yep. Yep. It's a lot of people are trying a lot of things and I don't like I think that Netflix is good. I think that Amazon is probably fine by virtue of some of the same stuff you talked about Margaret where it's just attached to so many other things.
Yeah. Hulu like long term I think it I think it pretty much is what it's going to be. It's just like a place to watch your network shows the day after mostly. I will say this is also tipping point for Hulu right.
Right. Mate's tail is coming out and so really is a question of like is it going to make the make the elbow turn into like all sorts of issues. Right. Yeah.
Because I mean I guess at some point like Netflix doesn't have unlimited resources right but they can afford to pick up a lot of stuff. They have a lot of resources and no one understands how. Yes. It's not like it used to be where you like a network only had so much airtime to fill and there shows competing for like a finite.
I'm not a resource like it is still finite but just there is no there is no reason why Netflix couldn't vacuum everything up. It really seems like a positive theme. Yes. Yeah.
I guess this is the best description of what Netflix is. I don't know if it's Hulu's last attempt to prove that it can pull down like A list stuff but it's just first major attempt to do any. It's been slowly building this something as prestigious as a handmaid's tail. I think the Stephen King show is close.
Yep. And also the path is the other one. Yes. Is that the one with Jesse?
Yes. I can't remember for some reason. Aaron's something. Yeah.
Jesse Pinkman. I know his name. I'm so tired. Okay.
Aaron Paul. Great. Two first names of course I should have remembered that. But I think the handmaid's tail is its biggest get yet.
Also I finally figured out why I always think that's starring Claire Danes when in fact it's starring Elizabeth Moss. Thank you. Not Olson. Peggy O'Kell.
Michael Roy. Yeah. Thank you. Sorry.
Just going through yourself here. The Audible celebrity series of a handmaid's tail is narrated by Claire Danes. Oh, really deeply lodged in my brain. That was so important for our TV podcasts.
It was definitely important. Okay. If you thought this episode was good and you want to come back and you want to come and tell us so Andrew, where can I do that? They can do that on Twitter at atpodcast.com.
Facebook.com. We have an email address. Check it. It's atpotted.
We also have a website where we have links to old episodes and our iTunes feed and RSS and Google Play. You can subscribe to the show all those different ways. If you subscribe to iTunes, do rate and review us. What was that?
What was that? Fellas name who reviewed us recently? Oh, no. It's the one who ranked the other podcast that are first in Dick Jokes.
The one who... Elrond Hubdonger. Yes. Elrond, thank you so much to Elrond Hubdonger for his five star review.
I mean, I'm assuming it's a dude. For his five star review where he hopefully told us how many podcasts make better penis jokes than us. And also thank you again to CookiePans17 who elaborated on her very hurtful review on Twitter with us. She did excellent points.
She really did. Yeah. Her chief was making a reference to a famous line about Pawnee, Indiana in Parks and Recreation which is the first in friendship and fourth in obesity. No, no, I can get the joke.
I just don't think it really maps to how good we are at penis jokes. No. If they want to reach us all individually on Twitter or Margaret, where should they start? They can start with me at Mrs.
Friday next. I am at K-Venerin. And I'm at Andrew writes. And if you enjoyed this, you can pencil us in for next week.
Bye.