Diluted Existential Crisis From Netflix.
Binge everything, then what?
We live in the age of binge. We binge watch, we binge eat, we binge drink. In short, we have gotten used to consuming massive and copious amounts of anything that we can get our ruddy little super entitled hands on which for some bizarre reason, all have super strong thumbs!
Netflix sort of changed the game on this, it huffed and puffed and wreaked havoc with the established patterns of the entertainment industry and basically in the process brought all of us to our knees, where we gave Netflix a blowjob and it serenaded our faces with the cum of existential crisis. Our viewing patterns changed drastically, most of us no longer like the 22–24 episode season format anymore. The quality of writing increased, the number of episodes reduced and the most important of all was that “the wait” was over. We could watch an entire season at once without having to wait between episodes. I thought this was great, at first. I finish watching a season of a show in like a day and wonder what to do with my life because now, the existential crisis has become a normal part of my life. I experience it very often, 4 times this week to be precise.
I think most of us have now entered into a never ending perennial phase of existential crisis because of this. We don’t experience it as much as we used to but it’s there at the back of our heads. It is lurking like a shady drug dealer who unlike his other colleagues, samples his own product. I wonder sometimes if now I just binge watch something just so that I can get my next fix of existential crisis.
The wait for the next episode pre Netflix era was kind of fun though. I remember starting to watch the Mentalist in the year 2010. It was a good show which followed the 23 episode per season format. I regularly followed the show which chronicles the life of a psychic conman whose family gets murdered by a serial killer, it’s his life’s aim to now find and exact his revenge on the killer. I followed the show till it’s very end which lasted a good 7 seasons! I remember the day the last episode came out. I felt a true existential crisis that day, a proper high, not this diluted crap! I remember downloading the last episode and getting ready to watch it. A friend of mine had come over and I told him not to disturb me. Then the series finale did something that most finales do, they gave a recap. After the recap I paused and looked at my friend.
“I’m sorry you won’t get most of this but please don’t mind”, I said.
“Nah I think I get it, this protagonist was a psychic conman who got in the wrong books of the serial killer called Red John by irking him on a television show, as punishment the serial killer then murdered all of the conman’s family. The conman then teams up with the Central Bureau of Investigation, (hahaha) which is funny because CBI (hahaha!), anyways they use his conman skills to catch criminals and close cases and the conman agrees because the police let him in on the investigation and then he kills Red John with the help of the friends he makes at the Bureau. He then skips town to not get prosecuted but cuts a deal with the FBI and comes back to America to solve more crimes. He has fallen in love with his colleague Lisbon and now they are together and he has asked her to get married. Right?”, my friend said in one breath.
I was flabbergasted, bereaved, shattered!!!!!!
7 seasons, 151 episodes over a period of 7 years and boom! He was up to date just like me. I was fuming and angry because that’s when I realized that I had wasted all my time watching this show when all I had to do was watch the finale. The show was fun but the recap just fucked me up! I hated it, all that time and effort gone in to watching something! I felt as if, I was the only one who studied for an exam whose question paper was leaked to every other kid. You know what! Netflix is best, screw every other format, I’ll take the perennial diluted existential crisis over the full blown thing any day. Now excuse me while I go get my next fix.
Thanks for reading. TheComicCurryBlog publishes four blogs a week, make sure to follow us. Donate to us, for a good cause (food!)
