Netflix has a looooooong arm of international content. Which is probably an important reason why they are by far the largest internationally. I don't see anyone replicating that anytime soon.

Good point. Which makes me wonder why Netflix pushed back against EU regulation that would put content origin quotas [1]. They should be lobbying for that, as they would have to do very little (compared e.g. to Disney+ or Amazon) to be compliant.

[1] https://tbivision.com/2022/12/09/exclusive-streamers-push-ba...

That international content is quantity but not AAA quality. Dark is probably among the best and it doesn't clear the bar... 1899 is better, but cut short after 1 season. Most others are noticeably low budget.

What quality bar does Dark not clear?

American shows do of course get wild budgets and can do some crazy stuff, but there’s good international tv

My personal bar of what counts as AAA I guess? It actually started quite well, but second half of the series drags down the average in terms of story/screenwriting/camera/VFX. It doesn't stand near the likes of Foundation, Game of Thrones, Mrs. Maisel, Mr. Robot, The Wire

Doing TV is a marathon, perhaps Dark showrunners are more of sprinter people and should do movies instead.

You'd be hard-pressed to find much that's going to stand with Game of Thrones on production values.

Dark, I'd agree, faded in terms of the plotting as it got kind of all twisted up in itself toward the end, but I still liked it quite a bit. And you could say similar things about some of your other picks, like Mr. Robot (or Game of Thrones for that matter). Sustained excellence season after season is really hard to achieve.

None of them went off the rails in visual quality, story, etc as dramatically as Dark...

Apple owns and produces AAA content. Foundation, Severance spring to mind.

Also Prime Video ("The Rings of Power" is -or rather will be, after five seasons-the most expensive television series ever made).

Terrible example- Amazon has nothing AAA.

Rings of power looks and is written like a cheap SyFy series. No-name actors, shoddy costumes, horrendous writing. I have no idea where their money went, but money!=quality.

The boys was good and went to shit.

Invincible was alright, supposedly season 2 is coming 'some day'.

By the time they bought The Expanse it had fallen off a cliff.

Netflix and amazon are not worth the subscription to me and haven't been for a long while.

If Mrs. Maisel is not AAA then I don't know what is. Probably in top 5 shows of the current golden age of western cinema and TV (yes, TV is now way ahead)

Maisel has been canceled. Ended, more specifically since apparently the creators made the decision.

Point taken, though. Still, if they only have a 1/10 chance at being good I am not taking the chance. It's like the netflix stamp is a kiss of death to me now. On the rare occasions they get it right they muck it all up after season 1.

If I hear good word of mouth about a show I may check it out, but I don't waste my time giving Hollywood the benefit of the doubt anymore. They have to prove they are worth my time and at the moment no streaming services are worth the amounts they charge.

To me "canceled" is only bad when it's cut short like Firefly. Maisel had a good 5 years/seasons worth of run. Otherwise you can say "canceled" about every show that isn't running today...

If I could afford it in terms of money and time I would probably subscribe to all of them, I mean why not? To go see one movie costs about as much as a month of subscription to one streaming service. So subscribing to Netflix, Prime, Apple and HBO costs like going to see 4 movies per month, except you get more than 4 movies (I think a season of a good TV show easily worth multiple movies).

I appended it with it being more correct to say 'ended'.

Aside from that it didnt start with 5 in mind, it just kept going till the creators decided to nix it.

That's not the same as having a 5 season vision and completing the story you wanted to tell.

And for sure to each their own, if you enjoy the services by all means continue being a patron.

I'm over all of them personally, even disney+ is going to start charging to watch new movies on it.

If there was one place to watch everything I'd be interested.

But I'm tired of lack of content worth watching, constant fluctuations in what's available, and horrible UX designs for no discernable reason.

All that coupled with the constant preaching has me watching more older movies, and occasionally something new worth watching like Super Mario.

So the money I used to spend on subs I now use on watching the occasional movie in the theater, and more storage for my ever growing media collection I know will always be there.

Sure, just your comment read as if that it's "ended" is a bad thing.

> Aside from that it didnt start with 5 in mind, it just kept going till the creators decided to nix it.

Many good shows are that way, it's good when they know when to stop. It's never good if it drags on or if it's cut early

Sure, own media collection is always better if you have the physical space for it...

That's AAA TV content. Maybe a tellatle of an ongoing diversification of streaming services between "TV-like" and "cinema-like".

Sure, all of Apple, Amazon, Netflix have dipped their toes into AAA movie production, but their collective throughput isn't anywhere close to becoming "players" in the field.

TV is not a sign of inferiority anymore. Welcome to the decade in which TV has surpassed film in quality

Netflix had first mover advantage, but that ship has sailed. Their only real moat now is their original content, but when stacked against Disney or HBO it's a pretty weak moat.