Is this the beginning of the end for compulsive watching TV series? One thing is certain, the Tou.tv platform is moving away this season from the business model to which Netflix had accustomed us in recent years, even if it means imposing on its subscribers a wait of one week before being able to watch the next episode of some series.
A proof: the third season of Plan B, whose new episodes are presented in a trickle on the Tou.tv Extra, only a week ahead of the TV broadcast. It is therefore impossible for televores to listen to all six episodes in a row, unlike the second part of the series, which had been made available in full on the pay platform in 2019, several months before being presented on the air.
“We have always had two approaches: series that can be listened to in full burst and series in which only one episode is premiered each week. This has always been the case, for example for a series like 5e rank Where All the life. On the other hand, it is true that there are more this year ”, recognizes Christiane Asselin from the outset, director, content and multiscreen programming for ICI Tou.tv.
Mme Asselin assures us that this choice was not guided so much by any strategic vision, but rather by technical imperatives. The shortage of manpower that has paralyzed the entire television industry for months has resulted in production delays, with several series not being able to be delivered in full on time.
For the second season of Guys, for example, Tou.tv first put the first five episodes online for its subscribers. The last five were delivered to the platform only on Friday. It was the same earlier this season for the detective series Reasonable doubt, starring Julie Perreault and Marc-André Grondin.
“Our goal is to make as many series available in a burst as possible, but this is not always feasible. […] Either way, people who really want to burst into streaming are going to wait until all the episodes are shown to stream them continuously, with no commercials. This is the advantage of platforms like Tou.tv: we become master of our own listening, ”notes Christiane Asselin, before specifying that this way of compartmentalizing the arrival of series has not aroused any wind of indignation. Even less a wave of unsubscribe, she insists.
A widespread approach
Strategy or not, Tou.tv is not the only platform to have distanced itself from continuous listening. Apple TV + and Disney + do this on purpose. New episodes of some of their original content are added in bulk or week to week.
“For platforms that compete with Netflix, it’s a way to retain their subscribers and build loyalty. Since their content offering is much smaller, subscribers may tend to stay subscribed for the time they see the shows they are interested in, and then leave. With some [nouveaux] episodes every week, they have no choice but to remain subscribers for at least a few months, ”analyzes Stéfany Boisvert, professor at UQAM’s Media School.
Even Netflix, which has made its reputation with fast listening, is increasingly opting for this model. At the start of the year, fans of the series Lupine had to take their pain patiently before seeing the rest of the first season. The release of the sixth chapter of the popular series Riverdale has also been stretched over a few weeks by the Californian giant.
“Netflix is still in a category of its own, given the size of its catalog of original content. It may seem less useful to want to segment the distribution of series. That said, Netflix could still have an advantage in doing so in order to give greater visibility to this content. Because often, we will only talk about a series when it comes out, and it will end up being forgotten because there is so much new content. But by filing episodes every week, [les plateformes peuvent] expect the series to be talked about throughout its broadcast, ”continues Mme Green wood.
Not for everybody
Not everyone in the television industry dares to make the same bet. Some fear that the subscribers of the paid platforms have lost the reflex and the patience to listen to a series in the small week so much they have been accustomed in recent years to gorging themselves on all the episodes in a few days.
Club illico, Tou.tv’s main competitor, also indicates that it has no intention of extending the publication of these original series over weeks. The Quebecor platform had to resolve to Patrick Sénécal presents because of the delays caused by the pandemic, but at least the episodes of this suspenseful series are separate stories, which do not follow each other. The eight-month gap between the release of the first five episodes and the last five then seemed less frustrating for the average viewer.
“Club illico’s strategy is, and always has been, to launch all the episodes of the same series at once. It is the very basis of the platform’s DNA, ”we reiterated by email.
TV producers also express doubts about the change of course of certain platforms, them to whom it has been repeated in recent years that the ” binge-watching Represented the future of TV. At Pixcom, we admit to having eyed a little when we learned that Tou.tv was not going to offer the whole family saga this fall. Sleepless night before its broadcast on Radio-Canada.
“The series was developed as if all the episodes were going to be available at the same time. I wouldn’t have developed it the same way knowing that people were only going to watch one episode a week. It’s not the same way of working, ”underlines producer Dominique Veillet, who observes, however, in the light of encouraging first audience figures, that the broadcaster seems to have put his finger on something. Are viewers in fact nostalgic for television meetings, weary of bulimic listening?