Would this show be better if it was binge watch?

[Davetello]

Originally Posted by Warhorse

It depends on the patience. I was an avid Lost fan, but then, I was just getting frustrated because it seemed like it was 3 minutes of show, then 5 minutes of commercial, and nothing seemed to move the plot along, so, i just gave up. If you don't move that plot substantially, or let key character developments kick in, the show starts to get stale, stagnant somewhat.

Yeah, that is completely understandable, and I can understand your frustration there. Have you not thought about going back to binge the remainer of the show now that it is complete?

Originally Posted by Luckyday

It just the pacing feels too fast for a moment of introspection. It's like there would be a big revelation and we before we could get to a character's reaction...it cuts to black.

Yes, this is the other side of the coin - no time for contemplation of a cliffhanger ending to an episode. However, bear in mind that if the Netflix model did become the default manner of producing episodes, there would be no need to reel the viewer in for the 'next week', and we'd see an end to that sort of thing. We could still have big moments but they'd perhaps be more likely to happen within episodes rather than right at the end. There would be a proliferation of that sort of thing, and it would make for superior storytelling. Think of how "The Wire" worked - the episodes were more like chapters of a book - part of a coherent whole and each 'chapter' didn't end on a cliffhanger (for the most part). That sort of model lends itself very well to a hypothetical future where seasons are released all at once.

[Coola Yagami]

Humanity is becoming dumber and dumber. It's all about instant gratification and super short attention spans.

Keep it weekly. If they aired it daily you'd run out of episodes in a month or so. Besides this is trying to be a somewhat more serious show with an overarching plot. If you complain about fillers now....turning this into a weekly show will REALLY crank up the filler ratio, and then you'll really see extremely horrible plot amnesia.

[Davetello]

Originally Posted by Coola Yagami

Humanity is becoming dumber and dumber. It's all about instant gratification and super short attention spans.

Keep it weekly. If they aired it daily you'd run out of episodes in a month or so. Besides this is trying to be a somewhat more serious show with an overarching plot. If you complain about fillers now....turning this into a weekly show will REALLY crank up the filler ratio, and then you'll really see extremely horrible plot amnesia.

There's no need to state that people are 'dumb' because they wish to binge watch a television show. It's more about being enthusiastic about a show. It's more a case of impatience than humanity being dumbed down.

[Luckyday]

All I can say was the writing in this season was binge. Kind of like the second season The Legend of Korra so maybe this would be the inconsistent season but everything after that will flow better in terms of story and continuity. : /

[Netkeeper]

Originally Posted by Davetello

Yeah, it's just a bit outdated now. I know people like the 'watercooler' effect, but it's just too difficult to become engrossed in a show when you have to wait a week between episodes (or longer in the case of this show).

I suppose counter-arguments would be that we'd have longer to wait in between seasons, and that the gap between seasons would replicate the problem of the gap between weekly episodes in a single season, but it would still be more preferable to what happens now.

Technically we could just watch shows which are already completed/well into their run, and let new shows build up over a few seasons before watching - but who's likely to do that when a fresh new exciting show comes along? Nobody really has the patience to let it build up, and it's a shame because I feel I'd have enjoyed shows like OUAT and American Horror Story even more if I could have watched seasons over a day or two.

I think a better compromise would be to put one episode on a day, same bat time, same bat channel. This is how I watched Dragonball Z and it kept me really into the show, partly because I had enough time to think about the events of each episode in between, and partly because watching it became part of my routine. In fact, it baffles me that shows aren't set up like that one was.

Also, I'm one of those people that watches shows that have stacked up a few seasons instead of watching it as it comes along. I have no problem with it, since I usually forget a show even exists until well into its run anyway. [Like Korra. Thinking about binging that one soon.]

Originally Posted by Luckyday

It just the pacing feels too fast for a moment of introspection. It's like there would be a big revelation and we before we could get to a character's reaction...it cuts to black.

This is also a huge problem and part of why I can't watch more than one episode at a time.

[Davetello]

Originally Posted by Netkeeper

I think a better compromise would be to put one episode on a day, same bat time, same bat channel. This is how I watched Dragonball Z and it kept me really into the show, partly because I had enough time to think about the events of each episode in between, and partly because watching it became part of my routine. In fact, it baffles me that shows aren't set up like that one was.

Yeah, I thought about that before as well. An episode every day or two would be more than fine by me. That would give some time to let the current ep settle.

Of course this sort of thing is really only a major priority for serial rather than procedural television shows.

