Tv shows now are seen almost as long form movies. They explore more original concepts than movies do these days and the writing seems to be better than ever. Many call this the "Golden Age of Television." While this is true, tv isn't always the trend setter it likes to pretend to be. Sometimes, more often than not even, networks and producers jump on the hype train of a particular genre or tone.
The first, and biggest, is superhero television. Channels like the CW (formerly the WB) rule the world on tv superheros. In fact, WB was the first one to really make them popular on the small screen (in the "modern era") with Smallville. Since then, they have created what is known as the "Arrowverse" which includes (the Green) Arrow, The Flash, Supergirl, Legends of Tomorrow, and, most recently, Black Lightening. Every network and their grandmother has a superhero or comic book show in the works or on. ABC has Agents of SHIELD, Freeform will have Cloak and Dagger, TNT will have Titans, Syfy is getting Krypton, AMC has Preacher, Netflix has Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Luke Cage, Iron Fist, The Punisher, and the Defenders. It isn't just the big Hollywood movies that dabble in comic books.
Another trend I see is the "fog and neon" effect. This is where a show tries to scratch that Twin Peaks/80's vibe. Stranger Things made it popular, Riverdale keeps it here. I personally get tired of the "Town with a strange/dark secret" trope. Just look at Bates Motel, Wayward Pines, and the like. Not that they're BAD but it is overdone especially when concepts like this have more potential or already intriguing main plots.
The biggest trend in tv is what launched us into this "Golden Age" in the first place. While HBO shows like The Sopranos and The Wire already showed promise with serialized television, Breaking Bad was the one to bring slow-burning, long form storytelling to the forefront of the eyes of basic cable. It made concepts similar to a Sopranos seem doable for networks like AMC or FX or even NBC. It showed that 2 people talking in a room for 20 minutes could be just as exciting and stakes driven as a fast pace action scene. Some of the shows that followed the example of Breaking Bad and found success are Fargo, The Americans, Man in the High Castle, House of Cards, The Leftovers, and many many many more.
I would consider myself a film enthusiast. I grew up watching movies all of the time. It wasn't until I convinced my father to buy the first two dvd box sets of the AMC series Breaking Bad that I was bitten by the "tv bug." I, like some people at the time, didn't consider tv and film to be on the same "level." It wasn't until I saw Breaking Bad that I finally realized the potentials of television as a medium.
Then I found The Leftovers.
The Leftovers is what I consider the pinnacle of storytelling through television. It expresses ideas and utilizes writing techniques that eclipse almost any other show. While I still consider Breaking Bad the standard of today's tv, The Leftovers is my favorite show, for it does everything I could have never imagined and more with its format.
The Leftovers ended in the summer of 2017. After I bought the blu ray of the third and final season, I allowed myself one more viewing before putting it away for presumably a number of years (It has been 4 years since I last watched the entire series of Breaking Bad, which I have returned to with it's 10th anniversary having just past.)
With me being done with The Leftovers for now, I haven't watched as much tv as I would like. With it being the beginning of the semester and books are a things college students have to purchase, my Netflix was the first to go. I did, however, find someone to bum Netflix off of so nothing much has changed as far as that.
Since then, I binged the Netflix show The End of the F***ing World. Its a quick new British series with 8 episodes each spanning 20 or so minutes. It's an easy binge that I knocked out in 2 days and could have easily gotten through in one (the full run time is about 2 hours and 45 minutes.) Another show I have been dabbling in is HBO's Crashing. It is a show done by Pete Holmes. It's about comedians. Its probably not for everyone. I'm currently waiting for the Netflix originals A Series of Unfortunate Events and Love to come back. Neither will until March 2018.
If I'm not watching a show I do a lot of YouTube watching. I have a pretty strange YouTube watching habit, but my less weird things usually include me learning something. I enjoy watching videos about writing, storytelling, and filmmaking structure. The channels I frequent for these types of videos are NerdWriter1, Patrick (H) Willems, ScreenPrism, and many more. If I'm not watching those I am usually watching whatever I'm subscribed to which is 80% movie related and 20% randomly assorted.
I prefer physical media to watching say Netflix or Hulu. Blurays look a lot better with the frame rate fixed and not changing due to your connection to the internet. I have a bunch of blurays in my closet in my dorm, but I don't have a tv or a bluray player so they're really just for show.
