A long time ago I did a blog post talking about their being too much to watch on television and for the most part everyone thinks the exact same. Gone are the days of people gathering around the water cooler at work and talking about the latest episode of Lost...actually I have no idea if people did that, i was only 9 when that show started. But point is, if that does infact happen, nowadays no one would be talking about the same shows, people will be talking about the latest episode of Game of Thrones, Mad Men, Scandal, Doctor Who, Better Call Saul, Last Week Tonight With John Oliver, Brooklyn 9-9, How To Get Away With Murder, Louie, True Detective, Fargo, The Flash, The Leftovers. Or maybe how they've only just caught up on Orange is the New Black, Sherlock, Supernatural, Battlestar Galactica, The IT Crowd, Orphan Black, Veronica Mars, The Wire, Dexter. Blablabla.
Point is there are about a billion shows out there right now that everyone is watching, granted a fair amount is people catching up on shows they never watched back in the day (I'll watch Angel one day! Shut up!). Which also means spoiling shows is out the window, you can't talk about The X Files because someone is considering watching that one day maybe. So let's just look at the shows that are currently running on television, even then there is still too much to watch. One new show that has been released is Mr Robot and people actually sighed at the thought that it's another great show to watch, yes, people are actually exhausted of watching great television, that's how much there is. I'll say it, we're in the golden age of television. Before maybe two or three really good shows were on television at a time but now, there's atleast a dozen. And the diverse range of the shows is just getting bigger and bigger too. Animation for kids is getting more serious and respected with shows like Gravity Falls or Steven Universe and there's plenty of adult cartoons like Rick & Morty or Bob's Burgers. Not to mention this is as popular as anime has ever gotten in the west with more care being put into the dubs and more exposure for the subs so instead of just watching whatever Toonami offers, you can pick for yourself. That's another thing, accessibility. Thanks to systems like DVR, Netflix and Amazon we can watch these shows whenever we want and is the perfect system for binge watching.
But it's not just quantity but quality has been improving as well. Shows like Breaking Bad and Game of Thrones have had so much effort and talent put into them that they could even rival the best movies. In fact some of them are even using movie stars like True Detective and Fargo that act more like 8 hour movies just split into parts and even have actors like Matthew McConaughey or Billy Bob Thorton behind them. Or even just look at superhero shows like The Flash and compare the 90's version to nowadays, there's clearly a lot more money, effort and talent put into the show without having to betray the spirit of the character. Comedy is also going strong as well, even though a lot of the best sitcoms are classics like Seinfeld or Friends, a lot of the older ones don't really hold up that well (Lookin at you Married With Children). With shows like Louie, Parks & Recreations, Community, The Last Man on Earth, we're still going strong. Though I will say comedy is the weakest of the current genres, or atleast still has the most crap *cough*Big Bang Theory*cough*2 Broke Girls*cough*pretty much every comedy on CBS*cough*.
Now i'm not saying every show on television right now is perfect, we still have plenty of trash but we also have plenty of masterpieces as well, which is especially strange considering before this time period we were also in one of the worst periods for television. Where television was ruled by cop dramas and reality shows, where the most popular sitcoms were Two and Half Men and that 70's show while great sitcoms like Malcolm in the Middle and My Name is Earl were getting snuffed in the ratings. Just comparing that period-hell any period to nowadays, we are living in the golden age of television.
-Danny
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