[ssjup81]

Originally Posted by Davetello

Yeah, I thought about that before as well. An episode every day or two would be more than fine by me. That would give some time to let the current ep settle.

Of course this sort of thing is really only a major priority for serial rather than procedural television shows.

Yeah, like the dying genre of soap operas.

[BubblyShell22]

I voted yes if you're a newcomer to the show. It's best to binge watch so you know what's going on because certain episodes are connected to each other. And if you're already into the show, binge watching is fine because it makes you see how the season is all connected and how it all comes together.

I agree about the breaks sometimes, but as long as we get consistent episodes each week, it doesn't bother me that we have to wait a week to see the next episode as opposed to a month or two. I'm fine with that because it gives us time to really drink it in and talk about it here on the boards.

[Warhorse]

Originally Posted by Luckyday

All I can say was the writing in this season was binge. Kind of like the second season The Legend of Korra so maybe this would be the inconsistent season but everything after that will flow better in terms of story and continuity. : /

Possible. In fact, there are some episodes I have yet to see from TMNT season 2. Mazes and Mutants is one, and the Newtralized one. And maybe another one or 2. I own only up to Rats and Men. I'm waiting for the rest of the season to be available on amazon.

[Refractive Reflections]

In my opinion, it would have the opposite effect actually. You'll notice a lot of the plot amnesia and weak points of the writing that were easier to forget during the breaks in airing, will now be more obvious. The first glaring example is when one notices how April casually returns back to high school in season 2 without addressing how the Kraang are still searching for her, when a few episodes before, within season 1, had a big dramatic ending of how she couldn't have her normal life back because of it.

Here a few more storywriting weaknesses that will become more noticeable if one binge watches:
How the TCRI building got mysteriously rebuilt after its explosion in the Season 1 finale, the highly adapatable Foot-bots that can "learn every move" of the Turtles are easy to defeat a few episodes later, the "Follow the Leader" revelation of Splinter telling Leonardo that Karai is his daughter but yet seems completely irrelevant when Karai reappears in "Target: April O' Neil", Mikey playing with the mutagen again in "Mikey Gets Shellacne" when he loudly commented on how grotesque Timothy was after handling it in "The Pulverizer Returns!"...

Originally Posted by Luckyday

It just the pacing feels too fast for a moment of introspection. It's like there would be a big revelation and we before we could get to a character's reaction...it cuts to black.

I wouldn't say the pacing feels too fast as it seems more like those introspective moments are unimportant by not taking the time to actually go into that, because if it was "too fast" we would have noticed the characters' viewpoints significantly having been changed by the time the next episode arrives, and we would be asking ourselves in that new episode, "Whoa! Wait a minute. How did this character jump that far in thinking like that now?". The biggest example of this is April's revelation of discovering she is a mutant herself, but seems unfazed by it all in the next episode.

[aliena]

I was wondering the very same thing. I only bought the first DVD for a time killer before the movie came out, but I was shockingly hooked after the first episode. I went out and bought all that was available and sat there and binged watched the heck out of them. When I was finished I turned around and slowly watched them again. I felt each episode was better than the last and as time passed for them, the episodes were stronger.

I often hear that people were really involved with the Karai storyline, but it was resolved so fast during my viewing that I didn't really get all that emotional about it. Later viewings, it did sink in. Then I watched the last few episodes that were not on DVD and I had to wait through the hiatus with everyone else. Waiting week to week really stinks, but I'm able to digest each episode this time around.

[JTH]

Sometimes it helps, and other times the breaks and hiatuses actually work when the show airs.

Since the season's according to the show's dialogue actually spans a whole year per season, actually airing the season a full year makes it feel more real.

And sometimes the breaks are put in the right place and intentionally placed, like in Slash & Destroy when Donnie's arm was messed up at the end, the show went on a 4 week break, the next episode, he's alright again. It's almost like the show is telling you that "this" much time has passed between these episodes.

[neatoman]

If you do marathon watch something you'll be less likely to notice a flaw or an episode you don't really like, since you'll plow through episodes too quickly to notice something that's off.

Of course watching an episode per week as usual makes you a bit more critical, since you get time to process what you saw those short 20-ish minutes as oppossed to 1-4 hours blending together for you. If I did binge watch it I might not have reactions like "A damn body switch episode?!" or "Oh c'mon, that anti-mutagen could have cured everyone if all it took was a drop!".

On the other hand, I might not be able to forget things the show counts on me to forget, like how the same sets are reused over and over again with the intention of being multiple locations...