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‘It’s a very tough time in Hollywood’: inside the shrinking world of the TV writers’ room
(www.theguardian.com)
Yea, despite this being the era of TV, I've been feeling for a long time that something has been lost or taken away from TV. The small writers rooms but still under pressure to pump out content tracks with this.
Because streamers have shorter seasons, writers’ rooms last a shorter amount of time. There’s fewer episodes – something like six to 10 – on streamers, whereas networks would do 22
I suspect that there's something essential to allowing TV to breath and grow and that that's been taken away by streaming companies that see themselves more as movie studios. It struck me a while ago that TV seasons now are basically LoTR productions and are probably produced similarly. Written, pro-production and filming all happening in series and all at once. So, if it turns out a character just isn't working in episode 3, or episode 5 falls completely flat, it doesn't matter, it's too late and has been filmed and wrapped already.
It's gonna get edited and shipped and maybe they'll try to correct next season, so long as they get renewed! On average, each episode might be better, or at least better produced. But I think it reduces the chances of those magical episodes where things just come together to produce classics.