The abridged version of this article appeared in the June 2023 print edition of The Mirror. This is an uncut version.
As a kid who grew up watching Netflix, I thought it was the coolest on-demand video streaming platform because it offered so many movies and shows. Every Friday after school, my family would gather in the living room with popcorn and pick a random movie that we hadn’t seen before on Netflix. We enjoyed almost every movie we saw through that ritual.
Movie night used to be the highlight of my week. But nowadays, my family and I don’t end up watching anything because it takes too long to find any movies that aren’t pure garbage. With new charges on password sharing being implemented, content quality plummeting, and monthly subscriptions increasing, Netflix doesn’t seem as desirable to audiences when compared to the other streaming services available.
Netflix became a household staple when it reached 1 million subscribers in 2003. The streaming service offers over 3,600 movies and 1,800 shows, so it makes sense that it has become a hit among people of all ages. My siblings, parents, and even grandparents watch Netflix. The service provides titles for everyone’s taste. However, despite this widespread popularity, Netflix seems off their game.
When I try to watch a movie with my brothers on Netflix, we usually spend about 20 minutes, if not more, just looking for a good movie to watch. Half of the time, we give up and simply rewatch a show we’ve seen a hundred times. It’s quite disappointing, and we often blame ourselves for it. We thought that we were too selective and had seen everything, but after talking to some of my friends, I realized that we were not alone. Apparently, we aren’t picky – Netflix’s content quality has just gone down. After this realization, we started choosing movies that looked mediocre and boring, and made fun of each other like we’re movie critics. But we shouldn’t have to watch a bad movie and make fun of it for entertainment when Netflix costs more than $100 a year and claims to be the best streaming service out there.
A Forbes article written last August stated that many series and movies on the Rotten Tomatoes front page with a “rotten” score are Netflix Originals. I’m not totally surprised, seeing as when Netflix releases a new original, I notice it’s either heavily advertised or barely advertised at all. Because of this, I think Netflix knows what movies are worth the advertisement and what movies they should barely mention.
One of the worst series I have ever watched on Netflix was “Hype House,” and I cannot begin to describe how horrible the viewing experience was. The show follows a group of “talented” TikTok “stars” who live together in a $5 million mansion to create social media content. However, none of the members of the Hype House are actually talented – they just create a ton of drama, get canceled for saying something idiotic, make an apology video and then complain that their lives are so miserable and that they are the true victims of society. The Hype House did not deserve a show, and I’m not the only person who hated it to the point where I couldn’t even get through 10 minutes of the first episode. On Rotten Tomatoes, it scored a whopping 12 percent in audience scoring. Netflix would have been better off not including it.
After the horror that was “Hype House,” I realized that Netflix isn’t trying to make good quality shows and movies. The streaming service just wants to make a large quantity of shows and movies, so it looks better on the numerical scale when it comes to advertising. The corporate officials running Netflix think that the availability of a bulk of shows will convince people to pay more for subscriptions. In January, Netflix announced that the streaming platform plans to raise their prices to continue offering a “wide variety of quality entertainment options.”
According to a Truelist article from last January, approximately 25 percent of Americans share their Netflix account with relatives or friends. That means Netflix will make big bucks when it fully implements a charge for account sharing, especially because it is estimated to cost a whopping $7 per month. You could get another streaming service in addition to Netflix for that price.
I think people should start looking into changing their streaming service. There are various services out there that are better than Netflix, my favorite being HBO Max. Despite costing about the same amount of money as Netflix, HBO Max offers more desirable titles. Because HBO is a cable television company, many movies that stream on the cable network go to the streaming service. Now, that doesn’t mean it has more titles, but I would definitely say it has more appealing titles. One of my favorite things about HBO Max is that people can stream movies often only about a month after their initial release, as I did with “King Richard” and “Black Adam.” Meanwhile, with Netflix, I don’t usually see a new movie pop up until at least a couple of months after its release. And not to mention, HBO Max has hubs for DC Comics, Studio Ghibli, Cartoon Network, and Adult Swim, all of which are hugely popular franchises. And like Netflix, HBO Max has outstanding originals, my favorite right now being “The Last of Us.” In my household, ever since we purchased a subscription to HBO Max, it has taken us a lot less time to find something to watch.
Netflix just isn’t meeting basic viewing standards anymore. It needs to quit it with the price increases, unless it’s planning to produce Steven Spielberg-level movies. The service must consider the wallets of the people who are subscribing and sharing their account with their grandma. And maybe, just maybe, Netflix could make some actually good movies and shows that have decent lines and aren’t torturous to watch. And maybe then, and only then, will Netflix ever be worth it again.
I just want my movie night back – is that too much to ask for?
