The Netflix/Hulu/Prime Thread

[Seance]

A lot of the documentaries on NetFlix these days are four parts even if they could/should be just one.
And there isn't much in the way of inventiveness or creativity with the form. A lot of NetFlix documentaries
are on interesting and/or important subjects, but as documentaries they range from competent to shoddy.

Yeah I agree with this, so many that are overlong and decent but not great. Feels a bit like they're churned out.

Not all subject matter (or the handling of subject matter) necessitates four hour-long episodes.
And yet all the NetFlix documentaries seem to conform to that. Feels like an algorithm at work
more than a producer.

[coldbrightsunlight]

Haha yeah. Let's see what did I watch recently, Murder Among The Mormons. It wasn't all a bad doc, super interesting story that deserved a documentary and glad I learned about it. But it was so much longer than needed

This one did feel deliberately made, they were putting together an arc and they separated the episodes on that basis... But I still think it could have been done shorter in a single feature length cut imo.

[MrNovember]

I've felt that with a lot of recent Netflix documentary series I've watched. There's a bunch of episodes, but then they just have like 6 people tell the same story. It's just gets repetitive and not as informative.

[Chankgeez]

I'm interested in this:



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OH18cKTmwZ8

[Seance]

Haha yeah. Let's see what did I watch recently, Murder Among The Mormons. It wasn't all a bad doc, super interesting story that deserved a documentary and glad I learned about it. But it was so much longer than needed

This one did feel deliberately made, they were putting together an arc and they separated the episodes on that basis... But I still think it could have been done shorter in a single feature length cut imo.

I saw that one. Yes. Could have been shorter. Same goes for the Nightstalker one (which was too focused on and from the POV of the homicide detectives).

The two documentaries about NXVIUM were also an interesting contrast in self-serving PR/bloat (9 episodes of The Vow) versus more compact conveyance of info (4 episodes Seduced).

[Dowi]

Haha yeah. Let's see what did I watch recently, Murder Among The Mormons. It wasn't all a bad doc, super interesting story that deserved a documentary and glad I learned about it. But it was so much longer than needed

This one did feel deliberately made, they were putting together an arc and they separated the episodes on that basis... But I still think it could have been done shorter in a single feature length cut imo.

I saw that one. Yes. Could have been shorter. Same goes for the Nightstalker one (which was too focused on and from the POV of the homicide detectives).

The two documentaries about NXVIUM were also an interesting contrast in self-serving PR/bloat (9 episodes of The Vow) versus more compact conveyance of info (4 episodes Seduced).

Agreed on Nightstalker, and with the general feeling of Netflix Documentaries being too long. I started to feel this a few years ago while watching Making a Murderer: interesting story but it could have been told in half of the episodes.

Speaking of Netflix Documentaries, i don't know if anyone of you saw Seaspiracy, but I saw it last week and I think it's one of the worst documentaries I have ever seen. Not because of the content, but because of how it's shown and how the "story" is told.

[coldbrightsunlight]

I've not watched it no, not terribly interested because it sounds quite polemical, and probably in a direction that I mostly agree with but presumably... very sensationalised?

[Dowi]

Absolutely.

In fact i am not talking about the content, 'cause the problem with it it's not the polemic, which is legitimate, but the fact that it shows several different issues just with the purpose of saying "they want to hide this from you", and for the people who watch it to say "aww that's terrible".
I know that the goal of this kind of documentary is to make the viewer think about those subjects, and maybe push him to do further research, but the sensationalistic tones make everything less effective, at least to me.

In addition to this, the narrative expedients are absolutely senseless. The amount of "look what i've just discovered" searching on the internet while spying the harbor hiding behind a wall.. come on.. if you didn't know it you wouldn't have had a reason to be there. And there are many other similar solutions, which are blatantly exaggerated.
The subjects shown are many and different, and they surely deserve to be addressed in an objective and analytical way, and when Seaspiracy does it it is actually interesting, too bad that it loses half of its time doing else.

fwiw i had some of these objections when i watched Cowspiracy last year, but this one is a lot worse.

[coldbrightsunlight]

Sounds pretty bad yeah. It is very annoying when people dress up things that ARE BAD as conspiracy to sex it up and make it more exciting. But like, no just tell the whole truth please and let me decide how bad it is.

I'm very much not the market for these sorts of things (already "on-side" nominally from what I gather), and there are few things worse than watching someone try to make a point you essentially agree with, but in a really stupid way.

[Warpsmasher]

Found out about PRIMAL from the comments on this, holy crap it's so good.

[coldbrightsunlight]

Hm interesting, I enjoyed a fair bit of the first instalment of love death + robots.

[Warpsmasher]

At a glance, it looks like they used all the same animators and just gave them new episodes to do. No signs yet as to whether or not any of the episodes will be sequels/second chapters to any from season 1, but would love some more of the mech farmers and battle beasties. Maybe the floating ghost fish? That style is insane. Also, season 3 confirmed at the very end of the trailer.

[coldbrightsunlight]

I imagine that it will just be adapting more existing short stories as with season 1? But I may be wrong that's just an assumption.

[ProCarsteNation]

Hm interesting, I enjoyed a fair bit of the first instalment of love death + robots.

same here, so looking forward to that

[ProCarsteNation]

adapting more existing short stories as with season 1

ah?
whose stories?
someone in particular?
someone in particular I should have read a long time ago?

I'm probably super out of the loop,
the last "new" scifi I read was probably ted chiang & greg egan....