(Paris) Like an air of déjà vu: launched in a frantic race for subscribers, the giants of streaming video are now investing massively in the recycling of old successful series, marking the era of the series ” blockbuster “.
Posted at 12:23 p.m.
The 1990s had The prince of Bel-Airthe year 2022 will have its continuation, Bel Air. The Peacock platform (NBCUniversal group) will broadcast a new version of this cult series from February 13, which revealed Will Smith.
Same tone or almost with How I met Your Father — broadcast on Hulu since January 18 and which will arrive on March 9 on Disney+ —, revival of the flagship series of the 2000s How I Met Your Mother. Or with House of the Dragon (on HBO Max in the course of 2022), based on the universe of the phenomenon series Game Of Thrones.
Fraser, True Blood, pretty Little Liars…Whether through a “ spin off (the story of a supporting character in a series), a reboot (existing series that returns with a new cast and a sometimes slightly different plot), or a “prequel” (how the characters got there), it’s time to recycle.
“Content War”
Not new, this practice which consists in betting on a “ blockbuster » infinitely declinable was rather the prerogative of the 7and art. But, in recent years, the small screen has also taken hold of it, in its own way.
The end of 2021 was no exception with the “reunion” episode of the cult series Friends or the new season of Sex and the City released in early December. Both on HBO MAX (subsidiary of WarnerMedia), which launched its deployment in several European countries last fall.
“We are witnessing a real war of content between platforms,” argues Jean Chalaby, media sociologist at City University in London, to AFP.
Netflix, Amazon Prime, Disney, HBO Max, Apple TV+… All want to carve out the lion’s share of a market boosted by the health crisis. But is there room for everyone? “The public is not infinite and does not have the means to accumulate three or four subscriptions”, underlines the sociologist.
Mastodons vs “outsiders”
It is in this context that the idea of the franchise made its way. “They are a capital on which to rely to get new subscribers”, analysis with AFP Rajinder Dudrah, who teaches in the media department of the British University of Birmingham.
Potential new subscribers often nostalgic for their youth, underlines with AFP Andrew Connor, lecturer at the University of Edinburgh, who worked in the series department of the BBC.
For him, the emotional argument of the reunion of an audience with a cult series was thought out by the platforms. And to point out: “In the case of How I Met Your Mother, the typical audience at the time was teenagers. Today, they are thirty-year-olds able to afford a subscription to a platform.
Because their business model is based mainly on the number of subscribers, which must constantly increase.
Netflix, despite its 220 million subscribers, experienced this and had a nightmarish day on the stock market on January 21 due to disappointing growth forecasts.
Above all, franchises limit financial risks. “Launching a new series costs a lot of money and success is not guaranteed. With a deductible, the risk is almost zero,” assures Mr. Chalaby.
One question remains: is the original creation doomed to die out under the weight of these behemoths? “There will always be a place for innovation”, assures Andrew Connor, for whom “the pandemic has shown that there is room for atypical programs”.
And to recall the planetary destiny of the South Korean “outsider” Squid Game or the telenovela Colombian The Queen of Flowwhich ranked in the top 10 of about thirty countries in the world.