In the past five years, television viewers have become accustomed to navigating a sea of proposals of immeasurable proportions. In Spain, weeks with more than 15 feature film premieres between series and new seasons are not uncommon. For a decade, the pace of production has only accelerated: more series have been released each year than in the previous year (with the exception of 2020 due to the explosion of the pandemic). However, this could change soon. Pundits, analysts and members of the US audiovisual industry point to several indicators that suggest the television glut era has reached its peak.
According to a study conducted by the FX channel since the start of series production (2002 with The Shield), in 2022 in the United States 599 series were released between platforms and open and paid channels. This new record beats those published in 2021 by 40. The account maintained by FX Research does not include children’s, non-English language, short format, or nonfiction productions. The data is double that of television fiction released a decade ago: in 2012, before the streaming explosion, there were 288 series.
The specialist magazine Variety also keeps its own record of the television productions that appear each year. Where appropriate, they include fiction and non-fiction, bringing the number to 2,024 programmes. With growth of 7%, this is a significant increase compared to the previous year. Compared to 2012, there are 779 more programs. These are record numbers achieved thanks to the huge surge in platforms that found the most effective way to acquire and retain subscribers in the original production.
But this inexorable growth in television production may soon come to an end. John Landgraf, President of the American broadcaster FX and one of the great oracles of contemporary television, had announced in August that a new peak in television production would be reached in 2022, but he went even further: “I will make another prediction : 2022 will be the be the highest brand. In other words, it will be the culmination of the era of top television,” he said, referring to the name “Peak TV” with which he himself christened this phase in 2015, which was characterized, among other things, by the continuous increase in production, the variety of content and Variety.
It wasn’t the first time Landgraf said something similar: in January 2016, he thought that this year or the next would see the peak of television production. This was not the case, and he later admitted that he did not know how to measure the volume of the pouring explosion. Now he sees it more clearly: “All the major streaming services have already started. We’ve seen many new platforms join the party over the past few years and the process is complete. I don’t see new players entering the scene like they have consistently over the past ten years. In fact, some leave the scene. We’ve gotten to a point where there are no more new providers, but some are partially phased out. Although I don’t think it will be a steep decline,” he said in August. On Thursday, January 12th, Landgraf appeared again before the trade press to update the production data and reiterate his words. In addition, he stressed that the pace of feature film series premieres eased in the second half of 2022 compared to the first half when more than 350 were launched.
Other indicators support this decline propagated by Landgraf. One thing is clear: The number of shows commissioned by U.S. networks and platforms fell by 24% in the second half of 2022 compared to the same period last year, according to data from consulting firm Ampere Analysis, published by the New York Times in December . This is a 40% decrease compared to 2019 data. The figure contrasts with the 325 series ordered in the first half of the year, more than in any of the previous three years. The companies that have launched the most series in the US in recent years have been Netflix, Warner Bros. Discovery and Paramount. According to the same study, their orders have fallen between 22% and 27% this year. At the other end of the scale, Apple TV+ and Amazon, companies whose main revenue streams aren’t from TV and lack the budget constraints of other companies, have increased orders. International orders and non-fiction books also remained stable.
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This data corresponds to the new phase that the platforms have entered. Elena Neira, professor of communication at the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya and author of the book Streaming Wars, cites three keys but highlights one above the other: “What has changed compared to 2021 is the economic recession, the war in Ukraine, causing a crisis in a key place for local international manufacturing, Eastern Europe, but the main player here is Wall Street.”
Until the spring of 2022, the stock exchange primarily estimated the increase in subscribers through the platforms. When Netflix announced in April that it had lost subscribers for the first time in the first quarter of the year and its stock was falling, all streaming services applied history and shifted strategy to pay more attention to cleaning up their accounts and reaping benefits to give, thereby satisfying the demands of both Wall Street and the investors in these companies. Along with the economic situation, this has led to decisions such as the inclusion of ad-supported options like those already offered by Netflix and Disney+ will soon activate, layoffs at some companies, project cancellations or budget adjustments. Added to the background of all this panorama is the threat of a possible writers’ strike as they negotiate the deals that expire this summer.
stabilization phase
Neira foresees more than a decline in TV production, a period of leverage. “Netflix said they wouldn’t spend more, but they wouldn’t spend less either. What they’re doing is reallocating the money so that instead of investing in season two when the first didn’t go well at all, they divert that money to generate new content that can give them a Wednesday or The Squid Game ’, two of the platform’s big hits with the public. Last Thursday, while presenting its results for the final quarter of the year, Netflix announced that content investment in 2022 was 5% lower than in 2021. The pundit claims that while Wall Street isn’t moving anymore focused on subscriber growth, but this remains the primary source of revenue for these companies. “They need to scale the business, and they can’t do that if they don’t have a set product rotation. Those growing with the lowest ratio are those with the lowest product sales. The one that was always growing progressively was Netflix because they release a lot,” he claims. Additionally, stopping suddenly after acclimating your customers to a massive amount of production would lead to frustration and abandonment.
If this is the pinnacle of television, where will the medium go? The expert is banking on a door that some companies are already opening: selling content to third parties. “The only way to achieve sustainable production, so that the platform can continue to grow and continue to be released at a reasonable price, is to sell this content once its commercial lifecycle, which is very short, ends.” Warner has said so Bros. Discovery has already done so with some of the European HBO Max series on the SkyShowtime platform, which will land in Spain in February, and with other titles, some as relevant as Westworld, which they have withdrawn from their platform around them to sell free services with advertising. “I don’t think we will see a drop in production because the players don’t close, but reorganize,” emphasizes Neira.
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